Page 128 of Loaded

The next morning, Jake calls me three times while I’m in the shower. I finally answer, my hair dripping all over the bathroom counter and my phone. “What?”

“The meeting got moved,” he says. “They want you here by nine-thirty.”

“Shoot.”

“With Orange County traffic, you need to leave in the next fifteen minutes. Can you do that?”

My hair’s not even close to dry, and my makeup looks. . .amateur in the extreme, but we step into a cab fourteen minutes after I hang up. We make the meeting with two minutes to spare. Jake’s waiting, tapping his foot like a husband waiting for the kids to be ready for Sunday morning church. “You’re here.”

“Why the change?” I’m panting.

“They want you to record some things first, like a sound test.” Jake’s smiling, but it’s forced. Why’s it forced?

“This was Adam’s idea,” Octavia says.

Jake’s flinch is so infinitesimal that if I didn’t know him extremely well, I might have missed it. “He thinks it’s a good idea to sell them on the songs first.”

“Fine,” she says. “Let’s do it.”

The process of recording an album in an actual studio is almost surreal. It’s rough, and we’re not really doingallthe things, but the way they put it down—I’m amazed.

“What if we increased that.” I point at the stabilizer. “And toned this down.” I point at the compression aspect. “Just a hair.”

“You have a real knack for that,” the guy who was showing me what the different knobs and buttons do says. “Have you done this before?”

I shake my head. “Don’t laugh, but I have a PreSonus Audiobox.”

He does laugh. “That’s a respectable hobby setup. The M7 condenser mic isn’t bad.”

“Really?”

He shrugs. “I mean, I think it’s better for people who are doing, like, podcasts, but you can learn the basics with it.”

But an hour and a half later, once we have some decent recordings, it’s time for us to clear out. After a rather awkward lunch with Adam, who doesn’t seem that pleased to still be dealing with this, we head over for the real meeting.

“I sent them the rough cuts.” Adam’s staring at his phone. “Stu loved it.”

“Really?” Jake’s nodding. “He’s the one who never likes anything.”

“But now they’re going to see my face,” Octavia says.

“I told them about it,” Jake says.

“Nothing quite prepares you, though, does it?” Adam’s grimacing.

I’m going to punch him.

“Stand down,” Jake hisses. “He’s on our side.”

Even so, I can tell that this time, Octavia and I are both preparing ourselves for rejection. It hurt too bad last time, when I thought we had it in the bag. So when we meet Stu, Frances, and Eddy, I try not to get my hopes up too high.

“We really want something a little edgier for this movie,” Eddy says. “I know Stu and Frances just care about the marketability of the songs, but I have to find something that really fits the tone of the movie. I liked that first track, the beast one, but the others are too. . .” He waves his hand through the air. “Too frivolous. Too happy.”

“I think we can do a little edgier,” I say.

“Adding the guitar, drums, and bass will go a long way,” Adam says. “Remember that.”

“Do you know how to write their parts?” Frances asks. “Some pianists are. . .not the best at integrating other sounds.”

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