Page 9 of Perfect Composition
And it was due to a few notes of music composed together.
Alone on stage with Shane’s piano. I sat down and began to belt out the song I wrote in my lonely apartment so long ago:
It’s a calamity
What they did to me
No one else can see
I gotta run—run to be free
That’s when I heard it—the slap of a single chair nearby as someone stood. But to my shock, instead of asking what the fuck I was doing, the person started to applaud. My fingers poised above the keys as his hawklike features came into view. “That’s a shame.”
“What is?” I challenged.
“You stopped.” He nodded to one of the security guards, who steps back respectfully before granting him access.
While I gaped at him, he walked calm-as-you-please up the side of the stage steps. “I’m unfamiliar with that song.”
Squaring my shoulders, I told him, “I wrote it.”
“Really? Interesting.” He leaned against Shane’s piano as if he owned it.
“Mind if I ask who the hell you are?”
His face broke into a Cheshire-cat grin. “I’m not often asked that. Must say, it feels good. I’m Wilde. Kristoffer Wilde.” Then his expression turns more serious. “You?”
I felt like my tongue was twelve sizes too big for my mouth. I was just some nothing mouthing off to a man who was everything to the music industry. On top of which, I was playing the piano and loafing off at one of his top acts’ shows. Swallowing humble pie, despite the fact that in a not-too-distant day in the future I might be at an event where this man and I might be equals, I give him my name before apologizing. “I’ll just get this piano moved now, sir.”
He scoffed. “Sit down, Beau? No. That doesn’t suit you. B? BAM?”
I sneered at that.
“Well, we have to find something better for you than Beau. You need a catchier stage name than that. What’s your middle name?” Wilde demanded.
From belting out a song I wrote about running away, to this? I raised my tattooed finger and thumb to my head and squeezed. Hard. “I’m sorry. I don’t understand.”
“Are you a solo act? Do I need to get a house band to…” But we were interrupted just as Mick and Carly came bouncing out from backstage.
“Hey. Are you finished with that piano yet? I think they have open mic night at…” Mick started. Then his voice trailed off as he realized I was speaking with someone.
Carly had pulled out a pair of spare drumsticks from her pocket. She twirled them around her fingers before she started tapping them on the boxes. Then she too froze.
“And that answers my question.” Wilde stepped around me and held out his hand. “Kristoffer Wilde.”
“Mick Ceron,” Mick managed.
“Carly Stolliday,” she blurted before shoving her drumsticks under her armpits.
“Where’s this place you were thinking of taking young Beau to play tonight? That is, if you don’t mind a tagalong?”
“It’s just up the road about a mile. It’s called the Mess. Let’s help you get this piano moved, Beau, before we…” Mick rushed out.
Carly was frozen in place. I remember hoping she’d snap out of it to hit some drums.
But Wilde just waved his hand. “I’ll deal with this and will see you later. It was good to meet you, Beau.”
“Yeah, sure.” Then Mick and I grabbed Carly to drag her offstage.
