Page 70 of A Love Song for Ricki Wilde

“I was too blocked to play my own stuff, so I became a… well, an influencer. But not how y’all think of it nowadays. I influenced the artists that mattered. Because I don’t leave a strong imprint, I can easily move in and out of studios, jam sessions, gigs. There’s always a few questions at first. Who booked him? What’d he say his name was? So on and so forth. But after folks heard me play, the questions were forgotten.

“When you’ve lived as long as I have, you start to see patterns in the culture. I especially notice patterns in music. A popular sound stays fresh for about eight, ten years, and then it evolvesinto another sound. I can feel what’s next. I can pinpoint the bridge between eras.

“I’ve been a silent collaborator on too many hits to remember. I was the whisper in someone’s ear, the suggestion in a smoky bar. The applause was never mine, but it was enough.

“After a session at Chess Records in Chicago, I ran into this kid, Chuck Berry, plucking his guitar out back. Sounded plumb crazy, like nothing I’d ever heard. He said the label wanted him to choose between blues and pop. No surprise—corporate kills creative. Tale as old as time. So I told him to marry blues and pop and spike it with country licks on a backbeat piano. I showed him what I meant on the studio piano, and he fucking lost it. Oh. Sorry, I…”

“Ezra Walker, don’t you dare pull that chivalry shit right now. Keep talking.”

“Right. Anyway, the blues, pop, country equation felt like him. It felt like the future. In his memoir, Chuck said I put the roll in rock. But he couldn’t remember my name.

“Look in the liner notes ofThe Great Ray Charles, his 1957 album. He dedicates two songs to ‘some Harlem cat’ who showed him how to ‘use his left hand like a drum.’ Quincy Jones heard me play a few chords in the late ’60s; I wanna say it was at the Lighthouse in LA? Later, he reimagined the melody when he produced Michael Jackson’s ‘Human Nature.’ He says so in his documentary. Didn’t include my name, of course. He couldn’t remember it.

“At a Motown studio session in 1970-something, I whispered a few ideas in Stevie Wonder’s head. Some chords, a few melodies. They ended up on what music theorists think is his most experimental album.” He rubbed the back of his neck, seeming to hesitate.

As blatantly improbable as this story was, Ezra was such aconvincing storyteller that Ricki was sucked in. She couldn’t help herself. “Wh-what’s the album called?”

“Stevie Wonder’s Journey Through the Secret Life of Plants.”He looked down at his hands, speaking quietly. “I know, it’s got you written all over it.”

Ricki’s jaw dropped, an icy chill rolling down her back. Feeling dizzy, she grabbed on to the counter for support. It couldn’t be. She’d never even mentioned to him that she played that album every day of her life.

“Chaka Khan’s ‘Ain’t Nobody’? The fire-red moon in Jimi Hendrix’s ‘Voodoo Chile’? The title itself? Me. In ’67 I was gigging at Atlantic Studios, and I overheard Aretha rehearsing Otis Redding’s track ‘Respect.’ Her band was calling her by this nickname, Re-Re. I thought it would differentiate her version from Otis’s if she sang ‘Re-re-re-respect’ on the chorus.” Ezra glanced at Ricki. “Worked, you could say.”

Ricki couldn’t speak. All she could think of was Tuesday sharing the Chaka Khan anecdote at the Sweet Colette party. And hearing the Jimi Hendrix story in the documentary at Ms. Della’s house.

God help me, she thought.I’m going crazy. Just like him.

“I’ve been around for decades, Ricki, slipping in and out of memory, places, lives, and music. It’s been a lifetime of loss. Everyone I’ve ever cared about is gone. And it never gets easier,” he said, his expression strained. “It’s nasty work, tricking folks into thinking you’re normal… for a week, two weeks. Because you start to believe it, too. Then you wake up and realize you’re standing in a life half-lived. Just going through the motions in the dark.”

As Ezra walked over to her, Ricki took a long breath. He was softening her edges. Her heart was at war with her brain; all she wanted was to run into his arms, but then she’d be just as crazy as he was. Ricki stood still, backed against the kitchen counter, ashe closed the distance between them. This time, she didn’t push him away or scream or threaten him with heat tools. Grasping her shoulders, he spoke with a helpless melancholy.

“I’ve seen beautiful things and terrible things. Until you, I didn’t know that they’re two sides of the same feeling. I want you, Ricki. Actually, it’s not a want. It’s an uncompromising, inconvenientneed. But it’ll ruin us both.”

Her eyes welled up with tears, hot and sharp. She dug deep inside herself to find the strength to not fall for this. To not get sucked into some dude’s madness, like all the times before. Her father’s admonishment,You let things happen to you, was imprinted on her brain. But she’d changed.

Ricki would dictate the terms of her own story. No one else.

“You need to leave, Ezra,” she said, tears flowing. “Do yourself a favor and seek some psychiatric care. Get help. I believe you’re a good person. But I can’t ever see you again.”

Ezra understood the conversation was over. He grabbed his jeans and shoes and then realized he was bare-chested.

“Um. Can I have my… Would you mind…” He gestured vaguely at her wearing his shirt.

“GET OUT.”

“Right.” He nodded. “Yeah, of course, you keep it. I’m gone.”

He was out the door in under sixty seconds.

After he left, Ricki stood frozen in place for what felt like an eternity. At some point, she crawled into the bed and curled in on herself, tucking her knees into Ezra’s shirt. His warm, clean scent enveloped her like the sweetest embrace. And then she cried herself to sleep.

Much later, Ricki woke to frantic knocking on her back door. She stumbled from her bed and caught a glimpse of herself in the wall mirror. Not good. Mascara-tear streaks, tangled bedhead,pillow-creased cheeks. A hickey was blossoming just under her jaw, and her lips were still raw from kissing. She was not presentable. But the person at the door was banging with such force, there was no way to ignore it.

“I’m coming.” Ricki yanked on joggers and checked the peephole. It was Tuesday, with a crazed look in her eyes. She burst into the studio.

“Thank God you’re alive.” She swept Ricki into her arms ferociously. Then she stormed around the apartment, opening the shower, checking the closet, peering under the bed. Her energy was bonkers.

“Where is he? Where is that motherfucker?” she bellowed. “I’ll kill him!”

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