The Love Song of Jonny Valentine (39 page)

“Maybe we could go there someday,” I said. “I don’t have a foothold in the Australian market yet, but we’d probably still bring along my bodyguard, Walter, for security. You’d like him.”

“That would be nice,” he said.

When we got close to the star/talent room, I realized that Jane might be waiting outside for me. So I told my father that we had to go around to the rear. I don’t think he knew why I said that. We found our way to it, and the hallway was empty. I listened in at the door for a second, since I didn’t want him noticing it and asking me why I was being so careful.

I didn’t hear anything, so I turned the knob and cracked it open. Me and Walter had forgotten to lock it, which was stupid because anyone could’ve come in when I was playing Zenon and kidnapped or killed or molested me. It was empty and the front door was closed. “Stay here a second,” I said.

I went inside and ran to the front door and locked it, and opened the back door for my father. “Are you inviting me in?” he asked.

I didn’t know why he was asking such an obvious question, and why he kept using the word
inviting,
like I was going to say, No, I’m just opening the door to show you how cool the star/talent room is and then I’m closing it on you. But I said yes, and after he did, I locked the back door.

Man, if he
was
a child predator, this was like hitting the jackpot: Jonny Valentine locking himself in a room with you without a security presence.

He looked awkward in the star/talent room, sizing up the buffet table and beanbag chairs and flat-screen like he’d never seen anything like it before. I went over to the buffet and grabbed a plate. “You want some food?”

“Are you having any?”

I wasn’t even hungry, but I could tell he’d feel weird about eating if I didn’t, so I piled some pasta on my plate. It didn’t matter anymore now that the tour was over. I could gain ten pounds of chub and then me and Jane would go on a maple-syrup-and-cayenne master cleanse for two weeks. “Yeah. They’ll throw it out if I don’t.”

“Then I’ll have a little.”

He started with a small serving of the pasta, but then, just like Tyler, he took some of just about
everything,
the steak and salmon and quiche and all the rest. Even Walter didn’t eat this much at my concerts, and that includes days he’d lifted when he needed to replenish with carbs and protein. My father didn’t look like he lifted, but like he had lean muscle from his construction work, which probably toned specific zones, like how Peter’s forearms were so defined from cooking. Maybe me and him and Walter could squeeze in a session at the hotel gym together.

He looked around the room again. “I used to think you were special, the way you’d sing around the house,” he said. “But I figured all fathers think that about their kids. I had no idea how right I was.”

In some ways that was better than hearing we’d broken ninety thousand in Internet sales.

We were chewing while standing, so I booted up Zenon and plopped down on one of the two beanbags in front of the TV, and he sat on the
other. I explained how I was finally at the Emperor but I couldn’t beat him. I put the TV on mute so no one would hear me playing.

The same thing as before happened when I went into the Emperor’s lair. I attacked, he deflected, and he fully damaged me with one cut from his halberd. My father kept saying things, like “Whoa!” and “Watch out!” and “Nice try!” Before my fourth try he suggested, “How about letting him attack you first and wear himself out?” which was a smart idea, but I still got damaged with the first hit. I kept trying and getting damaged to zero percent and restarting from my saved game.

“Did you do construction in St. Louis, too?” I asked.

“Yeah. Most of the time. Don’t you remember?”

“No.”

“And your mother never told you?” I shook my head. “Did you tell her I was coming tonight?”

“Do you remember that time I went to this kid Richard’s birthday party?” I asked. “You picked me up and drove on the highway for a few hours and we went to a diner?”

“I’m not sure,” he said. “But did you tell Jane I was coming?”

I didn’t answer his question again. “They lived in this super-nice house with a huge lawn. I was the last one at the party. You let me order French toast for dinner.”

“There’s a lot I don’t remember from those years,” he said. “It’s nothing personal. I’m sure we had a good time.” He watched me get damaged again by the Emperor. “Aw, I thought you had him!”

As my character was departing the realm for like the seventh time in a row and my ghost slipped up into the air, I said, “Why’d you have to go.”

I didn’t say it like a question. I just said it like it was too bad we couldn’t restart our life from then, from that time at the diner, and he could know I’d become famous and rich later on, and he’d stick around. I didn’t turn to watch his reaction, but I could tell he didn’t know how to respond, even though he’d probably practiced answering it. He didn’t say anything while my saved game restarted.

Finally he said, “It’s very complicated, Jonathan.”

It was the first time he’d said my name. Plus
Jonathan
sounded
super-strange out of his mouth and not Jane’s, even if he’d called me it in emails and probably called me it when I was little. “Why?”

We both watched my character run into the dungeon and get damaged again. I didn’t know how I was ever going to beat this Emperor. “We had problems.”

“Like what?”

“Like money problems, for instance.”

“I thought you said you had a job.”

“You can have money problems even when you have a job.”

“What else?”

“I don’t know. It was a long time ago.” He put his hand on my shoulder. “I’m very sorry. You deserved better. Every day I’ve been gone I’ve thought that.” He pulled an envelope out of his jacket. “I brought you something. I know it’s not your birthday for about a month, but in case I don’t see you then.”

He took out a four-by-six photo of me as a little kid in front of the Cardinals’ old stadium, wearing a Cardinals hat way too big for my head, sitting on top of his shoulders like I was at the riverfront concert. Maybe he always did that after the concert so I couldn’t get lost in crowds. “Remember this? The first game I took you to?”

“No. I only remember watching a game once on TV with you while it was raining.” I didn’t ask if
he
remembered the riverfront concert.

“Well, we went. A couple times, even.” I couldn’t remember going with him the other times, either, probably because I went with Michael Carns’s family on their season tickets all the time after he left.

He handed it to me. I had a big smile in the picture, and he did, too, like he was excited to show his son a real baseball game for the first time. “If I get to see you again for your birthday, I’ll buy you something nicer.”

I wanted to tell him to visit for my birthday, that I could take him to the fanciest restaurants in L.A. and get him brand-new clothes and we could drive around in whatever car he wanted. But I couldn’t say it. I guess it was like what asking a normal girl out might be like. Even if you know she’s going to say yes, there’s a part of you that’s probably afraid she’ll turn you down.

I put the picture down next to the beanbag chair and returned to Zenon. Right as I opened the door to the Emperor’s lair, I looked at it again. It was the only picture I had of him except for his old driver’s license. Maybe he was right. People make mistakes. In life, you can’t restart from a saved game to undo them.

I dropped the controller in my lap and threw my arms around my father’s body and buried my head in his chest. His leather jacket smelled like Zack’s, without the cigarettes. He didn’t react for a second. Then he curled one arm around my back and the other over my head. His heart thumped lightly against my forehead in a one-two-one-two rhythm and his chest moved in and out from his breathing like a metronome.

But because I’d already opened the door to the Emperor’s lair, he’d run up to the edge of the room and attacked me, and my ghost departed the realm for like the
twelfth
time. I squirmed out of my father’s arms and yelled, “Fuck you, you fucking Emperor!”

That was a mistake. A few seconds later the front doorknob tried to turn but couldn’t and there was loud banging and Jane’s voice was all high-pitched shouting, “Jonathan? Jonathan, are you in there?”

My father stood up. “Don’t let her in,” I said.

“I have to.”

“No, you don’t.”

“If I don’t, it’s considered—” He took a step toward the door. “I just do.”

“She’ll make you go away,” I said. “I saw the letter from her lawyers.”

He seemed kind of surprised. “I know. But it’s worse if I don’t talk to her now.” He unlocked the door while the knob was jittering from the outside. When he opened it she looked at him like she was about to smack him.

“Get out,” she said, calm and low.

“Jane,” my father said, “let me explain—”

“Let’s not make this ugly. I can have security here in two seconds.” I could tell part of the reason she didn’t want to make it ugly was she didn’t need another tabloid story.

His body shifted. It looked like he might leave. If he did, I didn’t know how I’d ever see him again. “Let him stay,” I said. “He’s not doing anything bad.”

Jane stepped out into the hall and swiveled her head in both directions. She came back in and closed the door. “What are you doing here?”

“I wanted to talk to you both,” he said. “This was the only way.”

“How’d he know you were here?”

I answered before he could. “I emailed him,” I said. “I found him on the Internet and emailed him, and I told him to come to the show.”

The side of Jane’s lips twisted like she’d been punched but was trying not to show it. “And what do you want out of this?”

“I don’t want anything except a chance to see my son.”

“Oh, I’m sure,” Jane said.

“It’s true,” I said. “He was in Australia the last few years. That’s why he wasn’t in touch.”

Jane looked at my father first, then at me. He didn’t look at either of us.

“Jonathan,” she said slowly. “He’s a drug addict. He’s been one for years. I didn’t tell you because you didn’t need to know what a lowlife you have for a father. He hasn’t been to Australia. I bet he doesn’t even have a passport.”

My father didn’t say anything.

“Is that the truth?” I asked.

He took a few seconds. “I’ve been clean six months,” he said. “I didn’t want to reach out while I was still using. But I swear to you, I haven’t touched anything in six months. Here.” He dug into his pocket and pulled out a big copper coin. Inside a triangle it said “6 Month Recovery.”

“I wouldn’t be surprised if he bought that off some junkie he’s friends with,” Jane said.

I ignored her. “What about Australia? Didn’t you live there? To have an adventure?”

“No,” he said. “A friend did.” He put the coin back in his pocket. “I guess I wanted to impress you. You’ve got this life, and I didn’t want you knowing I was strung out on drugs, living in halfway houses, and that’s why I was ashamed to get in touch all these years. All I wanted was to see you.”

Jane laughed a mean laugh. “Just like you did when you left after Michael.”

I thought she meant Michael Carns, which didn’t make sense. But the way Jane’s face looked, ready to break apart like an egg even though she was angry, and the way my father’s face fell down to the ground for the millionth time like he’d done something really bad, I could tell it wasn’t.

So his name was Michael, too. And he really was my little brother. I must’ve been too young to understand what was happening and they never discussed it and I wasn’t old enough to really remember anything.

He said, “I’m sorry, Jane. I’m very sorry.”

I thought about me and my father in that diner again, and him telling me to order whatever I wanted, he didn’t care.

Jane kept staring right at him like she was either going to cry or punch him. “Six years later, and I finally get an apology,” she said.

“People change, Jane.”

“Right,” Jane said. “Jonathan changed a lot, so now you conveniently want to see him.”

And Jane in her hospital bed, holding the baby with my face.

“I’d want to see him no matter what,” he said. “I don’t like what happened any more than you do. My life’s back on track.”

Everything happens for a reason.

“Anything else you have to say, you can say it to my lawyer,” Jane said. “If you don’t leave immediately, I’m calling security and putting you in jail.” She took her phone out of her purse like it was a weapon.

“Janie,” he said.

She dialed. “Don’t you dare sweet-talk me. It doesn’t work anymore.”

The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away.

“Now, wait a minute.” He pulled a crumpled piece of paper out of his jacket pocket, the same pocket that had my photo. “First of all, the restraining order hasn’t been approved yet. I’m well within my rights to talk to Jonathan, especially if he’s invited me, which he has, to the concert and on the stage and into this room.” He smoothed it out and gave it to her. “Your lawyers are receiving this tonight.”

Jane’s eyes bulged out like after I’d fainted as she got further down
the page, but she kept her cool. When she finished, she folded it crisply in half, like it was just any old piece of paper. Complete control.

“If you believe you’re financially entitled to all this, you’re very mistaken. You owe thousands in child support. You probably think coming here and charming Jonny is going to make it easier than if you’d gone through your lawyers, but you’re wrong.” She handed the paper back to him. “He’s mine, Al. Not yours.”

“We’ll see,” my father said. “We’ll be releasing a statement to the press this week if your lawyers don’t talk with us.”

He really did look a lot like me in the face. If he had my talent he could’ve been a star. Except maybe not, because a lot of being a star was about sacrifice and work ethic. There was something about my father you could pick up that made him look like someone who did what Rog called the bare minimum. The bare-minimum singers who were lucky were one-hit wonders. The ones who were less lucky never made it at all, they only played small clubs and were bitter and eventually burned out of the industry. The real stars didn’t kill themselves only when they liked the work, which anyone can do. They killed themselves when they hated it, when they’d rather be anywhere else. You don’t get to ten thousand hours just by having fun.