the kitchen and almost pissed myself. He’d given me a lazy smile, and after I directed him to where he could find beer, he’d spent a few hours with Cary in the studio.
People definitely seemed to like Cary and wish good things for him. That goodwill came from somewhere. Obviously, he’d earned it. And I’d heard him on the phone talking to friends, colleagues. He seemed to have pretty good rapport with them all, though the conversations never really got personal.
As far as I could tell, his friends never seemed to ask him to come out and do stuff with them.
This seemed really wrong. I had three messages on my phone today alone from friends asking to see me. He was a former rock star. How did it get to this?
This tiny, closed world he’d constructed for himself, where everything was in his control. Where he lived so alone.
At first, I’d wondered if he was crazy, like people said. But there was so much more to Cary Clarke than the eccentric recluse people seemed to think he was.
All you had to do was hear the stories behind Rose and Liam, and why they worked for Cary, to know that the man had a big heart.
Rose lived in her son’s guesthouse, just two blocks from Cary’s place. She’d put a flyer in his mailbox one day that she was offering her cleaning services. Cary had called her and when she came for an interview, she’d told him her son took care of her housing but she still wanted to work. When he asked her why, she’d confessed to him that she was lonely since her husband died. So Cary hired her, paying her a generous salary even though she only worked for him once a week.
Liam had been Cary’s bodyguard when he was with Alive. His wife was ill, he was already a dad, and when the tour ended, Cary had put Liam and his family up in a condo that was a five minute drive from Cary’s house, and kept him on salary—even though he so rarely called him in to work.
Rose and Liam had told me these stories themselves when I’d asked how they’d come to work for Cary.
Obviously, the man cared about people. He was generous and thoughtful.
Yet I knew I had to ask myself some painful questions about where this was headed. Eventually.
I was so drawn to him, but I didn’t know where that would leave me. If I loved him, could he love me back? Or was this just another relationship that was doomed to failure while I refused to want to see the signs?
At some point, would he push me away like he seemed to push everyone else away?
Despite Cary’s obvious kindness towards Liam and Rose, they were only allowed into his life in limited ways, at specified times, for a specific function. His employees, the band, his family, his friends, they all had a place, at arm’s length from him, and that was where he kept them.
I had my place, too. Much closer to him, but it still had its parameters.
I was his employee. His lover.
For now.
But what happened when this album was done?
Did he really mean it when he called me his protégé? When he said he wanted me to manage his studio and be part of his team?
He’d said other things, too. Things that gave me hope. Like that he was thinking about going down to Little Black Hole to see the band. And he said it like he meant it.
But he hadn’t done it yet.
As I walked into the studio, I found the bathroom door open, the light inside turned off. I found Cary lying on the floor of the great room on his back, wearing jeans and nothing else. With his guitar on top of him, staring at the ceiling. His hair was damp.
I smiled to myself as I watched him there for a moment. “What are you doing?” I asked softly.
He cracked a small smile and turned his head to look at me. “Working.”
“This is what a great musician looks like when he’s working?”
“Pretty much.”
I went to sit on the floor next to him.
“Wow. You look incredible.” He surveyed my short and fitted, asymmetrical black dress.
“Thank you.”
“What’s the occasion?
“I’m going out with the girls tonight.” I hadn’t told him this before. I wasn’t sure why.
Maybe I didn’t want him to feel left out. Like I was abandoning him to go out into a world he didn’t belong to anymore?