The Wrong Chord Chapter 17 (FINAL CHAPTER)
17.
I left my keys on the kitchen table, left without anyone to say goodbye to. My car had a couple tickets. I put them in my pocket, threw my stuff in the trunk, and got in. There was just enough gas to get to Hollywood.
.
I parked far away in some neighborhood so I wouldn’t have to pay for a meter. The weather was perfect. Crossing over the 101, I walked in the street to avoid all the tents clogging up the sidewalk. That’s not gonna be me, I told myself, glancing at a shirtless Mexican guy sleeping on a dirty blanket. Then I thought that was something Kevin would say, then I heard his voice hissing at me, you piece of shit, you fake pop star, that’s exactly where you’re heading once you bomb this meeting. I tried to shake it off, but then I thought, that’s what Kevin would tell me to do, but then, he also wouldn’t want me to, and I realized I’d lost my mind, it was his now, it had been his for a long time.
A car blasted its horn and I jumped onto the sidewalk and clung to the fence as it blew past. For a second, I was back. But as I caught my breath, I was re-ensnared in the endless acquiescence and rebellion to and against and in service of Kevin’s designs.
Looking over the highway, I thought about climbing over the fence and killing myself. But luckily, that was what he wanted. And it all clicked. That was all he’d ever wanted.
.
I bought a couple beers at 7/11 and got drunk in an alleyway. I laughed and cried as I sifted through my memories of my time in LA, New York, college, my childhood. What an idiot I’d been. Mistakes on mistakes, never seeing things clearly.
A shiver ran through me despite the heat. How did I end up so alone? Why did I let this happen? I crushed my empty can and hot tears ran down my cheeks. I thought about going back to my car for some privacy, but I had to move forward, I had to do this. I blew my nose with the plastic bag, dried my eyes on my sleeve, pissed behind a dumpster, and set off down Sunset Boulevard.
.
By the time I got to Stellastic Records, I was far beyond my doubts, beyond questions of what I really wanted, whose will I was obeying. I just went in.
The reception was as cold and unfriendly as I remembered it. The blonde receptionist stared me down as I approached.
“Yes?”
“I have a meeting with Julie Kim.”
“And you are?”
“Winston Lu.”
“I’m afraid she’s booked for the day.”
“You didn’t even look!”
“I know you don’t have a meeting. Goodbye!”
“I signed a record deal, she owes me royalties!”
“Sir, if you have an agreement, I’m sure she’ll be in touch.”
“But she hasn’t been! I wrote ‘Despicable Me’ and haven’t gotten anything!”
Everyone turned to look and I felt bad for raising my voice. Then I realized why they were really looking.
“Ms. Kim will not be seeing you today.”
“But I haven’t been paid!”
“Security!” The receptionist made a big show of being terrified, but I don’t think anyone was buying it. The security guard looked up from his phone, then slowly got up and walked over.
“Yeah?”
“He needs to leave,” she said, pointing at me then folding her arms.
“Aight, bro, let’s go.”
“But they need to pay me! It’s not my fault Trappa ruined my song! I wrote it and it got streams and I need to get paid!”
“Well, Ms. Kim’s busy, right?”
“She is,” said the receptionist.
“So let’s go.”
I realized the situation was hopeless, so I let him walk me to the door. When we got outside, he burst out laughing.
“Bruh!”
“What?”
He tried to continue but he was laughing too hard. “Bruh, I can’t—you really wrote Despicable fucking Me and came up in here asking where’s the check at!”
“Well I haven’t been paid!”
He kept laughing. “Man, they ain’t paying you for that!”
“But we signed a contract!”
He wiped a tear from his eye. “Alright bro, fair enough. What’s yours is yours. You really want to give it a shot?”
“That’s why I came here.”
“Okay. I’ll let you in.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, man, you wrote a real piece of—” he cut himself off laughing. “But I respect the hustle. Let’s go round back.”
“Okay. Thank you.”
I followed him up the hill and we took the long way around. He unlocked the back door of the parking garage and led me over to the elevator. The lot was packed with fancy cars. My heart skipped a beat when I saw a white Model X, but we were walking too fast to be sure. He pulled out his badge at the elevator and paused.
“You ain’t gonna do anything crazy up there, right?”
“Um, no, I just want to talk.”
He looked into my eyes. “Aight.” He pressed up and scanned his badge inside when the doors opened. “You know which floor?”
“Um, yeah.” I pressed six.
“Aight, bro. Good luck.”
“Thanks.” The doors closed and I went up on my own. The elevator stopped in the lobby and I backed into the corner and looked down, but the woman who got in was too busy texting to notice me.
I got off on the sixth floor. The empty hall was filled with malice, as if at any moment commandos would bust through the doors and drop down from the ceiling panels to neutralize me. I heard voices inside Julie’s office. Careful not to be seen through the glass, I stood at the door and listened.
“... and he got all serious and was like, you’re not kidding are you? And I said no, sir, and he looked me up and down and eventually was like, so you really want to know what goes on here huh? And I said yes, sir, and he said okay, meet me outside the propulsion lab at twenty three hundred, Door C.”
“This is like a movie.”
“Yeah, well, I showed up and he brought me inside—I didn’t even have clearance to go in there—all the lights were still on and all these scientists were working on all this crazy shit—”
“Like what?”
“I don’t even know, it was nuts. Anyways, he brought me to this door deep in the lab, he had to scan his badge, fingerprints and eyeball at the same time to get in, then he opened the door and I got slammed in the face with a pie.”
“A pie?”
“Yeah like a fucking cartoon. Everyone was laughing and when I wiped all the cream off I saw it was just a bunch of officers playing poker in this shitty room with porn all over the walls.”
Julie laughed.
“I was so fucking disappointed and they were DYING!” The guy was laughing, too.
“You should have known.”
“I should have known.”
The laughter simmered down.
“By the way, I think someone’s at the door.”
“Really?”
I pressed up against the wall, then, with nowhere to hide, stood more naturally.
Julie looked through the glass. “Winston?” She opened the door.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to interrupt.”
“It’s okay, come in.” Her smile was warm but not over the top. There was sadness there, too.
The guy was sitting in one of the chairs dressed in full military uniform.
“This is my brother, Andrew. Andrew, this is Winston, one of our songwriters.”
“Good to meet you.” He stood up and shook my hand. His grip was firm but fair.
“You too.”
“He’s on leave from Area 51 if you can believe it.”
“So you’re in the Air Force?”
“That’s right.”
“Wow. So um, are there really aliens there?”
“That’s classified.”
“Oh, okay.”
Julie laughed.
Andrew gestured toward the door. “I can step out for a minute if—”
“No, don’t worry about it. What’s on your mind, Winston?”
“Well, um, it’s just—I haven’t been paid yet.”
She sighed. “Right. That was supposed to go through Kevin.” She shook her head and sat down behind her desk. “Let me see how much we owe you.”
“My payments were supposed to go through Kevin?”
“Yes, that’s the way your contract was set up. You really should have read it more closely. But that doesn’t matter now that he’s—” She sighed again. “It’s all yours now, okay? Let’s just be done with it.” She opened her laptop and logged in, her face rippling with emotion.
“Wait, what do you mean?”
“It’s all yours, Winston.”
“I mean what happened to Kevin?”
She looked up, stunned. “Oh my God. You don’t know?”
“No, he—” I decided not to tell the full story. “We got into an argument a couple weeks ago and he went to Las Vegas.”
“And jumped off Caesar’s Palace.”
“What?”
“I’m sorry, Winston.”
To my surprise, I stifled laughter. I tried to summon up some sadness, but there wasn’t much. Then I thought of Nancy and Maxwell, especially Maxwell, and felt awful. What a piece of shit I was for feeling relieved.
“I wonder what happened,” said Andrew, gazing out the window.
“You were living with him, right?” asked Julie. “Did he say anything before he…”
“Um, well—” I stopped myself. I couldn’t tell her Nancy had left him. “Not really. Not anything like, you know, I didn’t see him again after our fight, but no, he didn’t say anything. Except—”
“What?”
“It’s just, I don’t know if it matters, but before he went to Las Vegas he kept talking about having powerful connections out there. I don’t know, it probably doesn’t matter.”
“Yeah, probably not,” said Andrew.
“Well, thank you,” said Julie.
“Sure. I wish I could tell you more, but—I don’t know. I don’t understand.”
“You don’t have to.” She kept going on her computer.
I could tell Andrew knew I knew more than I was letting on, but he didn’t push it. I wondered what he’d heard about Kevin.
“Okay, come here.”
I went over to the desk and Julie turned her computer so we could both see.
“This is all the streaming revenue from ‘Despicable Me.’”
“What? You wrote ‘Despicable Me?’”
“Um, yeah.”
“Well case fucking closed, no wonder he—”
“Andrew!”
“Sorry,” he said, chuckling.
“Jesus Christ. Anyways, your cut is ten percent. You were only supposed to get ten percent of that, but since—like I said, it’s all yours.”
“Your manager was taking ninety percent?”
“Um, I guess so.”
“What a scumbag.”
“Andrew!”
“What?”
“Shut the fuck up.” She clicked over to another tab. “I just need your bank info and we’re good to go.”
“Okay, um, one sec.” I opened up my banking app and struggled to find my checking and routing numbers, but eventually Julie showed me where they were and I put them into her system.
“Alright.” She turned her computer around and confirmed the transaction. “Okay, the first payment’s on its way. You’ll continue to receive royalties on the first of each month, but this is probably going to be the bulk of it.”
“Okay. Thanks.”
“Sure. Anything else?”
I swallowed. “Um, well, actually I kind of wanted to talk about getting my own album deal instead of, like, ghostwriting for people like Trappa.”
“Oh, Winston.” Julie smiled like I was a child.
“What?”
“We’re not making any more of your music.”
“But that was Trappa, he ruined—”
“No, I’ve heard your other music. I’ve heard a lot of music. You’re not going to make it.”
“But you said it was good!”
“Did I?”
I wasn’t sure. “Well, um, could I at least get like a recommendation to another label?”
“No.”
“But I have other songs you haven’t—”
“Don’t care.”
I started crying. “But this is my dream!”
“We all have dreams, Winston. You want my advice?”
“What?”
“Give up. Go get a real job.”
“But, I don’t want to do that! I want to make music! I want to inspire people!”
“No you don’t. You just want a way out of a normal life. I’ve seen it a million times. Stop kidding yourself. Get real. You’ll be much happier.”
I didn’t know what to say.
Julie sighed. “Anything else?”
I sniffed. “No.”
“Okay. Bye.”
I sat there for a moment, wiping my tears, racking my brain for another angle of negotiation. But I had nothing. “Okay. Thanks for paying me.”
“Sure.”
“Nice to meet you,” I said to Andrew.
He looked up from his phone. “You too. Sorry about your manager.”
I left and pressed down on the elevator. I was shaking. The doors opened and I got in and pressed L. There was a beautiful woman inside so I pulled out my phone to avoid eye contact. The $1800 from “Despicable Me” had hit my account. For a moment I felt rich, but without a place to stay, it wouldn’t get me through the month. I couldn’t call Eddy, that was out of the question. And what would my mom say? She still thought I was in New York, making good money at my banking job.
The doors opened and I walked out into the lobby before I remembered I’d pressed the wrong floor, I wasn’t supposed to be there. I hurried past the reception. Luckily no one noticed me.