The High Notes: A Novel(13)

Iris walked into Pattie’s dressing room seconds after Glen did, just in time to hear him unleash a torrent of abuse on Pattie for her performance that night. To Iris, he personified evil, and she leapt to her friend’s defense.

“She was fabulous!” she said to him. “She was as good as any headliner in Vegas.” Pattie looked touched, and startled by the surprise attack. Like the others, she hadn’t expected him to show up there.

“Don’t make me laugh,” he said dismissively to Iris, and told Pattie that if she didn’t watch out, he’d kick her off the tour.

“You can’t do that,” she said, hotly defending herself. “I tried out one new song. What’s wrong with that?”

“You don’t have the talent to create,” he told her, his face inches from hers.

“What would you know?” she snapped back at him, and with an instant reaction, he hauled off and slapped her across the face. The mark of his hand was on her cheek, and she looked stunned, as Iris reached out to grab him if he tried it again. He pushed her roughly away, as Pattie started to cry, and he stormed out of her dressing room, and left the building a few minutes later. He looked like a raging bull with wild eyes. Iris hugged Pattie. One of the boys commented that he must be back on coke again. It was an open secret that he had a cocaine habit.

“You should sue him!” Iris said, livid for her. He had no right to lay a hand on any of them, it was bad enough that he abused them verbally, and had them by the throats with their contracts.

“And then what?” Pattie said. “I’m out of a job, and no one will ever hire me again for suing him, and I can’t pay my mom’s rent, or buy shoes for my kid.” The others came into the dressing room then, and commiserated with her, and they cut up Iris’s cake after she blew out the candles, but the celebratory atmosphere was gone. Iris could still see the mark of Glen’s hand on Pattie’s face. It could have been her, or any of them. He treated them like dirt.

They went back to the hotel where they were staying, and the next morning, before they left to rehearse, an envelope arrived for Pattie. It had her name on it, and her hand shook when she opened it. She was sure she was being fired. Inside there was a thousand-dollar check with a Post-it on it, which said only “costume reimbursement,” which Glen never paid. It was clearly to keep her from suing him for slapping her. She could have charged him with assault and battery and he knew it. She showed it to Iris, who wished Pattie could throw it in his face, but none of them could afford to. He had gotten away with it, and ran roughshod over her feelings in the process. There was no note of apology, just the check. Pattie folded it up and put it in her purse.

“I should let him slap me more often. I need the money. Jimmy’s still wearing braces, and my mom needs new tires to drive him to school,” she said with a sigh. But something about the whole incident made Iris feel sick. How much abuse were they supposed to take? How many years would it go on? Her father, Billy Weston, Glen Hendrix, all of them debasing the performers and their talent in order to control and exploit them. When did it end? How many times would they have to pay their dues just to be treated with respect, like human beings?

“I’m okay,” Pattie told her, as they walked to the theater. But Iris wasn’t. She had another year left in her contract. She had worked for Glen for four years, and the thought of another year working for him made her feel nauseous, and trapped. She hated what he had done to Pattie, what he did to all of them, what he had said about her new songs. What gave him the right to disrespect them all, and treat them like dirt under his feet? He was a disgusting human being, and abused them all just because he could.

Iris was quiet when they got to rehearsal, and spent the whole day thinking about what had happened the night before.

She slipped out and went to the drugstore that afternoon, and bought something she didn’t even know if she’d use, but she didn’t know if she could stand it one day longer. It was all too much. Her heart and soul were begging to be free. She couldn’t hit the high notes for the likes of Glen Hendrix anymore.





Chapter 4





Iris’s backup band could tell that her heart wasn’t in it that night, in comparison to her brilliant performance the night before. She was disheartened by the way their manager had treated them, the vile things he had said, his lack of respect for their talent and how hard they worked, his abuse, and the slap across Pattie’s face, which she had to tolerate because she needed the money she earned for her mother and son. They really were no better than slaves. It was a high price for Iris to pay just for the pleasure of singing her heart out, writing her own music, and hitting the high notes when she was onstage. She loved what she did, and the audiences who appreciated it, but the people she had worked for had held her in bondage, starting with her father, and had exploited her in every way.

She was getting ready to leave the theater with Pattie that night, when there was a knock on her dressing room door. It was Judd, her bass player, who played for Pattie too. They were leaving the next day, traveling to Wyoming, and into Nebraska, up into the Dakotas, and on to Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, and Illinois. They had two months left in the tour, moving on every few days. And anytime he felt like it, Glen Hendrix could show up.

Judd looked awkward when she opened the door of her dressing room.