The High Notes: A Novel(16)
They weren’t delicious now that she was on the road, but she was sure they’d be better now. They had to serve hearty meals for the cowboys and ranch hands.
It felt weird to not be performing, to not be rushing into a town to start setting up, or going to dinner at a diner with Pattie and the boys in the band. You could tell that they were from a city. They looked it, and Iris was afraid that she did too, and someone would spot her here as an outsider. It was harder to just blend into the scenery. And she looked weird to herself with dark hair. It seemed like her most dominant feature, because it was striking and so new. It felt strange to see herself. It wasn’t as dark as Pattie’s, but it was a rich brown, and she looked radically different.
She turned on the TV as she lay in bed, as Glen continued to blow up her cellphone. She didn’t bother to read his texts. She knew he’d be threatening and insulting and telling her to get her ass back to work. She was never going back to him for the rest of her life, even if she had to keep driving forever.
She was going to explore the town the next day, and she could hardly wait. She felt like a bird in the sky, spreading her wings. She missed singing that night, but she hoped she’d be singing again one day. And best of all, she was free now, for the first time in her life, with no one threatening her or trying to use her.
Chapter 5
Iris spent the day exploring Jackson Hole. It was a funny little tourist town, an odd mix of cowboys, ranch hands, skiers, nature lovers in hiking gear, and a few fancy locals with houses there, in fur parkas with good haircuts, who had come to lead their version of “the simple life” in their luxurious homes just outside of town. There was a general store that looked as though it had been there forever, some simple shops and other fancier ones with jewelry, or high-end, brand-name clothes. It seemed to be a melting pot of people and social levels, in the shadow of the gorgeous mountains that hovered over them. Iris felt totally at ease strolling around town, and no one seemed to notice her. She wasn’t well-known or a big-name star, and there were a number of famous actors and actresses, Hollywood people, who lived there. There were many restaurants, again at all levels, and she stopped at a deli for a cup of soup and a sandwich at lunchtime. There was a fishing shop where you could rent equipment, and a stable where you could rent horses to ride on the trails. It was a perfect vacation spot, a place where you could hide away from the world.
A couple of ranch hands talked to her when she checked out the general store. She knew the look and the style of men like them. They reminded her of her father. They asked her if she was passing through and she said she was. They chatted for a few minutes, and one of them told her she should check out the Elk, on the way to a town called Moose just outside Jackson Hole. He said they had good live entertainment. They left and she checked out the souvenir shops for the tourists, with Native American dolls, bead necklaces, chaps and cowboy hats for kids, Ken dolls dressed as cowboys, and Barbies in full rodeo gear. It made her think of the rodeos she’d been to as a child with her father, and she wondered where he was now. The rodeos he’d taken her to, to look up his old friends, were among her happiest childhood memories, maybe the only ones. She hadn’t seen him in four years, since she’d signed with Glen Hendrix. She wondered if he was alive somewhere, unless he’d had an accident, or had drunk himself to death. It was odd not knowing if she still had a father or not, but she’d gotten used to no longer having him in her life. She wondered if she’d run into him here, but it wasn’t his kind of place. It was a little too upscale. One got the sense that there was a lot of money here, hiding discreetly. It wasn’t sleazy enough for him. Las Vegas suited him better. And the women here were too wholesome and not his style. She had a gut feeling that he was either in Vegas or had gone back to Texas, if he was alive.
She had no desire to go back there, and no urge to revisit where she’d grown up, except maybe for Austin. In fact, she had no home, just a lot of places she had lived and gone to school, and no ties to any of them. Her father was the main link to her past. He’d always been a moving target, and now he was gone. She was like a ship without an anchor, particularly now, since she had cut the ropes that had moored her, and was drifting. She liked Jackson Hole, but it didn’t feel like her destination. She was just passing through, as she had said to the ranch hands at the general store.
She bought another sandwich to take back to her hotel when it got dark, and she thought of the Elk on the way. She decided she might stop in later to check out the live entertainment the ranch hand had mentioned. It would be interesting to see what they played in local bars and how good the musicians were. They were probably locals.
She fell asleep for a while after she ate her sandwich in her room at the bed and breakfast where she was staying, woke up at ten o’clock, wide-awake and no longer tired, and decided to visit the Elk. She saw that she had four more texts from Glen, and erased them without reading them. She could guess what they said, and didn’t need to have his threats spelled out to her. He ruled by fear and debasing the people who worked for him, some of them with real talent, although he tried to convince them otherwise, and often did. That way, they stayed in bondage to him, just as she had, and Pattie, and the others.
She drove the few miles to the Elk, and found that it was a large log cabin, with a neon sign. She stepped inside and the room was hot and cozy, filled to the rafters with locals, tourists, ranch people, a few of the fancier looking ones she’d seen in town. There was a long bar with people standing, mostly men, and crowded tables with people finishing dinner. The room smelled heavily of beer, and voices were raised in laughter and conversation. She stood to one side, and saw the stage set up at the back of the room. The place reminded her of a larger version of Harry’s, where she sang when she was a kid, and she felt a sudden pang of missing Harry and Pearl, as she always did when she thought about them, even now, fifteen years after she’d last seen them. They were the closest thing she’d had to a family.