The High Notes: A Novel(50)

“Of course not.”

“In that case, maybe I should. I don’t like you going that far alone. Does Boy want to go?” he asked.

“I didn’t ask him.” It was a special mission, and she had planned to go alone. Once they set up the tour to include Houston, she had decided.

“I’m coming,” he said simply, and followed her to the SUV and driver she had hired for the night. She had given the limo company the destination, and they said it wasn’t a problem.

She’d been in Texas many times over the years when she was on tour for Hendrix and Weston, but it had never felt like a pilgrimage she could make before. She hadn’t had the time. It was just another stop on the miserable tours she’d been on, trapped for days on end in a crowded van. This time she had the time to do something she had thought about and wanted to do for years. She had brought three of her CDs with her to give them.

“Am I allowed to ask where we’re going?” he asked her gently after an hour. He could sense that it was important to her and he wondered if it was something serious, like the cemetery where her mother was buried. But she didn’t even know where her mother was buried.

“We’re going to see the only people who were ever nice to me as a kid. They were like my parents, or the ones I wish I had, and never did.”

They rode in silence for most of the drive. Clay watched her face and eyes, and was touched that she had let him come with her. When they’d been driving for almost three hours, she told the driver where to get off the highway, and gave him directions after that along some dusty back roads until they were on the edge of a small town.

“Here!” she said. She had seen the sign immediately, and it looked the same. She hadn’t called. She wanted to surprise them. She expected them to still be there. It never occurred to her that they might be gone after fifteen years.

“This is it?” Clay asked, looking surprised. “Harry’s Bar?” She nodded and looked excited as she jumped out of the SUV. It was a big jump for her, and Clay got out too and followed her to the restaurant-bar with the red neon sign.

She spoke to Clay softly as they approached. “This is the first place I ever sang for money. I was twelve years old. My father ran me in and out. I sang, and then I sat in the truck for hours, sometimes all night. I sang five nights a week, they gave me dinner whenever I did, and one of them made me a dress I wore for years whenever I sang.” He realized now how important it was to her, and what it meant. It was the only touchstone she had left of love she had been given as a child. It moved him deeply to be there with her, and he let her walk in first and followed her. There was an older man behind the bar, cleaning it with a wet rag. There were half a dozen tables with people eating dinner, and two men who looked like ranch hands at the bar. She stared at the back of the room, and the stage was still there. She stopped and gazed at it, and noticed a young waitress serving dinner. There was no sign of Sally or Pearl. He seemed much older, but the man at the bar was Harry. She stood watching him, as tears filled her eyes and she approached the bar.

“Harry?” she said in barely more than a whisper, and he stared at her, as though she was familiar. Clay kept his distance and watched with tears in his eyes too. It was a defining moment for everyone involved. “I’m Iris Cooper,” she said, and he reached out and touched her face with a gentle hand.

“Oh my God…it’s you.” He started to cry and came rapidly from behind the bar to hug her. “Oh my God, you’re so grown up and so beautiful. We’ve been hearing about you, and listening to your songs.” All the way here, they had heard about her.

“I’m singing in Houston tomorrow night. I had to come and see you,” she said, clutched in his bear hug, and then he released her to look at her again. They were both crying. “We never forgot you. How could we? You were our little girl.”

“Where are Sally and Pearl?” she asked. There was no sign of either of them. Maybe they had retired or moved away.

He went to the kitchen door then and bellowed for Pearl. She came out a minute later, wiping her hands. She had gotten older too, but she hadn’t changed.

“Do you know who this is?” Harry said to her, his voice shaking, and she let out a scream and flew into Iris’s arms and held on to her for dear life. She kept stroking her face and kissing her and hugging her again, and Iris couldn’t stop crying.

“I always wanted to come back to you. You were always so good to me. I don’t think I ever had a decent meal after I left here. We moved to Houston, and then Austin, and all over Nevada, and finally Vegas. But I always wanted to come back and see you. Where’s Sally?” she asked Pearl then, and she wiped her eyes.

“She died, about ten years ago. Breast cancer.”

“And you came back just in time,” Harry told her. “I just turned sixty-five. I’m retiring. I sold the bar. I’m leaving in a month. My brother has a place in Montana, and he lost his wife last year, so I’m going to live with him.”

“I’m staying,” Pearl said staunchly. Harry handed a fresh beer to each of the ranch hands, and sat down at a table with Pearl and Iris, and she introduced them to Clay and explained that he was her manager and had organized the tour, and the album.

“You’re a big star now,” Pearl said proudly, “and so pretty. You can still hit those high notes,” she said, and they all laughed, and Iris took the CDs out of her purse, and handed them to her and Harry. “I brought you my album. I wore the dress Sally made me till it nearly fell off my back.” She grinned at them.