“I got up to grab a little snack just after midnight,” Pauline told him, “and she was still out there on the balcony, all by herself, just strumming her guitar and drinking wine. I was going to go out and talk to her, then I saw she was smoking a cigarette. I’ve never seen her do that before. I had no idea she smoked.”
“She only does it when she’s stressed,” Jake said thoughtfully. “I’ve only seen her smoke a few times since I’ve known her.”
“Nobody else here smokes,” Pauline said. “You’re the closest thing we have to a smoker, right?”
“I haven’t had one in ... God ... probably four months now,” Jake said. “And that one made me dizzy and I almost threw up.”
“That means she bought a pack of smokes somewhere,” Pauline said, shaking her head. “Something is definitely up with that girl, something more than just Greg not coming to see her, don’t you think?”
He nodded. “Yeah,” he said. “I think you’re right.”
“Maybe you should have a talk with her?” Pauline suggested.
Jake shook his head. “If she wants to talk to me, she’ll talk to me. Until then, I’ll just let it go. She’s still singing and playing well in the studio, so whatever is going on with her is not affecting her performance. Until that starts to happen, this falls under the umbrella of ‘none of my business’.”
“I suppose,” Pauline said, picking up her pot and pouring it into the strainer in the sink. A cloud of steam billowed up into the air around her.
“Anyway,” Jake said, walking back to the refrigerator, “I’m gonna hit the trail.” He checked the tide chart and saw that it was low tide right now. Good. He would be able to run on the beach. “Enjoy your macaroni and tuna,” he said, picking up his bottle.
“I can’t wait to put it my mouth,” she assured him.
“Words I’m sure that Obie would love to hear you say,” Jake told her.
She rolled her eyes and shook her head at his crude joke. “Just when I start to think you’re beginning to mature,” she said.
He smiled and gave her a little pat on the belly. “Feed the clump,” he told her. “I’ll be back in an hour or so.”
“Break a leg,” she replied as she poured the pasta back into the pan.
He walked out of the kitchen and into the darkened living room. The sliding glass door that led to the balcony where last night’s festivities had taken place was closed, but the curtain that was usually pulled shut to cover it was still standing wide open and the outside light that provided illumination was still shining brightly, casting an eerie glow over the room. Jake saw through the glass that Rule Number 1 had been broken. Wine bottles and wine glasses, beer bottles and beer steins were sitting on the tables. He also saw that a significant marine layer had come ashore sometime during the early morning hours. Everything looked wet and drippy out there, with condensation plainly showing on the furniture, the glass debris, and even the balcony railing.
“Well ... shit,” Jake muttered, walking to the door. If the fog was too thick out there, he would have to cancel his run. The reduced visibility would make the trails down to the beach and, especially, the run on the roadway, a little too dangerous for his tastes.
He walked to the door and opened it to see how bad it really was without the window glare interfering. The fog was quite thick indeed, it’s damp chill instantly biting into his face and arms. But the fog only caught his attention for a moment. He looked over to where Celia had been sitting last night, in one of the wooden framed deck chairs. On the table next to it were four empty beer bottles, one empty wine bottle, another wine bottle still half full of red wine, and an empty wine glass. Next to the empties was an ashtray with six or seven soggy cigarette butts sitting in it. Next to that was a red and white package of cigarettes—also quite soggy—and a disposable lighter. Behind the table, leaning against the wall of the house, was Celia’s twelve-string guitar. It, like everything else out here, was covered with condensation.
“Jesus fucking Christ,” Jake muttered, stepping out onto the balcony and grabbing the three-thousand-dollar instrument, strongly suspecting it was already far too late.
Water dripped off of it as he picked it up, pattering to the deck. It was soaked. Moisture covered the entire instrument—which was bad—and was even inside the chamber—which was worse. He quickly carried it inside the house and back to the kitchen, where Pauline was now stirring the can of tuna into her mixture of pasta and powdered cheese sauce.
“Back so soon?” she asked him lightly, and then saw what he was carrying. “Why do you have Celia’s guitar?”
“She left it outside,” he said. “And the marine layer rolled in. It’s soaking wet!”
“Oh ... and that’s bad, right?” Pauline asked.
“That’s bad,” he confirmed. “It probably destroyed the instrument. The water soaks into the wood, especially inside the chamber, and as it dries it’ll warp.” He opened a drawer and pulled out a couple of kitchen towels.
“Shit,” Pauline said. “She loves that guitar. She must’ve been really drunk to have left it out there.”
“She is going to be very upset with herself,” Jake said, starting to wipe at the outside. Within a few seconds the first rag was already close to saturation and he had to switch to the next. He finished drying the outside as best he could and then looked inside. There was actually enough water in the chamber for it to slosh a bit. He shook his head. “Jesus fucking Christ,” he said again.
Celia was indeed very upset with herself. She came downstairs just before eight o’clock, freshly showered and groomed, but looking like death warmed over all the same. Her eyes were bloodshot and her skin was pale. She walked slowly, almost wincing with each step she took. She smelled primarily like a freshly bathed woman—fruity shampoo, toothpaste, and vanilla body wash—but beneath that was the faint undercurrent of stale alcohol and old cigarette smoke seeping from her pores. She made a sour face as she caught a whiff of the bacon and sausage that Mary was preparing for the communal breakfast.
Jake took her into the living room and showed her what had become of her guitar. He had tried to save it by removing all the strings, wiping out the inside as best he could with kitchen rags and then turning a portable hair dryer on it to try to get the water to evaporate from it without damage, but his efforts had been in vain. The body of the instrument had bulged out in several places, bulged inward in others. Even worse was the neck. It was now warped inward into an uneven C shape and twisted considerably out of alignment. No one would ever be able to put strings on it and get it into anything resembling proper tuning again.
“Madres de Dios,” she said, shaking her head, tears running down her face. “I can’t believe I left it out there!”
“Things happen, C,” Jake told her, putting his arm around her and pulling her against him. “I tried to keep it from warping but ... it was too late.”
“Mi padre gave me that guitar,” she said, her voice distraught. “He bought it for me for Christmas the year before we signed with Aristocrat. He couldn’t afford it, Jake, but he bought it for me anyway. I loved this guitar. It always sounded so sweet when I played it. And it always makes me think of papa when I hold it, makes it seem like he’s here with me.”