Circles Collide

Chapter 13: Touching Bases

Posted: 29.06.2023, 04:50:27

Pocatello, Idaho

December 7, 1996

It was a beautiful day for flying, with bright sunny skies and only scattered high-level clouds all the way to their destination. The air temperature was still rather cold—it was 31 degrees at Pocatello Airport, 34 degrees at South Valley Regional just outside Salt Lake City—but this was not a concern for an aircraft that routinely flew at high altitude where the temperature was 40 to 60 below zero.

“You’re sure this thing is safe,” asked Joey, Laura’s oldest brother, from the copilot’s seat next to Jake (Jake had locked out his controls). He was gripping the side of the seat and looked extremely nervous.

“I hardly ever crash this thing,” Jake assured him as he rolled along the taxiway toward the head of runway 17.

“Hardly ever?” Joey asked, alarmed.

Jake chuckled. “Just a joke,” he said. “Statistically, you’re about fifty times safer in here with me than you would be driving in a car to SLC.”

“If you say so,” Joey said. The only time he had flown in an aircraft prior to today had been a fishing trip he and Sarah had taken to Alaska five years before, going from Salt Lake City to Seattle to Anchorage and then back again. Those aircraft had been considerably larger than this one. And they had been flown by professional pilots, not a rock musician who perhaps had more money than sense.

“I do,” Jake said. “Now remember. The cockpit is supposed to be sterile right now. No unnecessary conversation until we get up above ten thousand feet.”

“Right,” Joey said. He turned and looked over his shoulder. “You hear that back there?”

Grace and Chastity were sitting in the seats just behind the cockpit. Brian was sitting in one of the rear-facing seats behind them. None of them had ever flown on any sort of aircraft before and all had varying degrees of nervousness on their own faces, but all had enough of a sense of adventure that they had not turned down Jake’s invitation to take them out on a little day trip.

Jake stopped at the hold-line and went through his takeoff checklist to make sure the aircraft was properly configured. As was his habit, he read off the items aloud. Altimeter was calibrated. Flaps were set for takeoff. Bleed air was set to automatic. Aileron trim and rudder trim were both set for takeoff. Altitude was dialed in at fifteen thousand feet, their cruising altitude for most of the thirty-minute flight. The tower controller told Jake he was clear for takeoff whenever he wanted to go. He thanked the controller and then throttled up, getting the aircraft moving. He turned onto the runway and aligned with the center line.

“All right,” he told his passengers. “Here we go.”

He throttled up to ninety percent. The engine noise increased and the plane began to pick up speed, rolling down the runway.

“V1,” Jake called out when they reached ninety-three knots. And then, “Rotate,” when they reached ninety-six knots a second later.

He pulled back on the yoke and the nose came up. The Avanti broke contact with the ground and began to climb into the sky. Joey was looking out the cockpit window in terrified wonder as the ground dropped away.

“Positive rate of climb,” Jake said. “Gear up.” He reached over and flipped up the lever.

When they got more than a thousand feet above the ground, he retracted the flaps and let the plane nose down a bit and start to pick up speed.

“This is sooooo friggin’ cool!” he heard Chastity exclaim from behind him. She was staring out the window in awe.

“I’m not really sure I like this,” Brian said, his voice cracking a little. “It feels like we’re falling.”

“We’re not falling,” Jake assured him. “I just reduced the rate of climb. That makes if feel like you’re falling. The sensation will pass.”

Grace, meanwhile, was snapping pictures out her window with a small instant camera she had bought just for the occasion. “I’m going to paint this view,” she declared. She sounded like she was having a blast back there. “I’ve never seen anything like this before.”

Grace, like everyone else in Joey’s family, had warmed up considerably to Jake and Laura over the past two days. She was still extremely shy, but she was no longer catatonic in his presence. The two of them had actually had an extended conversation the night before about the visual arts and music and how the two differed from and related to each other. She was a very intelligent girl, he had found, with surprising insight into the subject.

Since the runway he had taken off from faced generally south, and since Salt Lake City was just a few degrees east of due south from Pocatello, only a slight turn was needed to get the aircraft on course. He brought them up to fifteen thousand and then let the autopilot take over. He could have actually had it do that shortly after takeoff had he wanted, but it always made first time flyers feel better to see him actually controlling the plane himself during the climb-out instead of just sitting back with his hands in his lap.

“All right,” Jake said as the auto-throttle reduced their engine thrust to sixty-one percent. “We’re at fifteen thousand feet now and traveling at three hundred and fifteen knots true airspeed. That’s about three hundred and sixty miles per hour over the ground.”

Joey, who looked a little more relaxed now (though still quite nervous), nodded his head in approval. “That’s pretty damn fast,” he said.

“That’s the beauty of flying,” Jake said. “It gets you there fast and you get to see some cool shit along the way.”

“The view is incredible from up here,” Joey had to admit. “I can see the whole river down there. And the canyons! I never realized how big and how deep they were.”

“I can see the interstate down there!” Grace proclaimed. “Look how tiny it looks! You can barely see the cars on it!”

“There’s a mountain down there that looks like a big boob!” Chastity added. “It even has a nipple on it!”

“Chase!” warned Joey.

“Sorry,” she said.

“I’m gonna say that it’s nice just to have people to talk to up here,” Jake said. “Laura’s usually asleep by this point in a flight.”

“If you don’t mind my asking,” Joey said. “What’s a plane like this cost?”

Jake eyed his brother-in-law for a moment, trying to read his expression. So far, neither he nor his wife had made even so much as a hint about wanting or needing money. They had spent all day and evening together yesterday, much of it spent at an outdoor rifle and gun range where Jake had been introduced to the joys of shooting firearms (and he had had a blast doing it, he was not ashamed to admit) and nary a mention of finances was made. Was that about to change? He decided to simply tell the truth. “The sale price was four point seven-five million dollars.”

“Four point seven-five million?” Joey asked incredulously. “No shit?”

“No shit,” Jake confirmed, “although the bank still owns most of it. I put down twenty percent and financed the rest.”

“Holy shit,” he said, shaking his head in wonder. “I guess there’s good money in being a musician.”

“Not for most,” Jake said, “but I’m one of the exceptions. I paid a lot of dues along the way, but I managed to turn my natural talent into a pretty decent life.”

“I guess you did,” Joey said. He then said no more about Jake’s money. At least not until Jake himself brought it up.

“Listen, Joey,” Jake said. “I noticed that your house, you know, needs some repairs. The roof primarily, but I also noticed your plumbing has some issues as well.”

“That’s true,” Joey said. “I’m hopin’ to be able to start working on the roof come next summer. I got some money in savings put aside just for that project and I have some buddies at work that will come over and help me get her done.”

“I see,” Jake said. “Well ... I was just wondering if maybe ... you know ... I could help you out a little bit with that project.”

“Help me out?” Joey said, looking at him strangely. “You want to fly out to Pocatello in the middle of summer and help us pull shingles down and put up new ones?”

“Uh ... no, that’s not what I meant,” Jake said, shuddering a little at the very thought. “I was thinking more along the lines of maybe ... uh ... paying for a contractor to do the job for you.”

Joey did not even pause to think it over. He simply shook his head. “I appreciate the offer, Jake, really I do, but I don’t borrow money from family. Don’t lend it to ‘em either.”

“I wasn’t thinking about a loan, Joey,” Jake said. “I was thinking we could just pay for the job for you. We can afford it.”

Joey nodded a few times. “I’m sure you can,” he said, “but I have to say no. I won’t take no charity. Just not in my nature. I’ve been putting money aside for that and I’ll get her done on my own.”

“Okay,” Jake said. “Just remember, the offer is on the table and I would be glad to do it for you.”

“I understand,” Joey said. “And I appreciate you making it.” He gave Jake a shrewd look. “You know, I was really prepared not to like you.”

“Yeah?”

Joey nodded. “I’ve read all those things you been up to over the years. The cocaine, the other drugs, puttin’ your hands on women you date, cheatin’ on women you date, the Satanism. A big part of my reason for getting in touch with Little Bit was that I wanted to make sure she was okay. After all, until my mom broke contact with me, every time I talked to her on the phone she would rant about how my little sis was trapped in a marriage with you and you were keeping her from staying in touch with family and you were probably beating her every day.”

“But now that you’ve met me? Now that you’ve talked to Laura?”

“I think you’re all right,” Joey said. “I’m pretty good at reading a man and I don’t get any vibes about you being like what they say you’re like. And I can tell that Little Bit is very happy with you. She loves you and you love her. It’s obvious watchin’ the two of you together.”

“Well thanks,” Jake said, sincerely appreciative of the sentiment.

“You two are a bit highfalutin though,” Joey added, “but I guess that goes along with havin’ more money than you know what to do with.”

“Perhaps,” Jake said. “And, just so you know, I think you’re all right as well.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah,” Jake said. “I’ll be truthful as well. I was not looking forward to coming here to Pocatello and meeting you all. I had no desire to get to know anyone in Laura’s family after the way your mom and dad treated her. I assumed you were all nothing but a bunch of intolerant ... you know ... assholes.”

He shrugged. “I can’t say you’re wrong about mom and dad and the other kids,” he said. “But being on the receiving end of their shaming of me ever since Sarah got pregnant and now being on the receiving end of a full-blown Mormon shunning, I like to think I’m a bit more tolerant of different lifestyles and points of view.”

Jake nodded. “I would say you are,” he said. “And I like to think that about myself as well.”

Joey nodded himself, perhaps a little reluctantly, but a nod nonetheless.

“Anyway,” Jake went on, “Laura and I were talking last night, and we would like to return your hospitality.”

“What do you mean?” he asked.

“Maybe over spring break in April, you and the family would like to come visit us at our house.”

“Your house in Los Angeles?” he asked.

“Well ... we do have a house in Los Angeles, but we don’t hang out there much. I was talking about the house in San Luis Obispo. It sits up on a cliff over the ocean. It’s more than big enough for everyone to stay in. I even have a housekeeper who will cook meals and do the laundry and all that.”

“Sounds pretty fancy,” Joey said.

“It sounds amazing!” Chastity said with shrill enthusiasm. “Can we do it, Dad? Say we can do it!”

“I have always wanted to see the ocean,” Grace put in. She touched Jake’s shoulder. “You can actually see it from your house?”

“Oh yeah,” Jake said. “From any of the windows that face west, from the deck out back, and we have a hot tub that sits on another deck right on the edge of the cliff.”

“A hot tub!” Chastity said. “Wow!”

“And Grace, you could set up your easel right there next to the hot tub and paint the ocean scape—although sometimes the wind does kick up a bit.”

“I would really like that,” Grace said.

“Uh, before we start packing our bags,” Joey said, “I’m not sure we’ll be able to afford such a trip. How long would it take to drive from Pocatello to this San Luis whatchamacallit?”

“Uh ... well, fourteen to sixteen hours, I would think,” Jake said, “but there’s no need to do that. We could fly you from Salt Lake to LAX, no problem.”

“Fly us in this plane?” Joey asked.

“Well, not the whole way,” he said. “We’ll get you some airline tickets for the hop to LA and then I can fly everyone from LA to San Luis Obispo from there.”

“We can’t afford airline tickets,” Joey said.

“We’ll get them for you,” Jake said. “It’s nothing to us. Literally. Laura and I have a buttload of frequent flier miles that we never use for anything. They would cover everybody’s tickets, no problem. You just get yourselves to Salt Lake City and we’ll take care of the rest.”

“I don’t know,” Joey said.

“Oh, come on, Dad!” Chastity cried in dramatic anguish. “He said it won’t cost them anything! That’s not charity!”

“We would be happy to do it, Joey,” Jake said. “Sincerely.”

“I don’t know,” he said again. “I really don’t like accepting expensive things from anyone.”

“Did I mention the sand dunes around where we live?” Jake asked.

“The sand dunes?”

“Yeah,” Jake said. “Big ones that stretch for miles along the beach. And there’s places where you can rent ATVs for the day and explore to your heart’s content. I know a guy who rents them to us for pretty much free in exchange for letting him use my face in his advertisements.”

“ATVs, huh?” Joey said.

“That sounds like hella fun!” Chastity said.

“It really does, Dad,” added Brian.

“And you like to fish, right, Joey?” Jake enquired.

“You know I do,” Joey said.

“There’s a guy who runs a charter boat out of the marina in Morro Bay,” Jake said. “He has a Beechcraft Bonanza and flies it out of the same airport I use so we see each other in the pilot’s lounge a lot. He’s made a similar offer to me on a couple of occasions. Free use of the charter for a day of deep-sea fishing if I would let him publish some pictures of me on his boat for advertisements. So far, I haven’t taken him up on it because I haven’t had the time or a big enough group of people to take out. But this might be the perfect opportunity.”

“Deep sea fishing?” Brian said excitedly. “I’ve always wanted to do that!”

“Me too,” Chastity said. “Dad, we have to do this! I will seriously die if we don’t!”

“Well...” Joey said, visibly wavering now, “I did try some deep-sea fishing when we were up in Alaska. It was one of the best fishing trips I’ve ever been on.”

“Say yes, Dad!” Chastity demanded.

“I really would like to see the ocean, Dad,” Grace put in.

“Me too,” Brian put in.

“Well ... I guess the family has spoken,” Joey said. “All right. We’ll take you up on your offer, Jake. Thank you very much.”

“Our pleasure,” Jake said when the cheers died down behind him.

“I can’t wait to tell all my friends I’m going to California to hang out with my uncle Jake Kingsley!” Chastity said. “They are gonna be hella jealous.”

“Please stop saying ‘hella’, Chase,” Joey said. “I really hate that word.”

“Sorry, Dad,” she said.

They flew on for a few more minutes in silence, the members of the Best family pondering their upcoming trip. Jake, who had been goaded into making the offer by his wife, was surprised to find that he was actually looking forward to hosting them as well. And then Chastity made another observation.

“Look at that canyon down there!” she suddenly exclaimed. “It looks just like a hoo-hoo! And the trees around it look like pubic hair!”

“Chase!” Joey yelled, exasperated. “Will you please keep your vulgar imagination to yourself?”

“I’ll try, Dad,” she promised.

There was no restaurant at South Valley Regional Airport, but a short walk outside the grounds brought them to a local chain eatery where they were given a table for five. The food was quite mediocre to Jake, but the Best clan seemed to enjoy it. Joey insisted upon picking up the tab and Jake finally relented and allowed it. Their waitress was a cute blonde woman in her middle twenties. She did not speak much to them as she took their orders and served them, only engaging in what conversation was necessary to accomplish her job. At least, that was the case until it was time to start clearing the dishes away.

“You know that you’re going to burn in hell for all of eternity, right?” she asked, looking directly at Jake.

While Joey, Brian, Chastity, and Grace all stared at the waitress, their mouths agape at such rudeness from a server, Jake simply shrugged. “At least most of my friends will be there,” he said in a flippant manner.

“That goes without saying,” she returned icily. She then walked away, heading for wherever waitresses went when they had an armful of dirty plates.

“I ... I don’t believe she just said that,” Joey said, his face now turning red.

Jake shrugged again. “It happens,” he said. “Particularly in places like Salt Lake City or Cincinnati. You get used to it. Hopefully, she didn’t spit in my food.”

This suggestion angered Joey even more. “I’m going to have a talk with the manager about her behavior,” he said, starting to push his seat back.

“Don’t worry about it,” Jake said. “It’s just part of the life I choose. Chances are the manager would agree with her anyway.”

“I cannot let that go unanswered,” Joey said.

“Then do what I do,” Jake suggested.

“What’s that?”

“Don’t tip her,” he said. “Put a big old zero in the tip spot on the check. Maybe even draw some devil horns on it.”

“Really?” Joey asked.

“Really,” he said. “My policy is that if you accuse me of satanism, or hand my wife a WEAVE card, or tell me that I’m going to hell when you don’t even really know me, then you don’t get a gratuity. Hits them where they live and maybe that discourages them from such behavior in the future.”

“No tip huh?” Joey said. “That’s seems a little extreme.”

“It’s an extreme world,” Jake said.

Joey did as suggested and they left the restaurant for the walk back to the airport.

“Of course,” Jake said, “it goes without saying that you never eat there again.”

“That makes sense,” Joey agreed.

Thirty minutes later, they were back in the air and heading north to Pocatello. Ten minutes after that, they were at sixteen thousand feet and admiring the scenery once again. Everyone, even Brian, was considerably more relaxed on this flight.

“Tell me something, Joey,” Jake said as they approached the Idaho state line.

“What’s that?”

“How’s the Chinese restaurant scene in Pocatello?”

Joey looked at his brother-in-law strangely. “Chinese restaurants? We have quite a few, actually.”

“Are any of them any good?” Jake asked.

Joey shook his head. “No, not really,” he said. “If you want good Chinese food, you have to go to Boise or SLC.”

Jake nodded. “That what I figured.”

“Why do you ask?”

“Nothing,” Jake said with a chuckle. “I was just remembering a conversation I had once.”

“I see,” Joey said slowly.

“Anyway,” Jake said, “speaking of restaurants. I want to take you and the family out for dinner tonight to thank you for hosting us. What’s the best place in Pocatello?”

“That would be nice,” Joey said. Laura had already briefed Jake that this was the proper repayment for hospitality in her family. “Are you talking Chinese though? Because, like I said, there really aren’t any good...”

“No, not Chinese,” Jake said. “Just the best restaurant in town. Don’t worry about the price. We can afford it.”

“Well ... I guess that would be the Sandpiper,” he said. “We would have to dress up a bit for it.”

“Let’s do it then,” Jake said. “As soon as we land, I’ll book a reservation.”

“All right,” Joey said. “Sounds good.”

They landed just after three o’clock in the afternoon and taxied back to hangar row, where a different pair of rampers parked the Avanti back in its rented spot and received a pair of twenty-dollar bills from Jake. Jake then popped into the airport office and used the yellow pages to look up the Sandpiper. He called and was able to secure a reservation for eight plus an infant for 7:00 PM that evening. They then all piled into Joey’s Bronco for the trip back to the house.

Upon arrival, they found the scene inside pretty much as they had left it. Sarah, Julie, and Laura were sitting in the living room, chatting with each other and drinking iced tea while the television played on low volume. Laura was holding baby Everett in her arms, rocking him gently back and forth, occasionally smiling down at him and talking to him. Laura had been spending as much time with the baby in her arms as she could get away with.

Joey got himself, Jake, and Brian cans of Budweiser and they all sat down to join the conversation. They talked about the flight, the rude waitress, the upcoming trip to California (everyone became immediately excited about it) and their dinner reservations for the night.

“The Sandpiper, huh?” said Sarah. “Fancy. We’ve only been there once before, on our anniversary a few years ago.”

“We have to dress up for it?” Julie asked doubtfully.

“I asked about the attire when I made the reservation,” Jake said. “Business casual is fine.”

“Business casual?” asked Brian. “What’s that?”

“It means you don’t wear jeans or shorts,” Joey told him. “Put on a pair of slacks and one of those button-up shirts you have and you’ll be fine.”

“Oh ... I see,” Brian said.

Brian and his family left a few minutes later so they could go home and clean themselves up a bit. At around 6:00 PM, Jake and Laura retreated to Grace and Chastity’s room so they could change into their own business casual outfits. Jake looked longingly at Laura’s unclothed body as she stripped down to her panties. He tried to caress one of her breasts, but she slapped his hand away.

“You know the rules,” she said firmly. “Nothing resembling sex in my nieces’ room. It’s not right.”

He groaned a little in frustration. They had not been intimate with each other since the last night in Schweitzer—damn near a record for when they were actually in each other’s presence—making Pocatello the first place they had ever visited overnight as a couple in which they had not had sex. And that was not going to change on their last night here. She was very firm in her conviction that no hanky-panky (her phrasing for it) would take place in this room or even in this house. Copping a quick feel was not even acceptable.

“All right,” Jake said with a sigh, “but I expect a blowjob as soon as we get to cruising altitude tomorrow.”

She smiled. “Maybe we can do a little better than that,” she suggested.

“Oh yeah?” he asked, immediately interested. “What do you have in mind?”

“Something I’m sure the FAA would frown upon,” she said. “We’ll have to work out the logistics once we’re up there.”

“I’ll be looking forward to the experiment,” he said, leaning in and giving her a kiss. She accepted this affection until he tried slipping his tongue into her mouth. At that point, she pulled away and told him not to be naughty.

“Prude,” he accused.

“In Pocatello, yes I am,” she declared.

Joey drove them to Sandpiper’s in the Bronco. They arrived almost simultaneously with Brian, Julie, and Everett. They were seated immediately even though they were fifteen minutes early. The restaurant was moderately crowded, as it was a Saturday night, and they turned pretty much every head in there when it became known that Jake and Laura Kingsley were in the house. Some of the looks they received were disapproving, some curious, some neutral, but no one approached them and asked for autographs or tried to strike up conversation. Even the staff made no mention of who they were.

This had pretty much been the status quo with the locals since their arrival here. The Pocatello newspaper and the local news broadcasts were all aware that the Kingsleys were in town and were making a big deal about the visit of their hometown daughter and her sleazy husband. The mayor, who a few days before had talked of inviting the Kingsleys on a tour of city hall, was now on record as withdrawing the offer when his office was inundated with a flurry of emails and phone calls from the LDS population expressing disapproval. Local bishops of the LDS church were frequently quoted in their expressions of condemnation of the couple and the lifestyle they enjoyed. Everyday Pocatellons were interviewed and expressed a variety of opinions both in favor of the Kingsleys and against them. Every activity that the family made in public was reported on as well. But throughout all of this, not a single reporter had shown up at the Best home, or had called, or had made any attempt at communication whatsoever. And when the Kingsleys went out on the town, everyone stared and whispered as they were doing now, but no one had come up to ask for an autograph or to simply shoot the shit, no one had told Jake to his face what they thought of him. No one that they did not know even came within ten feet of the couple if they did not have to. It was very strange to be stalked, yet not stalked.

The food at Sandpiper’s was pretty good. Not the best Jake had ever had, but pretty good. He enjoyed a filet mignon with a fully loaded baked potato. Laura and most of the rest of her clan had the prime rib, which was a specialty of the house and something the Bests rarely were able to afford. Jake and Laura shared a $127 bottle of 1993 Merlot from the Napa Valley of California. Joey and Sarah drank Budweiser, but from the bottle instead of the can. They ignored the glasses that had been brought with the beer and drank directly out of the bottles. Grace, Chastity, Julie, and Brian all drank Pepsi in the glass. Little Everett drank from a bottle of apple juice.

The tab turned out to be just over four hundred dollars, to which Jake added an eighty-dollar gratuity. They then piled back into the Bronco and headed back to the house, Brian and family following behind. Once there, the canned Budweiser began to flow once again and they talked some more of the upcoming spring break trip to California and some of the things they might do there. Everyone definitely wanted to ride the ATVs and go deep sea fishing, but the girls also wanted to make a visit to Los Angeles to see Hollywood. And Chastity wanted to know if there was even the remotest possibility that she might get to meet Celia Valdez.

“I’ll have to check with her,” Jake said, “but if she’s available she would probably be open to coming by for dinner one night. She likes our house.”

“She just bought a new house of her own,” Laura said. “It’s in Malibu, right on the ocean. You can literally walk out her back door, down a flight of steps, and you’re on the beach. She’ll be moving into it next week.”

“That’s so cool,” Chastity said. “What’s she like?”

“She’s just an ordinary person like you and me,” Laura said.

“She’s so beautiful,” Chastity said. “Is any of that true about her getting it on with that female pilot?”

“Chase!” Joey and Sarah barked in unison. “You don’t ask people things like that!”

“None of it is true,” Jake assured her, lying through his teeth, of course.

They turned in relatively early that night since they planned to be wheels-up for the flight back to San Luis Obispo by 11:00 AM. Jake, as had been the case every night of this stay, did not sleep all that well thanks to the combination of sexual frustration, a bed that was about a foot too short for him, a mattress that was lumpy and uncomfortable, and the complete absence of any sort of white noise beyond Laura’s gentle breathing.

The next morning Jake dressed in his jeans, a t-shirt, and a pullover sweater. Laura put on a summer dress. And she removed her panties, failing to replace them with a fresh pair.

“Nice,” Jake said with a smile as he watched this maneuver (Laura made sure he saw her doing it). “Is Laura the Prude staying behind in Pocatello?”

“She most certainly is,” Laura said. “And good riddance to her. Laura the Nymph needs to have her lust slaked in a bad way.”

“Thank God,” Jake said, his motor already starting to rev a bit.

Breakfast was served shortly after they emerged from the room. It consisted of scrambled eggs, pancakes, bacon, and hash browns. Brian, Julie and Everett came over to partake in the Sunday morning family breakfast and to say goodbye to Jake and Laura. Sarah and Chase both made comment on the fact that Laura was wearing a summer dress in December.

“It’s like twenty-five degrees out there,” Chasity said. “You’re going to freeze your boobs off.”

“Chase,” Sarah said warningly.

“Sorry,” she said (although she obviously was not), “but I’m right, right?”

“Yes, you are right,” Sarah conceded. “Are you sure that’s how you want to dress, Little Bit?”

“I’ll wear my jacket until we get in the air,” Laura told them. “Remember, we’re flying to southern California. It will be in the sixties when we land.”

This was not entirely true. Jake had checked the weather forecast for the central coast of California and saw that it was going to be windy and rainy today with a high of fifty-six degrees. He did not correct her misinformation, however.

After the breakfast mess was cleaned up Laura snatched up Everett and spent much of the rest of her available time holding him and playing with him. Finally, around ten o’clock, she reluctantly surrendered the baby back to his grandmother and she and Jake went and packed their things. They carried their bags out to the Cherokee and loaded them inside. They then went back in to say their goodbyes to everyone.

Jake found that during his visit he had been elevated to hugging terms with the Best females. Sarah, Julie, Chastity, and even shy little Grace all put their arms around him and embraced him warmly, thanking him for visiting and for inviting them to visit in turn. Hugging was apparently not done among the Best males, not even a bro-hug, but he shook hands with them all and they seemed quite sincere when they told him it had been nice having him as a guest.

And then it was time to go. He and Laura got into the Cherokee, Jake behind the wheel, and started the drive to the airport.

“I’m really glad we came here,” Jake told his wife as they motored along through the lightly travelled streets of Sunday morning Pocatello. “Your family are really nice people.”

“Yeah,” Laura said, “they really are, aren’t they?”

“I’ll admit,” he said, “I really did not want to do this, especially not when you told me we would be staying in Grace and Chase’s room, but after I got to know them a little...”

“Uh ... sweetie,” she interrupted. “While you wax philosophical about family matters and epiphanies and all that, would you mind putting your fingers on my pussy and playing with it some?”

He looked over and saw that she had pulled up the hem of her dress, exposing her vaginal region. It was freshly shaved and the most beautiful thing he had seen in Pocatello or its surrounding environs so far. “Uh ... yeah, of course,” he said, extending his right arm to the side and letting his fingers land on the bare skin of her inner thigh. He then began to move inward. He waxed philosophical no further.

They loaded their bags into the Avanti and then pushed it out of the hangar. While Laura returned the Cherokee to the rental car area, Jake arranged for a fuel truck to come over and pump his tanks half-full—enough for the flight to San Luis Obispo with a ninety-minute emergency reserve. He then walked back over to the general aviation terminal and filed his flight plan.

They roared into the air at 11:05 AM, turning to the southwest and climbing in steps to their cruising altitude of thirty-two thousand feet. Flight time was to be one hour and fifty-five minutes, which would have them touching down at SLO Regional at noon Pacific time.

“All right,” Laura said once they were well settled into cruise flight under control of the autopilot. “Let’s figure out how to do this thing.”

“I need to be able to see the instruments at all times,” Jake said. He was having doubts about what they wanted to do—it went against every lesson he had ever been taught about flying an aircraft—but he was also extremely horny and really wanted to plant his member someplace soft and warm. “And I need to be able to quickly get back in my seat if something happens.”

Laura nodded. “I guess that only leaves us with one real option then.”

They unstrapped from their restraints and got out of their seats. Laura positioned herself so her feet were in the aisle just behind the cockpit seats. She leaned forward, so she was leaning over the back of the seats, one arm on the pilot chair, one on the copilot chair. Jake positioned himself right behind her, so he could see over her to the cockpit instruments and out the windshield. He had set the communication radio so it would emit through the speaker instead of the headset just in case Salt Lake Center needed to talk to him. He then lifted the hem of her dress up, exposing her butt and her heavenly gate. He stroked her a few times, relishing the feel of her and getting the blood flowing where it needed to flow. He then unzipped and unbuttoned his pants, pushed them and his underwear down to his knees, and took himself in hand. A moment later, he was inside of his wife and thrusting.

“Oh yesss,” Laura moaned as he gripped her hips and pounded in and out. “This is so fucking hot, sweetie. Fuck me harder!”

He fucked her harder, the speaker spouting out instructions and enquiries between ATC and other aircraft—most of them commercial carriers—as they bumped and bounced a bit in the high-altitude air. It made Jake nervous to be out of his seat during flight and unable to instantly respond in an emergency, but that nervousness just added to his enjoyment of the encounter. He was already congested from going three nights without even masturbating (Laura wouldn’t let him do that in Grace and Chase’s room either) so it did not take him long before orgasm started to approach. He barely hung in long enough for Laura to climax before he was pouring his backlog into her body.

“All right,” Laura said with a contented sigh after they strapped back into their seats. “We are officially in the Mile-High club now.”

“Right, officially in,” Jake agreed, prudently not mentioning that he had long since been a member of that particular club, initiated into it by another redhead way back in 1982 on a flight from New York to Los Angeles.

They settled in. Jake watched the scenery passing below, though the scattered clouds made this a hit and miss activity. He expected Laura to go immediately to sleep. That was her favorite thing to do up in the air and after getting herself laid, and she had just done both. But she did not nod off. She stared out the window as well, a thoughtful expression on his face.

“Everything okay, hon?” he asked her after perhaps fifteen minutes.

“Yeah,” she said, giving him an affectionate pat on the leg. “Everything is fine. I was just thinking about something.”

“What were you thinking about?” he asked.

“Well ... uh ... I was wondering if you ever thought about ... you know...” She trailed off.

“No,” he said. “I don’t know.”

She giggled nervously. “Oh ... never mind,” she said. “I’m just having weird thoughts.”

“Come on, hon,” he said. “Tell me what’s on your mind. Obviously, something is.”

She nodded. “Something is,” she said. “You see ... uh ... spending all that time with Everett ... it stirred something in me.”

Jake looked over at her, his eyes widening a little. “Stirred something in you?” he asked carefully.

“Yeah,” she said softly. “Something very powerful. Something ... well... maternal.”

“Maternal,” he said. “As in ... uh...”

She nodded. “We’ve never really talked about this before, sweetie, but, well ... what do you think about you and I ... you know ... having a baby?”

The email that Ron Standish, the ramper who worked for the FBO at Pocatello Regional Airport, sent to his photography club was a big hit among the members. The Avanti-180 that was seen in all of the attached jpeg photos was exotic looking, sleek, pleasing to look at. And the single picture with Jake Kingsley, Laura Kingsley, and Ron himself standing next to the Avanti—a shot that had been attached impulsively—was quite interesting in its own right. Not only did it show a really cool aircraft, it showed an actual celebrity and his wife. Of the 312 people in the photography group, 289 of them saved the email and forwarded it on to other people in their contacts list, most to multiple contacts, and not a single one of them harboring bad intentions. They just wanted their friends and family members to see some cool photos. And those second-generation contacts—there were well over a thousand of them—sent their own copies of the email to other contacts, increasing the number in circulation exponentially. At the moment that Jake was sinking his erection into his wife’s body thirty-two thousand feet above the spot on the Earth where Idaho, Utah, and Nevada all touched each other, there were more than forty thousand copies of the email circulating around the United States, Canada, and several European countries. And virtually no one in possession of that email at this point even knew who Ron Standish was.

By the time the sun rose over Jake and Laura’s Oceano home the next morning, a multitude of computer savvy people who had received copies of the email had copied the photo of Jake, Laura, and Standish out of the original email and used it to compose their own email. Again, none of these people were doing this with any maliciousness in their hearts. They just wanted to pass on the picture of a celebrity, his wife, their cool plane, and whatever loser that was standing with them in a more convenient fashion. This was an age where most internet users were still on dialup service and it took forever to pass along the entire email full of jpegs when they just wanted to show off one of them. Most composed a brief explanation of the shot that was along the lines of “Jake Kingsley and his wife Laura pose next to their Avanti airplane during a visit to Idaho”. No one identified Ron Standish by name and only a few even mentioned that he was a ramp worker. Very few identified the actual airport.

These new emails began to circulate far and wide as well, quickly passing up the original in sheer number of forwards since it was much faster and easier to pass on the single jpeg version than the original. By the time Jake and Laura sat down to a meal of Elsa’s chicken parmesan that night, nearly two hundred thousand copies of the photo were in circulation in eighteen different countries.

The next morning, while Laura slept in late in her own bed for the first time in weeks and Jake got up early to make the flight to Whiteman so he could check on the progress of KVA’s latest project, one version of the email landed in the inbox of a man named Daryl Broker, who lived in Tucson, Arizona.

Daryl was twenty-four years old. He was a computer nerd who liked to refer to himself as a “hacker”, but he had never actually hacked anything, he just liked the image that being a hacker represented. He was the youngest of three children and the least successful of the three in all aspects of life. His two older sisters were both college graduates and both were independent and working at good paying jobs—one in the computer industry, one in the financial industry. Daryl had never been to college. He worked at the local Walmart making just a little more than minimum wage. He still lived with his parents in the room he had grown up in. He had never been laid, had never even really come close to being laid, truth be told.

Daryl absolutely hated the band Intemperance and everything they represented, with a particular hatred for the band’s former lead singer, Jake Kingsley. This was primarily because Kingsley was everything that Daryl was not.

During Daryl’s early adolescent years during junior high and early high school, Intemperance had been all the rage among his classmates. The males thought that Intemp, as they called it, was the baddest-ass band since Led Zeppelin and Rush, that Matt Tisdale was the best fucking guitarist ever to throw down a riff or a solo, and that Jake Kingsley was the deepest lyricist to ever compose a tune. The girls all thought that Jake and Matt were the sexiest things on two legs, declared that they would gladly give it up to either one of them if only given the chance. In the circles that his two sisters had run in, Intemperance and especially Jake Kingsley were right up there with living gods. His oldest sister’s closest friend Debbie Mack, a bleached blonde party girl with incredible tits and a premium ass, whose image Daryl had jacked off to almost exclusively until the premier of internet porn (and who had always looked at and treated Daryl as if he were a cockroach crawling on her shower floor) even claimed that she had managed to get backstage during the It’s in the Book tour stop in Tucson and had almost fucked Jake Kingsley but had ended up having to settle for Coop the drummer instead.

In Daryl’s mind, he might have had a serious chance of getting into Debbie’s pants had it not been for her infatuation with Jake Kingsley and Intemperance. Nor was Debbie the only one he had these thoughts about. Through his high school years and his years of working at Walmart, he had become infatuated with multiple females that he thought he had a chance with, several of whom had ended up actually enjoying his strange company to some degree but who inevitably kept him firmly in the friend zone. And it seemed that all of these females had been really into Intemperance and Jake Kingsley, going on about how hot he was when the subject was discussed, about how his voice—especially on songs like Point of Futility or Insignificance or South Island Blur—made their respective panties wet. Like with Debbie Mack, he assumed that a primary reason these girls would not give up their sexual favors to him, even if it was just a pity fuck, was primarily because of their obsession with Kingsley.

This is why when a forwarded email appeared in his inbox with the subject line: Jake Kingsley and his wife fly their private plane into a local airport!!, he automatically began to feel his blood boil and the familiar hatred started to surge through him. He checked to see who had sent him such a forward, a part of him thinking it was yet another sick joke played upon him (in addition to being a perpetual virgin and computer geek, Daryl had been subjected to cruel bullying most of his life and tended to assume that anything negative was simply more of the same). He saw that it was a mass email from a guy named Steve Jeffery, who lived in Florida and was a member of the online Dungeons and Dragons club that Daryl was a member of. Daryl had never met Steve before, had never even played D&D with him. They were simply part of the same email contacts list. Nevertheless, though the email had been sent to hundreds from Steve’s account, Daryl still took it personally. It was just his nature.

He almost deleted it without opening it, but some kind of sick, morbid curiosity compelled him to take a look at it instead. The body of the email was simple and provided little detail.

Jake Kingsley and his wife Laura pay a visit to a local airport after flying in in their Avanti-180 twin-engine turboprop. What a cool plane! And how fucking hot is Laura Kingsley?

That was it. No mention of what airport they had flown into, what the purpose of their visit had been, what they had done after flying in, or any other detail.

“Who gives a rat’s ass?” Daryl muttered in disgust.

Again, he almost deleted the email without even looking at the attached jpeg file, but that same morbid curiosity compelled him to open the attachment. It downloaded relatively quickly since Daryl had talked his parents into paying for a DSL line instead of simple dialup (they were under the impression that Daryl was using the high-speed internet access to take classes and work on research). He stared at the picture that appeared on the screen, feeling that familiar hatred start to churn almost immediately.

The photo was of decent quality. It was not a scan of a photo but a digital copy of the original photograph. Kingsley and his wife were dressed in winter clothes and had winter hats on their heads. Behind them was a futuristic looking airplane. Standing between them was what Daryl assumed was a young girl with long black hair dressed in a work sweater of some sort. She was not terribly attractive. Her body seemed to lack feminine curves and her tits could not even be discerned beneath her bulky clothing. Who in the hell was she? Daryl wondered. Some ho they were sharing? He had read that Kingsley’s wife—if they were, in fact, actually married—was into chicks. It had even been suggested that she and Celia Valdez—who’s picture Daryl had masturbated to on occasion—regularly got it on when they were out on tour together.

He took a closer look at Laura Kingsley and found he liked what he saw. She was, as the author of the email suggested, pretty fucking hot. She had a cute, innocent looking face, copper colored hair that spilled out from beneath her beanie, and her feminine curves were easily discernible. And she liked doing women! How was it fair that Jake fucking Kingsley ended up with a hot chick like that when he, Daryl, computer genius and D&D dungeon master, could not even get laid by known skanks who slept with anyone? How was it that Jake fucking Kingsley could buy an airplane like that just because he could sing a little? The world just sucked!

His eyes turned back to the girl standing between the two of them. He wondered again just who she was. He noted that there was some writing on the front of her sweater. He could not quite make out what it said so he used the zoom function to bring it in a little closer. The image pixilated a bit, but he could now read the writing.

FBO Services

Ron

Ron? A girl named Ron? What the hell kind of name was that? And she worked for FBO services? What was FBO services? Some kind of escort service?

He moved the photograph a bit until he was zoomed in on the girl’s face. It was then that he started to wonder if Ron was actually a girl at all. True, the face was feminine, without a hint of facial hair, but when you looked closely there were a few masculine features that were nearly buried. Ron’s larynx was a little bit pronounced. And his cheek bones were a little bit sharp. And there was just a little bit of hair on the back of Ron’s hands. Maybe Ron was a tranny? After all, a guy who snorted cocaine out of butt cracks and let his wife eat pussy would be the sort of man who might be into trannies, wouldn’t he? In fact, wasn’t there a story a few years back about how one of the members of Intemperance had been caught screwing a tranny? He seemed to remember something about that.

Daryl minimized the email server and the open jpeg and called up his search engine. He typed in “FBO Services” to see what that was all about, expecting to find links dealing with prostitution and escorts and bondage and discipline. Instead, he found that FBO stood for “fixed base operator”, which was apparently the generic term for a company that provided aviation services for pilots at airports. Such entities were contracted to sell fuel, provide ramp services, rent tie-down and hangar space, and sometimes even provided maintenance. They were not, as a general rule, in the business of providing transexual prostitutes for rich people.

How fucking mundane, Daryl thought, disappointed. He clicked back over to the photo again and looked even closer. Yes, the person standing between Kingsley and his wife did look extremely effeminate and might very well be a faggot, but he probably was not an actual tranny and definitely was not a biological female. He was probably just one of the airport workers at whatever airport the shot had been taken at posing with a celebrity couple who happened to be utilizing his services. This was completely and thoroughly uninteresting.

He returned the zoom level to normal and was, once again, about to simply delete the email and then maybe pull up some porno pictures of hot redheads and have a good wank. But then he looked at the image of Jake Kingsley again and the hatred of him began to surge anew. Maybe the guy in the picture wasn’t a tranny that Kingsley and his so-called wife were fucking, but they had probably done things like that in the past, hadn’t they? Undoubtedly! And shouldn’t people know that Kingsley was into shit like trannies and threesomes with them? They really should. Maybe if they knew he liked taking a tranny cock up his ass they would stop worshiping him like he was some kind of god.

Maybe someone should take his ass down a few notches, he thought, a plan starting to form in his head.

The hatred now turning to determination, Daryl saved the jpeg to his hard drive. He then opened up his Photoshop program and went to work. It did not take him long to remove the name Ron, the logo for FBO Services, and the patches of hair on the back of Ron’s hand from the shot. It took only a little longer to change the color of Ron’s sweater to a feminine pink. He then saved the doctored photo separately from the original and opened up his web browser. He brought up his Hotmail account, where he kept an email address separate from his main email account. He generally only used the Hotmail account for subscriptions to porn services and to prevent spam on his main account. Now, however, it would serve a new purpose. He painstakingly copied all of the contacts from his primary account onto the Hotmail account and then composed a new email that was addressed to all but that came from noneofyour_bizness@hotmail.com instead of DungeonMasterSupreme@BDI.net. He attached his doctored photo to the email and then began to compose his own description of the photo into the body of the email. But then he decided he needed a few more details to make what he was alleging seem more realistic.

He returned to the web browser and began to research Jake Kingsley and his whereabouts of late. He was able to pull up quite a bit of information in this regard as the Kingsleys had just been on a public relations jaunt for a ski resort in Idaho.

A story formed in his mind and he began to put it down in the email he was composing. Being a dungeon master, he was actually pretty good at writing prose and developing plots. He was smiling as he worked.

Celia arrived at Pauline’s house just past noon on Tuesday morning, December 10. The rain had finally gone away and it was bright and sunny outside, with the temperature just edging into the sixties. The sky was bright and blue (for LA anyway) thanks to the pollution-clearing bath it had just received from the winter storm that had blown through. Jake’s pickup truck was already there, parked at the curb next to the driveway. The Honda belonging to the Nerdlys was there as well. She parked her Mercedes behind Jake’s truck and walked up to the door.

She was pleasantly surprised when Laura opened the door to her knock. Teach did not usually attend the monthly KVA business meetings, declaring that they were boring (which they often were, Celia had to admit). She hugged her friend and one-time lesbian dallier warmly. They had not seen each other in several weeks now.

“What are you doing here?” Celia asked. “Did you decide our business meetings are interesting after all?”

“Not in the least,” Laura said. “I have a doctor’s appointment at two today. Jake said he would drive me there after the meeting.”

“A doctor’s appointment?” Celia asked. “Is everything okay?”

“Everything’s fine,” Laura assured her, a strange little smile on her face. “Just a routine checkup.”

“Oh ... well that’s good to hear,” Celia said, sensing that Laura was not being entirely truthful with her—Teach was a terrible liar—but not that she was trying to conceal bad news. Interesting.

“How are things going with you?” Laura asked, changing the subject. “All ready for the big move?”

“Pretty much,” Celia said. “Everything that I don’t need on a day-to-day basis is packed up and waiting for the movers. I can’t wait to spend my first night there. To listen to the ocean like I do when I stay at your place or in the Oregon house.”

“That is one of my favorite parts about living where we do,” Laura agreed. “And I’m looking forward to seeing how you decorate the place.”

“Me too,” Celia said with a laugh. She would not be doing the interior design herself as she really had no knack for that sort of thing. She would just be approving the plans the design firm she hired for the job came up with.

“And how’s the love life?” Laura asked her next. “The last you told me, you were thinking about giving that limo driver a ride of his own.”

Celia actually blushed a little. “Madres de Dios, Teach,” she said. “I wasn’t serious about that. I was just fantasizing out loud after a few too many glasses of wine.”

“You seemed serious to me,” she said with a giggle. “And I’ve seen him. He’s driven Jake and I around a few times. He’s attractive. And he’s single too.”

“Yeah,” Celia said, “which means he’s probably gay. In any case, the problem remains the same. I don’t have a connection with him that way. It’s a nice fantasy, but I’d never actually do it.”

“That’s too bad,” Laura said consolingly. “I bet he has an impressive gearshift.”

“Laura Kingsley!” Celia said. “I cannot believe you just said that!”

“Sorry,” Laura said with another giggle. “I’ve been spending a lot of time with Jake lately.”

They made their way toward the living room, where the meeting was to be held. Celia pondered her love life—or lack thereof—a bit during the journey. She still had had no male sexual companionship since that last night with Greg all those many months before and still had no prospects for any on the horizon. She did still get together with Suzie once a month or so—Suzie was now pilot-in-command of a Gulfstream that flew on-call out of San Diego—but those were only stopgap encounters. She was grateful for them, and still enjoyed the softness of a woman, but she was craving the firmness of a man quite badly at this point.

Everyone was already seated and ready when they arrived at the living room. Pauline and Obie sat on one couch while the Nerdlys sat on another. Jake was seated in one of the recliners watching Tabby and Kelvin play with toys on the floor. Tabby was teaching him the intricacies of the See and Say Farmer Says toy. Kelvin’s favorite animal on the wheel seemed to be the pig, which was perhaps a bit ironic as he was a practicing Jew.

Hugs and greetings were exchanged and drinks were offered. Celia accepted a glass of wine, which Pauline fetched from the bar. They then talked a little about Jake and Laura’s recent vacation and their stay with Laura’s brother in Pocatello.

“His youngest daughter, Chastity—Chase for short—worships you, C,” Laura told her. “She has your poster in her bedroom and everything.”

“In the bedroom you slept in?” Celia asked. “You mean I was looking down on you two in action for three nights?”

“You didn’t see much,” Jake said sourly. “Laura closed down the attractions for the duration of that little trip.”

“There was no way I was going to ... you know... do it in my nieces’ room,” Laura said defensively.

“You poor things,” Celia said with false sympathy. “You had to go three whole days without it? I can’t even imagine.”

They all had a little laugh at that. Even Kelvin and Tabby seemed to find it funny.

“Anyway,” Laura said. “When they come out in April, they would love to meet you, C. Especially Chase.”

“I can’t envision being unavailable for that come April,” Celia said. “I’d love to meet them.”

“Yay!” Laura said, clapping her hands a little. “I’ll let them know the next time I talk to them.”

“All right then,” Pauline said. “How about we start talking some business here?”

“Let’s do it,” Jake agreed. “We need to be out of here by 1:15 at the latest.”

“It shouldn’t take that long,” Pauline said. “First things first. Brainwash II. Aristocrat has agreed to our terms, including the provision that they promote Lighthouse to the best of their abilities when their debut CD is complete. They did not even argue the point much.”

“I think they’re starting to actually have faith in my ability to find and promote a new band,” Jake said. “They didn’t fight us on it because they know there’s a pretty good chance that I came up with another Brainwash for them.”

“Yes,” Pauline agreed. “That and the fact that we’re giving them forty percent for Lighthouse sales and we’ve agreed to pay for fifty percent of a tour if such a thing is deemed feasible and necessary.”

“There is one thing I should mention about Lighthouse at this point in the discussion,” Jake said.

“What’s that?” asked Obie.

“They are no longer called Lighthouse,” he said.

“Excuse me?” asked Pauline. This was the first she had heard of this.

“I did an internet search on the name,” said Nerdly. “It turns out that there is already a Canadian band out of Toronto named Lighthouse.”

“I’ve never heard of them,” Obie said.

“I’d never heard of them either,” Jake said. “They were at their peak of popularity back in the early seventies, mostly in Canada but with some crossover into the US. They do still exist and still tour today, again, mostly in Canada. If we release a CD by a band named Lighthouse, we could potentially be in violation of a Canadian copyright. And even if we’re not, it could create confusion. The band has agreed to change their name.”

“To what?” asked Pauline.

“They’re still talking it over,” Jake said, “but they’re leaning very heavily in favor of V-tach.”

“Vee tack?” asked Obie. “What the hell does that mean?”

“Ted came up with it,” Jake explained. “It’s apparently some kind of really nasty cardiac arrythmia that kills people. The actual name is ventricular tachycardia, but those in the medical field just call it V-tach. The letter V, a dash, and T-A-C-H.”

“It does sound kind of cool,” Pauline offered.

“And I think it does go more in line with the kind of music they’re making,” Jake said. “To tell you the truth, I never really cared much for the name Lighthouse anyway. It just seemed too ... oh ... easy listening for the genre they’re setting.”

“Okay,” Pauline said. “I don’t think that will change anything as far as our agreement with Aristocrat goes. I will need to inform them, however.”

“Just remember to also inform them that they have no say in the name-change,” Jake said. “None whatsoever. Remember, these are the same people who wanted me to call myself JD King and for Matt to call himself Rajin Storm. They don’t have a good track record on shit like this.”

“That was National that suggested those names,” Nerdly pointed out.

“It doesn’t matter,” Jake said. “A record company suit is a record company suit. They’re all cut from the same mold.”

“True,” Nerdly agreed. “I was just striving for strict accuracy of the facts at hand.”

“And we appreciate that,” Jake said. “In any case, I met with the boys at the studio yesterday and had them go through their repertoire for me. They’ve been working hard this last month, getting together at least five times a week to nail down their tunes. They’re clicking well and they’ve got eighteen solid tunes for us to choose from. My plan for this week is to start culling that number down to the ten that will be on the actual CD.”

“That’s good to hear,” Pauline said with a smile. “How are they doing financially? Did they already burn through their advance money?”

“They’re hanging in there,” Jake said. “They were all very nervous about quitting their regular jobs back when we recruited them for the TSF. In fact, we almost lost Ben because he was so reluctant to lose his safety net. But between the money they made from us paying them hourly for the TSF rehearsals, the money from the TSF itself, and the advance money we laid on them when they signed, they’re all keeping their heads well above water. They should be fine until their first royalty checks roll in.”

“Assuming that happens,” Obie said.

“I think it’s a pretty good assumption that they’ll go Platinum at the very least,” Jake said. “Have some faith in me.”

“That I do have,” Obie assured him. “You’ve proven yourself time and time again.”

“I have faith as well,” Pauline said. “And it’s a good thing. No other record company would have signed them with the numbers we have. At their fifteen percent royalty rate and with all the money we’ve spent on them so far, they need to sell at least eight hundred and fifty thousand CDs before KVA is in the black on them.”

“Even more if we finance half a tour,” Jake added. “But I believe it will happen. They’re good solid musicians who put out good solid tunes.”

“I agree,” Nerdly said. “I’ve been working with them while Jake and Laura were traveling. Their music is commercially viable in the alternative rock music genre and will be radio friendly when properly mixed and mastered.”

“Damn right,” Jake said. “They’ll be hitting the studio on February 1. I’ll get them up to Oregon and tucked into the house on January 27^th so they’ll have a few days to acclimate. Obie has our usual team assigned to the project and we have unlimited use of Studio 1 through April 1 for the actual recording and through May 1 for the mixing and mastering.”

“For my usual fee and royalty rate,” Obie added helpfully.

“Right,” Jake said. “Your usual fee and royalties.”

“Okay then,” Pauline said. “It sounds like we have our plan well in hand for Lighthouse ... uh ... sorry, V-tach.”

“If that’s the name they settle on,” Jake said.

“Right,” she said. “Now, how about we circle back to what we were originally talking about: Brainwash II?”

“Sounds good,” Jake said. “Aristocrat agreed to terms offered. Did they say when they can have songs on the radio and CDs on shelves?”

“Songs on the radio by spring break,” Pauline said. “CDs on shelves by April 22. They are also interested in financing a US and Canada tour if the CD goes Gold by June 15.”

Jake shook his head in disgust. “They want to finance a tour? The same people who have claimed since the beginning that Brainwash could never make it because they’re not attractive enough?”

“That’s right,” Pauline said. “Market value ticket pricing is a game changer for the industry. Now there’s profit to be made by sending a band out on the road to tour. They figure that with one multi-platinum CD under their belt and with another breaking Gold and getting favorable saturation airplay, people will pay for those hundred-dollar tickets to see Brainwash live no matter what they look like.”

“Maybe y’all could send them out with these heart attack people?” Obie suggested. “Have your new band open for your old band?”

“That’s actually a pretty good idea,” Pauline said. “Something that bears thinking about.”

“Let’s see how things go when the CD is released,” Jake said. Though he had not told anyone this, he was not as fond of the second Brainwash CD as he had been of the first. The tunes were solid and the Nerdlys had done a good job on them, but when Jake had heard the master for the first time he felt some doubt. The tunes were over-engineered to some degree; the victim of his absence in most of the recording process. Without him there to temper them, the Nerdlys had gone hog-wild and tried to create a musical masterpiece instead of simply making good music that would appeal to a mass audience.

“Well ... obviously,” Pauline said. “Still, it wouldn’t hurt to put the idea in their heads. I would suggest you bring it up the next time you talk to them.”

“I’ll plant the seed in their minds,” Jake promised, “but I can’t guarantee they would agree to tour. They would have to quit their teaching gigs to do that and I’m not sure they’re ready to take that step yet.”

“If their CD sells as well as the last one, they’ll be quite financially secure,” said Nerdly. “Every last one of them.”

“I know that, and you know that,” Jake said. “But will Brainwash be willing to take that step? That’s the unknown here.”