I Will Sing for You - 4. Acknowledging the Elephant

We pull into the Palm Shadows parking lot and I direct him to park next to my red Jeep Rubicon. “Cool,” he says as he parks. “You must do a lot of off-roading.”

“Yeah, I need it for my field research since I have to get into places where a car would never make it.”

He gets out of the car, steps up onto the sidewalk and admires the Jeep from the front. “Wow. You must end up in some pretty gnarly places if you need a winch, which looks like it’s had some use.”

“It has. Despite it being a Jeep, I’ve been mired up to the axles in mountain wash sand, so believe me, it definitely comes in handy, especially when I’m out in the desert alone, which is most of the time unless I’m fortunate enough to have an undergrad assisting me. And I’ve gotten into other tight spots where I’ve needed to use it as well.”

He looks at me and smiles. “I’m looking forward to getting to ride in it.”

“You will, Chris. I’ll take you out into the desert soon and give you an idea of what it can do.”

He lightly taps me on the arm with his knuckles and smiles. “I’m looking forward to it.”

Suddenly an idea occurs to me. “Actually, maybe you’d like to go out with me on my next research trip and I can show you what I do in the field.”

He beams. “Hey, I’d really like that, Callan!”

“I’m going up into the Santa Catalinas next week for a day to do some sampling and detailed geologic mapping. Would you like to come along? It means that you’ll have to miss classes for the day. Would that be a problem for you?”

“No,” he replies. “I can afford to miss a day. I can get someone take notes for me.”

“Good,” I smile. “I’ll plan it for a day when you don’t have to work.”

“I’m off on Wednesday,” he offers.

“Then I’ll schedule it for next Wednesday, which means that I’ll have to find someone to take my Physical Geology class. Fortunately, I don’t have a lab that day. Then I gesture to the stairs. “Shall we?”

“I need to get my guitar,” he says, heading to the back of his car, popping the hatch open with his key fob and removing his guitar case.

When he returns, I gesture for him to lead, saying, “It’s apartment 2210.”

Chris precedes me, my eyes focused on the way his jeans hug and conform to the graceful curves of his butt, accentuating its every detail as he climbs the stairs ahead of me.

By the time we reach the second floor, I have an obvious problem which Chris will undoubtedly discover when he turns to face me; which he does when he asks, “Apartment 2210, right?” I see his eyes immediately go to my crotch, but he says nothing, presumably to spare me more embarrassment than I already feel.

“Yes,” I reply. “To the right.”

He proceeds to the right until he reaches my apartment, then stands aside and looks away, again presumably to spare me embarrassment as I unlock the door. Once open, I usher him inside ahead of me and then close the door behind me.

“Nice,” he says, scanning the living room, complete with a 50” Samsung smart 4K UHD TV with HDR and associated Bose theater system facing a Norwegian brown leather couch on the opposite wall bracketed by two Norwegian brown leather recliners with ottomans, and, of course, my Taylor 814ce DLX proudly displayed in its stand in the corner. He rests his guitar against the wall beside it, then sits in one of the recliners and smiles. “Nice place, Callan. Nice… everything.”

“I buy only the best,” I reply, “because it looks good and it lasts.”

Then I lead him into the kitchen/dining area with 42” glass table and four chairs and a breakfast bar with three swivel barstools.

“Nice,” he says.

“Two bathrooms,” I say, leading him by the main bath, “the other being the master ensuite bath complete with shower and Jacuzzi tub.”

“And this is the master bedroom,” I say, sweeping my arm to indicate the king-sized bed, matching nightstands, a dresser and a full-length standing mirror. “The other being the spare bedroom which I use as an office.”

“So, can I offer you something to drink: beer, sparkling or plain water?” I ask as I lead Chris back into the kitchen.

“A beer would be fine,” he replies, to which I remove two Barrio Citrazonas from the fridge, remove the caps and hand him one.

“I’ll get your guitar,” I say, heading to the living room.

Quickly returning, I lay the case on the table, smile and say, “I’ve been eagerly awaiting this moment.”

“I know,” he timidly smiles as he opens the case and removes an Ovation 6-string acoustic guitar. Not shabby, I think to myself. Not shabby at all. Ovation is a good guitar. “But like I said, I’m nowhere near as good as you, Callan.”

“Let me decide that for myself,” I smile. “So, would you prefer a barstool or to stand while performing?”

“I’ll stand,” he replies as he shoulders his guitar strap and strums a G-chord which sounds slightly out of tune.

“Hold on a second,” I say. “I’ll get my tuner.”

I return with my PolyTuner, clip it onto the headstock of his guitar and say, “Now strum all the strings open.” He looks at me like I’m nuts, then does it. I notice that the low E-string and A-string are spot on, but the D, G, B and high E ring slightly flat. “Since this is a PolyTuner, there are six LEDs, one for each string and in the same order as the strings, the left LED being the low E-string and the right LED being the high E-string, ” I explain. Green means spot on as are the low E- and A-strings. Red above green means that a string is sharp and red below green means it is flat. As you can see, the D-, G-, B-, and high E-strings are all slightly flat.”

“Wow. I didn’t know that an electronic tuner could do all six strings at the same time.”

I smile. “It’s for quick tuning. Because it’s the patented PolyTune function, this is the only tuner that does it. It also has a chromatic function as well as a strobe function for very accurate individual string tuning to within +/-0.02 cents.”

“Wow. I like it,” he says, tuning the errant strings until all LEDs shine green.

“At $50 dollars, it’s kind of spendy, but well worth it if you have to quickly tune while performing.”

Once tuned, Chris capos the third fret and begins strumming an intro of three sixth-fret barre chords that look like variations of C with respect to the capo. Then he launches into the song Don’t Dream It’s Over written and recorded in 1986 by Neil Finn of the New Zealand rock band Crowded House. When he finishes the song, the first words out of my mouth are, “Wow! That was really good, Chris. I think it’s the first time that I’ve heard it performed by anyone but Crowded House. You’ll have to teach me to play it.”

“I will. I’ll also give you a copy of the sheet music with chords and verses.”

“Cool. So what do you mean you’re not very good. You’re every bit as good as I am!”

“I’d like to fingerpick as good as you.”

“You learn the Travis pick and you’re mostly there because it’s the most popular fingerpicking pattern. I’ll teach it to you when you can stay longer. I know that you have to work.”

He gazes at me, wanly smiling. “But I could get you started on Don’t Dream It’s Over now if you want. I don’t have to be at work until 5:00.”

“Sure!” I beam. “Let’s do it in the living room where we have more room.”

Ushering him into the living room, I remove my guitar from its stand, shoulder it and capo the third fret. Then I clip the tuner to the headstock, check the tuning and make the necessary adjustments. Once it’s tuned, Chris stands facing me and says, “It’s in the key of E_b-major, the third fret above the capo. The intro is E_bsus², followed by E_b⁷sus² and E_b⁷sus⁴.” He demonstrates each chord as he describes them. “The main chords are E_bsus², Csus², A_b, B_b, Gsus², G and Cm.” He demonstrates them too, half of them being barre chords.

After working on it for a half hour or so with Chris accompanying me on his guitar and singing the lyrics, I’m finally getting to the point where I can perform it on my own with Chris singing the lyrics.

“It sounds like you’ve got it,” he smiles after we end the song. “I’ll give you the chords and lyrics when I see you on Wednesday.”

“How about planning to spend Tuesday night here?” I suggest as I unshoulder my guitar and cradle it in its stand. “That way you don’t have to get up early Wednesday morning to drive here. I’ll sleep on the couch and you can have my bed.”

“I can’t take your bed, Callan,” he says, then shrugs. “We could share the bed, though… If you want.”

I purse my lips as I hold his eyes. “You’re probably thinking that I’m ignoring what happened in the car on the way here. Aren’t you?”

“You’re reading my mind,” he softly replies.

“Well, I’m not ignoring it, Chris. I just want to proceed cautiously here because I don’t really know where we’re headed. And there’s a four-year age difference, too, remember.”

“I don’t consider that a problem, Callan.”

“Well, I don’t want to give you the impression that I have… expectations, because I don’t, Chris.”

He unshoulders his guitar and lays it on the couch, then approaches me until we’re standing mere centimeters apart. Looking me dead in the eyes, he says, “Right now I feel like I did in the car when I was holding your hand on my thigh. I wanted to kiss you then, Callan, and I want to kiss you now. There’s nothing wrong with that. Is there?”

“No,” I reply, bracing his arms with my hands as I gaze into his eyes. “I want that too, Chris. But a kiss is a start, and I don’t want to rush into anything that we might regret afterwards, because I respect you.”

“I respect you, too, Callan. And I don’t want to start anything really serious unless we’re both ready for it.” Then I watch as his lips close in on mine.

“Wow…” I smile, feeling hot when he pulls away. “That was nice.”

“It was for me, too,” he smiles. “I’m looking forward to spending a day in the desert with you and seeing what you do in your work.”

“I’m looking forward to spending a day in the desert with you, too,” I smile. “I might even get you to become a geologist, too.”

“Never know,” he smiles. “So I should leave since I have to go home and change clothes before work.”

“Yeah,” I smile. “Thank you for a wonderful afternoon, Chris.”

“You’re welcome.” He gives me a peck on the lips, then packs up his guitar. I see him to the door, then accompany him down to his car and watch as he stows his guitar in the back. After lowering the hatch, he slides behind the wheel and starts his car.

“Goodbye, Callan,” he smiles as he backs out.

“Goodbye, Chris,” I reply with a wave of my hand, then watch as he weaves his way out to Speedway Blvd, then blends into the traffic and is gone.

Already, I miss him.