The Ferlinghetti Twins

 

~ 1 ~

The Ferlinghetti twins, Jason and Jenna, were groomed from the time they got into high school to take over the family business. They earned their tuition to a private high school and the FIU, or the Florida International College of Business, by spending their entire summers in the Miami office with their dad, Louis, watching him work, learning the mechanics of making deals, arranging the shipments and overseeing the deliveries. 

Louis had inherited Ferlinghetti Shipping from his father, who had inherited it from his father. The three generations had built the company from the ground up and Louis had no real intention of letting anyone else run it but his children. To say he was fanatical about that would have been an understatement. The business was the family’s legacy. And after they finished college, it would be Jason and Jenna’s to run. He would stay around for a few weeks to guide them, then he and their mother, Maria, would finally get to take that trip around the world.

During their first week, Jason and Jenna sat down in the boardroom with their father and a man named Aaron Field, whom they had known for several years but never quite knew what exactly he did. He was just around and spent a lot of time with Louis. Whenever Louis travelled, Aaron went with him. When Louis was on vacation, Aaron took care of the company.

They sat in the large boardroom with coffees in front of them. 

“Well, you’re finally here.” Louis said. “I just want to tell you a couple of important things. The first is that I am happy you both decided to take over the company. This eases my mind and makes me feel quite optimistic about the future.”

Louis took a sip of his coffee. “As I have been watching you over the years, it very much seemed to me that there is a definite difference in your interests. So Jenna, your responsibility will be on the financial side of the business. Our chief accountant, Tony Primo, will work with you to get you up to speed. Jason, you will be responsible for operations. This will involve travel and making sure that our ships and warehouses are all staffed with qualified people. Your main man in this area will be Liam Forbes, who is the operations manager.”

Louis took a deep breath. “And last but not least, is Aaron. He will be your right hand. If anything goes wrong, he will help you fix it. He will be your bodyguard and your confidant. Because every business owner needs someone like Aaron.”

“What about Jenna?” Jason asked. 

“Your sister will be working almost exclusively in the office. There are a number of built-in protections here, thanks to Aaron.”

Jason looked puzzled. “What is it exactly we need protection from?” 

“Our ships work the east-west and north-south Atlantic lanes. There are elements in certain countries that would like to use our ships to transport illicit cargo. Drugs, people, and weaponry mostly. The safeguards we have built into the company have so far been effective at keeping them at bay. But that is the constant struggle we face.

“When the world finds out that you and your sister have taken over the business,” Aaron said. “There will be overtures made by different individuals. These will sound quite intriguing at first glance, but it’s critical that you investigate each one to make sure they are legitimate. Aaron will show you all the ins and outs of that.”

There wasn't anything inherently violent about the business, but the risk was always there. So they were both given 9MM Berettas and an instructor named Max, who had taught them how to handle their weapons and the best places to shoot someone, depending on the result they wanted to achieve. Max also taught them a bit about physical self-defence, because, in his words, “You just never knew when things would get up close and personal.”

~ 2 ~

The twins were good-looking young people, because their mother Maria and their father were both good-looking older people. Neither Jason and Jenna were virgins because they took full advantage of their extracurricular time in college to experiment. But neither of them had any real interest in romantic attachments at the moment. They were both quite intelligent and picky about the people they would allow themselves to associate with. It wasn’t arrogance, it was just instinct. Besides, they had a business to run and that would definitely limit any fun time they would have wanted to have, at least until they got a handle on things.

None of this bothered them, mainly because they had both become fascinated with the business they had been in since their teen years. But they were also equally obsessed with becoming as rich as humanly possible with the tools they had at their disposal.

The business they were being groomed to take over was what fit into the category of import/export. They owned a fleet of fourteen ocean-going freighters, half of which carried containers, the other half fuel and chemicals. They had warehouses and agents in coastal cities throughout North, Central and South America, as well as several warehouses in western European ports. The business their father had set up was nearly flawless. Everyone from the freight and warehouse managers to the boat crews, the loaders, and the overland drivers were all handsomely paid. Any attempt at graft or theft was dealt with harshly and then broadcast through the industry, which, as Louis discovered, was an extremely effective incentive.

No legal actions were taken. Because the last thing Louis wanted to do was draw undue attention to the company. No, any dissent was dealt with by Aaron Field, who was, in addition to Louis’s right hand, the company enforcer. Anyone needing discipline, because there was always one chance given, was put in a room with Aaron, and given a low-key talking to that coming from anyone else might seem trivial, but coming from Aaron, who could dial up the menace in his voice without resorting to anything close to anger, the fear of god was definitely put into them. 

Second-time offenders were simply fired and messages were sent to the executive offices of about a dozen different ocean freight companies, virtually blacklisting them. It was an unspoken agreement between these companies, which had to rely almost one hundred percent on the honesty of their employees. This ‘blacklist’ was a well-known concept in the ocean freight business, which meant that throughout the company’s 50-year history, there had only been a few second-time offenders. Through the course of the last 20-odd years since Louis took the reins of the company from his own father, there had been only three wrongful termination suits filed, and the Ferlinghetti freight lawyer, a man named David Sims, dealt with them out of court and out of the prying eyes of the shipping trade press. 

Over the past ten years, another thing that Aaron had done, with the help of Ray Simon, a young computer genius he had hired, was to create an internal communications system for the company that put all the key personnel, sales, warehouse management, ship captains and warehouse forepersons into a network that could be assembled quickly at any given time. Aaron was no computer expert, but an excellent judge of talent and human nature, which is why he was so important to the company. The online presence and e-commerce of the company was handled by a lady named Fiona Jacobs, who was an MIT graduate in computer science whom Aaron had recruited on her graduation day to work hand in glove with Ray Simon. She had been with the company ever since, and had her own little logistics kingdom in a corner of the head office. She had three assistants, all of whom were from MIT. Several years into her tenure at Ferlinghetti Freight, she and Aaron had moved in together.

~ 3 ~

It was a Monday, and the Ferlinghetti team was assembled, in person and online to meet Jason and Jenna.

As is the yin and yang of twins, Jenna was the introverted one, Jason the outgoing one. So after an introduction from their father, Louis, he turned the meeting over to Jason.

“Hello, Ferlingettis. We will be taking over the management of the company. And though we have been learning about it for the past several years, we are now going to be hands-on and full-time. I will work with Aaron to handle any personnel and operational issues that might arise. My sister, who is much smarter than me, will be working with Tony Primo to handle the business side of things and make sure we are maintaining our levels of profitability. Our father will be, after their honeymoon cruise, be available to advise us. And, of course, we have Aaron, so you can rest assured there won’t be any rookie mistakes.

“My sister and I have no intention of changing a thing, although we are keeping an eye out for any means of expanding our customer base, and we welcome any suggestions you might have. That’s it. We’re here to help keep the ship of Ferlinghetti Freight on course, just like you. Have a great day, and thanks for listening.”

ONE WEEK LATER

A large bon voyage party for Louis and Maria took place on a Sunday afternoon at the Ferlinghetti residence in North Miami. Managers from every warehouse and Captains from at least ten of the fleet’s fourteen ships were on hand to wish their departing boss all the best. 

After the party was over and the caterers were cleaning up, Louis took Aaron aside. They stepped out onto the terrace and lit small cigars as they looked out over the harbour.

“I’m leaving you in charge of the most precious things in my life, my friend. Keep them on the straight and narrow. Once the news gets out, the temptation will come from everywhere. It’s gonna take at least another year for them to weather all that.”

Aaron said nothing for quite a while. Then he spoke.“You know, Lou. I think you could be underestimating them. I’ve been watching them both, and listening to Liam and Tony. Those guys are both hard as diamonds, and they are quite impressed.”

Louis took a deep breath. “Yeah, maybe I’m being a little overprotective. They’re my whole life, Aaron.”

“They’ll be fine. You raised them the best way you could. You raised them to think like you. Take your lovely wife and go enjoy yourself. Everything will still be here, and hopefully even more profitable when you get back.”

Louis put his arm around Aaron’s shoulder. “I’m counting on you to make sure of that.” he said.

The two men stared out at the harbour.

Over the six months, Jason and Jenna, under their father’s expert tutelage, had grown into their roles beautifully. No longer green graduates, they were experienced import-export people who were now free to make their mark on the company. 

Jenna had worked hand-in-glove with Tony Primo and had quickly gotten into the rhythm of the business. Jason had been to every warehouse and on every ship in the fleet with Aaron and Liam Forbes. Both Jenna and Jason had received glowing reports from their respective mentors, which were passed to Louis in regular teleconferences by Aaron Field.

~ 4 ~

Jason and Jenna both still lived at home, which was a big house on Biscayne Bay, a relatively short drive from their office.

The house was big enough that there was more than enough privacy for both of them, so they could come and go as they pleased.  And with Jason spending so much time on the road, they hardly ever ran into each other, which was fine with both of them, since they were trying to create their own lives.

When their parents returned, they would have a family meeting and decide what to do next. Their parents showed a real interest in moving to somewhere further north along Lauderdale Beach. Jenna, being as introverted as she was, preferred her own company to that of the few friends she had made in college. One of the things she liked to do in the evenings was cook, so three or four days a week after work, she would cruise around the Sabor Tropical Food market looking for interesting ingredients to make her dinners.

This is where she ran into David North, who was an old friend from high school. David, with long brown hair and eyes to match behind a pair of rimless glasses, recognized Jenna right away, and after a bit of back and forth, Jenna started to remember him.

“So you and your brother Jason both went to FIU?”  David asked.

“Yeah, we graduated a year ago and have just started running the family shipping business.” Jenna said, mildly surprised that she felt so comfortable talking to David. “And you?”

“Oh. I uh, decided not to go to college. Instead, I applied for an apprenticeship program at a mechanical engineering firm in Boca. I’ve been there for four years. The first two were fairly low-paying, but that improved as I got to know the business. Are you still living down at the shore?”

“Yeah. My folks gave my brother and me the business to run and they’ve headed off for a trip around the world. They’ll be gone for another six months or so.”

“Wow, you guys seem pretty young to be running a big concern like Ferlinghetti’s.”

“We have a lot of help. So it’s not so bad. I do the office stuff. Jason handles the boats, new business, the ports and the people.”

“So what brings you to the market today?” David asked.

“Not sure. I just like to cook, and so I look around and get whatever’s interesting. Sometimes Jason’s home, mostly he’s not. That works for both of us.”

“I remember you always were kind of shy.”

“That hasn’t changed at all.” Jenna said.

“Oh really?  You seem to be anything but shy right now.”

Jenna thought about that for a moment, and then she said. “So what brings you down here?”

“Just doing some shopping. I live close by and I like to cook too.”

“As I recall, you have an older brother.”

“Yeah, Donnie. We share a small house up in Wynwood. We took off from home just before I got into high school. Long story…So how do you like your new job?”

 “I’m getting to like it. I haven’t been at it for very long,” Jenna said.

David found himself quite attracted to Jenna. His mind was racing to figure out a way to get to see her again. 

“Hey, maybe we should cook something together. You show me your tricks, I’ll show you mine.” David said.

Jenna’s shyness meant she was also not a very impulsive person. When she hesitated David saw that she was becoming uncomfortable.

“That was probably the worst pickup line ever spoken.” He said.

Jenna laughed. But it had disarmed her. “Yeah, it was pretty bad.”

“But it also was sincere.” David said, and let it just hang there.

Jena looked at him. Then she looked down at the ground, and she raised her head again.”

Okay, Mr North. You’re on.” Jenna said, “Give me your phone.” 

David handed over his phone and Jenna added her number to his phone book, then handed it back to him.

“Call me tomorrow. Maybe we can do something on the weekend.” Jenna said.

David stood there smiling. “Well, it was great running into you, Jenna. I’ll give you a call and I’m free any time on the weekend.”

“Good, we’ll work out a time.” And with that, Jenna turned and walked away, very proud of the fact that she had set her natural shyness aside, even if only for a short time. 

~ 5 ~

David North lived with his older brother Donnie. They were what Donnie called voluntary orphans, meaning there were no parents involved because they were both hopeless alcoholics. Donnie doubted that they even knew he had packed up all their worldly possessions into a U-Haul truck and moved to another part of the city while they were out getting hammered.. That was five years ago.

Donnie was a dealer, a profession he started in high school, which was as far as his formal education went. He specialized in high-grade Mexican marijuana and had developed an excellent connection with a very small Mexican cartel represented by a man named Raul Vega. Donnie was quite enterprising and he and Raul had built up a substantial street dealer network that they expanded to include several cities, from Coral Gables all the way up to Jacksonville. 

Donnie and Raul had been doing so for about six years. Raul had an excellent system for moving hundreds of pounds at a time through a well-established maritime network. Together, Raul and Donnie would travel up and down the coast in Raul’s high-end BMW and distribute five, ten and fifteen-pound packages to dealers in more than two dozen different areas. Raul and Donnie were 20% net partners in this venture. Raul provided the initial capital, and his family grew the product. Their legitimate business was fruit growing. Rauls family took 50%,. The remaining 10% was for expenses for Raul’s boat and payoffs to selected Coast Guard people. It was a very good arrangement and had worked flawlessly. It had also allowed Donnie to send his little brother to the same private high school that Jenna and Jason Ferlinghetti attended.

This, along with David’s salary from the engineering company after high school allowed the brothers to live modestly but comfortably in their own small house in an okay area on the north side of downtown Miami.

Over the previous year, Donnie and Raul had started having conversations about what would happen after weed was finally legalized in America. 

Raul, who  came from a farming family in southern Mexico, was quite enterprising, had a connection, a cousin who was a chemist and heavy into the pharmaceuticals market. Specifically, designer drugs. He was currently working on a unique semi-hallucinogenic phenethylamine compound in pill form. The pills were about half the size of an aspirin tablet and packed a pretty decent punch. Raul told Donnie that they were still in the process of refining it to reduce some of the punch, but he was convinced that this would be the next big thing in the designer drug world. The advantage that it had was that it was clean and non-addictive, chemically. Psychologically, well, that was a different story. 

When Donnie and Raul explained this to David, he challenged David, the young mechanical engineer, to come up with a foolproof way to ship quantities of these pills up to Miami, where Donnie and Raul would work to convert and expand their existing east coast network with a product that was even more potentially profitable than the marijuana.

David thought about this for the better part of a week while he was at work and even when he wasn’t. Then one day, he woke up with an idea. He knew that Raul was the local distributor for his family’s papaya, mangos and avocados, which meant he had complete control over the containers that the products were shipped in. Raul’s brother Carlos was the shipper and warehouse manager for the family’s legal export business, He also told David that they fabricated their own shipping containers in a small workshop in Heroica Veracruz, which was where they shipped their fruit and produce.

~ 6 ~

It was a Saturday morning when David got his idea, the first thing he did was to sketch it out on his computer, but he also wanted to build a prototype so he walked over to his local grocery store and asked for the guy in the produce department if he could have one of the box tops that the oranges came in, which were a little over a foot deep. He brought it home, then rode his scooter over to his local Home Depot and bought a couple of scrap pieces of four by four inch hardwood that were a little more than a foot long.  He then rode his scooter over to the machine shop where he worked, which was closed, but he had his own key.

When he was done, he had four triangular corner braces that measured four inches by four inches by a little more than five and a half inches, with a straight two-inch diameter hole down the centre of each one. The hole in the wood was about an one inch short of coming through the entire piece. Finally, he cleaned up the shop and headed home to show his brother and Raul what he was thinking.

Donnie was sitting at the kitchen table, drinking coffee with Raul Vega. The week before, Raul told David that his cousin, the chemist, finally had a finished product that he’d been working on for the past several months. He and Donnie were making a list of potential names for the pills. They had finally settled on Manic-Minis, or M & Ms. When David came in with the wood, he got the orange box and put it on the table where the two older men were sitting. 

“I’ve been thinking about the shipping challenge for the pills.” David said, “And I think I have come up with a solution.” He looked at Raul. “But it has to be coordinated from your end.”

He then took them through his idea, placing each triangle of wood in the corner of the small orange box with the hole side up on one of the pieces.

“Your larger shipping containers have triangular wooden reinforcements in each corner to keep them stable when they are being handled during shipping. I know this because I saw it at your warehouse one night.” David said. “So I made a little demo.  What I did was drill a two-inch diameter hole into the geometric centre of each of these triangular pieces. These are diagonally cut four by fours. They would be screwed, as opposed to glued, into the corners of a shipping crate so each one can be re-used three or four times at least. I’ve made two-inch diameter holes in each corner piece. From what you’ve told me about the pills, I would estimate that every two and a half feet of a two-inch hole, will hold, you know, at least a couple thousand of these pills. So you can ship out about eight maybe nine thousand or more pills with each box.

If you sprinkle a little bit of spice, like cinnamon or nutmeg, into each hole after you insert the plastic bags, it will throw the dogs off, if your cargo gets inspected at the border. Each piece goes into the corner of the box, the hole side down, you can just cover it over with masking tape, and screw them in. I don’t think there’s a sniffer dog in the world who would be able to figure that out. Then you ship it all out with the fruit in it, take out the pills when they get here, re-screw the corner braces and send them back. Easy peasy.”

“Jesus Christ, David!” Donnie said. “It’s so simple I’m surprised that nobody’s thought of it.”

“I don’t know about that. But I feel strongly that this will do what you want it to do.” David said.

Raul just smiled. “You are a very clever fellow. David,]. The authorities are obsessed with the contents of the crate, not with the crate itself.”

“That’s the idea.” David replied, “As I remember,  your shipping crates were about two and a half feet high. So you figure out how many pills you can get into each hollowed bracket, then multiply that by four and multiply that by the number of crates in each shipment. You can’t make the holes any larger because you have to put screws in on either side of the corner pieces to hold them in place and you don’t want them cutting into the bags. And since you and your brother are controlling the supply at either end, nobody else has to know. You just unscrew the brackets, empty them out and refasten them. When the screw holes get loose, you just re-screw them above or below, or replace the brackets. There’s a bit of overhead for the wood and the fabrication, but that’s about it. 

“The best part is, unlike the weed that comes by small boat, this is trucked in and there’s nobody to really pay off, so it’s really profitable and a viable solution.”

Raul was thinking. “I get your point. This idea has a lot of value.”

“Glad you like it.” David said.

David kept the wood and tossed the box into his recycling bin. Raul shook his hand and got up with one of the pieces of wood that David had used.

“I will talk to my brother and get them going on this. Once we’re in business, I will definitely see that some money comes your way, amigo. This is what you Americanos call a big idea. He pronounced it ‘beeeg’.

“I think it might be.” David said as Raul opened the back door. Then Raul said to Donnie. “Give me a week or so to get things going. According to my cousin, he’s already starting to manufacture the pills.”

“That’s great.” Donnie replied as the back door closed behind Raul.

“Well, little brother, all that engineering work is starting to pay off.”

“Yeah, I guess. I just hope it works. Hardly anybody gives a shit about weed these days. But designer drugs, that’s a whole different ball game.”

“Who knows, maybe Raul can get his cousin to bring his manufacturing here.” Donnie said

“That would be far and away the best option for you both. Anyway, I gotta go.” David replied. And he started to pack up his stuff.

“Where you off to?” Donnie asked.

“Got a date, well it’s not really a date. I’m getting together with an old friend from high school.”

“A female friend.”

“As a matter of fact, yes.”

“Okay. You go, boy!” 

~ 7 ~

David got off his scooter in the driveway of the Ferlinghetti house. He couldn’t see, but he could smell the ocean behind it. He took a small bouquet of flowers out of his saddle bag and walked up to the front door. Just as he was about to ring the bell when the door opened and Jason Ferlinghetti stood there. Both men were a little startled. They stared at each other, then Jason lifted his finger. “David North…It’s been a while.”

“Hey Jason. How have you been?”

“Doin’ just fine. Jenna told me you would be coming over to make some dinner with her.”

“That’s the idea.”

“That’s a good plan.” Jason said. “And what about you? What are you up to these days?” 

“Mechanical engineering. I work for a firm out near the airport. Been there for about four years now. It’s a good gig. Keeps me hoppin’. I hear you and Jenna have taken over the whole shipping company.”

“Yeah. We have a lot of good people helping us out. We’re just basically making sure things don’t screw up. Lot of moving pieces.”

“I can imagine.”

Just then, an Uber pulled up to the house and honked its horn. “Have fun. David.” Jason said. Then he turned and yelled. “JENNA!!”  Then he turned back to David and picked up his bag. “Good to see you again. Jenna will be down in a minute. Go on in. There’s a bottle of wine on the counter.”

“Good to see you too, Jason.” David said.

Jenna appeared in the doorway. Jason waved goodbye as he walked down to the waiting Uber. 

“Come on in, David.” she said.

David handed her the flowers.

“Well, thank you.” Jenna said.

They walked through the house, which was a lot bigger inside than it looked from the outside. Jenna fussed around getting the flowers into some water. “Jason wanted to check you out. Hope it didn’t over-interrogate you.”

“Naa. Just the usual catchin’ up stuff.”

“Yeah, well, he can be a handful when he wants to.”

“It’s OK. He’s a protective brother. I have one of those myself.”

Jenna was dressed in a pair of shorts with a light denim shirt on top. David had a pair of jeans and a black T-shirt under a blue sports jacket. 

Jenna poured out a couple glasses of wine and they toasted their culinary success. Then Jenna handed David an apron and they got to work. Through the emails they sent back and forth previously, they decided on Italian. So David brought a big Romaine lettuce and the ingredients for a dressing. Then they worked together to make the sauce and cook the spaghettini. Jenna had already made and cooked the meatballs, so they heated them up in the sauce. David made the pasta and put the Caesar salad together. 

Half an hour later they were sitting down at the dining room table eating. 

“Wow, the meatballs! I need the recipe for those.” David said.

“Well, I don’t know about that. I mean, it’s an old family recipe.” Jenna said but there was a hint of satire in her voice.

“You know,” David said after a few seconds, “I thought by now you and Jason would have moved into places of your own.” David said.

“Yeah, we thought about that. But then there would be furniture to buy and walls to paint. And then if we got married, or whatever, it might change again. We really don't have time for all that right now. Besides, my parents are gone for a year and when they get back, they’re planning to move out of Miami further up the coast somewhere. Fort Lauderdale or thereabouts. Jason, as you can see, is hardly ever here, so here we are in the family house. 

They finished up their dinner and chatted about all kinds of innocuous things.

When they were done, Jenna said, Would you like a tour?”

“Well, sure.”

“Good, then we can have some cheesecake and coffee.”

“You made cheesecake?” David asked.

Jenna chuckled. “No, I’m not there yet.”

Jenna and David walked through the house. He noticed that there was a large study and an even larger living room. The master bedroom was also on the first floor and looked out onto Biscayne Bay. They went upstairs and Jenna explained that each of the two large bedrooms had their own bathrooms, even their own exterior entrances to a mutual deck with steps down to the backyard and the pool. 

They took the steps down and walked to the end of the backyard. There was a large dock there with seating for four people. They sat down on the dock, looking out over the bay.

“What, no boat?” David asked.

Jenna just chuckled. “Everybody who comes here asks that question. No, no boat. Nobody has any time for a boat. Maybe that will change someday.”

“Well, you seem to have everything else.” David said.

“Yeah. The business is quite successful. Our job now, Jason’s and mine, is to keep it going strong.”

“I really admire that. My parents could barely make enough to feed us when we were young. But we got away from them, Donnie and I. We don’t live like this, but we do OK, all things considered.”

“Wow, your brother must do OK, being able to put you through Gulliver. That’s not an inexpensive school.”

“Yeah, he does quite well.”

“So what is his business?” Jenna asked.

“Weed.”

Jenna took a moment to process that. “Does he ever run into any trouble, you know, with the cops or the DEA?”

“No.” David stopped and thought about what he was going to say next. “Donnie has a partner from Mexico. Nice guy from a well-connected family. All of the product he moves comes from there. They have some kind of system to get stuff into the country. I don’t know much about it. But they’ve been doing it for about four years, and nobody’s really noticed. Their network stretches from here to Jacksonville. They stash the product in a produce warehouse that Donnie’s partner manages for his family. They import a lot of papaya, mangos and avocados and mostly supply Mexican food stores in the area.” 

“Well, nobody really cares about marijuana anymore,” Jenna said. “It’s well on its way to legalization.”

“Yeah, but I’ve tried some legal weed that my brother bought in Georgia and there’s really no comparison to what’s underground. My brother and his partner believe there will be always be a market for what they sell. It’s pretty high end as those things go. But like I said. I don’t know much about the business end of it all. I’m too busy with my engineering job.”

They started to walk back to the house. 

“This is really a beautiful place, Jenna. I can see why you wouldn’t want to move.”

“It’s also really close to work, and you know what traffic is like in this city.”

“Tell me about it. That’s why I ride a scooter to work. ”

When they got to the kitchen, Jenna made some coffee. They continued chatting about this and that. Not so much about people, because both Jenna and David were kind of loners. David told her about his job, which mostly involved building prototype products for entrepreneurs with big ideas. He also told her he was not at liberty to discuss any of that stuff, but that it was really interesting work and he got to work with some very smart people. They also talked about sports and David discovered that Jenna was a great Miami Heat basketball fan.

Jenna got a small cheesecake out of the refrigerator and set it down on the table. She ran the knife under the hot water for a while then cut the cheesecake into pieces.

“I don’t go to the games. I mean I did once, with my dad, but I enjoy watching it on TV a lot more.” Jenna said.

“Me too. I went a couple of times with my brother, and all it felt like was a bunch of really tall skinny guys running around. It really does help when you have the commentary and the different camera angles.”

“ I know!” Jenna said.

They drank their coffee and chatted for another hour and then David looked at his watch. “It’s gettin’ kinda late. I should be heading home.”

Jenna just smiled and they both got up and walked to the front door.”

“I really had a good time tonight Jenna. We should do it again.”

“Me too. And I agree.”

“Maybe I’ll bring my guitar next time. I’ve been playing around writing songs. It would be good to have an audience that wasn’t my brother.”

Jenna just stared at David for a moment. “There’s a lot more to you than meets the eye.” she said.

David just smiled sheepishly. “I don’t really know if I’m any good at it. But I spend a lot of my free time on it and have pretty much mastered the guitar and, in an amateurish way, the piano.”

“I’d love to hear your songs, David. Really.”

David smiled. There was an awkward moment of silence, and then David kissed her, very gently. “‘Night Jenna. I’ll call you.”

“Please do.“ Jenna said.

David opened the door and Jenna slowly closed it. ‘What an interesting evening.’ she said to herself.

 

~ 8 ~

The next morning was a Sunday. David was sitting in the kitchen with a coffee, his guitar and his laptop opened on the table. He was staring at a lyric he had written and singing the first couple of lines in order to find the right chord progression to make it work the way he heard it in his head. He was not one of those musicians with perfect pitch, but he was smart enough and good enough to know when he had hit it. Once he had it, he very quickly figured out the rest of it, and typed the chord progression into his computer beneath the lyric.

Then with the chords in his head, he started playing through the song, kind of whispering the lyrics as he went along, working to figure out the changes. 

After two verses, he got to the chorus, then he stopped and thought about it for a while. He played the chord progression a couple of times before he figured it out so he mumbled his way through that and got to the final verse. He wasn’t thinking about anything but the chords he would use. He could work on an instrumental break later on. All he wanted was to make sure the song flowed the way he was hearing it in his head. For the next half hour, he went through the song and noted all the chords and their progression. Then he sang the song aloud with the chord structure he had created.

Someone I once knew

One day said to me

That I could never give my heart away

Or let love set me free

That I’d be doomed to live my life

As a solitary soul

Never sharing, never caring

Never feeling whole

Someone I once knew

Told me this would be my fate

And like a fool I never believed her

Until it was way too late

And now I live to regret

Having ever let her go

And I try to forget all the things

That I was never supposed to know

Someone I once knew

Just a memory

Of all I could have had

Of all that love could be

And now I know that I

Didn’t have to end up alone and blue

If only I had opened up my heart

To someone I once knew

They say it’s a lonely soul

Who never sees the signs

Who never lets their heart depart

From the path their head defines

There was a time so long ago

I didn’t believe that was true

But that was before I broke the heart

Of someone I once knew

As he was finishing the song. Donnie walked into the kitchen. He was dressed in jeans and a jacket.

“Sounds pretty good.”

“Thanks, Donnie. I’m just gettin’ started. You heading out somewhere?”

“Yeah, were heading north, Raul’s on his way with a load. Be back Tuesday  night, if we stay on schedule.”

“Sounds like a plan.”

“So how did your date go last night?”

“Fine. Jenna’s a sweet girl. The house was fuckin’ amazing.”

“Well, they do own a shipping company. So they ain’t exactly poor.”

“We made some pasta and talked a lot. She’s really sweet, but kinda introverted, you know. And her brother, Jason, he’s on the road all the time, puttin’ out fires and checkin’ things out.”

“It’s a dirty job but somebody’s gotta do it. So you think you’re gonna see this girl again?”

“Yeah. We get along really well. I’m gonna play her some songs, next time we get together.”

“That sounds serious.”

“You never know. She’s a really nice girl, Donnie”

“She know what I do?”

“Yeah. She didn’t seem to be fussed by it. Not sure if she’s a doper or not. We just drank a little wine.”

Just then Raul walked in the back door. “Good morning, muchachos.” He said. 

“Senor Vega” both brothers said at the same time. It was a little thing they had that always made Raul laugh.

“He walked over and looked at David’s computer screen. “New song?”

“Yeah, just gettin’ started.”

“When you’re ready, we’ll find you a club gig to play, eh?”

“That’s gonna be a ways down the road.”

“Whenever.” Raul replied then he turned to Donnie. “Okay Amigo. Let’s hit the trail.”

“See you Tuesday or Wednesday.” Donnie said as he and Raul walked out the door.”

~ 9 ~

David got up and popped a couple pieces of bread in the toaster. Then poured another cup of coffee. He put some peanut butter on his toast and some cream in his coffee and sat down at the table again, and went through the song. At the end of the chorus he repeated the verse chords and started riffing a bit. He tried three or four different takes until he found one that would work for him. As he ate his toast he went through the song a couple more times and made a few more notes on it.

As he was starting to clean up, his cell phone rang. 

David didn’t recognize the number, but he answered the phone. “Hello?”

“Hi David. It’s Jenna.”

“Jenna. Hi.”

“I know we agreed to get together soon. But it’s such a beautiful day. I thought you might like to come over for a swim and maybe watch a movie or something. I mean. I’ll understand if you’re busy or whatever.”

“No. no.” David said. That sounds like fun. Can I bring anything?”

“Just bring your guitar and you can play me a couple of your songs.”

“Oh…Okay. I can do that. What time?”

“How about one?” Jenna said.

“I’ll see you then.”

David clicked off and stared out into space for a good thirty seconds or so. Then he chuckled to himself and cleaned up his breakfast dishes.

After that, he did a little cleaning around the house and then tossed his guitar and laptop in the back seat of the family car and headed off to Jenna’s.

The family car was a vintage convertible that David and Donnie had restored a couple years earlier. It was a 1995 Mustang that Donnie got for a very good price from a meth dealer Donnie knew, who had been busted and needed bail and lawyer money. The car was a bit souped up and in great condition mechanically. The brothers chipped in to have it repainted and detailed. It ran like a top but Donnie never took it on the road with him and Raul, because it was a cop magnet, and Raul’s very high-end BMW was the opposite. Plus Raul’s car was completely outfitted for carrying more than 200 lbs of weed.

David arrived at Jenna’s at a little after one. She answered, wearing a bikini and a light shawl. Her hair was pulled back into a tight bun and she wore no makeup, but she still looked pretty amazing. 

“Come on in. I have some wine chilling out by the pool.” Jenna said.

“Wine chilling by the pool sounds wonderful.”

Over his shoulder, Jenna caught a glimpse of the Mustang. “Is that your car, David? ” She walked by him down the driveway and around the car. David set his guitar down and his shoulder bag down. on the steps and followed her.

“Yeah. It’s a ’95. My brother and I had it completely detailed and repainted.”

“My God, it’s beautiful. Can you start it up for me?” Jenna asked. 

“Sure. Let me just take my stuff inside and I’ll take you for a ride.”

“That won’t be necessary. I’d just like to hear what it sounds like.”

David got into the car and started it up. Jenna just stood there in wide-eyed wonder, smiling. 

“Where did you get it?” She asked after he had turned the car off and gotten out. “Donnie knows a lot of weird people.” And he told her the story of the busted meth dealer.

“Wow. That’s the coolest set of wheels I’ve seen in a long time. You have to bring it over when my brother gets back. He’d love to see it.”

“I can do that.” David said as he picked up his gear and they walked through the house.

Near the rear of the house, Jenna opened a door to a bathroom.

“You can change and shower after in there.”

 They walked into the backyard and over to a table with a large triangular-shaped canvas shading it. David put down his guitar and bag. He reached into his shoulder bag and pulled out a pair of swim trunks. He then walked back to the house and into the small bathroom, where he changed. He came back out with his trunks on and still wearing his T-shirt. He sat down in a chair next to Jenna’s. She leaned over and kissed him on the cheek. “Thanks for coming. You, uh, sounded a little surprised when I called.”

“Yeah, I guess I was.”

“I was, too. But I had a great time last night, and there was nobody here but me and a whole beautiful Sunday. I’m usually not that forward as a rule.”

“That’s OK.” David said. “I was actually thinking about you when you called.”

“You were?”

“Yeah. I had a great time too.”

“That’s sweet.”

“But it’s also true. And I had a sneaking suspicion that you might have felt the same way.”

Jenna said nothing for several seconds. “I did. And I thought, how often does that happen to someone who works with people who are all at least ten or fifteen years older than her. But more than that, it got me thinking about how pathetic my social life really is.”

“Well, we’re in the same boat there.”

Jenna laughed and poured out some wine for both of them. She raised her glass and he followed. “Here’s to us. Let’s hope the boat doesn’t sink.” Jenna said.

On the second glass of wine, Jenna said. “So you brought your guitar. Are you gonna sing me a song?”

“I’m gonna do better than that. I’m gonna sing you a song I just finished this morning. I do most of my music writing on the weekend. But I write lyrics whenever they hit me. I have a bit of flexibility at work. It also helps fill in the time when you’re doing what we call the dumb work. Once you get an idea for how to do whatever it is you need to do, and lay it all out, there’s a lot of time that you spend just cutting out all the pieces. It kinda frees up my mind and I start thinking about musical ideas.”

Jenna just smiled as David got out his guitar and played a few notes, then tweaked the tuning a tiny bit. He opened his computer and then found the lyric and his notes. He got the chords back into his head and then started to play the song he had titled ‘Someone I Once Knew.’

Jenna was astonished. David’s voice was beautiful and soulful. The song flowed out of him like a stream. There was a gentleness to it that Jenna had not expected. She found it quite moving. 

When he finished, David said. “It’s still a little rough around the edges but it’s really only the second time I’ve sung it all the way through.”

“It’s beautiful David.” Jenna said. “ How…long have you been doing this?”

“I’ve been writing lyrics since high school. It’s only over the last year that I’ve started to write melodies for them. After I started working, and could afford it, I found a good music teacher and spent two years with him learning guitar and music writing. Truth be told, I picked up on it a lot quicker than I thought I would. And it was the best money I ever spent.”

“How many finished songs do you have?”

“Let me think. Probably about twelve so far.”

“Oh my God. Are they all as good as this?”

David laughed. “You’re asking the wrong person, Jenna. I really have no idea.”

“Are they all ballads?” Jenna asked.

“No. There are a lot of different tempos and themes.”

Jenna stared at him. “Then she pointed her finger in David’s general direction. Her eyes were closed. “I was trying to think if who you reminded me of. But, you know, nothing jumped out at me.”

“Well that’s good to know. I’m workin’ really hard to just sound like myself.”

“You know Jason would love this. He believes all the really good music was created in the sixties, seventies and early eighties. And after that, it all went to hell. That song has that kind of fell to it. Only, you know, more modern.”

David laughed because he believed the same thing.

“Well, your brother is pretty smart, ‘cause I believe his assessment is right on the money. I grew up listening to all that stuff. My folks were stuck on it. Plus, I’ve always gravitated a lot to individual singer/songwriters.

“So what are you planning to do with all these songs you’re creating?” Jenna asked.

David chuckled. “You know I’ve been spending so much time figuring out how to write them that I haven’t thought much about what would happen after that. There’s hardly any more record industry. The Internet killed it. It’s all just touring and selling online. Some people make it big like Taylor Swift and Ariana Grande, but honestly, it’s one of the toughest ways to make a living I can think of. Most of the stuff I hear on the radio kind of all runs together in my head. Nobody’s really jumping out. Maybe it’s different for people who weren’t suckled on all that great music from the past.  But right now, I’m just doing this to express my feelings.”

“Can you play me another song?”

“Sure.” And he reached into his bag and took out a capo and fastened it to his fret bar. “This one’s called The Lovers We Used To Be.” he said and then started playing, a good deal more uptempo this time. 

There’s a little bit of truth inside

Every little white lie

There’s a little bit of stay with me inside

Every last goodbye

There’s a little bit of I’m sorry inside

The words you scream at me

Cause there’s still a little love inside

The lovers we used to be

There’s a little bit of pleasure inside

All the heartache and the pain

There’s a little bit of sunshine hangin’ on

After all the rain

And try as I might, I don’t believe

I can ever get free

‘Cause there’s still a little love inside

The lovers we used to be

Yeah, there’s still a little love inside

Some things cannot be denied

You can run but you cannot hide

From this reality

‘Cause there’s still a little love inside

Still a little love inside

Still a little love inside

The lovers we used to be

There’s still a lot of good reasons

For us to carry on

There’s still a whole lot of romance left

Between the darkness and the dawn

Between the warm heart and the heartache

There’s a lifetime of memories

And there’s still a little love inside

The lovers we used to be

Jenna just sat there enthralled at the depth of feeling in David’s voice. He was as good as anybody out there, she thought. But what really got to her was the pure joy he radiated while he was singing, even though it was kind of a sad song.

After he finished, she looked at him and said. “You know I could listen to you all day. Have you thought about approaching any of the local clubs?” 

David shook his head. “Yeah, I did for a while. Then I started going around to listen to the guys who played there, and talking to them. They do not live well at all. And most of them are just starstruck fools. But honestly, Jenna. The smile on your face meant more to me than any money or fame I could attract out in the world. I’m sure I could get my brother and his partner to sponsor me if I wanted to do that. But these guys I talked to, you know, they were a lot more experienced  than me and they were…I don’t know, just really sad.”

“Well, you can come over and play your songs for me anytime you like. Because I think they’re great.”

David smiled and laid his guitar gently into the case on the stone patio. He picked up his wine glass and took a sip. 

“What about you Jenna? Any secret passions?”

“Not really. Cooking I guess, but I’ve been a numbers person ever since I can remember. My dad saw that early on and encouraged it. I sort of enjoy working in the family business. I know I’ll be pretty well off all for the rest of my life from the partnership that kicks in next year. Then, I’ll be able to think about things like my own house, getting married, kids, stuff like that. Right now, I’m learning the business during the week and cooking up a storm on the weekend. I do have to admit that with my folks gone for a year and Jason all over the place, it’s a bit lonely. That may be part of the reason I called you this morning.”

David got out of his chair and leaned over. He gently kissed Jenna and she returned the kiss, and caressed his face.

“You can call me any time you’re feeling like that. I’ll be over in a flash. I’ll bring my guitar and serenade you all night long, Jenna. You don’t have to be lonely. I understand the feeling very well. My family is shot to hell. My brother’s on the road most of the time, too. I get it.”

Jenna didn’t know what to say. So she simply peeled off her shawl. “Let’s go for a swim.”

That night, they made breaded veal cutlets with small roasted potatoes and a spinach salad. David talked a lot about his songwriting because he couldn’t talk much about his work. Jenna talked about her work and her school life. They drank some more wine and were both pretty blitzed when they fell into bed together. They didn’t make love that night because they were both pooped. They just lay there in each other’s arms and listened to the cicadas, and the echoes of Cuban music that drifted over from the other side of the bay. 

~ 10 ~

David left around two AM. He was back at work by nine the next morning, around the same time that Jenna arrived at her office. She thought a lot about David during the day. His beautiful voice. His poetic lyrics. His gentle touch. His pure affection for her.

David thought about Jenna as well. About how well they got along. About how much she loved his music and his passion for it. How smooth her skin was to his touch. How he could see a life with her, somehow, some way.

In their own ways, both of them were shy people. So neither of them had a clear picture of the road ahead. And maybe that was just as well because they both knew from their life experience to date that nothing good had ever come to them quickly. It was always a slow burn. So they did not put any pressure on each other. Besides, they both had careers and work that was coming at them every day, and they would probably only be able to see each other on weekends anyway, at least for the time being. And they were both okay with that. 

~ 11 ~

Two weeks or so later, the pills arrived by truck at Raul’s warehouse, in the industrial sector just south of the airport, in the papaya, mango and avocado boxes. The warehouse was not really all that big, just a little over 5000 square feet with a part-time staff of two who filled the orders into smaller cardboard boxes, which were then trucked to their three dozen retail customers. All the invoicing was done by his brother’s people online from Mexico, so there was no real paperwork to deal with other than the driver’s bill of lading. Even his part-time people were paid online.

At night, after the warehouse workers had gone home, and the deliveries were made, Raul and Donnie removed the corner braces from the ten specially marked shipping crates and extracted the bags of pills. They then re-screwed the braces back on and left the crates to be reloaded onto the truck the next day, which would then would head back to Mexico. They worked out a schedule that would ensure a shipment of pills would arrive once a month in the weekly shipments until they figured out how quickly they could sell them. Raul’s brother would check the corner braces at his end and replace any that were in rough shape.  

Raul’s cousin, Fernando, the chemist, had emailed him earlier that week and told him that the exact number of Manic Minis in the fifteen crates. Four bags, with two thousand pills in each of the crate’s four corner braces. So eight thousand pills in each on twelve crates for a total of 96,000 in the whole shipment. Their plan was to wholesale the pills at $7 each, which the dealer, in turn would sell at anywhere from ten to twelve dollars each. This would give them a gross profit of a about $650,000, minus the samples they would give out.

They kept aside a couple hundred pills for samples and they took off up the coast for their weed run, dropping off M&M samples to all their dealers, When they got back they they took the pills back to the warehouse and bagged them up in small baggies with a thousand pills in each. That was their minimum. They then took aa couple days off and hit the road again. Surprisingly they unloaded everything they had. While they were driving back to Donnie’s, with a trunk full of money,  Raul started doing some math on his iPhone calculator. “So we took in about six hundred and sixty thousand. Fernando and my brother get 50% which is say three hundred and thirty thousand and we split the remaining 50% which is about one sixty five. Not too shabby, amigo.”

Even if they moved a shipment twice a month that would add up to about $3,600,000 a year for each of them, and about twice that, minus material costs for Raul’s bother and cousin.

After six months to a year, they figured that his cousin could move his operation to Florida and they could start expanding, mainly north, because most of the states west of Florida were both fairly poor and redneck until you got to Texas, where they were still redneck but had more money. But this was a party drug and it would do much better in the larger cities all the way up to Boston.

When they got to back Donnie’s house, after selling all the pills, they walked into the kitchen where David was working on another song. Donnie made some coffee and Raul sat down at the table with David. 

“Well, my friend, we got our first shipment , and it was completely sold out, just to the weed distributors alone on the Florida coast. He then reached into his jacket and pulled out a white envelope, and slid it across the table to David. 

“There’s thirty thousand in there, amigo, and our thanks for coming up with such a brilliant idea.”

David touched the envelope, then he lifted it up. “It’s all in thousands.” 

“Deposit it into your bank account and then just spend it with your credit card.” Raul said.

“That’s a lot of money, Raul.”

Raul just laughed. “If you knew the math we were doing on way the back down here, you wouldn’t think so.”

“Okay, well thanks very much, both of you.”

“Take your girl out on a really nice date and get yourself some decent equipment for your songwriting.” Raul said. 

“You know I might just do that.” David said. 

“And remember my offer. You want to perform your songs, I have some friends with a club who would love to have you there.”

“That’s really a generous offer, Raul. But honestly, I’m nowhere near being able to do that.”

“A lot of things start out that way.” Raul said. “Then things change, amigo. As you get better and better with your songwriting and playing, your desires will change along with that.”

David said nothing right away. But the words went into his head and rolled around there. 

“Maybe you use some of that money to go into a studio and record some songs, you know. Maybe you can find someone to help place those songs with other people. Could become a revenue stream.” Raul said.

David knew that Raul was no idiot. He and Donnie had been running and extremely successful weed operation for four years now. And he the little pills were already making them even more money. So David always made a point of listening to both of them. And maybe they were right. Maybe there was a market for his songs. Of course, there was really no way to find out aside from making some demos and getting them out there. But he kept the thought in his head.   

Five days later, a new shipment of weed had arrived, and the day after that Donnie and Raul were off up the coast to sell their weed and to check on demand for the Manic Minis.

On the Thursday night of that week, David called Jenna and asked her if she would like to take a drive down to Key West with him on the weekend. She thought that was a great idea, and at the same time she invited him to come to dinner with her and Jason on Friday night.  

~ 12 ~

On Friday night, Jason was sitting on the doorstep. He was smoking a joint, which surprised David because he never in a million years would have thought of him doing that. 

David got out of the Mustang, and as he did, Jason got to his feet and walked over to it. He offered David a toke, which he politely refused. Jason walked around the car and stared at it in wide-eyed wonder. “This is some beast you have here. It’s gorgeous. Sounded great too.”

“Thanks, Jason. My brother and I put a fair bit of money into it. It was a little beat up looking when we got it. But the engine was in good shape, and it didn’t have a ton of miles on it.”

“Well, you guys should be proud. It’s a real gem.” Jason said, taking a last toke. “Let’s go in.”

They entered the house and walked down to the kitchen, where Jenna was just taking a large roast out of the oven. She walked over and gave David a peck on the cheek. I left work early today to get this going.”

“That’s a pretty big roast for just three people.” David said.

“It’s not just about the roast, my friend. It’s about the roast beef sandwiches tomorrow and the next day.” Jason said.

Jason poured some wine into three glasses and sat down at the kitchen table that was already set for dinner. Jenna put the roast on a carving board, then put the roasted potatoes in a large bowl and the steamed fresh green beans in a smaller bowl, and set them all on the counter. She walked over to the table and took a sip of wine, then started to carve the roast. David and Jason got up and loaded up their plates. Jenna followed them, and they all sat down to eat.

“So you and Jenna have been seeing a bit of each other.” Jason said, kind of out of the blue.

David was taken a bit aback, so he hesitated for a few seconds. “I guess you could say that.”

‘Okay.” Jason said. “I’m kinda glad in fact. I was hoping she wouldn’t end up with one of those disgusting preppies we went to school with.”

“Jason!’ Jenna exclaimed.

“Just saying that I always thought you could do better than that. And you did. Here’s a guy with a really cool car and apparently a really good singing voice too so I hear.” It was obvious that Jason was pretty stoned. So David just let everything slide.

“Who I choose to go out with is, and in fact, has never been, any of your concern.” Jenna said matter-of-factly.

Jason took a deep breath. “You’re absolutely right, Jenna. I should never get stoned before dinner.”

David sat and watched the dynamic between these twins and thought, ‘Can Jason really be the asshole he sounds like?’

The conversation drifted away from Jenna’s choice in men to some questions about just exactly what David did at work. 

“Somebody comes to us with an idea. We get together and talk about it, then we go away and build them a prototype. Sometimes it works out. Most of the time it’s just well, too weird. If it works, we find the right manufacturer and take them through the process of making the thing, wherever it is. Then we get paid and move on to the next thing. Sadly, I’m not allowed to talk about any of it specifically.”

“I can understand that.” Jason said. “These umm gizmos that you build, are you any good at it?” 

“I like to think so. They all do what they’re supposed to do. After that, it’s up to the people with the idea to get out there and turn it all into, you know, some kind of business.”

“Sounds a hell of a lot more interesting than the shipping business.” Jason said. “A lot of checking on this and checking on that. I’ve got a guy I travel with. He does all the checking. I just mostly watch and nod my head a lot because this business runs like a fucking Swiss watch.”

“Sounds like you‘re bored with it.” David said.

“I like the travel. I get a lot of reading done. The rest of it is, well, it is what it is, and that’s the family business. Jenna has a lot more fun. At least she gets to actually do something.”

“I never knew you felt that way about the business, Jason.” Jenna said.

“Well, I never did until the job got real and I saw how little there was to it for me… Aaron puts out all the fires, deals with all the crap, hiring, and all the rest. I just nod my head and keep watching.”

“Why don’t you quit?” David asked. “You’re well educated and smart. Why not go find something that’s more challenging.”

“Don’t think that hasn’t crossed my mind. It kinda does every damn day.”

“So have you figured anything out?” David asked.

“Not yet. But  I’ve got almost a whole year to work on it. I can’t leave while my folks are in Singapore or wherever. All this is by way of saying I envy you, David. You’ve got a job you love. Jenna tells me you write beautiful songs, and you’ve got that fucking Mustang out in the driveway. All I’ve got is a mid-sized freight company that runs all by itself.”

They ate the rest of their dinner in relative silence. Then Jason, who had come down a bit said. “I probably sounded like a gold-plated asshole. I apologize.”

David shook his head, and put his hand on Jason’s shoulder. “No, Jason. You just sound like somebody who’s looking for something and hasn’t found it yet. Keep looking.”

Jason kissed Jenna on the cheek. “Sorry sis. I really shouldn’t smoke the weed.”

Jenna hugged him. “I never knew you felt this way. Not until now.”

“We’ll figure it out.” Jason said. “We’re Ferlinghettis after all, and that’s what we’re good at. I’m gonna hit the sack. I’ve got to be up early tomorrow.  I’m riding one of the boats to Barranquilla with Aaron. We’re auditioning a new captain.”

With that, Jason turned and headed upstairs.

David and Jenna cleaned up and then took the bottle of wine out to the pool. The night was warm. Not too many stars were visible. They sipped their wine and were both pretty quiet for a while. 

“I honestly didn’t know that was how Jason felt about the business.” Jenna said. 

“Some people, you know, they keep a lot of stuff buried pretty deep.” David replied. “It’s kinda sad, he’s got this whole company and it’s so well managed that he has nothing to do.”

“It’s ironic. I feel sort of the same way, except it doesn't get me down like that. Maybe it’s… “Jenna hesitated and took a sip of wine.

“Maybe it’s what?”

“Maybe it’s because I have someone like you in my life.”

David leaned over and kissed her. “Yes, you do. And tomorrow your life is gonna take you down to the Keys. We’ll drink Margaritas and sleep till noon.

Then they both sat back and watched the sun set over the bay.  

“You know what I think?” David said, after a few moments. “I think everybody needs a hobby. I have my music. You have your cooking. Your brother needs a hobby of his own. Otherwise, he’s just gonna be an unhappy guy, and trust me, they make lousy bosses.”

“His problem right now and maybe for a little while to come is that he’s on the road almost all the time.” Jenna said.

“Yeah. But he’s a bright guy. He’ll get that figured out soon enough. And he’ll make some time for something.”

“Maybe.” Jenna said. “He’s always been a little on the obsessive-compulsive side.”

David chuckled. “I think we all are to some extent. The world is moving awfully fast these days.”

“Yeah, it is.”

“But ironically, the earth still takes the exact same amount of time travel around the sun. Which means the earth moves at the exact same speed. It’s human beings who are out of synch with that.”

“I never thought of it that way. How do you suppose we fix that?” Jenna asked.

“I’m not sure there’s a general rule, other than trying to make the most of the time you have.”

“And are we doing that right now? Just sitting here drinking wine?”

“You know, I think we are.”

Jenna smiled and took another sip of her wine.

“So did you write any more songs this week.”

“No. I uh…I’ve been thinking. My brother’s partner, he’s Mexican and pretty well-connected. He told me he could get me into some club to perform, because of the people he knew. I didn’t think much of it when he first told me. But the idea of it, you know, it stuck around in my head. I thought about it all week.”

“And what did you conclude?”

David took a deep breath. “Well for one thing, I’m gonna need a lot more material. Maybe another twenty to thirty songs in my repertoire.”

“Have you got that many songs?”

“No. But I did a count last night and I have about a hundred and forty-six lyrics, so I figure I’m half-way there, or maybe a little less because once you write the songs you have to learn them and get comfortable performing them. It’s a lot of work.”

“So you are thinking about doing it.”

“You know I actually am.”

“Well good for you.” Jenna said. “Because I think you’re good enough to do pretty well at it.”

David just smiled and touched her cheek. “Well, I guess we’ll just have to find out then won’t we?”

~ 13 ~

The next morning, they were up fairly early. Jason was gone. David had already packed his bag and had it in the trunk of the Mustang. So he went down and made some coffee while Jenna got her stuff together. Half an hour later, she came down carrying a beautifully embroidered canvas carry-all. They had some bagels and coffees, and then hit the road an hour later.

It was about a four-hour drive to Key West on Highway One. David had also brought a blanket, some towels, his guitar, laptop and his small recorder. They found a hotel called the Coconut Palms right on the beach on the east side of Key West. There were only a few people staying at the hotel that weekend because it was summer, which was off-season in the Keys. On the way, they brought enough groceries to make sandwiches and have wine to drink. They spent their days on the beach, swimming in the Caribbean and drinking wine, sitting on recliners under a large umbrella. It was a long weekend, so they didn’t have to leave until later in the day on Monday. Jenna listened to an E-book while David started playing with some of his lyrics. Jenna took off her headphones when she thought he was onto something. Her approval seemed very important to him. In the evenings, they drove around the downtown area and found different restaurants, mostly seafood, which was fine with both of them. And at night, they watched a movie on TV, made love and slept like babies.

The time literally flew by, and David had more or less figured out half a dozen new songs and was feeling a lot more confident than he was three days earlier. Having a great cheerleader like Jenna didn’t hurt the cause at all.

They arrived back at Jenna’s house in the middle of the evening, having stopped for an early dinner at a place called Mangrove Mama’s just outside of Sugarloaf. David walked Jenna to her front door and kissed her goodnight. Then he headed home.

When Jenna got inside, she saw that Jason was sitting at the kitchen counter with a glass of wine and some takeout ribs.

Jenna gave him a hug and poured a glass of wine for herself. She sat down at the counter with him .

“How are things in South America?” Jenna asked.

“They’re in good shape. Everything’s in good shape.” Jason said, but Jenna detected a little cynicism in his voice.

“Are you OK?”

Jason took a deep breath. “Dad left us to sit and watch the hands of a very well-made Swiss watch go round and round. There are no big management decisions to make. Guys who have been with us for twenty years do all that. All I do is travel around and look at shit.”

Jenna stared at her brother for bit. She knew exactly how he was feeling, because she was feeling the same way, only it didn’t bother her as much. Maybe it was because of David. She thought about him a lot. And it made the days of doing virtually nothing go quickly.

“I understand, Jason. I really do. And I guess that’s the difference between us. It just doesn’t bother me like it does you.”

“Fuck that. How was your dirty weekend down in the Keys?”

“We had a great time. A friend of David’s brother told him he could get him a gig in some club. So we spent a lot of time on the beach while he played around with his lyrics.”

“Is he any good? I mean really?” Jason asked.

“Yeah. I think he is. He has a beautiful voice and when he sings the songs he’s already written, he sounds really confident. He’s got a ways to go before he can actually perform publicly. He said he needs at least like thirty finished songs that he can sing and play from memory.”

“That’s a tough gig, the music business. Fuckin’ Internet almost killed all the record companies. The only performers that are left standing are the big-name bands and artists and most of them are older than mom and dad. Cripes, Bob Dylan is still touring and recording and he’s like eighty something.”

“You seem to know a lot about the music business.” Jenna said.

“Yeah, I’ve always been kind of interested, and God knows I have a lot of time to read. One day when I was flying to Portugal, I was thinking it might be cool to have a recording studio and a web-based record label.”

“That’s a pretty far cry from the shipping business.” Jenna said.

“Yeah, it is. That’s what makes it such an attractive idea. Do you know how much money we have? Of course you do, probably right down to the penny. But we could easily afford to build a studio and staff it. And then….” Jason's voice trailed off. “Yeah. Just a dream, Jen.”

~ 14 ~

Jenna and Jason Ferlinghetti were the newest generation of a three-generation family in the shipping business. As a result, on their eighteenth birthdays, they were given endowments of thirty-two million each, by their grandfather. They would not have access to it until they were twenty-four, which they now were. The thirty two million had grown to nearly forty-six million since they were handed over to the Ferlinghetti family investment firm to invest. 

During their first year as stewards of Ferlinghetti Shipping, neither of them thought very much about how they would use all the money at their disposal. But with this conversation and Jenna’s sense of her brother’s restlessness, they had both started thinking seriously about it, privately at first, but as the next few months passed, they began to talk about it more and more. Both Jenna and Jason had talked to their ‘guardians’ in the firm and had begun to reduce their workdays to three a week. 

Over the next few months, Jenna’s relationship with David North grew into love, so David was around a lot in the evenings and the weekends, and constantly working on setting his lyrics to music, and recording the chords in his laptop, working his was slowly and steadily toward his goal of thirty songs.

Jason, who really liked David because he made his sister so happy, got to listen to a good number of David’s songs and understood why Jenna was so impressed. He also used some of that time to pick his brain on the music business, such as it was these days. One night over a bottle of wine they started to discuss it in detail.

‘Well.” David said while they were sitting at the table out by the pool. “As you told Jenna yourself, and rightly so, the Internet has pretty much killed the recording industry the way it used to be. But it hasn’t killed the music industry. It’s just that people buy music differently now. The artists themselves make much less in terms of airplay royalties. They have to rely more on touring and selling on their web sites. The big acts like Rihanna, Taylor Swift, Dylan, and the Rolling Stones, still make massive bucks from touring. They also make good money from music sites and radio airplay and online album sales like they always have. But up-and-coming bands, not so much.

“What about the record companies?” Jason asked.

“Well, most of them now feed the streaming music sites and work to get their artists’ songs into movies, TV shows, social media sites and advertising. It seems to me that if you’re not one of the top artists, it’s more about promoting yourself. The labels aren’t spending anywhere near what they used to spend on promotion, because album sales were their bread and butter, are less profitable because it costs more to keep sales going. At least the way I see it.”

“So,” Jenna asked, “If you wanted to make a real career as a singer/songwriter, what would you do…assuming you had the money to do it?”

Nobody had ever asked David that question before. So he thought about it for a while. “Okay, well, if it were me, the first thing I’d need to do is write the songs, which I’m doing now. The next thing would be to find a producer who could help me shape the music, make sure we’re recording the right kind of sound for the market he would figure out for me, then put together the right kind of band for me, and help me pick the right songs. The producer would have a big say in the musical arrangements, the studio, the sound engineer, and all that stuff to make sure that the music that was recorded was well produced.

“I would probably also need a half-decent rehearsal space and work with the other musicians so they know their parts. That’s kind of a group effort. After that, the producer would help me record the songs, then use his connections to find a label that would take us on. Then of course, I’d need to find the right management who could deal with the label, the venues where I would perform to promote the music, and deal with budgets and marketing.”

“So that’s about it?” Jason asked.

“More or less,” David said, “There’s a lot more to it than that. That’s just kinda the starting point. There’s a fairly large local music industry here, mainly because there are a lot of clubs, and the whole East Coast strip from all the way up to Jupiter is a big market. Plus, the people down here like music a lot. So local bands can do well playing clubs and selling CDs and merchandise at the door, which more of the clubs let you do. Every so often, someone comes along who makes it big, then they end up getting signed to a major label, and whoever is managing them does OK too. But I’ll be honest, it’s a longshot, if you’re thinking about getting into the management side of the business.”

“We’re just talking in the backyard right now, David.” Jason said. “But say we did decide to do this. What kind of company would we need to build?”

David was a very perceptive guy, and he could see that Jason, especially, was quite interested in the mechanics of how things would work. 

“Okay…this is just my opinion. I don’t really know all that much about the nuts and bolts of music business per se. So I will probably miss a few things. But what I do know is that between you and Jenna have the senior management covered off. Jenna’s really good numbers person and you’re a good corporate frontman. Below you, would be what’s known as an A&R person. A&R means Artist and Repertoire, and that person would travel around to all the clubs and find the talent worth investing in.”

“Do you know anybody like that?” Jason asked.

“Not personally, no. But if you found a producer you thought would make a good partner in your venture, he would have access to people on that level of the business, including someone who could get bookings into clubs. Or he could actually be the A & R person as well. That’s inside the company. And later on, you’ll need a person to manage the publishing rights for the songs your artists would record and your company would promote and sell. Some songwriters just work for themselves. Others, like Dylan, have sold their catalogues to music publishing companies, with one or two caveats, like no politicians or certain types of advertising. In the long run you’re better off with a singer-songwriter who is also interested in making money from publishing, which really means airplay, songs for TV and movies and, of course, songs recorded by other artists.

“On the music side, you would need a promotion person or company who is well enough connected to get songs on different online playlists and into radio stations. That same person could also be a connection to the TV, movie and advertising businesses, where you could also have songs placed.

“Then you would need some kind of art director or designer to help you package these people up, a CD manufacturing company to make the CDs they record for the promotion people to play for club owners, and send to the streaming services and the radio stations, and, of course, for the artist or bands to sell at the clubs they play in. In today’s market you’d also need a company that could market and distribute the music online, which is becoming more and more the way music gets purchased.  Now if you get your artist signed to a major label, they will have a lot of that in place, but you’d really have to push them. If they do well enough, you move up into the concert circuit, and that’s where the game gets really dicey, ‘cause that requires a lot of money to book facilities and promote the bands.”

“So where does the money get made for, you know, the backers?”

“If your bands make it to concert level you get a percentage of the net profits from the concerts or any other venues, because you’d be putting up the money.  But, of course there are a couple of middlemen in between, like the venue owners and the ticket people. Then there is the advertising and the whole promotional video thing, and that can get pretty expensive, even if you just do performance videos as opposed to, like, concept stuff.”

“Sounds like a hell of a lot of work to get to the point where it’s profitable.” Jason said.

David nodded. “Yeah it is. And I’m pretty sure I haven’t told you everything.  But on top of all that, you have all the unknowns. Like what if the band breaks up, and how do you settle disputes over publishing royalties if you have more than one writer in the group. How do you manage all the egos involved? And how much you trust all the people you need along the way to deliver for you.” 

Jason started to laugh. “You’re making this all sound like dying and going to hell.”

“I won’t bullshit you, Jason. It can be that crazy, and probably nine times out of ten it will be. But most of the music business runs on that one in ten that makes it to the top of the pile, because that can become more profitable than all the other flops you have to work through along the way.”

Jenna and Jason were both smiling. Jenna because she knew she had fallen in love with a really smart guy. Jason because his business brain told him that this could be the answer he was looking for in terms of making his life more worthwhile. He knew his parents couldn’t really disagree, because they had raised them both to think for themselves. And this is what they were doing. 

“You’ve given us a lot to think about, David. So thanks for that. I’m interested in how is it you understand this business so well.”

“A guy I went to public school with and stayed friends with. His name was Charlie Knowles. After high school, he had a small band that played weekends for a couple of years. Then, after everybody was able to devote all their time to it, they got into the business. The group was called Prowler. They did a lot of introspective stuff, really moody. They got a manager and he got them a two-album deal with Liberty Records and once they had done their first album, they toured with the band, Foreigner for a year. Then they did their own club tour for a couple of years, after that made a couple of albums that sold pretty well, then they split up. Charlie used his money he made to get into real estate. Now he’s a mini-tycoon in Tampa. He, uh, explained the whole business to me one night when we went out for drinks. This was all before the Internet killed the record business. Plus, I was thinking about what I would have to do to get myself into a situation where I had a label or at least someone who was willing to invest in my music. I hadn’t even written any songs at this point.”

They spent the rest of the evening chatting about all kinds of things. It seemed to Jenna that her brother was a lot happier when he was talking about anything other than the shipping business. She wondered how serious he was about getting into the music business. They were sitting with an artist who, at least in Jenna’s opinion, had real potential. They had more than enough money. They even had some of the business skills. In short, there was nothing preventing them from giving it a go. David had written and finished close to thirty songs. He was already right where they needed their kick-off artist to be.

~ 15 ~

The next morning was a Monday, so David had gone home the night before because, unlike Jenna and Jason, he was still working five days a week.

Jenna swam for half an hour, then made some coffee while she had a shower. Jason wandered down a few minutes later. He made some toast and they sat down together at the kitchen counter, which was their favorite place to sit.

“So that was interesting last night.” Jason said.

“Yeah, it was. What do you think?”

“You first.” Jason said. “You’re more awake than I am.”

So Jenna told her brother everything she was thinking, including the part about David being a logical first choice. She then poured herself a second cup of coffee.

“To tell you the truth, I was thinking exactly the same thing. But David would have to quit his job in order to really do this right. “Jason said. “Did he ever tell you how much he makes?”

“Yeah, he’s a mechanical engineer, so he makes sixty-eight thousand a year.”

“OK so we offer him seventy-five a year to devote all his time to his music and see what happens. Do you think he would go for that?”

“I can always ask him.” Jenna said

 Jason took another sip of coffee. “We’d have to form a limited company you and I, and seed it equally. I’d say, three million each.”

“Okay, I can put that together.”

“We can run it out of the house. That would cut down our overhead.”

“Good idea.”

Jenna noticed that even just talking about this idea had lightened her brother’s mood. “I think this is making you happy, Jace.”

“I think it is too.”

They spent another ten minutes discussing a name for the company they were forming. They agreed that it would be called J & J Music. They also agreed that if David didn’t want to be the first artist they developed, they would offer him the job of A & R director, in addition to being their fist artist.

Jenna and Jason were smart enough to know that they could make this work as a business. All they needed was the right kind of talent to work with. They also believed that David North, was the key to making that happen. It never occurred to either of them that it was one thing to understand how a certain industry worked and quite another to dive in headfirst. But they would find out.

~ 16 ~

David was sitting in his kitchen the next morning, early. He was drinking a cup of coffee, when his brother Donnie walked into the kitchen. Donnie had been on the road for the last week with Raul and it showed on his face. He hadn’t slept much. He flopped down at the table. David offered to make him a coffee.

“Naa. I’m going back to bed. Just wanted to check on you and see how you’re doing. You’re spending a lot of time with Jenna Ferlinghetti. Just wondered how that was working out.” Donnie said.

“Just fine. She and her brother are thinking about getting into the music business. Between you and me, I think their shipping business kinda runs itself so there’s not much for them to do. So I may have an opportunity to get recorded.”

“Well, that’s great, Dave. How many songs have you got figured out?”

“About thirty more or less.”

“Well, that’s more than enough. So are they just talkin’ about it or are they actually gonna do it? ‘Cause you know, rich kids, they have the attention spans of hummingbirds. All gung ho one day and onto something different the next.”

“I guess we’ll see. But I kinda think they want to do this. Maybe just as a way to show their dad that they can make it on their own. They’ve both cut back to three days a week in the business.”

“That’s a good sign.” Donnie said.

“And how about you and Raul? How’d you make out on your road trip?

“We sold the whole shipment. Seems like most of the street dealers were looking for something else to play with and we came along at just the right time. I’ll be taking a couple hundred grand out of each shipment.”

“Jesus Christ.”

“Non addictive thrill pills are worth their weight in gold, Dave.” 

“Did you try one?”

“Yeah, we both did. After we unloaded everything we got a suite at a great hotel in Lauderdale. It was uh…well we were really stoned but not out of control. We went for a long walk. The colours were amazing but nothing scary, you know. It’s really a nice high. The only thing is that while it’s not chemically, it sure as hell could be psychologically addictive. But the nice thing is that when you come down off it, there no jangle, you know, nervousness. Raul and I wrote a little report for his cousin. I think he got the punch level just right.” 

Donnie got up and went over to his bag, which was hanging by the back door. He pulled out a thick envelope. He walked back and flopped back down in his chair. “Raul is cutting you in for twenty grand per shipment up to a hundred grand. Because there was zero trouble at the border. The spice had the dogs completely muted. And when the dogs are muted, the shipment goes through no sweat.

“Wow, that’s really generous of him. But make sure to tell him to go easy on the spice, just a hint. If you overdo it, it can backfire on you.”

With that, Donnie slid an envelope across the table with 40 five-hundred dollar bills in it.”

“Thanks, and please thank Raul for me.”

“I want to start looking at a nicer place to live. After the next shipment we should be able to buy something outright after we sell this. Be nice to get closer to the beach.”

“Okay,” David took the envelope and shoved it into his shoulder bag. “Well, thanks for the cash. I very much very much appreciate it. But I’ve still got to get to work.”

“Just be careful with the rich people, Dave.” 

“Don’t worry, I hear you.” David got to his feet and headed out to his scooter.

~ 17 ~

Later in the day Jenna called him and asked him if he was free that evening to come over for dinner. She and Jason had something they wanted to talk to him about.

At seven that night, David arrived in the Mustang and knocked on the door. Jenna greeted him warmly and invited him in. Jenna was making a lasagna and Jason was busy making a Caesar salad and garlic toast. When everything was ready they sat down with a bottle of very nice red wine and Jason made a toast.

“Here’s to the the future, however it happens to roll out.” he said and they all clinked their glasses.

As they were eating Jason said. “Jenna and I have been talking a lot about the idea of a music business. You have given us some great advice, and we want you to know how much we appreciate it. So we want to make you an offer.”

“Okay?” David said. He was definitely curious.

“Jenna tells me you make sixty-eight thousand a year at your job and that you have just recently become a full-fledged mechanical engineer. We would like to make you an offer of seventy-five thousand to come and be part of our venture. We will guarantee that in writing, so you know we’re not just foolin’ around. Plus we will cover you under the Ferlinghetti health plan. You will actually take home quite a bit more because we’ll pay you a freelance fee, so you will pay less tax. Jenna will take care of all that for you.”

David said nothing for a bit. Then he said. “So what exactly do I do for this money?”

“Well,” Jason said, “You demo your material and help us find the right people to help produce, promote and get your music out there into the world. And once we get going, you can do some talent scouting for us. We’ll cover all your expenses.”

David was stunned. He was working his ass off just to get a set together that he could play at a small club on the weekend and here were the Ferlinghetti twins offering him a whole career on a silver platter.

“We’re basically taking your advice,” Jenna said. “Because it made a lot of sense to us, and we figured what better artist to start with than you.”

“I’ve also done a lot of reading on this myself over the past few months. I think with the right people involved, we can really make a go of it.” Jason said. “But we need you to help us find those peeps.”

David leaned back in his chair and looked at both of them. They were smiling and looked hopeful.

“I’m sorry,” David said, “It’s always weird when something you’ve been dreaming about for so long is suddenly put in front of you. It’s a bit freaky.”

Jenna took his hand. “We have tons of money, and we’re both bored out of our skulls with the shipping business. This is a chance to create something of our own. If it crashes and burns, it won’t be because we didn’t give it our best shot. But we need you both as an artist and as someone who can help us connect with the right people and succeed, David. And that’s the truth of it.”

David lifted his glass. “Okay. But I need it all in writing. Not that I don’t trust you, because I do. But because my brother always told me to never do business with anyone who isn’t willing to put the deal on paper.”

“Fair enough.” Jason said. “Jenna will write it up and we’ll both sign it.” 

They spent the rest of the evening talking about the business. After dinner, David played a couple of the songs he had just finished.

Jason was all smiles. “Goddamn it David, you’re the real deal, aren’t you?”

“That remains to be seen. But this is where my heart is. Here and with your sister, man.”

The next morning, David went into work and had a meeting with his boss, Phil Sykes. He explained the whole situation to him. He was a little nervous, but Sykes was anything but angry or disappointed. In fact, he was downright excited. He told David that if this should run into a brick wall and he needed a job, the door was always open. 

David worked out the rest of the week, then packed his gear and said goodbye to the engineering business, hopefully for good.

~ 18 ~

The following Monday, Donnie and David drove to the Ferlinghetti house. Donnie came with David to meet both Jenna and Jason. He also witnessed the signing of David’s contract with the newly formed J&J Music. As he walked out with David, Donnie told him that he thought he would be in good hands. That made David feel a hell of a lot less nervous about the whole deal.

Between the time he spent with Jenna and the time he spent working on his songs, David felt like he was living in fourth gear. But after a couple of weeks, he had adapted to it. One of the first things he did for himself and his new career was to go down to Miami Vintage Guitars in Hialeah and buy himself a vintage Martin D-12 six-string acoustic guitar. Over the years, he had looked at a lot of different new guitars. But when he picked up the Martin, it felt just perfect for him. It became the standard that any less expensive guitar that he would look at would have to live up to. But thanks to the insane generosity of his brother and Raul Vega, he could finally afford it. It cost him more than $7000, but in David’s opinion, it was worth every penny.

David had also decided that he would make his own raw demos because there wasn’t any reason to spend money in a studio until he had gotten some advice from the producer he would find. There was a small, windowless room in his house, so his next trip was to The Music Arts Centre to pick up the equipment he would need to do his own recordings. There, he picked up a small Roadcaster 24-track board, a pair of mikes and stands and the wiring he would need.

He moved the table that functioned as his desk in his bedroom and his office chair into the small room. He tested it a couple of times and tweaked the controls until he figured out how they worked. Since David was naturally mechanical, he had very little trouble setting up the gear in the small room. He then played a bit of a song just to see how everything sounded, and lo and behold, it sounded pretty good. 

David had the chords figured out for exactly thirty songs, the thirteen he knew and another seventeen he had written over the past several weeks. Fortunately for him, he had a very good memory and knew all the lyrics by heart. Before recording each song, he practiced the chords he had written and then laid down the track into the guitar mike. It was a little rocky in first a few hours getting the hang of working with the equipment. But he persisted and figured it all out.

On the third day, he started the recordings in earnest. First laying down a guitar track and thinking through the lyrics, he quickly realized that wasn’t really the way to go about it. But he was a determined guy and nine days later, two of which were kind of hellish, he had the full demo completed, playing and singing at the same time.

Just after he got more or less finished, his brother Donnie and Raul Vega showed up at the house having done their run up north. They had even taken three days to hang around and relax at Daytona Beach. 

They were astonished that David had managed to actually record thirty songs in the week and a bit that they were gone and they were even more astonished at the quality of his recordings, done in the little windowless room.

“So what happens now amigo? Raul asked. “You have all these songs and you have people who are willing to bankroll your career, what’s your next step? I’m sure it’s up to you because your sweetie and her brother, they’re in the shipping business.”

“Yeah, that’s a good question.” David said. “I was so intent on getting these songs demoed that I didn’t think at all about next steps.”

“Well, fortunately, you know me.” Raul said.

“Okay?”

“I am not without my connections. I happen to know a gringo who is a major league music producer. I think he would love to help you build these songs.”

David absently scratched his head, pushing his hair back. “You think a big time producer would be interested in this? Really”

“You know, David, your humility is endearing.” Raul said. “Of course he would. He has told me a couple of times that the work he’s proudest of was what he called start from scratch. So yeah, I think he would love the challenge, and the fact that you have financial backing makes it all the more interesting.” 

Raul got out his phone. “Give me your phone, David”

David handed over his phone and Raul typed a name and number in his directory.”

“His name is Zack Jamison. Just call him and mention my name.”

~ 19 ~

The next day, David came for a meeting at Jenna and Jason’s house. He had made a bunch of copies of the demoed songs. He gave them a copy and told them he was planning to meet with a producer named Zack Jamison. Jenna told David that they had been to see their lawyer and he got the incorporation going. She and Jason had each put three million into the company’s account, and they would be prepared to add more once they figured out the ballpark cost of getting David fully recorded and established in the music market. 

Jenna was very matter-of-fact in the way she talked about the financing. It was the numbers person in her. Jason simply sat at the table and watched what was going on. 

Jenna then handed David a cheque for his first two weeks of work. 

David met up with Zack Jamison the next morning at a place called The Bistro Cafe on NE 1st Avenue. Zack was already sitting at a table outside, with a large latte in front of him and a small laptop he was staring at. David had recognized him from the picture on his website. He went into the Bistro and got a coffee, then came out and joined Zack at his table.  

The two men shook hands. Zack was about David’s height, and dressed in jeans and an untucked striped shirt. He looked to be in his mid-forties, but David couldn’t be sure. His hair was short, and there was a New York Yankees cap on the table beside his latte.

“So Raul told me that you have recorded 30 songs, just vocal and guitar.” 

“Yeah.” David said, and he reached into his bag and pulled out a CD in a paper sleeve with his name written it and the disk. “Just wanted you to know what the songs are about and basically what my voice sounded like. It’s all a little rough, but not too bad. I have a little 24-track at home, good mics and a great Martin six-string.”

Zack picked up the CD and slipped it into his bag, which was sitting on the cement beside his chair. 

“Okay.” Zach said. So the first thing we need to talk about, I’m sad to say, is money.”

“Understood.”

“I deal with a lot of people just starting out and for the vast majority of them, the sticker price, for even a half-decent recording, usually gives them a total shit fit.”

“My backers are my girlfriend and her brother, Jenna and Jason Ferlinghetti.”

“Ferlinghetti Shipping Ferlinghetti?”

“You’ve heard of them?”

Zack chuckled. “Yeah, my dad was captain of one of their ships. He retired about five years ago. Good company. They paid him well and had a great retirement plan. How do you know these people?”

“I went to school with them. Then I got into mechanical engineering and ran into Jenna one day, almost a year ago, and we started seeing each other. We’ll probably be getting married at some point.”

“And they’re bankrolling your music career?”

“Yeah. They’re actually starting a music company. They ran the shipping business on their own for about nine months, but after they learned the ropes, it bored the hell out them. Jason’s always been interested in the music business. So they’re giving it a shot. I’m their kickoff artist. But once I’m out there, we’ll be looking for more talent. So if this works out between us, that could be good for everybody.”

“Do they have any idea how tough the business can be?”

“Yeah, I think so. But they’re kinda fearless and damn smart business people.”

“OK, well that’s the financial discussion out of the way. Now is there anything you need to know about me?”

David shook his head. “Not really. I looked you up, read your website and, of course, the reco from Raul went a long way. He’s good people. The only thing I would say is that I’m kind of a virgin here. I like the songs I have written, but the reason I’m talking to you is that you can hopefully give me an objective professional opinion. And you’ll also help me shape them into whatever you think will make them work out in the world. I know enough about the business to get that the producer is every bit as important the artist, maybe even moreso, considering this is my first run at it.”

Zack laughed. “Wow, right to the bone.”

“Yeah, we’re not fuckin’ around here. We’re trying to build a team. And we’re tryin’ to do it right. The only way I’m gonna know if you’re the right guy for us is if you’re straight with me about what you hear and how you would shape it.”

“I hear you, David. You know I laughed when you said that because nobody’s ever really said that to me.”

“Like I said, we want to get it right. The music I heard on your site was great. Not over-produced or gimmicky. I have no reason to think we can’t work together. But I need your honest assessment of what I have before we go anywhere.” David said, surprised that he could be that forceful, but happy that he could.

“Okay.  Now tell me a bit about what you’re thinking.” Zack said. 

“I’ll be honest with you. I’m one of those people who believe that you hire a professional producer to put the sound together the way they hear it. The only thing I thought about was just a small band. I’m pretty good on rhythm guitar. So like drums, bass, lead guitar, synth slash keyboards and whatever else you think the songs need as long as it doesn’t break the bank. That’s about as far as I have gotten thinking about a finished product.”

“Okay. Well, I guess a lot will depend on the actual songs themselves. I just wanted to get your ideas without any bias that I might develop from having heard the songs already.”  

“My main idea is that you listen to the songs, figure out if this is worth the effort for you and what that will entail. Jenna, who’s the financial brains of the operation, will be pretty up front with you about what we can afford. We’re not poor. But Jenna and Jason are pretty smart business people and Jenna is probably researching costs as we speak. Just how her mind works.” David said, in the hope that Zack would think twice about going overboard on added extras.

“I just have one more question.” Zack said. “Who influenced you the most while you were developing your music?”

“That’s a good question.’ David thought about it for a few seconds. “I gravitated strongly to singer-songwriters, like Dylan, of course, Jackson Browne, Steely Dan, especially, Tom Waits, Leonard Cohen, Joni Mitchell, Tom Petty. I also like a bit of country. Reba McIntyre, Alan Jackson, people like that. I was always more interested in the lyric side. I learned to sing and play later, but picked up the guitar pretty quickly. Also had two years of music composition lessons when I decided to get serious about all this. It was determined that I actually could play. And I know enough about writing music to be able to understand what I am singing.”

“Okay, that’s really helpful.”

“There are thirty songs on this demo. So I’d like you to tell me which of those would stand the best chances out in the market. You know like an album’s worth.”

“I’m glad you said that David, because thirty is a shitload of material.”

“I’m in it for the learning as much as anything else. I want this to be successful so we can build it into a bit of an enterprise. So you tell me what would be the best way to get started.”

“Fair enough.” Zach said. “A dozen is an album. If we have thirty to pick from, that should give me a good enough impression of where to point you and how best to move forward.”

“That’s what I need to know.”

The two men shook hands and Zach gave David his business card. Then David excused himself and headed over to Jenna’s for dinner.

~ 20 ~

Jason was sitting on the front steps when David arrived. He was smoking a cigarette and had a small ashtray next to him on the steps. David sat down beside him.

“Not allowed to smoke in the house.” Jason said. 

“That shit will kill you wherever you smoke it.” David said.

“I’m down to about two a day.” Jason replied. “By the way, I went out for a long drive last night and listened to the CD of all your songs. On the one hand, I liked them all. Your voice is very powerful and your guitar sounded great. But as I continued to listen, I could really understand why you would want to have a band behind you. Maybe it’s just that we’re all conditioned to hearing music that’s fairly big in terms of its sound.”

“That’s an astute observation, Jason.” David said. “I made this demo strictly for Zack, the producer I met with and liked a lot. Just to give him an idea of what my voice sounded like, how well I could play. I’ll have to record my parts again anyway, once there is a small band involved. But that’s why it’s called a demo.”

“That makes a lot of sense to me.” Jason said. 

As they were walking into the house the land line phone rang. Jenna answered it. A few seconds later, she said, “Okay”, then she hung up. 

“That was mom. They will be landing at the airport in an hour.”

“My God,” Jason said. “Has it actually been a year already?” 

“No, it’s only been about nine months. I really hope everything is alright.” Jenna replied.

David got to his feet. “Okay, well, I’m gonna head home.” He kissed Jenna and shook hands with David. “Good luck. Call me when you want me to come over and meet them.” He figured that he should be the last person they meet at this point in time.

Jenna and Jason had been secretly dreading their parents coming home. There would be a lot of explaining to do, and there might even be some fireworks. The only thing they could do now was go pick them up, get them home, sit them down and talk to them.

It would definitely be a test of their resolution to make their music business work.

~ 21 ~

Two hours later, Jenna had made some coffee, and they were all sitting at the dining room table. Their folks looked none the worse for wear, and were very relaxed as they talked about all the different places they visited. 

“The main thing we learned, ” Maria said. “Is that there’s only so much cruise ship life that two people can take, and by the time we got to Mumbai, we were done.”

“It was an interesting trip up until it wasn’t.” Louis said. “We saw a lot of stuff. But we ate too much, and frankly, a lot of the people we met on board were kind of boorish.”

“Well, it’s good to have you back home.” Jason said. “Are you still planning to move further up the coast?” 

“Oh yes,” Maria said. “Nothing’s changed in that regard. This is your house now.”

“Okay.” Jason said. “Well, we have some news of our own. We’ve decided to put some of our own money to work and have started a music business.”

“A music business?” Louis said. “What does that mean? Like a record company. Or a management company?”

“Yeah, a little bit of both. Jenna met a guy we went to school with and he is this incredible singer-songwriter and we have started to help him get developed and into the music business. We created a little company called J & J Music, and we’re going to develop him and find other singer-songwriters and develop them too.”

“But…how do you do that and run the shipping company too?” Louis asked

Jenna took a deep breath. “That’s just it, dad. The shipping company doesn’t need us. You filled it up with really great people. The place runs itself. I was doing very little and Jason was doing nothing but travelling around with Aaron while he took care of everything. Same for me. Tony did everything. I just sat around and watched him. After a while, we both realized that there was really nothing for us to do there other than be Ferlinghettis.”

Their parents were both stunned. They weren’t angry, just confused. 

“I was planning to give you the entire company.” Louis said.

“And we really appreciate the opportunity. But honestly, the company runs itself, and does it very well with the people you have put in place.” Jason said. “Jenna and I both never felt really comfortable there on our own.”

“Well, this is astonishing.” Louis said.

“Yeah, but over the past month, since we started this new business we’ve both felt like we’re doing something really interesting. And let’s face it, even if it doesn’t go anywhere we’ll still be alright.”

“This singer you found.” Maria said to Jenna. “Are you involved with him?”

Jenna nodded. “Yeah, he’s really nice guy and a super talented. I think he can make it in the music business.”

“From what I understand about the music business, it’s a hard row to hoe for anyone.” Louis said.

“Yeah, it is.” Jason said. “But that’s the challenge, dad. It’s a game and Jenna and I are both smart enough to learn how to play it. Plus, our guy, his name is David North, he has connections to the kinds of people we need to help us make it.”

Both Louis and Maria sensed the excitement in the voices of their children. They were challenging themselves. And when Louis thought about it, even just for a moment, he realized that they weren’t wrong to want something of their own. He took Maria’s hand and looked at her. He could tell she felt the same way.”

“Well. I like to think we raised you to think for yourselves. And this certainly demonstrates that.” Louis said.

Both Jenna and Jason breathed a sigh of relief. They didn’t believe their dad would get angry with them. What they feared the most was that he would be disappointed.

They talked about the shipping business for about fifteen minutes. The kids had nothing to report because everything was being handled and expertly so by the people already in place.

“I’ll go and talk to everybody tomorrow. Looks like some promotions will be in order.” Louis said. “So tell me, this David fellow, has he recorded anything yet?”

Jenna got up and walked into the kitchen, then came back with the demo CD. She laid it down on the table in from of them. “This is a thirty-song demo. David has already met with a producer to talk about recording them in a studio with a band. So it will be going out to whatever musicians are going to provide the backup. What’s on here is just David playing guitar and singing. They’re called demo tracks. But if you listen to it, I think you’ll understand just why we’re doing this.” Jenna said.

“And this is your boyfriend?” Maria asked.

Jenna just nodded. “We went to high school together and then I ran into him, about a week after you guys left, he was working as a mechanical engineer, helping people with inventions build their prototypes. He’s a very smart guy.”

“And what exactly are you doing for him?” Louis asked.

“We’re funding the recording of his initial batch of songs. About twelve in all.  Then we’re going to work together to find all the other people we need to get the songs onto playlists on the Internet, find club dates for David, and promote and sell the music that the company’s other artists will create. After David is finished all his recording he’s going to work with us to find all the people we need to make this all happen.” Jason said. 

“I don’t really understand how the music business works. What you seem to be saying is that it’s gonna take some time and a pretty substantial investment to get this thing up and running and making a profit.”

“Yeah, it will. A couple years at least.” Jason said. “But I’ll be honest with you, dad, it’s something I have been thinking about for a long time. Then David showed up in our lives and he’s got some connections and Jenna and I are both smart business people. You made sure of that. This is our chance to prove it to ourselves. Taking over a successful operation like Ferlinghetti Freight…yeah we learned some stuff. But mostly, we learned that you put the company together with great people. From the time you left us in charge, we never really felt comfortable. All I did was travel around with Aaron. All Jenna did was sit and watch Tony Primo take care of everything. Those guys had it down pat. There was nothing we could contribute that would improve what they were already doing. So when David showed up in Jenna’s life and I got to know him, we both started to see a business we could build from the ground up. Like grandpa did.”

Louis was stunned at just how well thought-out Jason’s reasoning was. It was hard to argue with anything he had just said.

“Okay.” Louis said. “You’re following a dream, and there’s no way you can be faulted for that. The only thing I know about the music business is that it’s kind of a pyramid with very little room at the top.”

“But that’s the challenge, dad. Finding someone and developing them so they can get to the top.”

“This David,” Maria said to Jenna. “Does he make you happy?”

“Yes he does. He’s a nice guy and he has a lot of talent. He’s taking a risk too. He walked away from his engineering career to do this full time.”

‘As long as you’re happy, sweetie.” Marie said.

“I am, mom.”

“And, Jason, you’re happy too?” Marie asked.

“Yeah, mom. I’m happy and excited about this whole thing.”

There was a brief silence in the room and finally Louis said, “Okay, well I’m gonna go to the office tomorrow and issue some promotions. And then your mom and I are going to look at houses in Lauderdale. We spent the last three days of our cruise looking at houses online. We have two very good possibilities. Both are completely furnished so we’ll be leaving most of the stuff in this house for you two.” He picked up the disc of David’s demo songs. We’ll listen to this on our way to Lauderdale and back.”

Maria and Jenna got busy making dinner. Jason and his dad went off to their home offices. 

Jason called David, who was sitting in the kitchen with Donnie, drinking coffee and looking at houses on a local real estate site. “David. My folks are back and I want you to meet them. They’re heading off to Fort Lauderdale for a couple days, then we’ll all have dinner together.”

“Sure thing Jason. Just let me know when.” David said and disconnected.

“Sounds like everything is working out for you, little brother.” Donnie said. 

“Yeah, it kind of is.” David replied. “I hope her parents like me.”

“So what are your plans? Are you gonna move in with Jenna? “Cause you know it will affect my decision to some extent.”

“Yeah. I can see how that would be the case. To tell you the truth. I’m not sure about anything right now. Seems like a whole lot of stuff is happening all at once. But Jenna and I, haven’t talked about living together. I mean she’s sharing the house with her brother and he has to figure things out as well.”

Just then, Raul walked into the kitchen and poured himself a coffee. “Buenos días, muchachos.”

Raul sat down at the table. “So how goes the career, amigo?” He said to David.

“So far so good. Jason and Jenna just told their parents what was going on. I’m going over to meet them in a couple days.”

“Bueno. They have no problem with what their kids want to do?”

“As far as I know. And thanks for the referral to Zack Jameson. I’m pretty sure he’ll help me get my songs ready for the world to listen to.”

“Zack is a good guy. He’ll put together a great band and the right sound for you. You just make sure you listen to him and follow his advice.”

“We’ve had one meeting already, and I really like him.”

“Well, that’s good.” Then he turned to Donnie. “The next shipment of pills is due in a couple of days. The weed is coming in late tonight.”

The three men shot the shit for another fifteen minutes, then Donnie and Raul headed out the back door. David went into his home studio and started playing around with another idea he had.

~ 22 ~

Two days later, Jason and Jenna’s folks had returned from Fort Lauderdale. It was a beautiful early evening, so they decided to have dinner outside at the big table on the deck, and introduce David to them. Louis and Maria watched David closely to see how he related to their children. They saw his camaraderie with Jason and his genuine affection for Jenna. 

They asked him a few questions about his family. David answered honestly that he and his brother had abandoned their parents about eight earlier. They asked about what David’s brother did and David had to skillfully concoct a story that made it sound like he was in the produce business along with a Mexican friend of his. They had been working together when he and his brother had left their family home.

Finally, they got around to his music. 

“We listened to quite a few of your songs. You have an excellent voice and your lyrics are very interesting. Louis said. “I can see why the kids are interested in helping you succeed.”

“Just remember, dad,” Jason said. “This was not David’s idea. This was something Jenna and I decided on this completely on our own. David did help us understand the business, because he has been interested in it for quite some time. But the decision to move forward was entirely Jenna’s and mine. And I have a good feeling about it, especially after hearing the demo that David has done.”

“I met with the producer named Zack Jamison a few days ago,” David said. “He was recommended by Raul Vega, my brother’s partner. He took the demo home and he’s going to recommend twelve out of the thirty that are there for production. He’ll then put a band together, and cost everything out up front.”

“Why just twelve songs?” Louis asked. He was genuinely interested and curious.

“That’s enough material for an album.”David said. “He’s also gonna pick three or four that we can quickly get into rotation.”

 “Rotations are how frequently the songs get played over a given period of time. This is a key indicator for us going forward.” Jason said.

Louis and Maria didn’t really understand what he was talking about and it showed on their faces.

“Dad,” Jason said. “The music business isn’t as much about album sales as it is about airplay on the streaming services and radio stations, selling songs to other artists, getting songs into movies and TV and playing live. If we get the sound right, with David or any of the other artists we manage, the payoff can be substantial and make this whole venture profitable. But it’s front-end loaded, especially in David’s case. Other artists we find may already have their songs produced and are just looking for the right people to help market them. Or they are capable of producing the music themselves. I think we can get to be, with a little help, very good at figuring that out. But more importantly, the possibilities really excite us. But right now, we’re just at the beginning of all this. It will be a huge learning experience for all three of us, and going through the process, it will get us connected up to people who really know how to work the industry to make it profitable for everyone involved.”

‘Well, it sounds like you’re already on your way.” Louis said. “I guess I’ll always be a bit disappointed that you chose another road. But it is what it is. The company will still go on.”

“Of course it will, dad.” Jason said. “You have excellent people and it’s a real family. That’s rare these days.”

“Speaking of which, the producer I met with, Zack Jamison, told me that his dad was one of your captains for many years.” David said.

Louis thought about it for a moment. Then he smiled. “Joe Jamison. Joe was a good man. He started with my dad and worked, I don’t know, about six years with me before he retired. Small world.”

“Zach says his dad is doing fine. Bought a little boat and does a lot of fishing down in the Keys.”

“Sailors never stray too far from the sea.” Louis said.

The rest of the evening was quite pleasant. David sensed that he had been accepted into the family and that made him feel very good.

Louis and Maria talked about the houses they had looked at in Fort Lauderdale. David mostly just sat back, sipping his wine and thinking, ‘So this is what a real family feels like.’ Jenna held his hand all the time they were talking and made sure he was connected with it all.

~ 23 ~

It didn’t take Zack Jamison very long at all to realize two things. One was that this kid, David North, was the real deal. There was a genuine maturity and confidence to his singing, his lyrics and his guitar playing. The second thing was that he saw the opportunity to be very much a part of what David had told him the Ferlinghetti twins were working to build.

 Over the years, he had carefully cultivated a number of key connections to help the artists he produced get access to the real players in the new music marketplace. As he listened to the songs on David’s CD, his mind went to work. He sat at the computer and made notes on what he thought each song needed. He had a lot of faith in his own instincts. They had carried him a long way and made him more than just a producer. The players he would choose for David were also players who would be more than happy to become his band when and if he started to perform live. The sound he had in mind for David, using these musicians, would have the potential for David to start somewhere in the middle, as an opening act for an established concert band or solo performer in smaller concert venues, as opposed to working his way up through the clubs. But he needed to ease into this, because the people he was dealing with were rich, and if there was one thing that rich people loved, it was great value for the money they were putting on the table.

The last thing Zack wanted to do was let this opportunity slip through his hands over a few thousand bucks. And the reason he wanted to make sure he got this gig came right back around to David North. The young man who probably didn’t have any idea of just how talented he was.

~ 24 ~

Three days later Zack set up a meeting with David and the Ferlinghetti twins their house. He told David to make sure he brought his guitar.

David and Zack arrived at the same time. Jenna showed them in and they all went out the back to sit by the pool.

Once they were all seated and had glasses of wine in front of them. David said to Zack “OK, this is your meeting, so knock yourself out.”

“Thanks. I spent pretty much all of the last three days listening to your demo and I came to some conclusions about it. So I’ll explain where I netted out and then we can talk about it.” 

Zack took a sip of wine. “The demo you gave me was a very good one, all things considered. After hearing even a couple of songs it was clear to me that you’re a very good songwriter, and maybe even a great singer. But in my professional opinion, which is really why we’re talking, I honestly believe that the songs you are writing…are country songs. 

“Now don’t freak out about that, because country music is the single biggest chunk of the music business. And the genre has broadened out to a great degree, and now has a powerful mainstream side to it. And that, in my professional opinion, is where you sit. Get out your guitar, David.”

David opened his guitar case. He said nothing because he was finding this all quite fascinating.

“Now play me the song…‘She’s a Big Girl Now’ and imagine that you’re being accompanied by you know, a slide guitar and a fiddle, playing the long notes at a slightly slower tempo than your demo. And you're singing it with more, call it heart.

David started to play the chords and then slowed them down a little. Once he was comfortable with the slightly slower tempo he started to sing in time with his playing he noticed a difference in his voice, it was more laid back, like he was telling a story instead of presenting a song. Almost instantly, he got what Zack was saying. As he moved through the song he felt that it was a much richer, more heartfelt presentation, all because of relatively minor changes in tempo and voice.

Jenna and Jason noticed it as well. After a couple verses and the chorus. David stopped playing. He looked at Zack, who was smiling because he knew exactly what David was thinking.

“I didn’t really know how to focus the songs, you know.” David said. “I just wanted to see if the lyrics hung together and if my voice sounded OK. This adds a whole other dimension to well, everything.”

“And the best part is that pretty much all the songs you have written can take the same treatment with very little alteration to the lyrics. It’s mostly just tempo and vocal mood.” Zack said. “The voice you just sang that in is, what I feel, your true voice, David. You looked and sounded completely relaxed in it.” 

David looked over at Jenna and Jason. They were both stunned at how masterful Zack’s approach to David had been. 

“So the band,” Zack said, “Is drums, bass, lead and slide guitar and violin with you on rhythm. And maybe a couple of female background voices, depending on where we end up with the instrumentation. We can make a gorgeous album that will cut across at least three markets, which means more airplay and bigger album sales, plus a certain amount of flexibility in terms of who you can open for once you get there. On top of that, this material, done in the same sort of way as you did that song, has excellent market potential for other artists and producers, because relatively few country and crossover artists actually write their own songs.”

Zack gave David his list of the songs he thought would be best to record right out of the gate. After hearing what Zack was able to demonstrate to him about himself, David was completely willing to follow his lead.

David agreed to re-demo the songs Zack was recommending, while Zack would put together a budget and present it to Jenna and Jason.

Jenna and Jason would be the management team, because Zack always felt like a fish out of water in that area. But he assured them that he would refer them to the people they needed for packaging and distribution, sales and merchandising, which also meant selling the songs to other artists. 

“I’m curious.” Jason said. “How is this gonna go over in Nashville? I mean David would basically be an outsider there.” 

“Nashville is more of a concept than it is a mecca these days. Country music is popping up all over the place. Louisiana. Texas. California, even here in Florida. So David won’t have any trouble sliding into the field. It’s gonna take some time to build him. But there are all kinds of good people who can help.” Then he turned to David. “But at the end of the day, David, it’s all up to you. This is my idea of a direction for you. If you’re not comfortable with it, just say the word. But know that I always give my best advice right off the top.”

David looked over at Jenna and David, who were nodding in agreement with Zack. Then he looked back as Zack. 

“Do you remember when we were first talking and I told you that my whole philosophy was to find the smartest people I could and then take their advice?” David said.

“Yeah. It’s what got me really interested from the get go.” Zack replied.

“Well, there you go.’ David said. “If Jenna and Jason approve your budget and you fill them in on all the other stuff they need to be doing and they feel good about all that, let’s just move forward together.”

“It’s Thursday. Let’s all meet on Monday and I will take you through everything. That will give David enough time to demo those picks.” Zack said. And they all agreed. They spent another half-hour with a couple more glasses of wine. Jenna and Jason peppered Zack with questions, which he was more than happy to answer. 

This was quickly turning into something good, David thought. 

After Zack left, David said “Well, that was a bit of a surprise.” 

“No kidding.” Jason said. “But it makes a lot of sense. If I’m hearing him correctly, he wants to position you in that area between modern country and rock.”

“Yeah.” David replied. “It uh, sure sounds that way.”

“Well it’s a bigger market and if we can capture a good chunk of both, that won’t be a bad thing.”Jason said.

Jenna was sitting quietly staring out over the bay. 

“What do you think, Jen?” David asked.

“I have been listening to a lot of radio these days.’ Jenna said. “And what I think is that you, my dear, have lucked out, because you have found somebody who is bringing out the best in you. I liked your demos. But when Zack started explaining his idea for you, a bell went off in my head. The question is, are you gonna be able to pull it off with the material you have now?”

“I think so.” David said. But the only way to know for sure is to try it and to trust him.”

“Okay then. Let’s see what he comes back with and we’ll move on from there.”Jenna said.

A couple of hours later, David was back at his house with Jenna. He lifted his guitar out of its case.

He started playing the chords he had written for a song called ‘In The Prison of Your Love.’ Once his fingers were limbered up, he moved up the fret bar to get a slightly lower sound, and then he tried a couple of different tempos, singing the song in his head.”

Then he started to sing. Only this time he softened the hard words and stretched out the soft words. It sounded more like a ballad than a rock song. He even tried a couple of different vocal deliveries. At first he found them corny, but that was, he believed, because he was trying too hard. So he pulled back. And he took a deep breath, and he slowed down his delivery a bit. At that point, he knew he had hit it because wasn’t all that taxing. In fact, he was kind of pleasant, singing without the urgency in his voice that the demo possessed. 

He kept playing at the same tempo and started over in the voice he had stumbled on. By the time he was singing the chorus for a second time, he had found the voice. He had found the right key for it and he had found the perfect tempo. When he finished Jenna was smiling. 

David just smiled. He looked at the titles list that Zack had left him. “It’s gonna take some time, but I think I can pull this off. 

“I know you can,” Jenna said. 

That night David, Jenna and Jason all went out for dinner together, after which David went home to work on rejigging the demo tunes that Zack Jamison had selected. He didn’t disagree with Zack’s picks, but he wanted to be sure that they all worked the way he was suggesting and that the tempos were right for the message in the lyrics.

There was no sign of Donnie. But there was an email on his laptop.

Hey David

Hope everything went well with your meeting. Raul and I have gone to Mexico to sit down with Raul’s brother and some other people and figure a few things out. Probably three or four days. Donnie.

David deleted the note and then he got out got out his lyric book. He spent the rest of the evening going through the songs, modifying the tempos and vocal treatments. He was about halfway through the process and ready to pack it in for the night when he heard a knock on the front door. It was just a little past one am.

“David opened the door and Jenna stood there. 

“I couldn’t sleep.” she said, then kissed him.“I think it’s ‘cause you weren’t there with me.”

“That’s the sweetest thing anybody’s ever said to me.” David replied.

Jenna didn’t say anything for a while. Then she said  “What if I told you I want you to come and live with me?” Jenna said. “My folks came home tonight and told me they bought a house they found in Fort Lauderdale. And Jason told me tonight that he’s in the process of buying a condo downtown. I think that’s maybe because he wants you and I to live together.”

“Wow.” David said, sitting down at the table.

“So what do you say?” 

“My brother has been on my case to decide on a new house for us. But this is a vastly superior offer.”

Jenna leaned over and kissed him. He kissed her back and they did a little two-step into the bedroom.

After they made love, Jenna drifted off to sleep and David just laid there staring up at the ceiling, wondering what he did to deserve all of this good fortune. Finally, he fell asleep too.

~ 25 ~

The next morning they sat in the kitchen and sipped coffee and ate some French toast, which was David’s specialty. The secret, he believed, was to use real French bread, instead of the mass-produced kind. The other secret was using actual Maple syrup from Canada. 

“So where is your brother?’ Jenna asked.

‘He’s gone to Mexico with Raul. A little business planning strategy meeting.”

Jenna chuckled. “It’s hard to think of weed dealers having a corporate structure.”

“True enough, but the corporate structure, I believe, is what keeps them safe. I’m pretty sure they’re talking about expansion, which means that Donnie might even be moving out of Florida.”

“Well, that’s good timing for us.” Jenna said.

“Yeah. I suppose you’re right.” David replied, but there was a bit of sadness in his voice.

“Does this bother you?”

“No. It’s just kind of the end of a part of my life.” David said, and then brightened up. “But, on the plus side, it’s the beginning of a new part.”

Jenna smiled. “I’m hoping this new part includes French toast every so often.”

“You bet. It’s one of my few culinary masterpieces.”

Since Jenna had very little to do until Zack had his costings together, she decided to hang around with David while he finished up the demos that he needed to do for Zack and whatever band he put together. 

It was late Sunday afternoon when they finished. They were sitting back and giving everything one final listen before dubbing them for Zack. 

During the course of the day, Jenna had made some suggestions to David about where some female voices would make the songs more interesting. This gave David an idea, he set up a dub of one of the songs and put Jenna behind the mike. She knew the words, so he got her to sing along onto an extra track,  which he then doubled and offset by about 1/8 of a second to make it sound like two voices. He was amazed at Jenna’s singing voice.

“You never told me you could sing.”

Jenna chuckled, “Well, it’s the first time anybody ever asked me to actually sing into a microphone.”

David quickly mixed the two tracks that included Jenna’s voice into the song. If nothing else, it convinced him that a couple of female voices would really help in certain parts of the songs. He thought about Jackson Browne, and Steely Dan who were masters at using female voices and offsetting them just slightly to give them more depth.

They played it back several times. 

“This sounds great.” David said. 

“Yeah, it kinda does.”

In actuality, Jenna’s voice was a tiny bit too high-pitched for the music, but it was close enough to get David thinking about just how much more the voices would add to the songs. 

“I’ve been grappling with myself over the idea of using other voices, and this has got me convinced that it really can add to the overall sound.”

“Well I’m glad I could be of some help.”

“More than you know, sweetie. Way more than you know.”

While they were making the dubs they needed, David called Zack and told him the new versions of the twelve songs were done. 

Zack gave him his address, and about an hour and a half later, they arrived at his house, which was in Coral Gables.

Jenna and David pulled into the driveway of a small Spanish-style mansion. A beautiful Mexican woman came to the door. She introduced herself as Lora Jamison. Lora showed them through the house to the back patio, where Zack was working on his computer. There was a half-consumed bottle of Heidelberg Beer on the table beside him. The house was sitting right on an inland waterway. Zack got to his feet, shook hands with David and gave Jenna a light hug. “You’ve obviously met Lora. She is the better half of this relationship by a country mile.”

Jenna looked around at the grounds and at the 38-foot cruiser tied up to the dock.

“It’s quite beautiful here.” Jenna said. 

“Yeah, we like it. Been here for what, twenty years now?” Zack said to Lora.

“Would you like a drink of any kind?” Lora asked.

Lora went back into the house and came out with a bottle of wine and four glasses. They all sat down at the table where Zack had been working.

David gave him a small stack of disks. 

“So I assume the songs took the treatment well.”

“Yeah. It was easier than I thought. Also, Jenna sampled a couple of female voices that sold me on the idea. So you can include a couple of ladies in your estimate.” David said.

“Okay, that’s great.”

Lora poured out the wine and they all toasted. 

“So the production business is quite profitable, I assume.” Jenna said. 

“It can be, but the stock market most definitely is. Before I got into this, I was an analyst for Lehman Brothers in New York. Then, about ten years ago, I received an inheritance from my parents. They’re still alive but gifted out a lot of their money to my brother James and me. So I quit my job, moved down here, met Lora, bought this house with half of what I had and played the market with the other half. Five years later, I had accumulated enough to follow my real passion, which was music.

“I own the studio we’ll be recording in, and that allows me to focus more on new talent, instead of chasing after established people and all the emotional baggage that comes with them. You guys are all new. You haven’t had time to get cynical. And believe me, you will be tempted.”

“You know, I never asked you how you know Raul.” David said.

“You never told him? Gringo!” Lora said to Zack. Then she laughed. “Raul is my brother.”

Now it was David’s turn to laugh, mostly about just how small a world this world was. “Wow.” David said.

“And your brother is his best friend and business partner.” Lora said. “We have consumed many bottles of wine right here.”

“So it’s kind of an ‘All In The Family’ thing, David.” Zack said. “Your brother told me all about you. I kinda knew you were coming.” Zack said. “And now, here you are, and if the gods are smiling on us, we’re gonna make you a star one way or another.”

They spent a few hours with Zack and Lora and had a great time. Zack listened to the entire collection of songs and just smiled. Once they were fairly sober they drove back to David’s house and crashed there. 

When they got to Jenna’s house, after a late breakfast, her parents and Jason were there and organizing the stuff they wanted to take with them to Fort Lauderdale.

“I didn’t realize that you could move in right away.” Jenna said. 

“Well.” Maria replied. “The house was all cleaned and beautifully painted, and you know your dad,  ‘mister get it done ASAP.’ The moving truck will be coming very shortly.” 

“Is there anything I can do to help?” David asked. 

“Oh no,” Maria said. “We’re only taking a few pieces of furniture and some pictures, and of course all our clothes and computers The house was beautifully furnished. We’ll probably buy a few small things later on.”

Just then, Louis came down the stairs carrying a box, which he set down by the door. He said hello to David and hugged Jenna. “Apparently, they put all the clothes into bags for us so we don’t have to pack everything up ourselves.” Louis said. “Besides, if there’s anything we forget or need, we’re only in the next town so it’s not a big deal.”

David went into his office. Jenna and her mom walked through the house. Maria told her what they were taking. Jenna made some notes on the shopping list pad she got from the kitchen. David and Louis went out the back and sat on the deck. 

“Jenna told me she was going to ask you to move in.” Louis said.

“Yeah. She did.”

“You take care of her, David. She’s a good girl and we love her to bits.”

“So do I, sir.”

“I hope this music business works out for everyone. But if it shows any signs of going south, you guys get out quick. Don’t let yourselves go broke over it.”

“That’s part of the plan, sir.”

“They can always come back and work for the shipping company. Or start something else.”

“Yeah. And my boss said he would take me back as well. So it’s a nice safety net.”

“Always good to have a plan B.” Louis said. 

“Just hoping we never have to use it. I think we’re in pretty good hands production-wise. I have re-recorded the twelve demos our producer picked, so he can put a band together for the recordings. I also understand that Jason is moving into his own place downtown.”

“Yeah. Big changes in the Ferlinghetti tribe.”

“I know this isn’t the life you had planned out for your kids.” David said. “But I believe they’re smart enough to make a real go of this. I also want you to know that I was surprised as you were when they told me.”

Louis just smiled. “You know, I think you’re gonna make a pretty decent son-in-law one of these days.”

David laughed, because of all the things that were lined up in his head, marriage was something he could barely see. “Let’s hope so.” was all he said.

Just then, they heard the sound of a truck horn. A medium-sized box van was backing up the double wide driveway. 

Once everything was packed in the van, Jason came out the front door.

“Well, here we go.” Louis said as he got to his feet. 

There were hugs all around and a few minutes later, they were gone. Jenna, Jason and and David stood in the doorway and waved goodbye. Then walked back into the house.

They all sat down in the kitchen and Jenna made some coffee. 

“I’m gonna take my time moving out.” Jason said. “I have some furniture to buy, and all the Internet and TV shit to set up. Jenna and I decided to use this house as our office for the time being. If everything works out, we’ll look for some space downtown.”

“It’s yours and Jenna’s business. You run it any way you like. I still have to talk to my brother about moving in here with Jenna. He’s in Mexico for the rest of the week.”

“I’ll probably be done and gone by then.” Jason said.

They talked for a while longer then David played a couple of songs from the updated demo for Jason. He just laughed.

“Amazing how you can make it sound kinda country and it’s still, you know, very powerful.”

“It actually wasn’t all that hard to go there.” David said. “I surprised myself more than anything.”

“This is gonna be very interesting.” Jason said. “A far cry from the shipping business, but what the hell.”

“Zack said he would have all the costings and the musicians lined up by Monday.” Jenna said.

“Perfect.”

“He kinda freaked us out.” Jenna said. His wife is the sister of the guy David’s brother Donnie works with. Plus Zack owns his own studio.”

“Sounds like Zack will be with us for a while.” Jason said.

“Yeah.” David replied. “And he’s connected up the wazoo. I think this is gonna be a hell of a ride.”

With that, Jason finished off his coffee and said. “I’m gonna head over to my new place and do some planning. I’ll see you guys in the morning no doubt.”

After he left, Jenna sat down at the counter and took a sip of her coffee. “So you were talkin’ to my dad for a while out back. What was that about?”

“He just, uh, he just told me how much he loved both of you and wanted to make sure I would take good care of you. I told him I would. I think he’s startin’ to like me.”

~ 26 ~

The following Monday, they had their first production meeting at Zack’s Studio called South Miami Sound, just off 72nd Street. They got the budgeting out of the way first, and that went pretty smoothly because Jenna had really done her homework, and Zack’s budget was slightly lower than she had anticipated, mainly because he was giving them a real break on the studio time. Part of his investment in their business going forward, he told her. 

After that, the musicians started showing up. Zack introduced them as the best house band in Florida. A guy named Des Dorado on drums, who also played pretty mean bongos, a keyboard and synth player named Alvin Freemantle, a lead guitarist named Denny Gordon, who had moved to Florida a decade earlier from California where he had done session work for everybody who was anybody. The bass player was a black guy named Sye Bolton, who was also pretty good on saxophone. The two backup singers were Dana Anderson and Kristie Jonas, who was a cousin of the Jonas brothers and had worked on most of their albums. 

They all sat in the main studio which was not large but well designed for a band to play together. He piped David’s demo songs into the speakers there. Even though the songs were rough, the speaker system gave them a pretty decent sound quality. 

Once everybody had heard the songs, Zack distributed copies to everyone.

“Learning to play the songs will be fairly easy for you guys. Once you have that in your heads I want to think about what you could add to the basics to make this really special. I’d like to start recording next Wednesday, so if we can all get together on Monday and have a run-through and then a fine tune session on Tuesday. I’d like to get all the tracks for at least one song each day.”

Nobody had any objections to the schedule. Then Denny asked David “Are these all yours, music and lyrics?”

“Yeah. They didn’t start off sounding quite this way. Zack had a lot to do with that.”

“Well, whatever the case, this is very good material.” Everybody else grumbled their agreement.

“Thanks.” David said.

The musicians and singers then all got up and left Jenna, Jason and David with Zack. 

“I have worked with these guys for about four years. They are quick, smart and not afraid to go the extra mile. I’m just glad they were all available.”

Then Zack turned to Jason. “I want to sit down with you and give you a list of my connections. You need to start meeting people who can take this project out into the world.”

David and Jenna thanked Zack and left. Zack and Jason went into Jason’s office, where Jason wrote a cheque to cover the production cost, and he and Zack talked about the way forward. 

An hour and a half later, Jason drove home with a long list of contacts and a head full of ideas.

 

The next three weeks were a genuine hive of activity for Jenna, Jason and David. David and Jenna spent the last two weeks in the studio with his band of musicians as they built his songs. Not surprisingly, everything went quite smoothly, mainly because everyone was a seasoned professional and David was totally in awe of how they were able to work together so seamlessly to build exactly the kind of sound that Zack described to them. At the end of the recording, Zack spent another couple of days with the girls to add parts and rough mix them into where they would add the most value to the songs. David had redone all the vocals, feeling his way though and following Zack’s precise instructions working out the spacing for the various solos that Zack would incorporate. 

There was a real feeling of seamlessness to the process that only came from a group of people being given solid direction and having the talent and versatility to follow it creatively. 

After the recording was all done, there was a little celebration, then everybody left Zack with his engineer Edgar Reese, or Fast Eddie as he was known to everyone, to figure out the final mixes. Zack invited David to sit in with him while he worked on the first couple of songs, just to get his general agreement on the sound that Zack was going for. David loved everything, and the headed home. 

~ 27 ~

Donnie and Raul had come back from Mexico just as the sessions were starting and while the recording was going on, they had done their run up the coast.

When David finally arrived home, leaving Zack to do the rest of the mixing and finishing, he sat down with Donnie and they had a long talk about living arrangements. David explained that he wanted to move in with Jenna, and that Jason had already moved out of the big house.

“Well that’s a good thing,” Donnie said “Because Raul and I are moving the operation up the coast to Virginia Beach. That was what our meeting in Mexico was all about. 

“Virginia Beach puts us in close proximity to Washington, Baltimore Philadelphia even New York. They’re sending someone here to run the produce business, and Raul’s family is buying this house so his cousin, the chemist, will have a place to live. They’ve offered me four hundred grand, which is about fifty grand more than it’s worth so I jumped on it. He’s already hired someone to take over the produce business for Miami and that person will take over his apartment.  They have also leased more space, so Fernando will be able to set up his lab there. For now, Raul and I will share a house in Virginia Beach. He’s up there finding a place and opening up the market for us. The best part is that the pills will be our only business, and we have found another weed dealer for Florida and Georgia. Fernando will send the pills to us them to us via FedEx, if you can believe that.”

“What about raw materials for the pills?”

“Already covered.” Donnie said. “They’ll be shipped directly to the Miami food warehouse where Fernando will have his lab set up. The raw materials all come from Texas, so the shipping is a relatively short run and are about 10% of Fernando’s split. These are the same companies he was getting his raw materials from in Mexico. He’s setting up his lab as we speak and staying in a hotel downtown. So you can move in with your girl anytime. I’ll give you a check for your $200 grand as soon as the big check comes to me.”

David just laughed. “Look at us. A couple of capitalists, making waves in America. But I think you should keep the whole four hundred grand. I mean you paid for my education and everything else while I was getting started.”

Donnie thought about it for a moment then said.“Tell you what. I’ll take three hundred and we’ll call it square.”

“So one last thing.” David said, “What the hell do we do about the Mustang.”

“As much as it pains me to say this,” Donnie replied, “The Mustang is all yours. I have to get myself a ritzy car like Raul’s. We’ll be covering a lot more ground, and if we look like anything but high-end businessmen, we’re fucked. You, on the other hand, would naturally be expected to have a set of wheels like that.”

I don’t know what to say, Donnie.” 

“A fist bump and a hug is all that’s needed to be said, little brother.”

~ 28 ~

Zack brought the girls back in to sing over some of the choruses and some other parts of the songs. They were happy to do this because they knew that this album was going to go somewhere if the people behind David played their cards right. The songs were pretty much mixed, so the girls hung around to listen to the whole thing and check out the levels and pitch of their voices.

They had done a fair bit of work with Zack and knew that he had a great ear, especially for vocals. The stuff they were listening to was right in the pocket between pop and progressive country which meant it would do very well, even below the Mason Dixon Line. They both saw David North as the complete package. Good looking, affable, easy to work with, a great singer, writer and a pretty decent guitar player to boot. Kinda like a twenty-five year old Vince Gill, with higher energy. He would set a lot of hearts a fluttering out there on the concert circuit. But they also knew that was still some distance from where they were right now.

Three hours later, Zack hugged the girls and thanked them for going the extra mile with him. Then Zack and Fast Eddie mixed in the harmonies and called it a wrap.

The girls had a gig for the next day, so he scheduled the listening party for the night after at his house. He also invited a couple of A&R people he had gotten to be friends with over the years. Not that he was looking for a label, but more because he valued their ear. He knew that when you spent the amount of time he had just spent with an album, it was always good to have an outside opinion or two.

~ 29 ~

The next morning, David loaded up all his equipment into the Mustang and drove it over to Jenna’s. Then they drove back in her Lexus, which had a lot more room with the back seat folded down and got all his clothes and shoes, and a couple of hats. He didn’t need much more than that. By the middle of the afternoon, they were both sitting by the pool. David would set up the equipment at his leisure. 

“The timing was pretty good, you know, with your brother moving north and all.” Jenna said. 

“Yeah. It’s gonna be strange for a while not having him around.”

“Weird. My brother moved out too.” Jennas said. 

“Yeah, but we’ve got each other, so it’s not a bad deal.”

“There’s always that.” she said.

“I think we should get dressed up and go out for dinner. somewhere really expensive.”

‘Don’t we need a reservation for that?”

“I think we can bribe our way in.” David said.

So off they went.

~ Epilogue ~

 

Two days later, a listening party was held at Zack Jamison’s house. It was organized by Lola and catered by a Mexican restaurant and catering service owned by her cousin, Esse. 

All the players and their significant others were in attendance. There were also two A&R guys from Columbia and Warner Electra, Johnny Jackson and Clinton Forrest. Even Jason had a date. A girl whose name was on the list Zack gave him. Her name was Julie Mills, and she was an entertainment lawyer.

The party was a smashing success with both A&R guys more than willing to take David’s album, which was entitled “Risin’ & Fallin’, after what Zack had determined should be the first single to be released.

Getting signed by a major label would preclude a lot of the grunt work that needed to be done with an independent artist, and for Jason and Jenna it would simply be an extension of their learning experience. It would also leave them free to look for other artists to sign to their management company, of which they had made Zack a partner. The session musicians, who were mature but not that old, all agreed that going on at least one tour with David would be a lot of fun, and, of course, a steady gig.

Donnie and Raul moved to Virginia Beach and began to develop their upper east coast market, which turned out to be quite a bit more lucrative than it was in Florida, simply because the people ‘up north’ had more money to spend on recreational drugs. So they were able to wholesale their pills for $10 each, which the dealers in their networks would turn around and sell at $15. Within a year, with a steady supply from Fernando, the business was grossing in the low millions. As their incomes grew Donnie and Raul rented their own houses on the beach. The Florida weed business had been taken over by another cousin of Raul and continued to thrive, because Florida was a state controlled by an idiot Republican governor who would never allow legalization.

David, Jenna, Jason and Zack settled on a deal with Columbia Records. They started him as an opening act for a southern tour with John Mellencamp, which was a great pairing for David and a good audience with which to start his career. He and Mellencamp got along famously and just watching the man perform provided David with a lot of the raw material he would need to refine his own stage presence. 

Jenna, who had relatively little to do in this partnership, except at tax time, took over the creative director role and worked with the record company’s recommended designers and photographers to help put together the packaging for David’s first album. She also found a good web designer and created a beautiful site where people could find out more about David, sample his music and buy or his album. She found that she loved this work a whole lot more than the numbers work that she was so good at.

Since John Mellencamp only did gigs on the weekends, this left David a lot of time to work on the rest of the songs in his initial grouping of 30 and write some new stuff.

Jason spent some of his time with the record company, working ahead to make sure that David’s album was getting good promotion and that his singles were getting lots of airplay all around the country, which, as it turned out, they were. 

Jason and Zack, who had become good friends, spent at least a couple nights a week with their ladies, checking out talent at a number of venues along the Florida coast. Since Jason’s girl, Julie, was a very light drinker, she was the designated driver. Over the course of the next year, they had managed to find three new artists who showed a lot of promise and three new clients for Julie as well.

At the end of the Mellencamp tour, Jenna and David decided to get married. The ceremony was performed at their house and was attended by the hundred or so people who were in their lives at the time. Even Donnie and Raul Vega drove down with their ladies. It was a great party, and David and Jenna really got to see up close and personal, just how large their ‘family’ really was.

David and Zack and the band recorded a second album for Columbia, and David toured alone in smaller venues with a new band new smaller band that he and Zack had put together. Six months later, after David had fulfilled his two album commitment to Columbia, he sat down with his Columbia guy, Johnny Jackson, and told him he didn’t want to negotiate a new contract. He explained that after two years on the road, he really felt he wasn’t cut out for that kind of life. 

Johnny Jackson, who had worked with dozens of very talented people, totally understood. So they worked out a publishing arrangement which would give Columbia’s publishing wing first right of refusal on any of David’s new songs. 

Zack Jamison was delighted to hear that, and after a brief vacation that David and Jenna took to Jamaica, put David to work writing songs for the now five bands they had signed. This turned out to be David’s true calling. And one that got him home for dinner most nights. 

Jenna had sold her part of the management company, which was now becoming profitable, to her brother and Zack. She was intent on starting a family. The ongoing revenues from David’s songwriting, both through Columbia and Zack and Jason’s new bands actually provided him with a greater annual income than he estimated would have been the case as a performer.

David spent most of his time sitting by the pool with his beautiful Gibson guitar, his laptop and a small mike, writing songs, which he realized, almost five years later, was right where he had started. Except for that he now had two successful albums of his own, six successful singles, three feature film title songs, and a scad of original songs on three new albums for other bands, and a couple of online commercial songs and a recent request to write the songs for a new musical feature film. He had, in fact, found his true calling, and he was perfectly happy working mostly at home.

Jenna became an upscale Florida housewife, but when Jason was working she liked to sit by the pool and watch him. Then one day, she came out to the pool where David was working and announced that their first kid was on the way.

Of course, David wrote a song about it.

LYRICS FOR DAVID’S FIRST ALBUM

‘RISIN’ & FALLIN’’

1. IN THE PRISON OF YOUR LOVE

There are fires that burn

And dreams that turn

To ashes right before my eyes

And my poor heart breaks

As the promises you make

Turn out to be nothin’ but lies

It’s a foolish dreamer

And a second rate schemer

Who thinks he can rise above

The cast iron bars

And the hard luck scars

In the prison of your love

(‘Cause) There ain’t a dungeon

That’s deep enough

There ain’t hard time

That’s half as rough

There ain’t any torture

You can think of

No there ain’t any punishment

Half as cruel

As the solitary life

Of being your fool

And the pain I feel

In the prison of your love

It’s a long hard road

And it’s heavy load

That I have to carry for you

And the miles ahead

Hold nothin’ but dread

For what you’re puttin’ me through

But I do it all, baby

In the hope that maybe

When push finally comes to shove

You’ll start lovin’ me

And throw me the key

To prison of your love

2. SHE’S  A BIG GIRL NOW

She don’t want anybody

To hear her cryin’

She don’t want anybody

To see her tears

Her love is so alive

But she feels yours dyin’

And now she’s all alone

To face her fears

You made her promises

And she believed you

You said you’d love her

Till the day you die

Her love was strong and true

She would never deceive you

How could you hurt her so?

How could you lie?

Right about now 

She’s never felt so low

Right about now 

It’s time for you to go

Don’t worry ‘bout how

She’ll make it through the night

She’s a big girl now

And she’ll be alright

It won’t be easy for her

To get past the pain

She still breaks down 

Every time she thinks about you

When this nightmare’s over

And she’s ready to dream again

I’ll be there to make sure

All her dreams come true

Right about now 

Pain and darkness are all around

Right about now 

She needs to know you’re leavin’ town

Soon you’ll be just a memory

That fades with the morning light

Cause she’s a big girl now

And she’ll be alright

Yeah, she’s a big girl now

And she’ll be alright

3. WE GROW OLD TOO SOON

The deck is marked

The game never-ending

Even though we know

It’s gone on too long

Kisses in the dark

Messages we’re sending

Just a matter of time

Before we’re dead and gone

Inside your white lies

You find your freedom

Behind your gold mask

You hide your tears

Nobody gets to know

What you’re feelin’

‘Cause you measure love

Like you treasure fear

And like mad dogs

Howlin’ at the moon

Darlin’ we

Grow old too soon

You move the pieces

From square to square

Your velvet glove

Rubs the ebony pawn

But nothing changes

Till the queen is dead

The game is just for show

And the show must go on

Inside your dark eyes

I  see no love

Behind your gold mask

You laugh at me

And on your canvas

You paint a rainbow

In the gaudy colours

Of your insanity

4. GOINʼ DOWN SLOW

Goinʼ down slow

When the lights are low

It’s tellinʼ me way more

Than I need to know

But youʼre givinʼ me your love

Like you never loved before

Goinʼ down slow

When the lights are low

Rock me gently

Into the heart of the night

And even if youʼre lyinʼ to me

It makes me feel alright

So baby, donʼt stop lyinʼ

Till the morning light

Just rock me gently

Into the heart of the night

You know when Iʼm dreaminʼ

Iʼm dreaminʼ dreams of you

Wakinʼ up beside you

Is like a dream come true

Baby, youʼre a surefire cure

For all my nighttime blues

So Iʼll just keep dreaminʼ

Dreaminʼ dreams of you

I want to ride with you

To the end of the line

Cause baby when we’re together

You make me feel so fine

I tell you I could live like this

For two or three lifetimes

I want to ride with you

To the end of the line 

5. RISIN’ AND FALLIN’

I‘ve been risin’

I‘ve  been fallin’

And I got to say

It’s been a long time

Since I heard you callin’

I’ve been dreamin’

About a love I thought was true

Risin’ and fallin’

Every time I look at you

I’ve been risin’

I’ve been tumblin’

And I tell you that there’s

Been a few times

I thought I was crumblin’

It’s been a long night

And my heart doesn’t have a clue

Risin’ and fallin’

Every time I look at you

You walk into the room

In that blue satin dress

And I have admit

It causes me great distress

But I’m a fool

And you are never what you seem

Risin’ and a fallin’,

Like a bright star in my dreams

I’ve been risin’

I’ve been fallin’

And I guess we just fell out of love

Without any stallin’

But I still dream about

A love I prayed would stay true

Risin’ and fallin’

Every time I look at you

6. DEEP DOWN IN THE BLUE LIGHT

Deep down in the blue light

I hear you whisper soft and low

Promises melt like honey on your lips

But your words are just for show

Deep down in the blue light

Everything feels soft and warm

Bodies intertwine like quicksilver flows

But it’s the calm before the storm

And I been livin’ through

A thousand crazy days

And it looks like it’s gonna be

One of those crazy nights

Between the unsung passion

And badly written passion plays

This perfect love has a tragic flaw

Deep down in the blue light

Deep down in the blue light

Love is over before it begins

And the sinner never gets the chance 

To do penance for his sins

Deep down in the blue light

Passion is cheap, lies flow like wine

Lovers treat each other as strangers

And end up lonely before their time

And I been livin’ through

A thousand lonely lifetimes

And it looks like tomorrow

Has no relief in sight

You’re lyin’ here but I can feel

You cuttin’ that lifeline

And I go drifting alone again

Deep down in the blue light

Deep down in the blue light

Deep down in the blue light

And I go drifting alone again

Deep down in the blue light

7. I’LL BE WAITING FOR YOU

I know somebody else

Is takin’ up your time

I know he’s got you hypnotized

With all his lies

But soon you’ll find that one and one

Don’t always make two

And I’ll be waiting…I’ll be waiting for you

It’s a crazy world

Filled with crazy things

It’s a world where even love

Comes with too many strings

So when you find yourself

Looking for love that’s simple and true

I’ll be waiting…I’ll be waiting for you

I’ll be waiting for you

Even in the darkest night

I’ll be waiting for you

To make everything alright

When all your dreams have flown away

Like dreams are bound to do

I’ll be waiting…I’ll be waiting for you

I know someone

Has stolen your fragile heart

It’s just matter of time

Before he tears it all apart

So when you find yourself all alone

On Heartbreak Avenue

I’ll be waiting…I’ll be waiting for you

8. SOMEONE I ONCE KNEW

Someone I once knew

One day said to me

That I could never give my heart away

And let love set me free

That I’d be doomed to live my life

As a solitary soul

Never sharing, never caring

Never feeling whole

Someone I once knew

Told me this would be my fate

And like a fool I never believed her

Until it was way too late

And now I live to regret

Having ever let her go

And I try to forget all the things

That I was never supposed to know

Someone I once knew

Just a memory

Of all I could have had

Of all that love could be

And now I know that I

Didn’t have to end up alone and blue

If only I had opened up my heart

To someone I once knew

They say it’s a lonely soul

Who never sees the signs

Who never lets their heart depart

From the path their head defines

There was a time so long ago

I didn’t believe that was true

But that was before I broke the heart

Of someone I once knew

9. HOLD ON TO ME

Hold on to me

With all your might

I will be your strength

I will be your light

Shinin’ like a beacon

Through the darkest night

So hold on to me

With all your might

Hold on to me

In the moonlight glow

We will fly together

Through the great unknown

Our love will bind us

Through all the highs and lows

So hold onto me

In the moonlight glow

Hold on to me

Come take my hand

And we will live together 

In the Promised Land

I will never let you down

I will always be your man

Hold on to me

Come take my hand

Hold on to me

And never let go

I will be your anchor

When the hurricanes blow

So much chaos around us

That we will never know

If you hold on to me

And never let go

10.  TWO WRONGS

DON’T MAKE ANYTHING RIGHT

Well you were wrong

To say my love wasn’t enough

And you were wrong

To pull out when the goin’ got tough

And now I got nothing

But empty days and lonely nights

Cause two wrongs, baby

Don’t make anything right

You were wrong

Not to try as hard as you could

And you were wrong

To think that what we had was no good

Cause I loved you

Loved you with all my might

But two wrongs, baby

Don’t make anything right

Two wrongs

Don’t make anything right

All it makes is two sad hearts

Sleepin’ alone at night

I was sure we had a love

That burned so hot and bright

But two wrongs, baby

Don’t make anything right

I was wrong

For bein’ such lovesick fool

And I was wrong

For tryin’ too hard to love you

And now I know

But it’s 20/20 hindsight

That two wrongs, baby

Never make anything right

11. HOUSE OF CARDS

She built a house of cards

On a shaky table

She gave her heart to a man

She thought would be able

To give her everything

She was lookin’ for

But her house of cards

Tumbled to the ground

With the slammin’ door

She built a house of cards

On an acre of sand

Now love feels like cold rain

Slippin’ through her hands

There’s nothin’ she can do

Nothin’ she can say

It’s just a house of cards

Driftin’ on the tide

Of love that got away

(CHORUS)

Ain’t it funny how love

Can be a crazy game

No matter how you cut the deck

You can lose it just the same

No matter how many aces

You got up your sleeve

It’s just a house of cards

Blowin’ in the wind

When love decides to leave

The pain is mostly over now

And she feels alright

It’s been a while since she last worried

About makin’ it through the night

But the cards are callin’

Callin’ out her name

Beggin’ her to build

Another house of cards

Daring her to fan the flame

12. READIN’ IN BETWEEN THE LINES

Readin’ in between the lines

Of a letter I got today

All about how you feel so sad

And that our love’s faded away

I don’t know what to tell you

We once played that game and lost

I’m still waitin’ for the scars to mend

Still tryin’ to measure the cost.

Readin’ in between the lines

I feel you finally understand

That you just let my love slip away

Like water through your hands

Now you’re startin’ to have your doubts

About where your heart should be

Tryin’ to find that perfect love

Or with the fool you once made of me

I’ve always been a fool for you

And I’ve always paid the price

Your words, they sound so sweet on paper

But your heart’s as cold as ice

You’d never hesitate again

To just leave my love behind

It’s all there in back and white

When I read in between the lines

Don’t write me any more letters

Don’t tell me any more lies

It’s hard enough keepin’ my head together

When I think of how hard I tried

And how much I once loved you

And how little you loved me

And just how hard it was to take

That it was never meant to be