The early songs existed in partial photographs. God, he could write a whole new set of songs based on these photographs alone. And all the things that were left out of them.
How the girl's hand, just below the photograph, remained bare, even though he had BEGGED her to marry him. She was wise. Wiser than he.
But WOW, they had some lovely moments together. He had trapped her in a barn on a shoot, it wasn't raining, but maybe if it was, she'd have stayed longer. She made some remarkable observation and he could still smell the hay, and wondered if her hair would smell that sweet. And if she'd let him put his nose in her hair.
A year later, he could ask anything of any girl, they'd let him put his nose and any other body part wherever he'd like, and they'd be eager. But she never fully warmed up to him.
Even now, she was as old as he was, somehow she looked like a grandmother-type and he wore the look of a has-been rocker. She had kept her radiant smile, and he still fell for her every time. Now she was more likely to pose with him, with her arms around him, as if they were still good friends, or as if they had been lovers.
As if she hadn't married a music producer, had a few kids, gone on her own road-as complicated as his. And still in the business, playing grannies and other old lady parts. Clinging to him for whatever aura of fading fame. They still shared a smile of possibility, of lovers who've never consummated.
Maybe too late to ask her, or if he did, he was sure to be disappointed. Maybe she was the type who had left sex back in her 50's. Better not to ask-unless they get to have a long conversation-unless she stays long after the concert. But she "Had to go". Again, that phrase. The awkward parting of people who have more to discuss. Better to leave the party early, while there is still fun to be had.
(And that was how she died, with the conversation still ahead of them. So much to reunite over. He should have insisted she stay. Opened a bottle of champagne, or sparkling apple juice. Anything to get her to realize the moment, how precious it was. But she was gone. Dematerialized as quickly as she'd come.
START WITH?? He never knew who was in the audience until after the show. Even then, he couldn't be sure of those people who just didn't have the nerve to come backstage. Some people just looked like other people. Only so many faces and arrangements of features available; only so many variations on a theme. But that night, he was sure he saw Val in the back. That same radiant smile. That song that was not about her , but was. The songwriters confessed they had seen a call sheet with her name, it was floating in the immediate ether. They chose it because it had enough syllables. They wrote the song on the way to the producers' office.)
This recent picture, taken just before her death, his nose is close enough to her hair. She smelled like shampoo. And his fantasies began anew.
From "You and me and rain on the roof"
Lovin Spoonful
(Him in love with Val)
