Chapter 14: The Valleries

“I'll fucking kill him,” hissed Aster, her fingernails digging into the plastic wrap which covered the record in her hands. Her bright orange eyes shook as they scanned the unsightly gob of the has-been which was plastered across its cover. Johnny Vallerie's latest break-out hit— the star is back!, read the packaging of the record Aster held and which was flying off of the shelves at that moment as Floyd, Sylvia, and Cecil tried to keep pace with the orders pouring in.

Sylvia could only offer fleeting looks of mutual disappointment to Aster as she tried her best to manage the swathe of people tossing her copies of the new single. The radio beside the register blared on, stuck in a figurative loop of different disc jockeys playing the song.

“It's an absolute sensation!” one customer called out, three copies of Johnny Vallerie's face in hand. “I've never heard anything like it!”

“It has to be song of the year, I don't know how he did it,” replied another as he glanced over the credits of the cover.

'The Valleries – Backing Band', read the sparse personnel notes underneath his name.

Aster sat, barely functional, awash in a blur of rage. The familiar sounds of her composition and the playing of their band taunted and tormented them as it echoed throughout the store, as the crowd poured in from the street, showing no signs of letting up. Her self-appreciation withered in how they all seemed to look through her, despite being the true author of the song.

She glanced down at the stack of records she was supposed to help bring to the front, and contemplated destroying them in some truly undignified fashion— or at the very least burning them. She thought on with a sickening worry of how The Cherubs were making ever quicker steps to fame while she had to watch herself be robbed— taking ten steps back as she was still relegated to a complete and utter unknown.

Simply put, Aster was beyond all definition, absolutely furious. She had been intimate with a fiery attitude for most of her life, but this morning her rage was of such a degree that it made her delirious in its intensity.

Nobody fucking steals from me. Nobody takes my fucking songs, she told herself, her frenetic eyes darting up to the bustling front of the shop as she watched customer after customer steal away with her work. She turned her fiery eyes towards Floyd, catching the exhausted man mid-stroll as he made his way to the back to grab yet more copies of the single.

“Miss Aster, I'm sorry but we really need—”

“You're our manager right? Pull the song from sale,” Aster demanded. Her ferocious stare stopped the prim man in his tracks, unaccustomed to hearing the quiet girl speak so pronouncedly.

He stood for a moment, a pained look coming across his face as he moved to speak. “Well, I am afraid it is not that simple, Miss Aster. We do not have a copyright on the song and—” Aster felt as though her entire being would disintegrate with the intensity at which she was trembling with rage.

“And you didn't consider this happening?! Are we even getting paid from it? Look at the cover, our names aren't even ON IT!” she screamed.

Floyd stammered, unable to give a response as the rest of the shop's attention gravitated towards the commotion. Aster, sick with rage and embarrassment, all at once rushed past Floyd, fetching her oversized coat as she bolted out of the shop into the sleet descending upon the town, her eyes painted polar in the tears that streamed wildly out from her eyes. She marched with no objective, stumbling through the slush as she hiccuped to herself.

Fuck you Floyd, and fuck you Johnny. Fuck the shop, the customers, fuck EVERYTHING! she cried out in thought as the tremors of unbridled rage gave way to the chills of her body fighting off the cold headwinds as she pressed on down main street. “You stupid piece of shit!” she exasperated under her breath, the thought of Johnny Vallerie taunting within.

Just get me out of here, get me the fuck OUT of here! she cried in accelerating mania, slipping as she navigated the slick, cold cobblestone streets as she continued to sob in her frigid stumble.

She pulled Sylvia's hand-me-down tight as the wind kept up, her snot running cold down her upper lip as she began to weep in a convulsing swirl of emotion. Stumbling once more, she finally fell to her knees and howled, giving little regard or care to the passersby who shot her looks of concern. Through her swollen and frigid eyes she glanced up, realizing she had happened upon the steps of the Strawberry Set by the poster which caught her eye.

Lightning strikes twice! read the header of the poster. Johnny Vallerie's unsightly, self-assured grin was plastered below it, and below that were the details of a week-long residency at the Strawberry Set, which Aster realized coincidentally started the day after tomorrow.

Aster sniffled, taking several, deliberate steps down closer to the poster as she looked onto it in detail, spitting on it before falling before it, her eyes let loose in a yet stronger, sputtering fit of crying.

“Fucking bastard!” she screamed as she wiped away at her eyes, her fist hitting the wet sleet covered ground, sniveling as she shivered. “It's fucking pointless, isn't it?” she sobbed, grabbing at her knees as she shook. “I just wanted to make music, and have it touch people.” Aster's cries seized as she worked herself into an unhinged fit. “I just wanted to be fucking happy!” she bawled, stomping her soles against the cold ground as they slipped in the sleet and mud.

“Then be happy!” called a voice softly before her. Aster wheeled around in response, the swollen, dark circles around her eyes settling onto the little blond head before her, doused in sheets of white, powdered fair like some sort of wintery confection.

“You really had me worried you doofus,” Sylvia continued, walking down the steps of the Strawberry Set as she knelt to meet Aster.

Aster immediately began to sob once more, even more profusely this time as Sylvia came closer, wrapping a large, woolen shawl around her, gripping her tightly as she slowly tried to calm her down.

“To think that idiot was my favorite musician,” she mumbled as she warmed Aster up, trying her best to soothe her sobs. “I know it's a total drag to see, and it doesn't really do much now— but it was still your song that did that well,” she offered in a motivating voice, making sure the shawl was still wrapped tightly around her.

“Yeah, but it's that fucking idiot who gets the credit,” she sobbed, sniveling as she cried into the shawl's thick, wirey threading.

“But who's to say you can't do that with another song? That was only your first try ever recording one!” Sylvia chirped, looking down on her friend with a smile. Aster glanced up at Sylvia's cheery, flushed face, her own snot and tears bitter in how their coldness cut into her skin.

Aster could only weep in response, pulling her close as she sobbed once more.

Sylvia said nothing more, and stroked Aster's back as she let her anguish and unbridled rage out, the two crouched in the alcove of The Strawberry Set's staircase, as November swirled around them.

“Hey, how's about we get back now? It's a total blizzard out here!” she offered a few minutes later, herself now shivering. “Cecil is probably losing his marbles too.”

 

—

 

Sylvia opened the door to the shop as they returned, holding it open for Aster who entered in from the storm, snowy head down in shame and thorough embarrassment at her outburst earlier as she made for the back of the shop in a hurry, determined to wallow in misery and self-pity until the sun burnt itself out over the horizon.

“I've returned! There's no worry!” Sylvia confidently exclaimed upon making it through the door with Aster, wiping away the light dusting of snow that covered her bow and hair.

“Well thank heavens, I was worried,” moused Floyd in a soft voice as he tended to a customer, Aster's gaze locked on the floorboards as she shuffled away.

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“Aster,” Cecil dryly called out halfway through her dash to the storeroom, gritting her teeth in anxiety as his voice stopped her in her tracks. He motioned her over down the aisle to where he was busy sorting through crates.

“Look, I know it's awful what he did. He's a straight up piece of shit,” he started. Aster glanced up from the floorboards in surprise at hearing Cecil swear. “But you can't flake off on us like that. You still work here, and I'm still one of your managers,” he continued, sorting through the records as he spoke.

Aster closed her fists, running her fingernails through the undersides of her fingers as she began to speak. “He stole my song. That loser did absolutely nothing and he still gets to claim credit for it,” she began, her dizzying rage slowly returning as she began to speak, a nasty scowl underscored by her heavy eyebrows forming as she thought about the pot roast man.

“Yeah, but what are you gonna do about it now? Be angry? Run off into a blizzard and catch pneumonia and die out on the streets? That'll show him,” he replied. Cecil's voice had taken a suddenly stern tone as he set the records aside. “Guess what Aster, I've had a song stolen before too,” he continued. Aster's scowl dissipated with her surprise.

“Youth piano league, when I was nine. There was a small scholarship being awarded to the kid who had the best original composition, and so I worked all summer on mine with help from my dad— who played in the Cherryaire Orchestra,” he began, glancing off at Floyd and Sylvia who continued to deal with the now manageable stream of customers.

“But there was this other kid, who I made friends with at our lessons, who decided he liked my piece so much that he would play it as his own at the recital,” he trailed off, Aster's once ember embellished, furious gaze now hung in suspense as Cecil began to speak again. “And it won. But I had nothing to play as a result, so I just left the recital,” he mumbled, the sharp bite of tension filling the sudden vacuum of silence throwing Aster into her usual mess of sweating and walking the tight rope beneath the knives that were her attempting any sort of a response.

“I'm sorry,” she awkwardly and lamely gave in response, to which Cecil shook his head.

“Don't be, it was a long time ago now. And besides, the point is that it happens, and you can't do anything about it, but keep going on,” he replied, standing up to overlook her diminutive stature. “So no matter how hairy it gets, do not think about giving up. Don't let it get to you like it did me. It would be a waste of those songs,” he said, lifting the crates up as he moved further on down the aisle. “Now try and get some work done before the shop closes.”

Aster remained in place, her mind a whirlwind of anger and fatigue, as she looked on down the aisle and watched their customers leave happily with her song in hand, the abscess of joy that was aggrandizing such a grotesque man's fame eating raw at her ability to maintain any basic form of composure.

“Johnny Vallerie... has a residency at the Strawberry Set?” she suddenly interjected.

“Huh? Yeah, the prick ended up taking over the time slot reserved for our poetry,” Cecil replied with a frown as he scratched names off of the clipboard before him, halting suddenly as he finished speaking, a sudden look of deep thought making its way across his face.

“Wait, that's it—” he started, setting the clipboard down as his mind continued to run its paces. “What good is a show if nobody shows up?” he asked, looking up at Aster.

“What do you mean?” she stuttered.

“I mean to hell with people like that. If he's going to steal your song then we'll steal his show,” he put forth in an unexpectedly defiant tone, rising to once again stand over the messy haired girl. “People like your songs, they're drawn to them,” he continued, Aster's wavering eyes meeting his as the oft-aloof man was suddenly overcome by an apparent zeal and momentum. “If we can pull off a big enough show, then we can steal all the wind from his sails, and his residency will be done for,” he declared, making his way down the aisle towards Floyd and Sylvia. “Believe me,” he continued, looking back to Aster, “I know the owner of the Strawberry Set, he won't take a dead draw like that.”

Aster followed in complete confusion and subtle excitement as they made their way to the register as Sylvia sent the last customer in sight out the door.

“Phew! That really was something,” she chimed, wiping her brow. Floyd, his usual illustrious air having been dulled the past few days, merely offered them a 'good job' and began to walk away as Cecil stopped him.

“Floyd, like I told Aster, you can be sad about the way things go or you can get over them,” he said abruptly, the prominent sadness worn upon Floyd's face letting up for a second as he looked onto Cecil quizzically, before wilting back into a pained hesitance.

“I am sorry Cecil. I am sorry to all of you in fact. I am starting to think more and more that old Floyd is just not cut out to manage a band,” he muttered, Aster's dead stare the period on that train of thought, a frightened glance joining his brow as he broke eye contact with her.

“Can we organize a show?” Cecil asked. The three furrowed their brows in surprise.

“A show? Well of course, but are you all that willing to just move on?” Floyd responded.

“We're not moving on. I'm talking about a show that will make Vallerie's residency look like the lamest, squarest place to be.”

Floyd scratched at his chin, looking off as he thought. “The residency starts the day after tomorrow Cecil. In fact, there is a lot of buzz over his show already. A lot of sponsors have already signed on,” he continued, before giving a painful glance towards Aster, “The song itself is number five on the national charts. I am afraid one of our shows—” he looked over again with a shaken stare at Aster, her face now completely set in a furious scowl. “No matter how exquisite your songwriting abilities or the utter angelic quality of your arrangements, will be able to pull crowds away from him, I am afraid.”

“Well what about a festival?” added Sylvia, her finger against her chin in a cotton-candy soft expression of thought. “Like, what's— what's cooler than Johnny Vallerie?” she muttered as though in pain, grimacing as she waited for their non-existent responses.

“A lot.” chimed Cecil.

“—A festival! With food and games, and other bands!”

“Sylvia, do you know how much a festival costs?” interjected Floyd.

“Does it matter to a great manager?” Aster finally cut in, Floyd's hands nervously playing with his cane as her eyebrows curled inward in question. “If you're that great a manager the success of the festival will outweigh any cost,” she continued, Sylvia flashing an expression that a little faerie would upon stealing some heirloom, Cecil in total surprise.

Aster, propelled by that ever rich fuel of fury, temporarily forgot her anxiety as the sheer anger and indignity she felt overrode any thoughts she had of doubt or self-consciousness. Or rather, she in that moment was empowered with the ability to consciously chose to move those worries to the background as she let loose her entire life's living hell of anguish and sorrow upon the cloudy-haired man, as she began to work herself up back into hysterics.

“If you want to manage a band then you're going to have to manage them well. You have to support them, you have to—”

“Alright, Miss Aster,” Floyd interjected, smiling. “I shall try my best, you have my word,” he replied, tapping his cane as he moved from the register.

Aster stood shaking, wracked by anger and the adrenaline that came from supplanting her severe anxiety.

“Sylvia, get the phone and ring up Marion, we only have a day and a half to organize this 'shindig'!”

“Aye, aye captain!” peeped the ever sweet peppermint, Sylvia, as she braced to be once again screamed at through the receiver.

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