Freedom [99]
The kid was wearing a hoodie and the sort of low-cut skinny pants that Katz had first observed in London. “What do you think of Tutsi Picnic?” he said. “You into them?”
“Don’t know ’em,” Katz said.
“No way! I can’t believe that.”
“And yet it’s the truth,” Katz said.
“What about the Flagrants? Aren’t they awesome? That thirty-seven-minute song of theirs?”
“Haven’t had the pleasure.”
“Hey,” Zachary said, undiscouraged, “what do you think about those psychedelic Houston bands that were recording on Pink Pillow in the late sixties? Some of their sound really reminds me of your early stuff.”
“I need the piece of material you’re standing on,” Katz said.
“I thought some of those guys might be influences. Especially Peshawar Rickshaw.”
“If you could just raise your left foot for a second.”
“Hey, can I ask you another question?”
“And this saw will be making some noise now.”
“Just one other question.”
“All right.”
“Is this part of your musical process? Going back to work at your old day job?”
“I hadn’t really thought about it.”
“See, because my friends at school are asking. I told them I thought this was part of your process. Like, maybe you were reconnecting with the working man to gather material for your next record.”
“Do me a favor,” Katz said, “and tell your friends to have their parents call me if they want a deck built. I’ll work anywhere below Fourteenth and west of Broadway.”
“Seriously, is that why you’re doing this?”
“The saw is very loud.”
“OK, but one more question? I swear this is my last question. Can I do an interview with you?”
Katz revved the saw.
“Please?” Zachary said. “There’s this girl in my class that’s totally into Nameless Lake. It would be really helpful, in terms of getting her to talk to me, if I could digitally record one short interview and put it up online.”
Katz set down the saw and regarded Zachary gravely. “You play guitar and you’re telling me you have trouble interesting girls in you?”
“Well, this particular one, yeah. She’s got more mainstream taste. It’s been a real uphill battle.”
“And she’s the one you’ve got to have, can’t live without.”
“Pretty much.”
“And she’s a senior,” Katz said by old calculating reflex, before he could tell himself not to. “Didn’t skip any grades or anything.”
“Not that I know of.”
“Her name?”
“Caitlyn.”
“Bring her over after school tomorrow.”
“But she’s not going to believe you’re here. That’s why I want to do the interview, to prove you’re here. Then she’ll want to come over and meet you.”
Katz was two days short of eight weeks of celibacy. For the previous seven weeks, abjuring sex had seemed like the natural complement to staying clean of drugs and alcohol—one form of virtue buttressing the other. Not five hours ago, glancing down through the skylight at Zachary’s exhibitionist mother, he’d felt uninterested to the point of mild nausea. But now, all at once, with divinatory clarity, he saw that he would be falling one day short of the eight-week mark: would be giving himself over to the meticulous acquisition of Caitlyn, obliterating the numberless moments of consciousness between now and tomorrow night by imagining the million subtly different faces and bodies that she might turn out to possess, and then exercising his mastery and enjoying the fruits of such