We Sold Our Souls Read online

  “Are you high?” Tuck raised his voice, then got self-conscious and dropped it again. “You are the last person I’d take to see Bill.”

  “You read the note!” Kris said. “Something is wrong with us!”

  Tuck’s face closed down and he shut the garage door. As it rattled down, closing off the endless stream of happy people jogging past in their Lululemon tops and black yoga pants, Kris spelled it out.

  “It was UPS,” she said, knowing how crazy that sounded even as it came out her mouth. “Obviously, not UPS, but it was guys dressed like UPS drivers. After Scottie shot himself, Angela, his wife, called 911. But the fake UPS drivers showed up instead and killed her and his kids.”

  “Kris,” Tuck began.

  “I hid in the pantry, and ran,” she said. “But they saw me and they’re looking for me. We have got to go warn Bill.”

  “Kris,” Tuck said.

  “Something is going on, Tuck, and I don’t understand it, and you don’t understand it, but why don’t I remember contract night? Why is one entire night missing from my brain? Why did Scottie think we’re all in danger? We need to go find Bill, we need to make sure he’s safe, and we need to get you away from your family. What if you’re a danger to them? What if they can make you do what Scottie did?”

  “KRIS,” Tuck barked.

  She shut up.

  “Let me make a phone call,” he said. “But for the record, you sound crazy. Wait here.”

  He opened the white door in the white garage wall and went into his house. Air-conditioning billowed out and wrapped itself around Kris’s ankles. Faraway music drifted out the door, peaceful and lazy on a Sunday evening. Then she recognized the breakdown: “Stand Strong” by Koffin.

  First she swayed toward the closed garage door thinking it wasn’t too late to get out and drive away, then her feet were on the brick steps leading into the house, then they were on the tile, walking down the dim hallway. This was the song Scottie Rocket heard on his phone before he took out his gun, and it drew Kris in. If Tuck was getting a gun it was better to face it head on.

  The hushed sigh of central air swaddled her in cool, sweet clouds. The dark hall ended in a bright, modern kitchen. Kris had just passed the island when she heard a human noise behind her. She turned. Lily stood by the opposite counter, a cutting board and a pile of carrots before her.

  Lily’s face was tight, her mouth pinched shut. Her eyes were the same hard chips Kris remembered from the hospital. In her right hand was a butcher’s knife, held low at her side, her knuckles around it bloodless.

  She took a step forward. Kris took a step back, bumping into the counter with her butt.

  “What the hell are you doing inside my house?” Lily asked, pointing the butcher’s knife at Kris.

  “I’m here to keep you safe,” Kris said.

  “Get out of here, now!” Lily said, stepping closer to Kris.

  Then Tuck was in the kitchen, getting between the two of them. “Whoa, whoa, whoa,” he said. “Lily, put the knife down. Kris is leaving.”

  “I’m not leaving,” Kris said. “Not without you! You have to get away from your family. That Koffin song is everywhere.”

  “What the hell is she talking about?” Lily shouted.

  Two boys about to turn into teenagers and one six-year-old girl, attracted by the commotion, stood in the living room and watched the adults. Seeing the kids sent Kris into a panic. She saw Martin on the floor with a hole in his chest, mouth lolling open, Ursula upstairs, half in and half out of the bathroom in her soccer uniform. Angela stretched flat on the kitchen floor, one eye staring up at the ceiling.

  “We have got to go now,” she said to Tuck.

  “Hold on, Kris,” Tuck said, arms outstretched, putting himself between the two women. “Hold up. Look, I talked to Bill, just now, on the phone, and he says come on down. You can sleep in your car, or at a hotel, or I don’t care where, and we can ride down in the morning.”

  “You are not getting in any car this woman drives,” Lily said.

  “I’ll drive,” Tuck said. “Okay, Kris? So go on now.”

  “We are going now,” Kris said. “This is happening now. Any minute there’s going to be a knock at the door and UPS will be there. Or you’ll get a call and you won’t be able to help yourself. You look around and see your family? I look around and see a bunch of potential murder victims!”

  The kids in the living room had been following this, and now the six-year-old started to wail.

  “Dad,” one of the little boys said, “what’s wrong with UPS?”

  “Everybody stop!” Tuck tried.

  “She has a knife, Tuck!” Kris said. “Koffin was on the radio. The song is the trigger. No one is safe.”

  “Calm down,” Tuck said. “No one wants to hurt you—”

  “I do!” Lily said.

  “Quiet!” Tuck shouted. “Fine, we’ll go tonight. That’s fine. I’ll feed my family and we’ll drive down after. Lily, we’ll be gone in an hour. Kris, you will sit in your car and wait for me to get ready. This is not a debate.”

  Kris sat outside in her car and watched Tuck’s family eating through the front window. She tried to convince herself that this was what families were like, loud and rambunctious, and fighting over who got too many mashed potatoes, and which one got extra chicken fingers. That they didn’t look like Angela, and Martin, and Ursula.

  It took Tuck forever to get ready, and Lily watched them from her bedroom window the entire time. Kris watched the street. Even in the dark, the power walkers kept going past on their merry-go-round to nowhere, identical faces staring back at Kris, giving identical good-evening waves, as Tuck loaded up his road snacks, water bottles, phone chargers, and two suitcases. Kris only had her Bones and her guitar.

  When they finally got in the car, Kris crawled out of her skin as Tuck arranged himself: his phone, his seat, the satellite radio, the rearview mirrors.

  To distract herself, Kris asked, “Where is Bill, anyways?”

  “Bill?” Tuck said. “Bill’s still living in the Witch House.”

  “How do you know that?” Kris asked, shocked.

  “We exchange Christmas cards,” Tuck said.

  “I never got one,” Kris said.

  “Why would Bill write you?” Tuck said. “I’ve forgiven you, but Bill…he’s with Lily on this one. No one likes you, Kris.”

  Then they hit the road. And Kris remembered the night she broke up the band.

  DÜRT WÜRK

  All That Cremains

  Steeltown road warriors Dürt Würk—as in “grave diggers”—seem to live in their mangy secondhand van, which means that they’ve given up on stuff like washing and cleaning their teeth, and the cover of their new, self-penned album, All That Cremains, is as ugly as an orthopedic shoe. But what was it mum said? Don’t judge a book by its cover, and that proves to be the case with these razor-sharp riff-slingers who have made an underground name for themselves by delivering tight power metal to rough crowds in the former colonies (what about coming over here, boys?). You could be forgiven for almost giving up after wading through trite trash like “Keep on Digging,” the misguided showcase for drummer Bill Cameron, and the forgettable ’80s throwback “Reaper’s Harvest.” But the final three cuts are near genius—“Chained to the Wheel,” “Troglodyte Rising,” and “Blinded by Darkness” veer perilously close to Gothic bombast, but wrest themselves away at the last minute and showcase Terry Hunt’s soaring vocals and Tuck Merry-weather’s organic bass, while easy-on-the-eyes Kris Pulaski’s rock-solid lead guitar and Scottie Rocket’s electrifying solos clash in all the best ways. With better production, they could score some serious airplay.

  —Nick Sharman, Kerrang! magazine

  February 15, 1996

  t was always raining at the Witch House. They’d found it one summer when they
were touring and needed someplace near the Midwest where they could store their gear and hole up for a couple of nights between shows. It was a two-story wreck of rotten brown planks sagging against a cinderblock chimney, hidden deep in a forest that grew between two Kentucky hills, and it rented for $140 a month. Trees grew too close to its walls, so it was always damp. Even in the dead of winter, it smelled like mold, and the dirt track that led to the road was mostly mud.

  After that, they came there every summer to write, to practice, to drink beer, to kick holes in the walls, to stash their gear in the padlocked, ice-cold basement where they practiced. That summer they’d gone there to record Troglodyte, and it had been the best two months of Kris’s life. Then, after the Slayer tour blew up, they went there to fire Terry.

  Their new manager, Rob Anthony, had gotten them the spot opening for Slayer on the northeastern leg of their tour. At that point, Dürt Würk had a following, but they were either a big bar band or a small club act. Opening for Slayer got them closer to the big time, and with Troglodyte in the can, they were ready. The plan was that Rob would bring A&R reps to hear them. Reps would come for the free Slayer tickets, and hear Dürt Würk in the process. If they were interested, the band already had an album ready to go.

  No one had counted on Terry. It had taken them so many years to get there, but it took him less than a week to blow it all up.

  The Slayer tour had them sleeping in Holiday Inns, not the van. There was actual food backstage, and something to drink besides Rolling Rock. But Terry had taken nonstop potshots at Tom Araya and Kerry King, accusing them of selling out, telling interviewers that Slayer was going to rap on their next album. He acted like such an obnoxious prick that Slayer’s road manager finally demanded he apologize. Instead of smoothing things over, Terry trashed his hotel room and disappeared. The road manager was waiting for them when they showed up at the venue that night, ready to play with Tuck filling in on the vocals. He told them they were off the tour. Powerhole would fill in for them. After they paid for the damage Terry did to his room, they only had $700 of their fee left over.

  No one understood why Terry had destroyed everything. No one knew where he was. At loose ends, they headed for the Witch House to regroup. Bill drove in a daze, Tuck and Scottie dozed in the back, and Kris rode shotgun, hypnotized by the falling rain and the whoosh of the wipers. It was four in the afternoon, but everyone on the road already had their headlights on. Bill came to a full stop before rolling the van off the two-lane blacktop onto the muddy track to the Witch House. Their headlights barely lit the black air as they took the spookhouse ride through the tunnel of dripping trees and emerged in the Witch House’s clearing. Rob Anthony’s midnight-blue Porsche 911 was parked out front. No one said a word.

  They ran through the pouring rain to the kitchen door, and shoved their way inside. The smell of wet, rotten carpet was so thick Kris gagged. The interior of the Witch House was a seventies dungeon, all water stains and rotten wood. The doors were gone, replaced by tacked-up tie-dyes and beaded curtains. The carpet was a blood flood, wall-to-wall eye-searing crimson that sloshed through the halls and poured down the stairs and covered the entire first floor. Every inch of it was cigarette-burned or water-stained.

  But this afternoon, the dark kitchen was full of warm and friendly candlelight. The coffin-sized cooler they used as a fridge was sitting wide open, piled with ice and Champagne. In the living room, black candles burned on every surface, like someone was about to shoot a bad music video. Terry and Rob Anthony were sitting on the busted green velvet sofa, grinning like best friends. Rob was, as always, sculpted out of raw honey and sunshine. In front of him, lined up on the three-legged coffee table they’d rescued from a dumpster, were five contracts. They gleamed in the dim air, the cleanest things in the room.

  “What the fuck are those?” Kris asked.

  “Those,” Terry grinned, “are our future.”

  “Dürt Würk is dead,” Rob Anthony said, standing, hoisting a bottle of champagne. “All hail Koffin.” He popped the cork.

  “You ditched us,” Tuck said. “You screwed up our gig and took off. And what the hell is a Koffin?”

  “It’s all in the contracts, Tuck,” Rob explained, flashing his blinding smile.

  “What’s all in the contracts?” Bill asked. Then he pointed at Terry. “You’re fired. We’re firing you.”

  Terry found that funny. “Welcome to the big time,” he said. “You get inside the headliner’s head and mess with them so they play a weaker show and we look better to the reps.”

  “That doesn’t make any sense,” Tuck said. “How high are you right this minute?”

  “Fellas, fellas, fellas,” Rob said, taking up a position between Terry on the sofa and the rest of the band. “Let’s not relitigate the past. Let’s pop a little bubbly, hoover a few rails, and welcome your future.”

  “He got us thrown off the biggest tour of our lives,” Bill said. “This is a crisis.”

  “Did you know,” Rob said, “that the character in Chinese for ‘crisis’ is the same as the one for ‘opportunity’? An Oriental girl I lived with told me that. I almost got it tattooed on my wrist because that idea is so powerful. She killed herself, and I was sincerely bummed for a while, but then I wound up dating Neve Campbell, right when she was doing Party of Five, so see? Nothing is ever really good or bad, it’s all about your perspective.

  “Slayer fired you because their manager felt threatened by the potential he sensed inside Dürt Würk. It’s what I sensed in this band. It’s why I’m doubling my investment. But Dürt Würk isn’t popping. It’s a dead end, so you’re going to become Koffin. I’ve got designers coming up with a whole new look, I’m bringing in makeup and costume people to put a serious show together. Inter-scope has already made an offer.”

  Kris didn’t want to touch Rob’s champagne, but she needed something, so she snatched the bottle off the table and slugged back half. The band drifted to windowsills and folding chairs.

  “I thought you’d like that,” Rob smiled. “It’s a five-year, three-album deal.”

  “Troglodyte and two others,” Bill said. “That’s not bad.”

  “Troglodyte goes back underground,” Rob said. “Don’t get me wrong, it was a great calling card, but calling cards open doors, they don’t move units. But you should be proud, okay, no frowns. It earned you the advance you need to write your first real album.”

  Anger built inside Kris’s brain. Troglodyte wasn’t a calling card, it was everything in her life poured into nine songs (ten, actually, but Terry had cut “The Door with Cerulean Hue” from the final mix for reasons that still pissed her off). Pried from her journal, taken from her life, forged from ideas and melodies and fragments that had floated in the dark ocean of her brain for years. She couldn’t imagine writing another album after Troglodyte. It was her masterpiece.

  “I know what you’re thinking,” Rob said to Kris. “But Troglodyte is no masterpiece. You should have seen the reaction the engineers had when we mixed it in LA. It fell flat on its face. But the next album? As Koffin? We have Das Jacks writing some killer hooks, Terry has some next-generation lyrical ideas, Koffin is going to get major airplay.”

  Bill looked up. He was already halfway through his contract. “I’ll want my lawyer to look this over,” he said.

  “Pussy,” Terry said from the couch.

  “Any questions you have, I’m happy to answer.” Rob’s smile gleamed in the dim light.

  “I’m still going to want to run it past my lawyer,” Bill said.

  Terry erupted up off the couch. “Rob had lawyers going over them for a month,” he shouted. “I’m sick of this shit. Sign tonight or get the fuck out.”

  “I can’t do that!” Bill said.

  “Do you know how long I’ve been putting up with your shit?” Terry said. “All of you! Where’re my carrots? For ten years it’s all bee
n the stick. I’m tired of waiting!”

  “This says you can fire us anytime,” Bill said. “You own the name, we’re hired guns.”

  “I’m offering you seats at the table,” Terry said. “Don’t you dare fucking hate me for being smart.”

  “You keep the publishing rights,” Bill said, pointing to another clause, his voice cold. “You keep the name rights. We all get a salary instead of royalties. Why the fuck would I sign this?”

  “Because I own the name,” Terry said. “Because I registered the publishing rights. Don’t spaz, I gave you guys a fair share based on how Rob and I assessed your contribution.”

  “Assessed our contribution?” Scottie screamed, getting up in Terry’s face. “When the fuck did that happen?”

  “Let’s de-escalate—” Rob began.

  Scottie Rocket grabbed his folding chair and flung it at Rob, who dodged just in time. Two of its legs spiked the cheap pine-paneled wall and it hung there, suspended.

  “Hey,” Kris said.

  She hadn’t spoken yet, so at first no one listened. Then she stood up, and said louder, “Hey, Terry!” He turned to her. Scottie shut up.

  “What do you mean Koffin’s going to get major airplay? What are you changing? How’s it different from Dürt Würk?”

  “We missed out on grunge because we weren’t ready,” Terry said. “We thought we were better than our audience. That’s not going to happen this time. Koffin’s nu metal.”

  The loudest sound in the room was a candle flickering in the cold draft that whined beneath a window.

  Nu metal was metal lite, the flavor of moment that was ushering hardcore acts to mainstream success at the cost of their dignity. Bands that had been growling were suddenly rapping. Bass lines that had previously blasted now bounced with “get on the dance floor” funk. It was all about branding, fan outreach, accessibility, spray-on attitude, moving crowds of white kids smoothly from the pit to your merch booth where they’d buy $20 Limp Bizkit beer cozies and $30 Korn bandanas.

  “Nu metal isn’t about anything,” Kris said. “Nu metal kids are cul-de-sac crybabies with their baseball hats on backward. Every song is a little boy crying in his bedroom about how his girlfriend won’t make him a sandwich like his mommy used to do.”