Jazz

When they stopped playing "Stardust," Peter, said, "We have a special treat tonight--a great young jazz singer making her debut. Let's give a hand to Ginger Lee Dawling."

I walked up to the stage as a few people clapped. Someone whistled. I looked at the mike and moved it closer to me and looked up at the spot light. I never sang into a mike before and squinted trying to see the audience. Gabe's father started a little intro and I snapped my fingers to set the tempo. I started singing, "Blue Skies" real slow, looking out at the audience. The place was half empty, filled with smoke and people hardly paid attention. I closed my eyes and concentrated on the words, thinking about the story and let the words flow, when I heard someone shout, "Hey, girl, show us your tits." And another guy shouted, "Shut up you jerk." I saw the Ed come over and pull the guy by the arm. The man yelled again, "Come on girlie, show us your boobs." Ed pulled him to the front door and pushed him to the street.

I kept singing but had trouble concentrating. I was scared and had never been yelled at like that. I looked at Peter urging me on. He said,"Keep going." He smiled.

When I finished people applauded. I sang,"All of Me" and just concentrated on the song as if the audience wasn't there. The piano, bass and drums inspired me to sing like I never sang before and I knew I was hooked. I knew there was nothing else I wanted to do but sing jazz. When I finished, people applauded—even the guys in the band applauded.

I was a hit and when I went back to the bar, Ed came over to me and said, "You're going to be a star—you can sing here anytime."

Gabe stood up and wrapped his arms around me and said,"You were so good."

It felt wonderful to be held like that and I pulled him closer, my tits crushed against his chest and didn't want to let go. I was feeling high after singing and loving how it felt to be on the stage—even if people weren't really listening—and liking how it felt to lean against Gabe's body, feeling his strong arms and whispered in his ear,"let's get out of here."

Gabe's bus was at the other end of the small parking lot. Only a few cars remained. The only light came from a small spotlight on the corner of the building but it was dark where he was parked.

When we got in he said,"You want a smoke a joint" and without waiting for an answer took one out of his shirt pocket.

"I never smoked pot before."

He lit the joint, took a deep inhale,holding the smoke in then passed the joint to me. "Well, there's a first time for everything and this is one of those times. Your first gig, now your first joint and maybe later, another first, unless I'm wrong about you."

I chuckled,knowing what he meant and took a deep drag on the joint and held in my breath, excited to be in his car smoking pot for the first time. "You surprise me, Gabe."

"Why?'

"Well, you seemed so serious when we met the other day and it was the first time you ever cut and I cut all the time." I passed the joint back waiting to feel something.

"I am serious and determined to get a scholarship for college but I think I'm more like you than you think. I mean, my music means everything to me." He paused, took a deep drag and looked into my eyes before speaking. "I want to be the best but I also want to be out there. I want to be free and uninhibited like you. When we met the other day, you blew me away with not just your singing but your determination and I like that you don't give a fuck about what people think." He passed me the joint and I took another deep hit. "But that's not all I like," he said, looking at my legs then into my eyes, a little smile on his lips.

"Yeah. What else do you like?" I took a deep drag on the joint and held in my breath,excited to be in his bus and how we was talking to me. I handed him the joint and suddenly felt my head getting light and my body loosening and that feeling that comes to my pussy when I want to masturbate.

"I like how you dress—I mean you dress and act different than most of the girls at school but somehow you are way more sexy."

"Is that so," I said, smiling, looking into his eyes. I shifted in my seat, moving my skirt higher on my thighs. I was really stoned now and wanted him to do something. I wanted to encourage him. I wanted him to move his hand on the inside of my thighs like he did earlier but go higher. I turned and glanced towards the rear of the bus and saw the middle seat in his VW was missing and there was a carpet on the floor and room to lie down.

He saw me look and then looked at me, took my hand and we slid between the seats and suddenly he was all over me and I was all over him. It was like a dam had burst and all that pent up tension needed release. We were attacking each other's mouths with fierce kisses, making out like crazy, groaning and moaning. He was laying on top me, my legs spread apart and I could feel his hard cock grinding into me while I lifted my hips aching for more.

I wasn't sure how experienced he was but it didn't take long to know what to do—our bodies were on fire from being stoned and also being so ready to fuck. I somehow pushed him on his back and straddled him,rocking back and forth,my tits crushed against his chest,our tongues swirling in our mouths. My tight dress was way up over my hips and he grabbed my ass pulling me harder against him while he lifted his ass and we were grinding harder and humping each other like crazy. He then pushed me onto my back, got up on his knees, unbuttoning his jeans while I lifted my ass off the floor squirming out of my soaked panties. I spread my legs and pulled him down on me.

We kissed wildly, grinding and humping again then suddenly he started rubbing the head of his cock against my dripping pussy lips, opening me. I lifted my hips wanting him to go deeper. He pushed his cock harder, thrusting, inching his way, opening me, my desperate pussy gripping his cock,loving how big he felt. This was so much more intense then my fingers. Soon,his cock was filling me and pushing against my hymen causing me both pain and pleasure. "Oh you feel so good. Keep going. Don't stop!" I moaned.

Suddenly, he reared back and with one hard thrust broke through causing me to scream through the pain, "Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhh I love it I love it" and suddenly a huge orgasm swept over me and I exploded while he kept thrusting making me convulse again and again.

"You're so tight," he screamed as he pulled out and thrust faster and harder, opening me even more as he filled me and I climaxed again even harder. I felt his body tensing and knew he was about to explode. I remembered mom getting knocked up and suddenly started pushing him away but he already knew and just as he exploded pulled out, screaming and shooting cum all over my face, tits and thighs as I lay under him, looking at his closed eyes and writhing body. Spasms still rocked through me and he collapsed on my body, his cock pressed against my wet pussy, my legs wrapped around his back, my arms holding him, clutching him, both of us panting and gasping.

Neither of us spoke, trying to catch our breath but the realization I was no longer a virgin excited me and I just lay there with Gabe on top wallowing in the afterglow realizing I was in his bus in the parking where I had sung jazz for the first time to an audience. I loved the feeling of the bass and drums and how Peter's piano made me sing better than ever. I also loved getting fucked for the first time and knew I wanted a lot more.

Gabe drove me home. It was after midnight but we sat outside and made out some more. He pushed the driver's seat back and I straddled him with the steering wheel touching my back. Somehow I lifted myself while he unzipped and pulled his cock out and moved my soaked panties aside and I came down hard on him then started bouncing up and down faster and harder, his cock filling me, going deeper with each thrust. I swallowed my screaming as I exploded all over him then felt him about to cum and again, he pulled out and I felt his hot cum spurting all over my thighs. It was so intense holding each other breathing heavily and feeling so good. It was hard to leave him but it was really late.

Mom knew I was singing that night and I couldn't wait to tell her how it went but again, she was asleep in the chair with an empty bottle of Jack Daniels on the floor. The record player was on and the needle was making a scratchy click click sound at the edge of the record. I tried nudging mom to wake her up but she was too drunk. I turned off the record player and sat in the dark looking at her head slumped to the side, her mouth open. She looked old and tired. I remembered how she used to sing in the kitchen and what a great voice she had. How she had me and had to work to put food on the table, but ended up not able to do that or sing. I wasn't going to let that happen to me. I was going to sing to people who would listen. I was going to sing because mom couldn't. I was determined to be a jazz star.

Gabe's father let me sing with his trio at the Black Cat and then at a few other clubs. I would do a twenty minute set—usually four songs. He even started paying me twenty bucks—not much but I didn't care. I just wanted to sing. We hardly rehearsed cause with jazz you just let it happen and I got pretty good with improvising—letting the words and the mood take me where I needed to go and the trio just followed.

Then someone named Frank Weinstein heard me at another club called Ken Barry's Town House, a pretty classy place compared to The Black Cat and said he knew an agent in New York who could get me bigger gigs. He got me to make a tape with the trio and he sent it to this agent who really liked it. Peter and Gabe were excited for me and encouraged me to go to New York but I couldn't-- not with my mom being in such a bad way so I put that on a back burner and kept singing at the Town House and a few other places.

I started getting a following and Ken, the owner said he booked Peter's trio cause of me and that I was going to go places. He used to invite me in his office to hang out and talk but I could tell how he looked at me he wanted more. He was in his fifties and kind of sleazy. Then one night, he said how about a drink and poured me a drink—a Bloody Mary even though I was underage and sat with me on his couch but he must have poured a lot of vodka in it cause I got really woozy. I said I better get going but when I stood up and staggered, he pushed me up against the wall and put his hand up my dress, grabbed my pussy real rough, tried kissing me, his cigarette breathe stinking. I was drunk and almost gave in, but then I squirmed away and ran out of his office. I never said anything to Peter or Gabe but Ken kept trying to get in my pants. I wanted to quit singing there but it was a good gig for the guys so I just handled it.

I kept working at Roma's and the Save-way and hung out with Gabe. I was on the pill and he'd pick me up after work. We found this isolated out of the way place on a hill over looking the city. He got an old mattress and we put it on the floor of his bus and sometimes we'd stay there all night. We also fucked at his house sometimes when his dad was at work. His mom was a real estate agent and never home during the day.

When we graduated—me near the bottom of the class and Gabe was third. He got a big scholarship to Oberlin because they had a good music program. I wouldn't have gone to the graduation but mom was really proud and wanted to see me in a stupid cap and gown—I guess because she never graduated. I tried to get her not to drink so people wouldn't smell booze on her breath and she wouldn't stagger but she had one drink just before we left the apartment.

We had a great summer. Gabe practiced a lot and was working on those Paganini pieces. I loved listening to him and actually thought some of music he played sounded like jazz. He had a landscaping job and worked hard. He got a great tan which made those blue eyes even more captivating. He always drove me to the gigs and afterwards we'd go to one these all night diners and have eggs, home fries and coffee which gave us lots of energy then we would go to our favorite spot, get really stoned and fuck all night.

I dreaded the idea of him leaving in September but that's what happened. A heavy metal band heard about me and tried to get me to sing with them but there was no way I'd do that---no one would ever hear me over their stupid loud music. One day that agent who had my tape said I was really good and should look him up when I could come to New York. His name was Morris Katz and said he could line up some gigs but I couldn't leave mom. I could see she was getting worse and then that fall, the doctor said she's done for—her liver was shot. She wouldn't make it past Christmas.

Two weeks after mom died, I took the bus from Akron, Ohio to New York with one suitcase. I figured I'd find clothes in thrift stores but I made sure I had that black cocktail dress and mom's shoes. Before I left I told Gabe I'd let him know where I was so if he wanted he could come visit on his break. It was hard in the beginning not knowing anyone, but I got a room at the Y then went to see Morris Katz at his office on the sixth floor of the Shubert Building. I had fifty dollars to my name and he said he'd be able to book me at a few jazz clubs. I was nineteen so he got me a fake ID so I could get in those places.

Morris was in his sixties, bald, fat but loved jazz and kept saying he thought I could really make it if I was persistent and trusted him. He got me to sign a contract that he would be my agent and manager and he'd get fifteen percent of everything. I signed the contract and thought I was on my way. He said he had a friend with a small studio apartment in the Village. The guy owed him for something and so I could stay there for nothing for a few months until I got some gigs.

I got a job in one of those coffee houses in Greenwich Village where they had open mikes and anyone could sing or read poetry. I liked working there because the tips were good and on weekends, lots of tourists came to be part of the Beat--Hippie scene. Most of the waiters and waitresses were actors, dancers or artists. It was cool listening to all the different singers—some really good, most so-so. They played guitars and sang what they called folk music—songs that told stories—never any jazz and I wanted to get up there and do my thing but I was so different. Also, I didn't play an instrument so I had to find someone who could play the beat up piano they had.

I put up a sign on the crowded message board near the front door—jazz singer looking for pianist. It turned out one of the waiters named Ben came over to me and told me he played piano and so we agreed to try some tunes after the place closed. I couldn't wait 'cause I was dying to sing and I could tell he was anxious. He kept coming over to me while we were working asking what songs I knew and did I know this singer or that sax player and I could tell he loved jazz as much as I did. When everyone cleared out except the manager, we finally went over to the piano.

As soon as he played his first few chords and made some runs, I knew he was great—something about his playing startled me and I remembered the first time I heard Gabe play the guitar—that passion and intensity. He loved all the old standards like I did from mom's records and when I sang,"I Got You Under My Skin," he knew exactly how I wanted to sing it—first real slow then picking it up and then we did "Autumn Leaves."

Our eyes kept looking into each others eyes while I sang and man we were so connected, so in a groove that I knew something was going to happen. Finally we had to leave 'cause the manager kicked us out and we went back to my place which was around the corner for coffee and to talk but it didn't take long before we were fucking like crazy on my futon couch.

Ben was a little under six feet tall and had dusty blond hair that was kind of disheveled and came just over his ears. He was kind of thin and lanky but I could tell he was strong by the way he held me and I could feel his energy but it was his imagination not only when he played the piano but how we played teasing games when we fucked that made me know we had something special that would come out when we did jazz together.

It was so cool when we did our first open mike at the coffee house. We followed a girl with a real high voice that sang an old English ballad called "Barbara Allen." Then we got up and did "It Had to be You" and I got into scat singing like Ella and Anita O'Day and then Ben did a really cool two choruses that was so way out then I came back in snapping my fingers, practically dancing while we went to town. We were a big hit which was amazing since no one ever sang jazz there and we'd do a different number every night.

It was okay with the manager, this guy Stan, that we did that number during one of our breaks, but then it was really hard to concentrate on serving after singing cause people kept saying how good we were and wanted to hear more and Ben and me –all we wanted was to do jazz. I called Morris and told him I had a great pianist and could he get us some gigs and he did. Ben and I were really hooked on each other and he'd stay at my place or I'd go to his tiny apartment on the fourth floor over a bakery.

Gabe and I wrote letters and talked on the phone but we both knew something was fading because the letters came less frequently and the phone calls were shorter then he told me he had a girl friend. I told him about Ben and we wished each other well but knew we would always be friends—no matter what. Life goes on, right!

We both liked getting stoned after we got home from work then come up with some role playing scene. He liked when I wore these tight cut offs and put my hair in pigtails and be the farmers daughter and we had to sneak off to the barn and man we rolled all over the place fucking like wild animals. I liked getting picked up in a bar and I'd wear this really slutty short skirt and he'd push me up against the wall like we were in an alley and I'd give him a blow job but before he'd cum he'd pick me up and slam me against the wall and get down between my knees and eat me, his hot tongue driving me insane then stop just before I exploded and I was desperate to cum then we'd fuck on the floor both of us crazed with him pounding me, getting really raunchy calling each other dirty names and I'd scream fuck me harder come on bastard give me that big hard cock and he yelled give me your fucking cunt slut and we'd both have mind blowing orgasms.

Morning fucking was the best. He'd wake up and push me on my stomach and straddle my ass, putting two pillows under my stomach. I felt so possessed and then he'd fuck me from behind with really strong hard thrusts, pulling my hair forcing me to rock back on his cock 'til I exploded all over his cock screaming my head off, I loved his power and then we'd collapse and spoon for a long time, holding each other and I liked how tender he'd get, how he'd kiss my shoulder and head and called me darling.

The whole Greenwich Village scene was pretty wild in those days with crazy clothes, drugs, music and politics. Dylan was already making it but he started at some of the open mikes--so did Rambling Jack Elliot and Eric Anderson, Tom Paxton. Lots of poets read there and Ben and me did our thing.

I called Morris and believe it or not, he got us a gig to open for Mose Allison at the Village Gate—a pretty famous place. He was really cool—a kind of southern gent but he said we were really good and he told some club owners about us and we started playing all over the city.