Marsha Hunt - Joy

Sebastian was always pushing that flop of blond heavy hair of his back, ’cause it was always falling in his eyes, and from where his hair separated into a natural parting, I could see it was his natural color though Joy was always teasing him that he got that perfect straw color out a peroxide bottle. There’s no denying Joy sure knew her blonds, and when we was all working down in LA for the first promotion tour, Joy said she preferred them tan, blond surfer boys to Sebastian ’cause they had some meat on their bones. It was a shame that she said that in front of Sebastian, ’cause even though he would laugh like he saw the joke in it, I know it probably hurt his feelings with him being so gone on Joy.

Brenda said there was two things that put Joy off him. The first being that he was too crazy about her and the second being that he didn’t have nothing but the wages he made off playing for the Bang sisters. But with that said, I could see he didn’t love nothing living better than a black Bechstein he got to play when we was recording in the LA studio and a silver and brass trumpet he carted everywhere like it was his only child. He’d named it Sunshine and kept the silver and brass on it gleaming better than I could.

Seeing him around them Southern California boys, Joy said you could tell right off that Sebastian was foreign. And it was true. He didn’t even have to open his mouth for you to hear that English accent of his that I liked so much. Though Freddie B thought he talked like a fairy. But like I said to Freddie B to put him straight, them English soldiers that Freddie said he met when he was fighting overseas during the war must of sounded just like Sebastian, and Freddie had told me when he come home how brave he thought they was for white boys. They wasn’t no sissies. And neither was David Niven that Sebastian sounded just like to me.

Sebastian had him a college education. In fact he explained to me one night when he was setting in my room waiting on Joy that he had him two college educations, ’cause he’d been picked out special from all the people at his music college to get him a degree from a university at the same time he was taking a special musician’s course. I didn’t get all the gist of it, and I had a hard time trying to picture him being at two different schools at the same time, but I believed him, ’cause even though he was a atheist, I could tell he wasn’t no liar, and in spite of him throwing cuss words around all the time, even when he wasn’t mad, you could kinda tell he was real smart and from good people. He would just cuss for the sake of it, and like other folks would say good morning, with Sebastian it was always ‘F’ this and ‘F’ that.

It put me off him at first, but Joy told me not to take no notice ’cause he didn’t mean nothing by it, no more than them other musicians did. But I didn’t never cotton to it. But seeing as he wasn’t no child of mine, wasn’t nothing much I could say to him. He was nice enough otherwise and had a gentle way about him that I liked.

Seeing Joy standing with him reminded me of the first time I saw her walk out swinging Bernie Finkelstein’s arm when we was living on Grange. Her and Sebastian looked made for each other, and the few times I saw her let him put his arms ’round her, I could see that he didn’t want nobody else in the world but Joy. He’d kiss her on the cheek with his lips just about grazing that rouge she wore to go with her fire engine red lipstick that was all the rage then. His lips would just barely touch her like he thought she was too delicate to kiss harder which used to make me want to laugh, ’cause delicate was one of them things Joy wasn’t. And sometimes when we’d be waiting, the whole crowd of us, the girls, the musicians and the roadies, waiting to check into some hotel where we was staying on tour, I’d see Sebastian stand just close enough to Joy for their shoulders to touch, but he wasn’t never bold enough to put his arms ’round her unless she put her arms ’round him first which she didn’t do unless she wanted something off him.

Joy charmed Sebastian into loving her when he first started working with the girls. But I think it was ’cause she was antsy, with Rex off touring in Europe. She said she was bored and needed a diversion.

‘A diversion! Sebastian Egerton ain’t no road re-route. He’s a man, Joy, and you can’t get him all excited about you if you don’t mean to do right by him, ’cause that stuff comes back on you.’ And sure enough she got the same treatment from Rex Hightower.

I know Joy had Sebastian in her room all night for two nights once. But I didn’t hear no sounds like they was having no sex. ’Cause with me always in the room by hers and thin as some of them walls was in them hotels and motels we stayed in while we was traveling, I could hear if she had somebody in there and was actually doing something with all that noise she liked to make. Whooping it up like a mule on the run or a hog getting murdered. A few times I got up out the bed and took a shoe to the wall. Not that I was bothered to hear her having sex since she was grown and what she did with her body was her business, but she was s’posed to be a star. Folks got to recognizing the girls in them hotels and I didn’t think all that noise was dignified and didn’t want nobody putting it out that Joy was fast, ’cause Anndora had that reputation and deserved it.

It was Anndora said Sebastian’s dick was too small for him to be any use to her or Joy and I wanted so bad to slap her face not only for talking dirty, but for knowing in the first place what he had between his legs. I reckon she only got in the bed with him to spite Joy, and whereas Joy said after she caught ’em together that it didn’t bother her one way or t’other, I felt Sebastian had a chance with Joy before that. Anndora didn’t care where she put herself and I never thought I’d see the day when I met a woman that I felt took advantage of men when it come to sex. But there came Anndora to prove that it was possible.

I was there the night she dragged Sebastian to her room. They’d both been sitting with me in the bar of a hotel we was staying at one night on East Pleasant Street in Baltimore, and Anndora handed him one of her sleeping pills to pop in his mouth, ’cause he said he couldn’t rest after them shows. Next thing I knew the boy was slurring his words and spilling his Wild Turkey that he always ordered wherever he went but never drank. Them pills didn’t affect Anndora like they did other folks. They was supposed to be sleeping pills, but no sooner than she had one, she was wanting to lay on her back and throw her legs up in the air. It was Brenda that saw Anndora lead Sebastian off and told Joy when she come to set with us that Anndora’d took Sebastian up to her room. I know she just told it to stir things up. And that’s the exact results she got, ’cause Joy went and got a key from the porter claiming she was Anndora and walked straight into Anndora’s room at that ritzy hotel and caught Sebastian sleeping there in her sister’s bed. Joy said she just walked in on ’em for a joke, but I knew that in her heart she was hurt, ’cause much as she said Sebastian didn’t mean nothing to her, he had that thing about him that made you trust him and I don’t think she ever thought that he’d be one to do no dirt like mess with her sister when he claimed he had eyes for Joy.

Sebastian tried to explain what happened and him and Joy finally had a little set to about it, ’cause I heard him say to her the next night ’fore they went out on stage, ‘You’re hot and cold. Interested but not interested. I don’t know what the fuck you want and I don’t think that you do.’ She turned her back on him and he whirled her ’round to face him. ‘If I wait for you after the gigs to make sure you don’t get hassled,’ Sebastian said, ‘you’re annoyed because you say I’m hovering around too much, and now just because I passed out in your sister’s room, you’re not speaking and moody and want to give me a hard time.’ But Joy didn’t never like to be disturbed before she went out on that stage, and always wanted to go on there smiling like the world was hers, so I wasn’t surprised that I didn’t hear her answer. She was checking herself in the mirror ’cause that’s what she did last thing and she acted like he wasn’t talking to her.