Audrey Hepburn's Pearls: Part I

Chapter 94.1: 1968, Georgina

Chapter 94.1: 1968, Georgina

“That is so weird. What the heck is Paulie doing with a Beach Boys record? I thought he liked rock and roll and that’s it, Beatles and all that. He even likes Elvis, which makes Ganya go crazy as you can imagine. No wonder they get along. He likes Judy Garland, sure, but do you know what I’m getting at?” Sasha was holding the record up to the dim light, studying the cover. “Is this another side of Paulie we don’t know?”

“Are you even sure its his? Let me see it.” I reached my hand out. Sasha was across the room, crouched over, looking in the clear glass cabinet next to the TV. He’d been flicking through the albums, curious to see what Paulie liked because apparently last night at the club Paulie had been going on and on about his elite music tastes, which had annoyed the shit out of him. Sometimes it annoyed the shit out me, too, so I was curious to know as well.

“’I don’t like pop, I don’t like folk, I don’t like that new experimental stuff like’- wait, here’s another one! I swear, when he gets home I’m going to- Here, look at it if you don’t believe me!”

Suddenly the record was flying at me, spinning. My hand clamped over it like a clam shell snapping closed, stopping its spin towards my face as I winced. “Don’t throw things! You might break it! What if its not really his?”

“Why wouldn’t it be?”

“I don’t know. He writes his name in all of his books, ‘property of’, you know? Maybe he does the same thing with his records. Let me check.” I secured the record in my hand so carefully, because it wasn’t mine. Much more respect than Sasha was showing things that were not his right now.

“Maybe it’s a front. Maybe they’re not even Beach Boys stuff. Maybe he’s hiding something. Let me play this one. Who knows what it could be?”

“You’re acting as if he was a spy for the Nazis or something.”

“As if you would doubt him if he was? Some things about him are so mysterious.”

I had to laugh at this. As the sound of the Beach Boys’ “Don’t Worry Baby” came on and Sasha made a disgusted sound at being wrong, I slipped the record in my hands out of its envelope to inspect the inside. Maybe there was a name here or maybe not, but it was to humor Sasha more than anything.

“Maybe if you play it backwards it reveals the words of Satan or something. You know, like how they say if you play the Beatles backwards it chants things.”

“Satan?!” I doubled over laughing. Sasha sure knew how to get me going.

“Yeah, Satan! There’s this one Beatles song…here, let me see if he’s got it…” Sasha’s head went into Paulie’s record cabinet again.

“Oh, you’d better not mess with his record player like that, though. He’d get mad if you broke it or scratched something.”

“That’s true.”

“Yeah, isn’t it?” My hand slipped inside the record envelope, expanding it a little to see inside. Sure enough, there was something there in pencil but I couldn’t see it too well. “Hey, I was right, he wrote something here.”

“Nazi secrets!” Sasha perked up, crawling on the carpet towards me like an excited puppy.

“No,” I giggled, putting the envelope on top of the record on my lap and setting my hands on my resters to wheel towards the lamp next to the couch. “I can’t see what it says, let me get to the light.”

“Okay.”

Next to the light, the colors on the cover were bright. Satisfied, I expanded the envelope again with my fingers and peered inside. Sasha’s face joined mine like we were two curious deer peering into a forbidden garden.

“Avi Goldberg,” he read quietly, puzzled.

I blinked twice. That definitely wasn’t Paulie’s handwriting, even in this difficult space to mark. I didn’t know what to say, the name catching me off guard. My mouth was going dry in these few seconds, staring at the penciled letters. Reminders of the past few days. What he’d said to me, his so in love face.

“I thought Paulie didn’t see Avi anymore.” Sasha took the envelope from my hands, staring at the name some more.

“Might be from a long time ago, I guess. This song came out two years ago, right? Maybe he brought it over and never took it back.”

“Well at least its not Paulie’s and he’s still got some credit.” Sasha straightened up and took the record from me, starting to slip it back into its envelope.

“Yeah, I guess,” I said, staring at his back. But seeing that name had made me feel floaty, strange. Too in shock, the reality of what Paulie had said at dinner the other night coming back too fast like incoming waves. I had to steady myself, and as Sasha took the other record off the spindle of the player I breathed deeply to myself and wheeled back to my previous position.