That Blue Gibson: Etc.

4670 Encino Ave

🎃 Happy Halloween!! 🎃

(these 7000+ words were barely edited so I'm profusely apologizing for any errors!)

👻

"You weren't kidding about it being just around the corner, were you?"

"Nope," Dave grinned and slid out of the driver's seat of the Tesla while Liz remained planted in the passenger side, "Hurry the fuck up."

Her stare left the house in front of them to shoot him an only somewhat playful glare. He would always rush her along whenever he was excited to show her something, which she thought was charming and adorable... up to a point. And being dragged out of bed at six in the morning on a day they were kid-free was apparently that point. She begrudgingly grabbed for the coffee he made her and put into his favorite travel cup to keep her from whining during the half-mile drive down the hill from their place to this one and climbed out.

The house, mansion really, had been the result of a tequila-fueled jam session featuring Dave, Chris, Pat, and Nate one night on the Grohl's back deck while Liz rolled her eyes at their drunken ideas from the balcony above them. They resolved to find a house and it's acoustic sweet spots, set up all their gear, and record their tenth album without having to work around any pesky studio schedules, various other celebrities, or precocious little girls interrupting their sessions.

"It's gonna be so fucking amazing, babe," Dave had slurred once Liz finally sent everyone home safely and rolled him into their bed, "No one breathing down our necks about shit. Gonna make our longest album ever. C and D sides!"

Smiling at the memory of him passing out mid-sentence soon after that, Liz followed him up a set of sweeping tiled stairs and waited for him to flip through his massive set of keys. "I swear to fucking god I'm halfway to being a janitor," he grumbled when it was taking longer than his patience could handle and giving her time to look around a bit.

It was clear that at some point the big house had been beautiful, but after several years of neglect and ownership turnover, it was looking a little shabby. The overgrown trees, crumbling stucco walls, chipped tiles, and dead leaves blown about the front porch were surprising to her, knowing they were all things that would drive Dave up the wall if it were their home.

But the most evident difference was that everything around them was silent, oppressively silent, making Liz wrap her arms around herself again. "It's really quiet here," she whispered.

"It's nice, right?" Dave grinned as he tried another key in the lock, "I might finally get to have a window open when I track."

"No, I mean...," she looked around again at the trees growing over the stairs, "There's no sound at all. No wind or birds or... anything."

He lifted his head and was still for a moment, his eyes drifting from Liz to the hillside the house was built into. "... huh. Maybe there's just less wind on this side of the ridge," he decided and finally swung open the mission-style door.

He grabbed her hand to tug her inside where the same tile from the front steps traveled into the bright and wide foyer but now that it was positioned against honey oak trim and pristine white walls, Liz felt like she'd walked onto the set of a 90's sitcom. The house, what little she'd seen of it so far, fairly reeked of painfully dated trends, ones that were more suited to a typical suburban home on a quiet cul-de-sac than a massive Valley manor. And above all of that, it was nearly ten to fifteen degrees cooler than outside.

Wrapping her arms around herself, she looked around for a thermostat, "Are you guys paying the utilities while you're here?"

Dave stopped short on the tile and pinched his brow together, "No? The fuck made you ask that?"