From Flower Vase to Film Emperor in Hollywood

"I don't record things that won't sell, Mr. Cash. Gospel songs like this, they just don't sell."

Johnny's cheeks flushed instantly, even his ears turning red. He didn't even realize he was doing it, tilting his chin up, trying to use his gaze to suppress Sam.

Johnny questioned, with a hint of anger, "Is it the gospel song that's the problem, or is it my singing?"

Sam could feel the anger coming at him, but it had no effect on him. "Both."

Johnny: ......

This back-and-forth head-butting allowed Johnny to calm down a little. "Fine, then what's wrong with my singing?"

Sam paused, quietly looking at Johnny, deliberately slowing down his speech, saying each word carefully, "I. Don't. Believe. You."

Dallas was a little excited, a little agitated, a little carried away—

Crazy, crazy, he must be crazy, he actually dared to talk to Anson like that, even though it wasn't condescending, the arrogance in his words was clear.

However, crazy as it was, Dallas had an intuition that this was the right thing to do, the words deeply imprinted in his mind naturally coming out.

Looking at the man in front of him, Sam maintained a seated posture, not leaning forward deliberately, but not retreating either, calmly and frankly facing that gaze.

Johnny raised his chin, his slightly lowered eyelids concealing the emotions surging in his eyes. When anger reached its peak, he calmed down instead, asking in an extremely calm voice, a calmness that had no warmth, no waves, no emotion, but this precisely showed the suppressed anger.

There was also a hint of contempt.

"Are you saying I don't believe in God?"

This was a matter of principle, as well as a matter of faith. Johnny believed that this slick-haired guy was provoking his bottom line.

That emotionless voice made the two people behind him realize that the situation was not good.

Luther spoke, his voice tight, "JR, forget it, let's go."

Johnny Cash, original name "JR Cash". His parents were uneducated and couldn't decide on a specific name, so they simply used two letters. The "R" was solely to match the "J", added to avoid a monosyllabic name, and was not an abbreviation of any complete name.

Later, when he joined the army, the military didn't allow abbreviations, so he changed his name to "Johnny Cash."

However, close friends, or those trying to calm him down, would still call him "JR", in this way awakening Johnny's childhood memories.

Unfortunately, it didn't work this time.

JR didn't regain his composure, he refused Luther and Marshall's persuasion.

"No. I want to figure it out."

His eyes were filled with sincerity and seriousness.

"I mean, we came here, performed for a minute, and then he tells me I don't believe in God?"

This anger was burning.

Sam didn't back down, the corners of his mouth slightly raised, revealing a hint of mockery, "You know exactly what I mean."

"We've heard songs like this more than a hundred times... just like... that... and the way you sing it... exactly the same."

Those drawn-out trailing notes, so annoying and so provocative, with a condescending judgment.

Johnny was stunned: ......

He couldn't refute it.

But he needed to refute it.

"Suppose you were hit by a truck, you were lying dying in a stinking ditch, and you only had time to sing one song, a song that people would remember you by before you turned to dust, a song that would let God know how you felt in the world, a song that could summarize your long life."

"Tell me, would you sing that song just now?"

"Just like the songs we hear on the radio all day long by Jimmy Davis? With a calm tone and then telling us it's called being real and how you shout out your emotions?"

"Or are you going to sing something else?"

With cadence, sarcasm, and full power.

Sam held nothing back.

Sam's pace wasn't fast, unhurried, each word and sentence, looking directly into Johnny's eyes the whole time.

Then, in those deep eyes, Sam saw the pain and struggle that Johnny inadvertently revealed, which he quickly concealed in a blink of an eye.

Sam paused, and then had a thought.

"Something real? Something of your feelings?"

"Because I'm telling you now, that's the music that people are really eager to hear, that's the music that can truly save souls. It has nothing to do with whether you believe in God, Mr. Cash, what really matters is whether you believe in yourself."

Some intuition told Sam: He believed in this silly kid in front of him.

Whether it was the last time he volunteered, or this moment in front of him, in his eyes, Sam could see some vitality and some passion.

That was sincere, and also fragile.

That was urgent, and also intense.

This was just an invisible and intangible intuition, but he wanted to believe it.

Sam stared at Johnny, just staring quietly, openly and calmly, generously and sincerely.

Bathed in Sam's gaze, Johnny's stubbornness and anger quietly and slowly subsided, his raised chin lowered, finally touching his chest, escaping in embarrassment, even afraid to look directly into Sam's eyes.

He closed his eyes, with pain and struggle gently tugging between his brows.

The whole place was silent. Since when, no one had spoken, even the sound of heartbeats had quietly disappeared.

Hunter stared at the handsome face on the monitor screen, his forbearance, his struggle, his tug-of-war, all fleeting in the blink of an eye, carefully hidden in his tightly furrowed brows; however, the complexity that leaked out in an instant was so real and rich.

That was Johnny Cash.

Fans who really understood Johnny knew that he wasn't perfect, not only wasn't he, but he was riddled with holes and scarred.

In the fifties and sixties, paparazzi hadn't appeared yet, and news wasn't well-circulated. Those singers stood brightly on the stage, and people rarely knew the truth about their private lives.

However, Johnny Cash wasn't like that.

Not because he generously showed his private life, announcing everything in detail to the world; but because his music inadvertently leaked his truth, those vulnerabilities, those scars, those pains, those struggles, everything was hidden in the melody, so real.

It was precisely because of this that Johnny Cash's music possessed the energy to stir the heart and strike the soul—

He was never perfect.

Later, the media became more and more developed, and a Johnny riddled with holes and covered in scars was presented to the public, but they weren't surprised at all.

And, they weren't repulsed either.

On the contrary, this was the Johnny in their hearts, a real and fragile person, an imperfect person who had been working hard to persevere as the Man in Black.

Until now, Hunter finally saw the real Johnny Cash in his mind on the monitor screen.