Silent Song (Ghostly Rhapsody) (10 page)

It is my husband
, I thought, the song swelling somewhere in the background.

I loved this man, damn it. I trusted him! He also was my friend, my confidante. I could not just believe the gossip, even if I thought I had proof. I had to confront him about it, no matter how much my voice shook when I did. Was he seeing someone else? Was there another woman? Dave’s face looked pained for a split second, but then he visibly squared his shoulders. He said that there was nothing of the sort, but he didn’t look me in the eye. Instead, he busied himself pretending to discard his hat and his jacket. I wanted to believe him, but his whole attitude screamed “guilty.” So I pressed him. I told him I knew her name, but still he shook his head.

“Mrs. Erlynne,” I spat out at last, trying desperately to get a reaction out of him—either a reassurance,
oh please let it be an assurance
, or, if it couldn’t be… then at least an admission.

Dave looked me in the eye then, for a long minute, and he said, “Yes, I’m visiting with her.”

The words were even but they felt like a blow. I had to stagger back, to reach for the back of a chair to steady myself, and I saw his calm façade break and his hand reach out, as if he wanted to hold me through the pain. But this time, he had caused it. He couldn’t help me, the hypocrite.

I averted my eyes, and he lowered his hand, fingers closed in a fist. When he spoke again, his voice sounded pained and barely held together

“I swear I have not betrayed you.”

I didn’t reply. I couldn’t, and after another moment of tense, thick silence, he left the room with his head down, the weight of knowledge bearing down on his shoulders.

The music ended and I was left completely alone, trying to find the scattered pieces of my heart, my trust, my happiness…

Silence hung for a long moment afterwards and then applause. I blinked, looked up, and saw Professor Hedford with the greatest Cheshire Cat grin I’d ever seen. The other students stared at us open-mouthed. Anna clapped like mad among them. I turned to Dave, who came back on the stage, and we both shared a look, as if we were just waking up after a long, wonderful dream. A dream where we were Lord and Lady Windermere.

Understanding slowly flooded me.

“And that, my dear students,” said Mr. Hedford, “is exactly what I meant. That is what I will be asking from you for Lady Windermere’s Fan. Now that you’ve seen it and understand it, I think it’s time we call it a day, don’t you agree?”

People were slow to react, still too deeply gone into the play to remember that it was late. Later than any other day of regular rehearsal, actually. As subdued “see you laters” were exchanged and the rest of the folks started to clear the auditorium, I turned to Keith. He had done it, I knew, but when I turned to him, he just smiled in encouragement like everyone else and gave me a small nod. His gaze was on me, but the fingers of his left hand still danced lightly over the muted strings of his guitar.

I headed toward him, not minding that we were in plain sight.

“You knew it, right?”

“What?” he asked, with picture perfect innocence.

“You knew what the difference was, between performance and…” I gaped, at a loss. I had already forgotten the other word used by Mr. Hedford.

“Performance and rendition?” He laughed a bit. “Yeah, I did. So did you.”

“I didn’t even know…”

Anna collided against my back and her hand shot forwards over my shoulder, giving a thumbs up to Keith.

“Good one, Dracula.”

I turned to face Anna. “Wait, you’re in on this?”

She shrugged. “Come on, Alice, it didn’t take an Einstein to figure it out. You love how he plays, and I’ve seen firsthand what he can do in the way of getting anyone into the feelings of the story. We all saw it that first day. You guys just needed a little push out of the script and into the gut-wrenching drama.”

I opened my mouth and shut it again. Anna was right, wasn’t she? All that had changed during our stellar performance—our rendition—was the way we had approached our lines. We hadn’t known how our characters were supposed to feel; then we had felt it.

“Girls,” Dave said then, looking at our little trio a little weirded out and a little suspicious. “You coming?”

I blushed, realizing what we were doing and where, and nodded, but Anna’s arm locked around my shoulders and she waved at him. “Nah, you go ahead. Alice’s coming to my place, so we’ll go together once we are done here.”

“When you’re done?” Dave raised an eyebrow, incredulous. “Okay… whatever you say.”

We watched while he left, the last of the long string of stragglers, and I said, “I don’t think he looked very convinced. And besides, I can’t drop by your house tonight. I really should check in at home first.”

“Did you want to go with him?”

“No, but…”

“Then stop ruining my excuse. As I said, we need to talk.” She pointed a finger at Keith, who was almost finished picking up his things. “You,” she said, sounding quite imperious. “What have you done to Lena?”

Keith immediately snapped into defensive mode. “I haven’t done a thing…”

“I can’t believe you think…” I followed right after his lead.

She lifted her hands to forestall us.

“I’m not accusing anyone here,” she said, “but I’ve been thinking. Lena knew Keith played, and while her explanation might be true, I still think it’s fishy. Besides, Alice, you said yourself that waiting for weeks to try to get revenge on Keith for something as minimal as hitting with his tray someone
who wasn’t her
was too much, even for her standards. And I’ve yet another exhibit. She looked positively livid when Keith came in today, which means she’s not letting it go. So”—she turned on him—“I’d like to know why she’s got her sights on you. We might figure out what’s coming next.”

Keith and I blinked, and he darted a nervous glance between Anna and me.

“I don’t want to come across the wrong way, but what’s it to you?” he asked with guarded eyes.

Anna shrugged, not fazed in the least.

“Well, Alice seems to think you’re interesting. I’m going to go with that. If it fails, I’ll argue that a cause as lost as yours makes for an entertaining pet project.”

My jaw dropped, but Keith laughed, not entirely free, but with more amusement and less self-deprecation lacing it than last time I’d heard it.

“Okay, I’ll consider myself a lab rat. But I still can’t think of anything that might have made the Bitch Queen lock her jaws on me.”

“Bitch Queen?” Anna arched an eyebrow and I giggled.

“Yeah, I’m the Princess.”

“Wait, does that make me the Jester? Don’t answer that,” she warned, waving a finger in Keith’s direction. “But think about this, okay?”

“Will do. Thanks.”

“Alice, we should really get going now. I’ll drop you off?”

“Sure. You coming?”

Keith shook his head. “I want to stay and put in some practice. I have an idea.”

I didn’t really understand how anyone would want to stay longer after school once the extra curriculars were over, or how he could speak of spending his Friday night alone with his guitar, as if there was nothing more normal than that, but I shrugged and headed off with Anna.

By the time we made it outside, the parking lot was deserted and it was cold enough to make our breath puff out in white clouds.

“You were pretty nice to Keith back there,” I said as we approached Anna’s car.

“Are you saying that I’m not nice as a general rule?” She smirked and I rolled my eyes.

“To the likes of him? Please! I wouldn’t be particularly civil in normal circumstances either.”

“But that’s just the thing. You look comfortable talking about him. Look at you. Two days out of your stalkerish tendencies and you’re already acting as if you two are friends.” I went to protest, but my mouth clamped shut when I realized that I had no decent argument against her. She looked too smug and she was right. “I thought I should give the guy a chance,” she went on with a devilish glint to her eye, “because I have a feeling that now that he’s here, he’s going to stay.”

“He can’t stay, Anna. I mean, theater and rehearsal is one thing, but what would we even talk about afterward? What would happen if we were seen around together?”

“Lena would have a field day.”

“Exactly.”

“Okay, so you’re just going to go back to ignoring him once
Lady Windermere’s Fan
is out of the way?”

The “of course” got tangled up in my throat, and I stared at her. My look must have been as pitiful as a lost, kicked kitten, because she pulled open the door to her car with a grin.

“That’s what I thought,” she said.

Anna dropped me off at my place just a couple minutes later. I lived within walking distance, but it was on her way and riding in her warm car was better than prowling the streets in the rapidly approaching winter.

“See you later?”

I nodded. “I promise I won’t be late this time,” I said, hopping out and running toward the house.

After I dropped my school stuff, took a shower and changed into something decent, I’d be out the door again and headed toward the movies to watch some nonsensical zombie apocalypse flick that Ray was just crazy about. Dave and I would tail along, as usual, playing third and fourth wheel to the couple.

It was our standard weekend plan, unless there was some party to attend, and while I stepped under the hot water of the shower, I tried to imagine how it’d be if Keith were there instead of Dave. 

The image short-circuited my brains. Everyone would look at us, yes, but I could learn to live with that. I thought so, at least. However, social ostracism was too much to even consider, and I knew no one else would get used to his company. Ray, for example, wouldn’t put up with the situation.

He was a lot like Lena, I guessed, but in a masculine way—more direct. Being direct, in his book, didn’t translate into being honest. It became a direct punch to ruin your face instead of convoluted rumors to ruin your reputation. And he was a football player, still in high school, but with the build of a future linebacker, so Keith’s face would not survive the encounter.

Nope, if Anna was right, if I did let myself get carried away and kept seeing Keith, nights such as this would be over. I added a final touch of mascara and stared at my reflection in the mirror, all glitter and style after a long day of classes.

I wouldn’t give that life up.

It was who I was, wasn’t it?

***

I hardly slept after the movie. It hadn’t been that bad—nothing too original, but decent special effects—and the pancake eating afterward had been as cool as always, but my heart hadn’t been in it.

I refused to think about why and instead, stared a hole through the ceiling. The strange knot seizing my stomach would go nameless. 

In spite of my good intentions, though, I declined when Anna called me the next day to ask whether I wanted to hang out with her and Ray. I told her that I had plans, and she said it was okay, and it sounded like she understood. She probably did.

I knew in my gut that if I went with them, I’d spend another night unable to sleep, wondering at that other possible life that might be waiting for me. It seemed to be worse than my current one in all-important matters, but I still couldn’t forget it so I dragged myself out of bed and got ready to face my metaphorical demons.

An hour later, I rang the bell.

Keith’s father opened the door, his face drawn and tight, but he brightened up when he saw me.

“Hi, Mr. Brannagh,” I chirped.
Chirped! Go ahead and kill me now…
“I’m sorry I didn’t call beforehand. Is it a bad time?” I pressed on, trying very hard not to second guess myself.

“Alice! No, not at all, I’m very glad you are visiting. Come in,” he said, smiling and stepping aside, completely oblivious to my inner drama.

“I brought a cake,” I said, lifting the shopping bag I carried while telling myself, quite sternly, to relax already. “Chocolate.”

“You shouldn’t have! But thank you very much. I’m sure Keith will appreciate it. He’s playing in his room; perhaps you can get him to stop and come out to celebrate with us.”

I smiled. “He’s taking it seriously, then?”

“You could say that.” Mr. Brannagh’s smile wavered a little, and I thought there was a smidgen of worry in the creases of his eyes, but I shook it off and went down the short corridor to Keith’s door.

I knocked twice and twisted the doorknob when I got no response. There he was, wearing headphones and playing like there was no tomorrow. He even looked cute, gazing off into nothingness. I stepped into his room and checked for Sparrow, in case the wild beast was thinking of sneaking up on me, but the cat was nowhere to be seen, so I approached Keith.

“Hi,” I said, but he didn’t give any signal of having heard me. Probably he hadn’t. Music blaring in his ears and all.

Moving to stand in front of him, I watched, incredulously, him looking right past me. I reached out to tap his shoulder, but then had a moment of doubt as his fingers picked up speed playing the silent song.