Song of Summer (10 page)

I get back to my stool and Trent leans over. “What was that about?” he whispers.

I shake my head and turn my attention toward Pastor Mark, who's saying something about near silence in the second verse.

“It must have been something big,” Trent continues to whisper. “You turned bright red. Is everything okay?”

“Shut up!” I whisper back. “I'm trying to listen! Yes, everything's okay.”

But instead of thinking about “Wondrous Love” and near silence and the mood blossoming, I mull over the words, “Sorry I've been quiet.” Is that a joke? He joked like that a few times. My new fingerpicking patterns are underpracticed, and I haven't found the right one for this song yet. The music becomes rote, mechanical, going straight from my brain to my fingers without stopping by my heart. As soon as rehearsal is over I pack up Bender and rush to my bag to get my phone. There it is in all its glory: “Had a great time too. Sorry I've been quiet. Wanna hang out?” No other new messages—that's it.

“Ooh, who's that?” I hear over my shoulder. Trent.

“Nobody…” I try, unsuccessfully, to hide the phone as he grabs it out of my hand.

“‘Had a great time too. Sorry I've been quiet. Wanna hang out?'” he reads out loud.

I give him a tight-lipped smile and hold out my hand for my phone.

“Who sent you this?” he asks, waving the phone out of my reach. I cross my arms, refusing to play his little game.

“A person,” I say. “Now give it back.”

“‘Had a great time too…' Now could this be that deaf guy from the park?”

I shrug.

He laughs. “Could not. Believe that. Did you seriously tell him you had a good time? I can't imagine Robin Peters having a good time that didn't involve a guitar and three-part harmony. I guess people change, huh? Priorities change? What used to be the most important is no longer so important?”

It stings a little. I shrug again. “I guess so,” I say to his face. “Some
people
who used to be so important are no longer so important.”

“Sorry you feel that way. Some of us are coming over to my house to keep jamming. I was going to invite you, but it sounds like you might not be into that anymore.”

I give him a look. “The awesomeness of jamming will overshadow the suckiness of the ones I jam with.”

He gives my phone back, pressing it all warm into my hand and winking at me. “Everyone'll probably be there until eleven, which is when my mom puts the kibosh on jamming. Come if you want.”

“Maybe,” I say. I stow my phone in my bag and walk out to the parking lot, cool as a cucumber.

Until I get to the car. Then I dig for the phone and call Jenni.

“Hey. You wanna go to a jam session?” I ask.

“No. Where?”

“Trent's house.”

“Seriously, Robin? Definitely no. Why?”

“He invited me. And I thought maybe you could keep me from doing something stupid.” Jenni sighs, and for a minute I'm afraid she's not going to say anything, which is worse than saying no. “Please, Jenni, please! I don't want to go by myself! And it's not like you have anything to get up for in the morning! We won't even be out that late—we're done at eleven!”

“Fine. I'll go. But you owe me.”

“I owe you! I really do! I'll be there in five minutes!”

I hang up and head over to Jenni's house, listening to the first seven seconds of each song on Robin's Best-Ever Mix VII and finger combing my hair. My heart beats out a staccato rhythm, which my fingers echo on the steering wheel.

Jenni slumps into the front seat and slams the door.

“Thank you so, so, so much! You really and truly are the best,” I say. “And that is the cutest bracelet. It's new, isn't it? New… colors?”

“Good try,” she replies. “I'm trying to think of what you owe me.”

“Anything within my power, up to half my kingdom.”

She smiles grudgingly. “You are so weird.”

We're at Trent's house in just a couple minutes. We head to the front door, Bender in hand, pennywhistle in pocket, and Mrs. McGovern opens the door. “Robin!” she says. “It's good to see you again!”

“Hi, Mrs. M,” I say.

She's soft and squishy, but with Trent's green eyes. She squeezes me tight. I guess because it's been a really long time since I've seen her. I used to be over almost every day.

“Everybody's in the basement,” she says, and Jenni and I thank her and wind our way through the hallways to the basement. “Stairway to Heaven” floats up the stairs. It's disconnected and repetitive. We walk down.

“Look who decided to grace us with her presence!” Trent says from his spot in the beanbag chair, guitar in his lap. The riffs had been coming from him. A couple of his friends are stuck around the room—John's behind the drum set and Stumpy's fooling around with Trent's stand-up bass. A girl is impossibly perched on the back of the beanbag chair, draped across Trent's shoulders. She holds a microphone loosely in her hand.

I run my hand over the garage-sale amp I found last summer and glance up at the acoustic tiles I spent hours installing. This was last summer—scouring classifieds and sweating and spending hours fixing up Trent's basement, stopping to make out or get a drink of water. My eyes come to rest on the microphone the girl is holding: a Rode NT3 I researched, I saved for, I drove all the way to Erie to buy.

“Ana!” I say, throwing a look at Jenni. “Didn't know you'd be here! Didn't think you were into this kind of stuff.” She plays fiddle. Well, violin really. And I can tell you exactly what stuff she's into. It has curly hair and rhymes with Brent.

Jenni elbows me and I switch my smile back on.

Ana bites her lip and digs her free hand into Trent's hair, smiling up at me. “Trent's teaching me how to play guitar,” she says. I grunt and look away. Maybe we won't stay long, after all.

“Jen-ni, what did Robin have to promise to get you to come?” Trent asks, a lazy smile on his face.

“Up to half her kingdom,” Jenni says. “I'm here to make sure she doesn't make any bad decisions.”

Everybody laughs and I turn red. “Like playing “Stairway to Heaven,” ad infinitum,” I say. “Too bad she wasn't here earlier, Trent.”

Stumpy laughs and I kneel down to unzip Bender's case.

I draw out Fender Bender and run a hand across some bumps and bruises from my less careful days. “Who wants to do this?” I ask.

Answer? Nobody. “Jamming” actually means lazing around Trent's basement. His mom brings down some popcorn and John drags out a six-pack and we all just chill. I was promised a jam session and it turns out to be a do-nothing-but-watch-Ana-flirt-with-Trent session.

I bear it for about an hour. Then the conversation turns deadly.

“So this is the first time in I don't know how long that I won't be dragged to the craft fair!” Trent says.

The craft fair. I fingerpick “Walking in Memphis” absentmindedly and stew. The craft fair is my favorite thing of the whole summer. It's fair food and local art and music and everything I love all in one place. I go every year at least twice. Until this year, I'd always gone with Trent. From when we were kids selling juice for the band, to when McClurg Street (the school folk band) played, to just wandering around holding hands.

“Aw… McClurg Street's not playing this year?” Ana asks. She could be in it. She should be in it. But she plays “violin,” not “fiddle.” They're the same instrument, just different music. It's like the difference between running and jogging—they're the same thing just at different speeds with different styles.

Trent shakes his head. “Not enough summer interest this year. I called a rehearsal but nobody came. Seems like some people are defecting…” he says, and glances at me. I roll my eyes. He called that rehearsal over text, two hours before it was supposed to start. I didn't even get the message until it was over.

“I'm not defecting,” I say. “I'm busy. I'm doing this church band thing and working at Grape Country, saving up for the Dreadnought, learning new patterns—”

“And having a ‘great time' with a deaf kid,” Trent finishes, putting the words in air quotes. “I'm sure that has nothing to do with skipping rehearsal.”

That's it.

What am I doing here?

An hour ago, a charming, sweet, fun, hot-as-all-hell guy texted me, wanting to go on a date.

“Yup!” I say, standing up. “That's right, Trent. I was having a great time with a deaf kid. Who has more class in his left pinky toe than you could ever hope to have in your entire body. So screw it. Screw your ‘jamming'”—I put the word in my own air quotes—“and your flirting and your waste of talent. There's someplace I'd rather be.”

I slide Bender back in its case and heft it to my shoulder. Jenni follows me, wide eyed and closemouthed, as I march up the basement stairs.

“Leaving so soon, Robin?” Mrs. McGovern asks from the kitchen. I force a smile.

“Sorry, Mrs. M,” I say. “Gotta go home. Work tomorrow, you know.” It's a lie. I have tomorrow off. But I can't tell her that her son's a jerk and deserves the bimbo he's probably making out with right now.

“Sorry to hear that,” she says. “You're welcome back anytime!”

I nod as surprise tears spring to my eyes. “Thanks,” I say before heading out the door.

To her credit, Jenni has stayed quiet this whole time. She keeps stealing little sideways looks at me as I wipe hot tears from the corners of my eyes.

When we're sitting in the car, buckled in and ready to go, I talk. “What the hell is wrong with me? Why did I drag you out here for that crap session? I am a sucky, sucky friend. You deserve much more than half my kingdom.”

She chuckles and hands me a tissue. “I dunno, Robin. You just got stuck on him, I guess.”

“No more,” I say. “I am no more stuck on him. He is a jerk and a creep and you can quote me on that.”

The car is silent for another second. We're still sitting in Trent's driveway. I turn the key.

Click.

“Nonononononono…” I turn the key again.

Click.

“God! Let this start!” I scream, and stomp on the gas. “I will not be stuck in this shit anymore!”

RumrumrumRUMMMM…
The engine sputters to life and the radio blasts Robin's Best-Ever Mix VII. I punch the Power button to kill it, preferring the music of my tires spinning in new gravel. The boat trundles up the driveway and down his country road. I keep an eye out for deer through my angry tears.

“In my bag,” I say after a minute, “is my phone. Can you get it?”

“Yeah,” says Jenni. She digs through my bag until she finds it. “What do you want me to do with it?”

“Go to the most recent text,” I say, “and text back. Say ‘What are you doing on Friday?' and ‘Remember that craft fair we talked about?'”

She looks up at me. “Is this… ?”

“Yeah. It is. Let's give it a shot.”

Carter

The traffic in Westfield is terrible.

I think that's the first time that sentence has ever been written.

I wait in a NYC-worthy line of cars. For once, I'm afraid I won't find a place to park my bike.

Robin said she'd meet me on the steps of the Presbyterian church in the middle of the park. I squeeze my bike into an impossibly small spot and make my way towards the steeple- the tallest point in town. It's not easy- there are people crowding the sidewalks and the park. On the way I run my fingers through my hair, my fingers brushing against the scar behind my right ear. My hair is sweaty and starting to curl but thankfully not squished to my head from the helmet. I flap my t-shirt a couple times to get some air under there. My leather jacket is stowed in the lockbox on the back of my bike.

I come down the sidewalk and look towards the doors of the big church. After a little searching, I find her. She's sitting on the steps with a gorgeous redhead. Ah. Jenni. Barry will be thrilled. He made me promise a double-date if Robin said she'd hang out with me again. I think he called it a “finder's fee.”

Robin looks up and I wave. A smile lights her face and she waves back.

“Hi!” she signs as she stands up. She looks around, avoiding uncomfortable eye contact as I walk the last fifty yards to the steps.

“Hi,” I sign. There's an awkward moment when I feel like I should hug her or something but she's just standing there with her hands in the back pockets of her cutoff jean shorts. Not the best hugging position, really. So I just shrug, feeling like a middle schooler at a dance.

“This is Jenni,” she introduces, slowly spelling Jenni's name and indicating her gorgeous friend.

“Hi,” signs Jenni timidly. She flicks her hair like a shampoo commercial.

“Hi,” I sign back. I wonder if Jenni is going to hang out with us the whole time. Not that I mind, but I'd hoped it would just be me and Robin.

I take out my pad and paper. “So… this is a craft fair!” I write.

Robin nods and smiles. “It's my favorite thing,” her mouth says. She signs, “Love.” So I guess she's looked up a few more signs since the picnic on the hill.

“Let's see it,” I sign. She nods and her smile sparkles up into my face. After a moment of hesitation, I reach for her hand. She takes it, her sweaty palm against mine. It's nice.

Jenni takes that moment to tap me on the shoulder. “My family's having a yard sale,” she writes. She makes an apologetic face but she's hiding a smile. “Gotta help them. Sorry I can't come with you guys.”

“It's okay,” I write. Robin says something to her. I catch the words “See you at the” and “an hour,” but she's half-turned away so I can't see everything. We wave good-bye and head into the crowd.