Girl, Unstrung

by Claire Handscombe

  Chapter Fifty

  I’m sitting on my bed reading over allowable two-letter words in the Scrabble section of my bullet journal when someone knocks on my door.

  “Just a minute,” I say, because I want to get to the end of the list. I get there and call out, “Come in.”

  It’s my dad. My dad almost never comes to my room. I think he’s a little bit afraid of it. He stands in the doorway tugging at the bottom of his t-shirt and I have to tell him again to come in.

  “Hey, kiddo,” he says. He sits on the edge of my bed and traces the outline of the patterns of my comforter with his finger. He clearly has a Message Of Great Importance to deliver. “I have something to ask you. I was doing some digging on the LACHSA faculty.”

  “Why?”

  “I’ll tell you why. Let me get there.”

  I hate when people do this, make you wait for the punchline. Like, give me the actual information first and then fill in the background. Don’t keep me in suspense.

  “I wanted to see if maybe I knew someone there who could help us.”

  The pillows behind my back have started to slip down, and I rearrange them. “With what?”

  “With getting you another audition. For when your wrist is healed. Or for next year.”

  “They don’t take rising juniors,” I say. Surely he knows this. Surely I have drummed this hard enough into people’s heads over the last year.

  “They don’t usually, no. But it turns out that an old friend was just promoted to head of the music department. We went to Juilliard together. He was huge fan of The Classroom, and back in the day I got him a tour of the set and he got to meet some of the guys. It was years ago, but he still tells me sometimes how grateful he is, that it was one of the best days of his life. I could put in a call. Mention that my super-talented, super-hard-working daughter deserves a second chance.”

  It would actually be a third chance, since this was my second chance after not making it to the in-person stage the first time. Arguably, I’ve had my second chance already.

  “Thanks, dad.” I realize I am holding my left wrist with my good hand, as if trying to protect it from being overworked and damaged again.

  “No promises, okay? But I can try.”

  It seems unthinkable to turn this down. Unthinkable to do anything other than yelp in delight and smother my dad in hugs till he can’t breathe. But for some reason, I don’t feel like yelping. I feel less than thrilled. What is wrong with me?

  “Lemme think about it, okay?”

  Dad looks surprised. I don’t blame him. I’m surprised too. “Sure,” he says. “Just let me know.”

  I feel a little bad, because he thought he was coming into my room like the clichéd white knight on a stallion and I’ve basically told him I’m not sure that I need rescuing. The thing is, six months ago not getting into LACHSA then Juilliard then the Symphony felt like the worst thing that could possibly ever happen to me. Now... I don’t know. I’m playing my viola for an hour a day instead of three, and I’m enjoying it, you know? It’s frustrating that my fingers are slower to respond than they were, but I’m getting there, almost back to normal, pre-skiing abilities.

  Playing with Dan, in London, with no expectations and an audience of one who was determined to be impressed no matter what we did, with no expectation that I would practice and practice until my fingers bled and I achieved perfection, it was fun. No, not fun. Fun is not quite the right word. Fun is splashing around at the beach or watching a rom com with Katie. Playing the viola is more satisfying than that. Those things are like a McDonald’s burger compared to a lovingly prepared steak, medium rare just how I like them. (The steak is the viola playing in this analogy, but I’m guessing you’ve got that.)

  It’s the kind of fun I’ve been working towards my whole life, and so there’s something super satisfying about it. And what if that’s the whole point? Not competition, not being the best, maybe not even being admired, but being swept up in the moment, enjoying the moment, enjoying the enjoyment of those watching? And maybe I don’t want to be at LACHSA, grinding away, playing mind games with other violists, pretending to be their friends while secretly plotting their downfall so I can get ahead. That does not sound like a fun way to spend two years. Maybe what I want instead is to be at a normal school (as normal as things get in Pasadena, ha) and be one of the best, a big fish in a small pond, without having to trample on people. Trampling is no fun for anyone, actually. I don’t want to be that person anymore. There’s got to be a way to compete, to be the best without being horrible to everyone around me. There’s got to be a way to get to be a damn good viola payer, good enough to enjoy it, without maiming myself in the process.

  I’m not gonna lie, it’s scary seeing the front page of my bullet journal covered in question marks. If I’m stepping off the LACHSA-Juilliard-Symphony train, then I’m not sure where that leaves me, or what to structure my life around. (Let’s face it, it’s probably not going to be Scrabble.) And maybe it will still be the viola, in a different way. Or maybe I don’t even need LACHSA to get into Juilliard and I can step back on the train later. Who knows. Uncertainty terrifies me. I’m going to have to sit down and think long and hard about these new goals. Because I need goals. I definitely need goals.

  My dad looks at me, maybe trying to read my thoughts. I am inscrutable. I have learned this from him. He gives up, stands, and kisses me on the forehead instead.

  “Love you, kiddo,” he says, before he leaves and closes the door.

  Chapter Fifty-One

  It’s ridiculous that Tim and I have both ended up in this Scrabble final at the swirly carpeted ballroom of the Marriott Hotel in downtown LA, but there you have it. If there’s one thing I’ve learned in my almost-fifteen-years of existence, it’s that life is ridiculous sometimes.

  The rules of competitive Scrabble are, as you’d expect for a competition, but as you maybe wouldn’t expect from Scrabble, pretty strict. You have 25 minutes total each to make all of your plays, usually about 12 to 15 of them. You can’t just make a word up, or you can but it’s dangerous because the other person can challenge you and if they’re right, if the word doesn’t exist or that you’ve misspelled it, then you get the score that word would have given you deducted from your total, and that matters a whole lot at this level because games are usually close. You can be within sight of victory and then, bam, like a skiing accident before your LACHSA audition, it can be taken away from you.

  I’ve played seven games so far, moving from square table to square table to face nerd boy after nerd boy and the occasional actually pretty normal girl, and according to the screen showing everyone’s points, Tim and I are neck and neck, right at the top of the scoreboard. Well, okay, not quite: he’s three points ahead. But I’m playing him next, and we’re far enough above everyone else that whoever wins our game wins this tournament. Needless to say, I’m ready for this showdown. I’m waiting for any tricks Tim might pull, any words he might invent. He’ll never get past me.

  Rumor has it, and I’ve done my research and verified this, that Tim’s been into Scrabble for years. Apparently, his dad taught him, and then when his dad passed away he sort of carried it on as a legacy thing, in memoriam. He got obsessed with it and learned all the two-letter words and all the other tricks like I have. Only, he did it over a period of years. I’ve crammed it all in the last couple of months. There’s acrostics you can learn, tricks to remembering combinations of letters, kind of like when you’re starting out with reading music and you learn Every Good Boy Deserves Football as a way of remembering that the note that goes on the first line of the stave is an E, the second one a G, and so on. That’s when you have a treble clef at the beginning of the line, which most instruments do, and not an alto clef like the viola. My favorite necklace is a silver alto clef. Ebba bought it for me for my birthday next week, June 12th, and gave it to me early as a kind of good luck charm for this competition, and it was, I admit, super thoughtful of her. It’s really
easy to find treble clef earrings, treble clef necklaces. For the alto clef, you have to go on etsy, do some digging. It was a risky strategy, giving it to me, because the viola makes me sad, too. It reminds me of everything I’ve lost, everything I’ve worked for that’s come to nothing, the dreams that won’t come true and the fact that the first page of my bullet journal looks like this now:

  LACHSA

  JUILLIARD

  SYMPHONY

  ???

  I have no idea what my life is going to look like now. But I do know the viola will always be part of it, that being a viola player has made me who I am. And I think that Ebba understands that and that’s why she bought me the necklace. She wrote me this really sweet card, too, with a list of all the things she loves about me. She used that word, love, and she wrote it again right at the bottom – I love you ­­– and I think maybe Libby is right, maybe I should give Ebba a chance. Especially seeing as she has such good taste in jewelry.

  I’m fingering the alto clef necklace now as I’m looking at my seven wooden Scrabble tiles, poised to play a great game, poised to defeat Tim. He looks so serious and thoughtful under that swoopy hair. He looks so determined. I’m pretty sure that’s what my face looks like a lot of the time, too. I hope so, because I don’t think there’s anything more attractive in a person than determination. And, damn it, he’s good. Because of course he is. He’s the person playing opposite me in this Scrabble final. That’s not something you just fall into. He clearly knows the entire list of two-letter words, all the useful one-letter prefixes. I wonder if there are Post-It notes with word lists on this bathroom mirror too. He probably spends more time in the bathroom than the average boy does, getting that hair to swoop just right.

  He’s good, but I’m better. Or, at least, I’m doing better in this particular game. I’m leading him by 22 points, and there are only four letters left in the bag, which by my calculations of the tiles we have already used and depending on exactly what he still has on his rack, might be As and Is and a P or an R or an L, and there’s not a ton you can do with that, points-wise. But then he plays his turn, and it’s a good one. A very good one. The word is spurious, and the P is on a double letter, and the second S is on a double word, and it links with piece to make pieces, so that’s a lot of points, and it’s a master stroke. It’s really hard to pull that off at the end of a game, when there’s hardly any space left on the board and just in general not much room for maneuver.

  The thing is, though, is that how you spell spurious? I’m not sure that it is. I think that’s the British spelling, and we’re using the American Collins dictionary in this competition. I know the pain of almost getting a great word but being one letter short or of having a bingo, which is where you use all your letters in one go and get a fifty-point bonus, but just not having anywhere to put it. And what if that’s what this was? What if he very nearly had it and decided to take a risk? He definitely doesn’t deserve the points if he’s cheating on purpose and hoping I won’t notice. Nobody underestimates me and gets away with it. I always prove them wrong. Almost always. I maybe should have listened to the PT and not forced myself with the viola after my accident. But how did I know my story wouldn’t be the kind of against-all-odds story that we cheer and make into movies? I was almost certain that it would be. Madison Harper could have played me. Maybe for the viola parts they could even have used my real hands, made it look like it was her, playing me, playing the viola.

  And now I’m here instead, in this room that’s smelling increasingly of BO despite the Axe body spray, potentially becoming Southern California’s Junior Scrabble Champion, when I don’t even like words that much, when they’re really just a means to an end. A redemption story, of sorts. It’s not LACHSA. It’s not Juilliard. It’s not the Symphony. But it’s something. And it all hinges on Tim being wrong in his spelling of spurious.

  I open my mouth to challenge him, but just as I’m about to, I see something in his eyes – something that looks like pleading. I think about the Zyzzyva app on his phone, his years of preparation, the triumph for him of getting to this final. I think about how for me this is a chance to prove myself and a lot of fun but ultimately just a hobby. It isn’t everything, the way that playing the viola was. Is. Or the way that winning this competition is for Tim. And I think about Ebba, about that time she said she’d still love me if I didn’t get into LACHSA. Achievement isn’t the path to love. I know that now. Maybe Tim doesn’t yet. Maybe he needs this win for reasons I know nothing about.

  I close my mouth. I look at him as if to say, you’re welcome. We finish the letters and he wins. He’s the Junior Scrabble Champion of Southern California, and I’ve never seen him smile so wide, with all his teeth showing, his name flashing in bright white letters at the top of the score screen. I’d like to be that person. Because I like to win, because I’m used to winning, when I set my mind to something. But you know what? It turns out that being gracious feels a little bit good, too.

  Chapter Fifty-Two

  “Congratulations,” I say to Tim after the medal ceremony, where he gets gold and I get silver and we’re clapped like Olympic athletes which seems, you know, a bit much. What I actually want to say is, You’re welcome.

  “Thanks,” he says, playing with the red, white and blue ribbon around his neck. People are milling around us, starting to disperse. Our parents are hanging back, waiting for us to exchange gracious platitudes or praying that we don’t rip each other’s hair out. “I was really hoping you didn’t know how to spell spurious.”

  “I do know. It doesn’t have a U.”

  “Yes, it does,” he says. He pulls his phone from his jeans pocket – damn it, those dark jeans, they look so good on him, show his butt off just right – and taps on the dictionary app and shows me how wrong I am. I lean in to look. I can feel his breath in my hair, skimming my cheek. I realize how that the plea I thought I saw in his eyes wasn’t please don’t challenge me, I really want to win. It was please do challenge me, I want to win by a lot.

  “Oh,” I say, because I’m not sure how to process this, and also because I’m distracted by how very close our faces are. One more inch... “Well, then. Double congratulations. For knowing how to spell spurious. AND for being Junior Scrabble Champion.”

  “Southern California only,” he says. “Nationals are next.”

  “Good luck,” I say. “Not that you’ll need it.”

  “Thanks,” he says. Man alive, I wish he wasn’t so good-looking. I wish that winners weren’t so attractive. I turn to go before I have any more of these disturbing thoughts.

  “Wait,” he says, before I make it all the way back to mom, who’s waiting for me at the back of the hall, biting her lip like she’s anticipating a meltdown. I spin round and take some steps back to him till we’re close enough to speak without shouting. “How come you didn’t challenge me? You would have won if you’d been right.”

  That is an excellent question. It all made sense in the moment, but I can’t remember right now. Right now all I know I want to punch him in the mouth. With my mouth. And maybe a little less force than a traditional punch. And more tongue.

  I grab hold of what’s left of my senses and swallow hard. “It seemed like it really meant something to you, winning this.”

  “It does.” He pauses and looks at me and my palms are sweaty. How does he do that? With those long eyelashes under that swoopy hair, obviously, but like, how? “But you let me win?”

  I can see how that’s disappointing. When I was a little kid, I used to have tantrums when I didn’t win at board games, so sometimes mom and dad just let me win, because it was easier for everyone. But then sometimes I’d realize they were letting me win, and I’d be even madder. I like to play by the rules and I like to win by the rules. Fair and square.

  “You, Clara Cassidy? You let me win? After, you know... everything?”

  “It’s not like winning a Scrabble competition was going to get me into LACHSA,” I say. His face falls.
My stomach lurches, because I didn’t mean in the way it sounded. I was just explaining why logically it didn’t make all that much sense for me to cling onto this victory.

  “I really am sorry,” Tim says. “I don’t know how else to say it. I know flowers are kind of a pathetic attempt, but –”

  “They were nice flowers.” Objective fact.

  He kicks one foot against another. “But not enough.”

  “No,” I say. “Not enough. But I’m not sure that there’s any way you can make it up to me, really. You can’t undo what’s done. The flowers were a good effort. Plus, I have time for this Scrabble lark now that I can’t play as much.”

  He’s confused. I can tell. “You don’t sound mad,” he says.

  “I’m so tired of being mad. Mad at you, mad at my parents for not staying together, mad at Ebba, mad at my sister for being boring and my other sister for being too cute and talented. I thought maybe I’d try not being mad for a while.”

  “Wow,” he says.

  “I know. I’m as surprised as you are.”

  “Think maybe you can try not being mad for long enough to hang out with me sometime?”

  My face flushes. I don’t want to ask this, but I have to. It’s important for certain things to be clear. “Like a date?”

  “Like that, yeah.”

  I think about the Tres Jolie lingerie languishing in my closet. About the fact that I’m almost fifteen and, damn it, I want to be kissed.

  “I guess we could go get celebratory ice cream or something sometime. Seeing as how we’re Junior Scrabble Champion and Runner Up.”

  “Southern California only.”