Out of Tune

by Beth Reekles

  He shakes his head, and loads some more cheesecake onto his fork. ‘Not really.’

  ‘Oh, come on,’ I say. ‘There are girls swooning when you walk down the hallways. The mysterious Todd O’Connor, with his edgy atmosphere. And you play guitar.’

  He appears to be fascinated by the sight of the cheesecake on his fork, and shifts in his seat, but I don’t miss the bright pink blush spreading over his cheeks. ‘They’re only interested in me because I’m the new kid.’

  I roll my eyes, and put a strawberry in my mouth to shut myself up before I blurt out something incredibly stupid – but, admittedly, kind of true – and say that he’s cute, of course girls are interested.

  I mean, he does have something going for him in the looks department apart from those amazing cheekbones of his . . .

  Not that it even matters what I think. He could be the next Adonis for all it matters to me. I’ve got Josh.

  Once we all finish dessert, the adults carry on talking, and they’re deep in conversation about their jobs, the state of the economy, and all that stuff. Callum pauses long enough to say, ‘Why don’t you kids go watch a movie or something? There’s some popcorn in the cupboard, if you like. Todd, you know where it is.’

  ‘Okay.’

  Todd nods his head at me and I get up to follow him. I say, ‘Thanks for dinner, it was amazing. My compliments to the chef.’

  ‘No problem, Ashley,’ Callum says with a broad grin, before turning back to my dad and carrying on his sentence. They all start to get up to move this conversation to the lounge, so Todd changes his direction to the staircase and I follow him up.

  This time, he doesn’t stop on the stairs.

  ‘I would apologize for the quantity of papers on the floor, but I’ve been trying to catch up on my French grammar – I remember less than I should,’ he tells me, without turning. I laugh. He pushes open his bedroom door. ‘But I am going to apologize if there are any boxer shorts lying around. Because that’s just a bad habit.’

  I laugh again. ‘Don’t worry.’

  He kicks a T-shirt that’s in a heap on the floor out of the way of the door and then holds his arm out to me to go on inside.

  I’ve sort of seen Todd’s bedroom; I can see it from my window if his drapes aren’t shut. Out of the corner of my eye, I see him run to the side of the bed and kick some boxers out of sight.

  The wall behind his bed is dark blue, like the carpet, but the others are cream, to keep the room from feeling too closed in and dark. His bedding is a gold sort of color, and there are dozens of posters of bands on the wall. Some are old and torn and some are shiny; some are signed and others are small, like they’ve been torn out of a magazine. And there are shelves lining the walls, holding so many books and CDs I would lose count if I tried to see how many there are.

  ‘I read a lot,’ he says, almost sheepishly, seeing me looking.

  ‘So do I.’ I think about the stacks of books leaning haphazardly against the walls in my room, some of which are almost as high as my waist. Dad’s always saying he’ll put up more shelves for my books, but he’s yet to get around to it. And Mom prefers to keep the bookshelves in the lounge for things like recipe books and photo albums, and for displaying a few ornaments and photos.

  ‘I know, I’ve seen you.’ I turn to look at him, quizzical. He rubs the back of his neck and laughs nervously. ‘I mean . . . like the other night, I couldn’t sleep, and then I saw your light was still on, so I looked over, and you were sat in your bed reading. It was like, two in the morning. Your shutters were open,’ he adds.

  Now it’s my turn to look guilty.

  ‘You don’t read much during the day,’ he says. ‘At lunch. I’ve seen you. Sometimes you look bored out of your mind. But you read a lot at night.’

  ‘That’s . . .’ I can’t explain it to him. I wouldn’t know how to, or where to start. ‘It would be a bit antisocial.’

  He nods and says, ‘Mm.’

  And I say loudly, ‘So that’s your guitar.’ It’s one of those acoustic ones, propped up in the corner by the window. His blue book is on the window seat, a black biro lying on top of it, next to a small black cushion.

  ‘You’re good,’ I tell him. ‘I hear you playing sometimes, if my window’s open.’

  He wavers, like he’s not sure how to reply, until he finally says, ‘Thanks.’

  Todd sits down at the window seat, and I choose the bed, lying across it on my stomach and facing him. He’s taken out his guitar pick again. I think he’s a bit nervous – I know I am. This whole conversation feels tentative – like it’s more personal than anything we’ve said so far. But I can’t help myself from asking about the guitar pick.

  ‘Why do you take that everywhere?’

  I hear a soft sigh leaving his lips and his voice is quiet when he finally answers. ‘It was my granddad’s. He’s the reason I got into guitar.’ There’s a long pause. I can see the struggle in his face – the shadow over his eyes and the frown underneath all that hair, and the contortion of his jaw muscles – and I know he’s trying to find the right words to carry on. So I wait, to see if he’ll tell me more.

  ‘I was really close to my granddad. See, my mom . . . She left us about three years ago. She and my dad were always arguing, so they got a divorce and she moved to the next town over. I got to see her a lot, but she’s back in Idaho. My dad got a job offer he couldn’t pass up here, so I decided to move here with him.

  ‘Anyway, my granddad – my mom’s dad – he moved closer to us a couple of years ago, just before the divorce, and after my grandma died. Then he died a year ago. My mom’s been a little distant since then, and she’s got a new guy now. They’re engaged.’

  ‘What happened?’ I ask before I can stop myself. ‘To your granddad, I mean.’

  ‘Heart attack. The hospital called us as soon as they could, and we got there just in time to say goodbye. He couldn’t talk, or anything, but he held my hand real tight.’

  If I was expecting him to tell me anything, it wasn’t that.

  I sit quietly for a moment. I still have all of my grandparents, except for my mom’s dad, who passed away when I was two or three; and my parents have always had a strong, happy marriage. I can’t even begin to relate to Todd’s story. I try to think of something to say in reply because I can’t stay silent.

  Eventually, I manage to say, ‘That must’ve been horrible. I can’t even imagine . . .’ Trailing off, I shake my head. ‘I bet you’re sick of condolences.’

  ‘Damn straight.’

  There’s another long pause that feels like it lasts eons, but it isn’t awkward or uncomfortable for once, and I don’t think either of us is willing to break that silence for a while.

  ‘That’s about when I started writing songs,’ he says. ‘It helps.’

  ‘I can understand that.’

  ‘They’re personal, though. That’s why I don’t like to share them.’ Then he says, ‘So do you want to watch a movie?’

  And I reply, ‘Sure. You pick, I’m good with whatever.’

  As Todd sets up one of the Iron Man movies in his DVD player and grabs us some popcorn from the kitchen, I sit on his bed and I start to doubt every judgment I’ve made about him so far.

  I don’t mean to, but I fall asleep at Todd’s house, sometime near the end of the movie. I don’t even remember feeling sleepy.

  ‘Ashley!’ Mom’s voice calling up the stairs wakes me up, and my eyes flash open, disconcerted by the sight of a room that’s not mine. A hand shakes my shoulder. ‘Are you ready to go?’

  I’m lying on my side facing Todd, my knees tucked up and pressed against him. I scramble off the bed hastily, blushing at falling asleep and almost cuddling up to him. God, how humiliating!

  Turning away from Todd, I discreetly wipe at the edges of my mouth. I didn’t drool, at least – that’s something.

  ‘Ashley!’ Mom calls again.

  ‘Just a sec!’ I yell, then turn to Todd with an awkward smile. ‘Sor
ry, I guess I was more tired than I thought . . .’

  ‘You haven’t been asleep long,’ he says, ‘only about half an hour. I just – um, I didn’t know whether to wake you or not.’

  I shrug, like it doesn’t matter – but I’m still embarrassed. I can hear him gulp, and I shift my weight from one foot to the other. ‘I guess I should, um, go. Thanks for the popcorn.’

  ‘Sure.’

  He follows me downstairs, and his dad and my parents are laughing at something, and don’t seem to notice the uneasiness between Todd and me. Mom has that rosy tint in her cheeks that she usually gets when she’s drunk a little bit too much, and she has to hold onto Dad’s arm to steady herself.

  ‘What movie did you kids watch?’ Callum asks us as I’m putting on my coat and shoes.

  ‘Iron Man 2,’ we chorus. I wait for Todd to laugh and tell them I fell asleep, but he doesn’t.

  We thank them again for the meal and the lovely evening, and I glance back at Todd, who’s standing on the bottom step of the staircase fiddling with the guitar pick.

  ‘Night,’ I say.

  ‘Night, Ashley,’ he replies. There’s a pause, when I think he might be about to say something else, but then my dad calls my name, and I wave to Todd before hurrying after my parents back home.

  Chapter Five

  Neither Todd nor I brought up anything about our after-dinner conversation when we saw each other on Monday morning.

  After we’d said hello, I counted to twenty-four before he decided to break the silence.

  ‘I hope it doesn’t rain later.’ He grimaced, looking up at the dark clouds that were crawling across the sky.

  I mumbled an agreement and tried to think of something else to say that wasn’t about Saturday night and wasn’t about the weather. I managed to make some small talk by asking what classes he had today, and we both complained about the amount of homework we’d already been given from the first week back at school.

  Todd drives a lot slower than I do; everything he does is cautious and carefully calculated. He doesn’t forget to put his blinkers on even once. But I looked at the clock on his dashboard and thought if he carries on driving like this, we’ll have to leave at least five minutes earlier in future.

  ‘You know, if you drive the whole way like this, I’d say we should be at school by . . . oh, maybe Friday. In March. If the traffic isn’t too bad.’

  He laughed, but didn’t go any faster.

  Now, it’s lunchtime, and Eliza and Naomi are on one side of me discussing an episode of The Vampire Diaries that they watched last night, and Josh is talking to the boys on the other side of me.

  Danielle comes careering over, slamming her palms down on the lunch table and catching everyone’s attention.

  ‘Party at Hunter Smith’s house this Friday,’ she says. ‘Eight o’clock.’

  ‘Cool,’ I say along with everyone else, before taking another bite of my sandwich.

  ‘And Todd O’Connor is totally going,’ she adds. ‘I spoke to Reyna who overheard him telling some guys in his French class that he’d go.’

  ‘Wait, are you serious?’ Eliza says, eyes bulging.

  I roll my eyes.

  ‘Oh, God, you guys aren’t talking about the new kid again, are you?’ Neil sighs. ‘I thought this would’ve blown over by now.’

  ‘Oh, you’re just jealous!’ Naomi waves a hand at him. ‘Of course it hasn’t blown over. He’s hot. And you know he plays guitar.’ She addresses that statement more to us girls than to the guys. ‘He’s totally got that whole brooding musician thing going for him. It’s to die for.’

  ‘I know, right?’ Eliza says.

  Danielle says, ‘Tell me about it.’

  My mouth twists up in a wry smile. ‘So I’ve heard.’

  They look to me, perplexed. ‘You don’t think he’s hot?’

  I am suddenly very aware that Josh has turned away from his conversation to listen to my answer. I shrug, take another bite of my sandwich, chew deliberately, swallow. I go through the motions carefully, as though it requires a great amount of calculation. Josh is still listening and the girls are still waiting.

  Finally, I sigh, ‘Sure, I guess, I don’t know. I haven’t looked at him in that way. We just carpool. That’s all.’

  Satisfied that I think there’s a certain charm about Todd O’Connor too, the girls carry on talking – now about the party.

  Josh says to me, ‘You just carpool? You had dinner with him.’

  Turning to Josh, I place a hand on his knee underneath the table. ‘Come on, you know I couldn’t have got out of that. It was a family thing. It’s not like I had a lot of choice in the matter.’

  ‘Mm.’

  Irritated at how much of a big deal he’s making out of this, I settle for raising my eyebrows and giving him an unimpressed look.

  ‘Aw, come on, Ashley, don’t look at me like that.’ He leans forward and gives me a brief kiss and smiles. I don’t smile back, and when I reach for my bottle of water, and Josh turns back to the conversation about football, my eyes drift across the cafeteria, bored. Everyone is chatting and laughing and eating and maybe doing a bit of last-minute homework for their afternoon classes.

  I start when I catch Todd’s eye across the room. I don’t know if he’s been watching me or if he just happens to look over in my direction when I look in his. There’s something in his face I can’t quite define, and then he turns to the guy next to him. I shake my head to myself. Todd O’Connor is a very strange boy.

  The rain is far heavier than it threatened to be this morning. I should have listened to Mom; I should just keep an umbrella in my bag all the time like she does. I don’t even have a coat, just a sweatshirt with a hood. I didn’t think it’d get this bad.

  From inside the school, you can hear the rain ricocheting off the windows like teeny tiny cannonballs even if you’re not near a window. It’s ridiculous. The air in the hallways feels muggy, and I am grateful that Greendale High School is all within one large building so I don’t need to get drenched going between classes.

  Josh is supposed to give me a ride home after school; we were going to go back to his place for a while, and I’d stay for dinner. But he texts me during last period to say that football practice isn’t canceled after all, so he won’t be able to see me until later this evening.

  Mom has to go to a meeting this afternoon, and Dad will be working till at least seven o’clock.

  I find myself texting Todd, asking if he can give me a ride home after all.

  ‘Sure thing. Meet me at my car after school.’

  At least I’m not walking, I think with a sigh of relief.

  When the day is over at last, I weave through the throng of students heading the same way as me to the parking lot, and push against those moving the other way to catch their buses.

  ‘Ashley! Hey, Ashley!’

  I look around, people bumping into me from all directions. I crane my neck, stretching myself up on my tiptoes. I see Josh waving me over, and I join the crowd of people moving to get their buses until I detach from them to stand in the corner he’s lounging in.

  He leans against the wall, arms folded across his broad chest. As I step up to him, he opens his arms and folds me into them, and I breathe in the weakened smell of his aftershave. I bury my head into his blue T-shirt for a moment. The fabric softener his mom uses makes it smell of coconut. For those brief seconds, I inhale his smell and I smile, curling my arms around his neck. ‘I was sure Coach was going to cancel with this weather,’ he tells me. ‘Have you got a ride home?’

  ‘Yeah, Todd’s going to take me. Give me a call later if you still want me to come over.’

  He nods. ‘Of course I will. It’ll probably be about six.’

  ‘All right.’ I reach up and he leans down to meet me for a kiss, a kiss that he draws out and deepens. I pull away first; not because I don’t want to kiss him but because I don’t want to kiss him like that here, in plain sight. ‘I have to get going. I
love you.’

  ‘I love you, too,’ he replies, kissing me quickly once again. I smile and wrap my hair into a knot at the back of my neck to keep it tucked into my hood as I pull it up.

  ‘See you tonight,’ he calls after me.

  My sweatshirt is already soaked and my T-shirt sticking to my skin by the time I reach Todd’s car near the back of the student parking lot. I automatically go to open the door, but it’s locked – then I notice that Todd’s not even in his car yet. I look around, squinting because the rain’s getting in my eyes, but I don’t see him. I hold my binder over my head, but it offers little protection.

  I am left with no other option but to wait here for him in the rain.

  He jogs over a minute or two later, holding his hand over his head – as if that’s going to help, I snort derisively to myself – and by then, my teeth are chattering, and my hands have turned numb.

  ‘Sorry,’ he says, almost shouting because the rain is so loud. ‘Had to talk to my history teacher.’ He unlocks the car and I clamber in, my limbs stiff from the cold.

  He cranks up the heating. I’m glad; I’m shivering all over. ‘How long were you waiting?’

  ‘Not long.’

  He nods. There’s no point in either of us making some sort of small-talk comment about how horrible and dreadful this weather is. We can both see it for ourselves.

  ‘Josh’s football practice wasn’t canceled,’ I say. The words sound clipped where my teeth are still chattering. ‘Sorry, if I’m being rude or anything. My parents are both in work.’

  ‘No, don’t worry about it. You live next door. It’s not like it’s an inconvenience.’ He twists his head slightly to give me a small half-smile, and I smile back.

  ‘Well, thanks.’ Then I recognize the song playing on the radio, and, smiling to myself, I turn the volume up slightly, humming along to it because I don’t like to sing outside the safety of my bedroom or the shower.

  We turn down Maple Drive and Todd parks on the kerb outside his house. I yell a quick, ‘Thanks for the ride! See you tomorrow!’ and make a run through the rain for my front door.