The Sound of Us

by Julie Hammerle

  Andy plops down on his bed. “Like I haven’t heard that one before.”

  When we’re safely on the third floor, I ask Seth, “Do you really have a harem?”

  Seth grins as I open the door to my room. “I wouldn’t call it that.”

  He sits at Brie’s keyboard and plays what he has so far.

  “It’s kind of sad, though, right?” he says. “Is it too depressing?” He looks back at me. I’m sitting in Brie’s forbidden papasan chair. I always make a point of sitting in it whenever she’s out of the room.

  “First of all,” I say, “it’s just for theory class, so who cares? Second of all, it’s not depressing.”

  “It sounds sad.”

  “It’s just in a minor key, so maybe it sounds kind of sad. But I don’t think of it that way, because it’s just…bittersweet, unfinished, like there’s more to the story, you know? Like this is the end of the song, but it’s not the end, the end. There’s still a chance that everything will be okay.” I feel my face flush.

  “You got all that from my homework assignment?”

  I frown, holding out my hand and beckoning for his pencil. “You know what, though, I think the piece would be perfect if you just changed the chord progression here.” I sit down on the bench next to him and make a note in his music, changing one chord from a VII to iv.

  Seth hums a few bars and then plays what I wrote. “Much better,” he says. “How did you know to do that?”

  I flush. “I love playing around with song arranging. It’s just a little hobby.” I push thoughts of the “Deathly” arrangement I was working on earlier out of my mind. It sucks, but, at least until I secure one of those scholarships, Dana’s sappy lady songs are a thing of the past for me.

  “It’s impressive. You’re really talented, Kiki.”

  I pull down my bun. I can’t believe I’ve been sitting next to him this long without fidgeting with my hair or my hands. “It’s kind of elementary.” I shrug. “Like, theory 101, right?”

  “Well, I didn’t pick up on it. And Brie didn’t pick up on it when we were working this morning.”

  He plays me what he has again, his arm rubbing up against mine a few times. It reminds me of the first night in the basement with Jack, but it isn’t quite the same. There isn’t the same magic there. Seth finishes a segment and I give him some suggestions. Then we start the process again. There’s nothing visceral about it at all. Doing this with him is like watching sausage being made.

  When we finally reach the end of the piece, Seth smiles at me as someone knocks on the door. I check the clock. It’s nine o’clock, an hour after I was supposed to meet Jack. I’m pretty sure I know who I’ll find behind my door.

  My stomach swirling like an Icee machine, I pull open the door and say, “How did you find me?” like I’ve been in hiding. It’s not untrue.

  Jack shrugs. “I came up to the third floor and found a tag outside this door that said ‘Kiki.’ Then I called a guy I know at the police department, and together we cracked the code.”

  “And now you’re here,” I say.

  He glances at his hands and arms, flipping them over, examining them from every angle. “It appears that I am.”

  “Did you get my note?” I whisper. “I’m sorry, but I just, I don’t have time—”

  I pause when I hear the piano playing behind me. Jack leans forward into the room, to see who’s there. Who’s there is Seth Banks sitting at the piano next to Brie’s bed.

  Jack’s face goes white and he backs out of the room. “No problem, Kiki,” he says, plastering on a grin. “I get it.”

  He turns to leave, but I stop him. “Wait.” I glance back at Seth, who is now looking at what’s happening in my doorway. He takes the hint.

  “I was just leaving.” Seth stands up, grabbing his homework off the music stand. He holds it up to show Jack. “Kiki was helping me with this piece.”

  Jack and I both watch Seth, universally attractive Seth, as he passes by and heads down the hall.

  “You want to come in?” I know I should probably send him away. I don’t have time for this. Nothing about Jack being up here tonight will help me get that scholarship. But at the same time, I have never, ever had a guy come looking for me, to hang out with me. I want to see how this plays out.

  “I guess?” he says, and I think he’s about to change his mind, but then he’s inside my room. I close the door and kick a pair of dirty shorts under my bed.

  It’s funny how you see your living space differently when someone new is inside it. My sloppiness has never bothered me. I know it bothers Brie, just as it always bothered Beth. She was constantly coming over and cleaning my room before she’d hang out with me in it. But Jack? I don’t want him to see my own dirty laundry, so to speak.

  “Why do you have a picture of Bobby Krakow on your laptop?” Jack says.

  Shoot. I forgot about that. I left all other evidence of my Project Earth love at home except for one dumb sticker of Bobby Krakow on the cover of my computer. Brie’s never said anything. She probably thinks Bobby’s a cousin of mine or something.

  Jack’s over by my desk, checking things out. “Krakow’s such a nerd. Is this supposed to be ironic? I thought all the girls liked Ethan.”

  “I like nerdy guys,” I say. “And besides, Ethan’s a dick.”

  “Really?” Jack swivels around and now we’re facing each other. I’m smiling like a huge goober. I can’t help it. I’ve been imagining him for days, ever since the first night of camp, but in real life, he’s even better. He’s cute. Interesting. He’s not universally hot like Seth or anything, but he’s got this crooked grin that can go from flirty to cutting in about half a second. There’s nothing saccharine about Jack. I can tell. He’s exactly my preferred flavor of douchebag.

  “Ethan is a complete ass to Dana,” I tell him. “He makes plans with her and then he blows her off. They start hooking up in the CAE cafeteria, and he won’t admit he likes her. They start seeing each other semi-officially and then he shows everyone pictures of her in her underwear. Bobby Krakow, on the other hand, really likes Dana. He’s smart and kind of shy and awkward and you just know he’ll be good to her. He’ll appreciate her.”

  “And someone like Ethan Garcia won’t appreciate her?”

  “Someone like Ethan Garcia doesn’t have to appreciate her. He’s got too many other people already appreciating him.”

  I recall a conversation I had with my sister right before coming to camp. “Screw that safe, nerdy guy noise,” she said. “You’re young. You’ve got your entire life ahead of you. You go for the Ethan Garcias, not the Bobby Krakows. Artists need to feel great pain and great love. I just don’t think you’re gonna get that from a Krakow. Trust me. I’ve been with both guys. The Krakows will give you blue balls and flowers. The Garcias will give you orgasms and tears.”

  I chuckle at the memory, and Jack gives me a confused look.

  “What’s so funny?” he asks.

  “Nothing,” I say. “Just…nothing.”

  I’m about to send him away before I get pulled deeper into his vortex, but he points to the bulletin board just to the left of my desk. “These your friends?”

  What’s a few more minutes? “Sure.” No, they’re not.

  He plucks a picture off the wall, one of me and Beth and some random girls. “What are your friends doing while you’re in Indy?”

  “I have no idea.”

  “You haven’t talked to them?”

  I snort. “I haven’t talked to them since before junior prom.” I cover my mouth. I can’t believe I just said that. What’s the point of having pictures of fake friends on your wall if you’re going to spill the beans at the first question someone asks you? I try to cover, leaning casually against my desk. “I mean, it’s no big deal. Nothing happened.”

  “Nothing happened? You haven’t talked to your friends in weeks because nothing happened?”

  “Friend,” I say. “One friend. She…kind of mortally emba
rrassed me in front of the guy I liked and then stole him for herself, but whatever. It’s over.” I can’t believe I’m telling him this, but it’s as if I’m physically incapable of lying to Jack. We only talked to each other twice before tonight, which seems ridiculous, but I feel like he can see right into the depths of who I am, and I into him. There are no secrets between us. That night in the basement, on the piano bench, our souls bonded. God, I sound like a melodramatic Hallmark movie. That’s what he’s done to me. “What about you?” I ask Jack. “Are you Mr. Popular?”

  He shrugs. “I do all right. Don’t change the subject. Who was the guy who came between you and the redhead?” he asks.

  I chuckle. “Oh, him. His name is Davis Blankenshaft the Third.”

  “Well, he sounds like a dick.”

  “A pretty fair assessment,” I tell him.

  Jack puts down the picture of me and Beth and Beth’s friends and perches on my bed, facing me, folding his arms across his chest. “Go on,” he says.

  I chicken out. I’m not ready to give away this piece of myself, not even to Jack. I worked so hard to put Chicago Kiki away for the summer, to distance myself from her. I scrunch up my face. “I don’t think I want to talk about this.”

  “Some other time,” he says. “What should we talk about now?”

  I take a deep breath. I know what we need to talk about. “I’m sorry about tonight.”

  He waves his hand. “I get it.”

  “No,” I say, “leaving a note was a jerk move. I didn’t think I’d be able to tell you to your face. I have to stay laser-focused on opera stuff.” I hold my hands next to my eyes like blinders. “I need the scholarship. If I don’t get it, I have to go to my dad’s school. My parents won’t pay for me to go anywhere else. I don’t get to study music, and I don’t get to go to Krause.”

  “Well, we can’t have that.” He grins.

  My stomach fills with butterflies. “So I kind of have to curb the extracurricular stuff, you know? And the stuff that will get me full-on kicked out of this camp.”

  “I get it,” he says.

  “I really want to go here.”

  His gaze holds mine. “Yeah, me too.”

  I’m not sure if he means he wants to go here himself or he wants me to go here with him. The possibility of it being the second thing almost convinces me to throw everything else away. Who needs an opera scholarship when there’s Jack? But I change the subject, shattering the tension. “The drumming,” I say, “you’re really good.”

  “I know,” he says. His eyes are little green and gold halos.

  “So why is it a secret?”

  He shrugs. “Just is. It’s my thing. Nobody knows I do it, outside my family, at least.”

  “I know about it.”

  He narrows his eyes. “Yeah. You do.” I wait for him to finish, to put into words what I can’t, that there’s just something—here—between us. Though maybe I’m being ridiculous. I mean, I didn’t tell him about what really went down with Beth and Davis. And I’m still holding on to perhaps my deepest and most disturbingly dark secret—the time I kissed Tromboner Dave. Maybe I’m imagining a connection because I so desperately want one. Maybe I’ve mistaken musical compatibility for romantic soul-mating. I feel like Jack’s about to explain things further, like he’s going to squash all my fears and insecurities, but then he says, “My drumming’s generally not something I advertise.”

  “Why not?”

  “It doesn’t fit my image.”

  “Your super suave and badass image?” I wave my hand to indicate his ensemble of khaki pants and a light blue polo shirt.

  “The very one.”

  “So,” he says, drawing that one word out to an interminable length. “You and Seth?”

  “Me and Seth?”

  He taps on his thighs. “I assumed, perhaps incorrectly, that I was the one you wanted to…play music with.”

  “Um,” I say, my heart pounding, “you are. I was just helping Seth with his homework. He’s a nice guy, but I’m not…” I shake my head. “Seth and I are nothing.”

  “All the other girls like him. Word is he’s got a harem.”

  “Pretty sure he’s a Garcia.”

  “Are you saying I’m a Krakow?”

  “I might be.” I bite the inside of my cheek.

  “I haven’t known you very long, but I do recognize that might be the best compliment you could’ve paid me.”

  Jack stands up and my whole body freezes. Is he coming over here? I prepare myself, running through everything I learned about kissing from, ew, Tromboner Dave, but Jack doesn’t come to me. He’s back at my bulletin board. He picks up the picture of TroyTrent and me that I tacked near the bottom. “Is this Davis Blankenshaft the Third?” Jack asks.

  “I have no idea who that guy is.”

  “It’s a good picture of you.”

  “That’s why it’s up there.”

  Jack surveys my desk, where I’m still sitting. He leans over me, his arm close to my thigh, his face dangerously near my chest, but he doesn’t touch me. He pulls a pair of scissors from the Bulls mug on the desk and cuts the picture of TroyTrent and me in two, throwing the TroyTrent half into the garbage. “There you go,” he says, tacking the picture of just me back up on the board. “All fixed.”

  He leans over me again, putting the scissors back, and I hold my breath, trying to quiet my heart. I’m afraid he might be able to hear it thumping like a jerk inside my chest. As he straightens up, his hand grazes my thigh.

  He shakes his head. “I’m sorry.”

  Our eyes lock again, and I hope he can read my thoughts. They feel like a neon sign in my brain: Kiss me. Please. Just do it. Lean in and kiss me, you fool. I don’t have time in my life for him right now, I know that, but he’s here now and, goddamn it, I want this.

  Before we can make sense of what’s happening, the door to my room clicks open and Brie rushes in, dropping her things onto her papasan chair. “It’s almost ten,” she says. “Time to leave.” Now she looks at Jack and me, a little surprised. “Norman’s roommate.”

  Jack shoots me a sheepish smile as he leaves the room.

  Brie shakes her head and shuts the door. “Kiki, boys? Really?” She tsks. “Diddling Norman’s roommate will not land you a scholarship, I can guarantee you that. Keep your head in the game, my friend. There are sharks in the water, and they are hungry.”

  Brie is just the dose of reality I needed to pull me back from the brink. Jack is a distraction. Jack is not going to help me win that scholarship. My earlier instinct was the right one.

  He has to go.

  chapter eight

  Kiki Nichols @kikeronis: I know pulling a Kelly Taylor and choosing myself over a guy is the right thing to do, but damn if it doesn’t suck. #adulting

  Cop Land!

  The words shout at me from the shelf behind Mr. Bertrand’s piano. Cop Land. Why in the world does my voice teacher have the Cop Land score in his music library? It’s so random. The only reason I even know that movie is because my little brother, Tommy, was on a Sylvester Stallone kick two summers ago, and we ran through his entire film catalog together. That was before he started high school and became cooler than me.

  As Mr. Bertrand plays scales and arpeggios and I warm up my voice singing different vowel and consonant combinations, I check out the other books surrounding the Cop Land score. I’m discouraged to discover that many of the titles are unfamiliar. For someone who sings a lot of opera, I don’t spend much time listening to it. If I’m going to spend time devouring music, it’s probably going to be one of my Dana playlists.

  Half paying attention to my warm-ups, I scan the shelves for a title that looks familiar. There’s something called Die Fledermaus and a Le nozze di Figaro and books boasting names like Schubert and Sondheim and Strauss. Nothing jumps out at me. But at least I know Cop Land?

  Mr. Bertrand lifts his hands from the piano keys and releases the damper pedal, choking all instrumental sound in the
room. “You’re not recording your lesson, are you?”

  I pull my eyes from the Cop Land book and glance around, searching for an answer to his question. “I don’t…” I begin. No one told me I’d need to record my lessons. That should’ve been on a syllabus or something. Between that and the fact that most of these opera titles are unfamiliar, what else don’t I know? I just spent the past week mainlining “Vergebliches Ständchen,” trying not to look like an idiot at my voice lesson, and now I might actually get kicked out for not bringing a recording device.

  “You don’t have a phone? Or a pocket recorder or a laptop or an iPad or even a tape to fill one of those?” He points to his desk, where a lifeless old tape recorder sits, mouth open and ready to receive a cassette.

  I turn back to Mr. Bertrand, shaking my head. “My phone’s charging in my room,” I say.

  “You get one strike on this. Next time, no lesson. You need to record what we do in here, otherwise everything goes in one ear and out the other.”

  I nod, stuffing my hands inside the pockets of my twee polyester dress. This one is polka-dotted. Green, blue, and yellow polka-dots. I feel like a clown.

  He ruffles some papers over the piano keys. The baby grand takes up at least half of his office. I wonder how the piano got inside or if the room had just been built around it. Then Mr. Bertrand cuts into my daydream again. “Another thing, Kiki,” he says without looking at me, “your lesson starts at two o’clock. I don’t know if you got here late or were skulking around in the hallway, but your lesson time is sacred. Do not squander it with your timidity.”

  I nod. “I’m sorry. I was waiting outside and I didn’t know if I should knock or what.” I place my forearms on the piano for a second, but then snatch them back. Maybe Mr. Bertrand doesn’t want anyone touching his instrument. God, I feel off today. I’m thinking about Jack. I’m thinking about Cop Land. I’m thinking about asking Jack to come by my room tonight to watch Cop Land. I have to keep focus. I shake my head to clear it. No more boys. No more thinking about movies. No more listening to Dana’s lady songs. Opera, opera, opera. All the time, opera. I vow to download some of these titles and fall asleep to them in bed at night.