The Sound of Us

by Julie Hammerle

  “Kiki, respect the dead,” says Andy.

  Mary, who’s been clutching her failed exam and crying since we left our afternoon classes, says, “She was the best and she couldn’t hack it. Mr. Z. actually told her that. I wish Mr. Bertrand would do us the same courtesy. Why get our hopes up?”

  Seth shoves a cookie in his mouth, and Seth never eats cookies.

  Norman glares at Seth, like his very existence disgusts him. “You”—he points at Seth—“have nothing to worry about. You’re Bertrand’s favorite, the golden boy. So you failed a theory exam. Greg will get you a tutor. He’ll work with you himself. He’ll do everything in his power to keep you in. I, on the other hand—” Norman shakes his head. “I’m not as good as the rest of you.”

  “That’s not true,” says Kendra.

  “It is true, and you all know it. I try really hard. I can do the theory stuff, but singing-wise? I’m garbage.” He reaches into his backpack and pulls out a Krause brochure. “I’m thinking about majoring in business.”

  “Norman, no!” shouts Andy.

  Kendra, Andy, and I are the only students in Bertrand’s class not melting down right now, which sucks for my friends, but is great for me. Even if my personal life is a bit of a mess, at least the singing thing is going well. At least I have that.

  I pluck the business brochure from Norman’s hands and shove it under my dinner tray. “We all need to blow off some steam, do something fun.”

  “Not another party,” says Kendra. “I’m not going to ruin the good will I’ve built up.”

  “Not a party.” I point to a sign on the bulletin board behind us.

  *

  The next night, Thursday, at seven o’clock, we voice students head over to Crossroads, a coffee shop in Broad Ripple, to hear Tromboner Dave’s band play.

  At first my friends balked. “Why would we want to watch a stupid band? Tromboner Dave’s band?” asked Kendra.

  “Because how good could they be? It’ll make us feel better about our own talents,” I said.

  “Or it will make us feel worse because Tromboner Dave is a better singer than we are.”

  “He doesn’t sing, Eric does,” was my response to that.

  Crossroads is decorated like the inside of a dive-y fortuneteller’s place. Ratty, rose-colored, velvet curtains drape the walls, which are adorned with creepy portraits by local Indianapolis artists. Every available bit of wall space is covered in patrons’ signatures from the time the coffee shop opened until today. The tables are also marked up with pen and Sharpie—tic-tac-toe games and bawdy limericks and the odd phone number for a good time.

  By the time Kendra and I get there, Mary has already grabbed a table at the front, right near the stage, with Sad Mezzo. The two of them drove together in Jack’s car with Norman, while I grabbed the front seat of Tromboner Dave’s van with Kendra. I chose to drive in Tromboner Dave’s skank-mobile over Jack’s nice, fancy car. That’s my level of hatred right now.

  “Mary, what are you doing?” Kendra asks as we slide into the empty chairs across from her. The spot on the table in front of me says, “There once was a girl named Theresa. She lived in the tower of Pisa. It did not yet lean ‘til T was a teen, on account of her affair with pizza.”

  Mary tries to hide a book under her seat.

  Kendra reaches over and grabs it, holding the book up to show me. “Theory textbook,” Kendra says, shaking her head.

  “Mary,” I say, “we’re here to blow off steam.”

  “I know. I figured I had a few moments before you girls showed up.” Mary pushes a cup toward me. The whipped cream mountain is about to slide right off the top. “From Andy’s boyfriend.” She points to the bar where Randy, the theatre guy Andy likes, is making drinks and talking to Andy, who is listening with rapt attention.

  “Do they know their names rhyme?” I ask, sipping the iced vanilla latte.

  “I’m not sure they care,” says Kendra.

  “I think it’s cute,” Mary says.

  Kendra keeps staring at the guys at the counter, total opposites. Andy is small, jumpy, and fair, while Randy is tall, lithe, and dark. “What if he and Andy are hooking up? How does that…work? It’d be like a Great Dane mating with a Chihuahua.”

  “Kendra…” Mary’s blushing.

  “I try not to picture my friends having sex, generally,” I add. And with that, Jack wanders over.

  “Hi, Jack.” Kendra kicks me under the table.

  Hands in pockets, he looks only at Kendra. “You guys have room here?”

  “Of course we do,” says Kendra, pulling out the chair next to her. Jack drags it next to me. I stick out my tongue at Kendra, who smirks.

  Feeling on edge with Jack sitting right next to me, I focus on the stage, trying to convince myself that whatever Eric the Hermit is doing with an amplifier is the most fascinating thing I’d seen that day.

  “What have you been up to, Jack?” says Kendra. “We haven’t seen you for a while.”

  “Golf.” He drops his phone to the table and folds his arms across his chest.

  “We’ve missed you.”

  “I’m sure.” His eyes make their way over to mine, and I scoot my chair away from him a tiny bit.

  We would’ve sat there in silence until Dumpster started playing, but thank goodness for Sad Mezzo. She shows up at our table with a massive blended coffee drink and proceeds to go on and on about some new guy she’s seeing now that Angry Tenor is gone.

  Three boyfriend stories and two lattes later, Dumpster is finally ready to start playing. They’re a group of four. Eric sings and plays lead guitar. Some older guy in a Canadian tuxedo, double denim, plays the bass. A girl I remember seeing hanging out in Unit Six is on the keyboards. And Tromboner Dave is on the drums. Of course he is. I really have a type, don’t I? I chuckle thinking about Brie’s rules for dating. I kissed Tromboner Dave, who is both a trombonist and a percussionist. He must be practically subterranean to her.

  Dumpster plays through a couple covers and what I assume are original songs. Watching them is torture. It’s absolute torture. I ache to be up there. To imagine a life where this will never be an option for me feels like a kind of death. Playing like that up on stage, with everybody watching and cheering me on, that’s the dream. Dumpster is living it. And then, as if there wasn’t enough salt in my wounds already, they launch into a song that makes my heart feel like a fist is clamped around it.

  My eyes immediately snap over to Jack before I can stop them. The opening bars are too recognizable, too much a part of my soul. I’ve been playing them over and over in my head since the first night of camp when I met him, Jack, the Nutty Bar guy. And then Eric the Hermit sings the first line, and I know Jack is checking me out, too. I feel it, even though my eyes are back down on my coffee. I stare at the cup for as long as I can handle it before picking it up with a shaking hand and drawing it to my lips.

  I try to think about the song, our song, in a truly academic fashion, like I’m witnessing heart surgery or something. Eric is singing, and he’s doing a fine job. This is pretty much an exact copy of the Dire Straits version, which is fine, but there’s nothing really original to it. The dude in the Canadian tuxedo has the bass down pat. It’s all very serviceable. Except for stupid Tromboner Dave, who is bringing nothing to the table. He’s like a seventh grader who just got his first drum kit for Christmas. All enthusiasm and no talent. Watching him flub his way through this song forces a pit of what could’ve been into my stomach.

  I notice movement in my peripheral vision and glance over at Jack. His eyes are fixed on the stage, his face unreadable, but his hand is on his right thigh, tapping away to the rhythm, adding syncopation, filling in the gaps left by Tromboner Dave, and there are many. Not even thinking about it, after the first refrain, I reach over and lay my hand on top of Jack’s, silencing his drumming. Instead of pushing me away, like I expected, he flips his hand over and laces his fingers between mine and we sit like that for the rest of the song. M
y eyes blur and my throat tightens and my stomach keeps on mixing cement. I want to cry or grab Jack and kiss him or run away or some combination of the three.

  The end of the song shakes me out of my trance, so I drop Jack’s hand and start clapping. He does the same. Everyone does. And I glance around at Mary and Kendra and Sad Mezzo and everyone to see if they saw what Jack and I just did, to see if it was real, because, honestly, I’m not sure. We were holding hands, and then we weren’t and through the caffeine and the emotions and the oddness of the whole situation, I’m not entirely sure I hadn’t imagined it.

  When Dumpster starts playing the next song (“Closer” by Nine Inch Nails, led by Tromboner Dave, which, gross) I stand up and stroll over to the counter. I need a minute. I need to sort this out. I’ve been kissed and groped by Tromboner Dave, but that was a mistake and a one-time thing. I kissed Seth on the garden bench, but that was a weak moment of sadness and desperation. It wasn’t about him. It could’ve been anyone. But with Jack, touches mean something, at least they do to me, and I’m pretty sure, deep down, despite the continued existence of Izzy, they mean something to him as well. My body is a concrete mixer of emotion, turning and swirling. Sometimes my connection to Jack trumps the anger. Sometimes it’s the other way around. I feel like the kids in Love, Actually, vacillating between loving and hating Uncle Jamie.

  A sign on the wall catches my eye. Open mic night, the open mic night Jack mentioned the night we almost kissed in his bed. Next Friday. The last night of camp. I start running through my catalog of Dana’s sappy lady music. What song would I play, if I could play? What song perfectly captures the way I feel today? It comes to me in a flash. “Untouchable Face,” Ani DiFranco. I go to my happy place, imagining myself up on stage, belting it out, and then I picture Mr. Bertrand running up on stage and snatching the microphone and the scholarship away from me. Somehow I find my way up to Andy at the barista counter.

  “Hey,” I say.

  “Pretty good, huh?” He points a thumb at the stage.

  “Yeah. Good.” Holding hands with Jack has rendered me only slightly more verbal than a zombie from The Walking Dead.

  He motions for Randy to bring us a couple of scones.

  “You like him?” I ask when Randy is out of earshot.

  “I do.”

  “Does he like you?”

  “I don’t know yet.”

  “Well, good luck.” I glance back at my table. Jack isn’t there anymore. It’s just Mary and Sad Mezzo. Kendra is over by Finley now. Maybe Jack was never at the table. Maybe I’m going nuts. That seems about right.

  “What about you?” he asks.

  “What about me?” I touch my palm. I can still feel Jack’s hand there. I try to rub the sensation away. Jack is a jerk. I hate Jack.

  “We need to find you a man, don’t we? Because…” He nods past me to where Jack is sliding into the spot next to me.

  I turn so that I’m now standing flush against the counter, my elbows resting on top, hands folded. Jack is doing the same. It’s like we’re kneeling in pews at church. He’s not looking at me, but his forearm rests against mine and electricity shoots through my body. Next to me, Andy is flagging down another espresso.

  “That should’ve been us,” Jack says, so quietly it barely happened.

  I nod.

  He grabs a pen from the little cup sitting next to the cash register. The wood in front of us is covered in marks, and Jack makes his own. In blue ballpoint pen he writes, “Leave with me.”

  I can’t even look at him. I stare at the words for a minute, and then I take the pen from him and write, “Now?”

  Then I glance up. He’s peering down at me, brows furrowed behind his horn-rimmed glasses. He nods.

  “Why?” I ask.

  “I don’t know.”

  I check on Andy’s situation. He hasn’t heard any of it. He’s not paying any heed to Jack and me, as he seductively sips his espresso with tight lips and lowered eyelids while watching every move Randy makes. It hurts my heart to see it. I want someone to look at me like that, ideally someone who either isn’t disgusting or whom my roommate hasn’t already called dibs on or who doesn’t already have a girlfriend. But, given my current situation, that may be asking too much.

  Regardless, we have less than two weeks left in Indianapolis and I want whatever this is with Jack to come to some sort of resolution. I’m probably going to get the scholarship. Jack and I are probably going to end up here together next year. We might as well figure out what that means.

  Shoving a final bite of scone into my mouth, I say, “I’ll get my purse.”

  chapter nineteen

  Kiki Nichols @kikeronis: Yeah, nope. It wasn’t the time that was wrong :(

  Smart Singer Girl @smartsingergirl: @kikeronis :-(

  “So,” I say when Jack and I are in the car. I have no idea what he’s thinking, what his plans are for us when we get back to Chandler Hall. I haven’t let myself consider how I hope it plays out. I don’t want to be disappointed. Again.

  “I don’t accept it.” Jack presses the push-button ignition and the car roars to life. Some rock song blares from the speakers and Jack immediately lowers the volume. “I will not accept that you and I are going to be here for the next week avoiding each other. I think we need a restart. We need to watch some Project Earth and just be normal again. Be friends.” He emphasizes the word.

  “Friends.” Coming from him, that word disgusts me.

  “Friends.”

  He pulls out of the parking lot and I stare out the passenger’s side window, watching as we rush through Broad Ripple and past the Monon Trail. These are places I’ll know when I go here next year. If I go here.

  In his room, he kneels in front of the mini-fridge and pulls out some Cokes. He unearths a six-pack of beer and a bottle of rum from his closet. Pulling a can off of the plastic ring thingy, he says, “Presents from Dave and the Hermit.” He hands me a beer. “They felt bad that I seemed so down. Plus Chet said he’d write them up if he caught them with alcohol again.” He shoves the remaining beers into the mini-fridge.

  “Why are you so down?” He doesn’t have the right to feel down.

  Jack starts rummaging through things on his desk.

  “We’re not supposed to drink,” I say.

  “I won’t tell if you won’t.”

  I sigh, sitting down on his bed. I stare at the can. Part of me wants to drink it. The beer is a license to make bad decisions. If anything happens between Jack and me tonight, I can blame the beer. I want the excuse. I want to make a mistake.

  I check out the label. Natural Lite. Natty Lite, I’ve heard people call it before, at Matt Carroll’s parties. I pop the tab on the can and take a sip, my mouth rejecting the taste. Not only does it taste like cat piss, it tastes like warmed over-cat piss. Apparently Natty Lite is not my beer. Is Natty Lite anyone’s beer?

  Jack sits down next to me and presses play on his iPad. The beer warms my insides as the familiar establishing shot of Earth from space fades in on the screen. I scoot back and settle against the wall.

  “We should play a drinking game.” Jack adjusts his position so that he’s right next to me. “Every time they say the word ‘alien’ or show a shot of Earth from space, you have to drink.”

  I shrug and down half the can. “I hate you,” I say.

  “I know.” He rips the tab off the top of his beer can.

  *

  Two beers and several shots later we’re tipsy and lying together on Jack’s bed. I keep checking the clock, ticking down the minutes. It’s nine twenty-eight. Thirty-two minutes until curfew. We’re lying together on a bed, doing nothing more than watching Project Earth and drinking our swill. But every sense in my body is heightened knowing that Jack is there next to me, smelling like apple shampoo and beer, wearing a soft, worn polo shirt, asking questions about the show that I don’t have answers to.

  “What else has that guy been in?” He points at the guy on the screen with dots
all over his face. We’re watching the infamous chicken pox episode.

  “I have no idea,” I tell him.

  “I thought you knew these things.”

  “I don’t know the curriculum vitae of every extra on the set of Project Earth.”

  I glance at the clock. Nine-thirty on the dot.

  I should just do it. I should just kiss him, like, for research, just to see what would happen. I mean, it’s his problem that he has a girlfriend. I don’t have a boyfriend. I’m free and clear. I wouldn’t be doing anything wrong. Technically.

  But even through the beer, I know that’s not true. He has a girlfriend and my pretending she doesn’t exist won’t change that. Plus, all things considered, Jack is kind of a dick.

  And this is not how our first kiss should go down, a drunken mistake on a random Thursday night when he has a girlfriend at home and I resent him more than I like him. We deserve better than that, or nothing at all.

  I try so hard to be cool around Jack, but he drives me crazy to the point of distraction. Half the time I resent him and half the time I want to bury my face in his hair. Maybe part of me likes that he treats me like shit. Maybe Jack is my bad boy, my Ethan Garcia. Everything about him is an unlikely aphrodisiac, from his glasses to his khakis to his golf obsession to his drumming skills. He is a contradiction cocktail, and I am drunk.

  I am drunk.

  I shoot up and swing my legs to the floor. “I’ll be right back.” I fumble with the door handle, hurry out of the room, and dash down the hall to the boys’ bathroom, which is mercifully empty. Standing at the sink in front of the mirror, I sprinkle some cold water on the back of my neck and take a few slow breaths, long enough to get a grip on myself but not so long that Jack would start to wonder what embarrassing thing I’m doing in the bathroom.

  He has a girlfriend, Kiki, I keep telling myself. And he’s a dick. Get over it. Get out of this before you do something you regret.

  Also, get out of Unit Six before someone comes in and finds out you’re drunk and tells Bertrand about it, you idiot.

  I march back into the room. “I’m going to bed,” I announce.