Avra's God

by Ann Lee Miller

  Jesse studied the girl over the steam from their coffee. He couldn’t help remembering another restaurant, months ago, across the table from Kallie. He shoved away that image.

  “You ought to sing more solos,” she said. “You’ve got a good voice.”

  Jesse grinned wryly. “So I’ve been told. Anyway, it’s Zig’s band. His call. What about you—” His mind whirred searching for her name. “Marissa. What do you do?”

  “I’m a Days Inn desk clerk by night, college student by day.” She had a throaty voice, probably an alto if she sang.

  “I pegged you as a girl with a brain.”

  Her sensuous lips wore her intelligent smirk well. Jesse liked her. She was different from the bobbleheads he usually attracted.

  “Can I be honest here?” She flung sleek dark hair over her shoulder.

  “Shoot.”

  “It’s after midnight. I didn’t come looking for you backstage for coffee and conversation.”

  Jesse’s eyes widened, then fell to the skin exposed in the V of her button-down shirt. His gaze flitted away to the plate glass window across the front of the restaurant. The menu board, hung purposefully askew, reflected back at him. Two guys played chess in a corner. A loud group crowded a center table.

  Jesse’s eyes circled back to Marissa.

  “So?”

  “You’re bold, girl.” He studied her eyes—confidence with a pinprick of uncertainty.

  That pinprick moved his hand across the tiny table to her cheek. Her skin was silky under his palm. He kissed her, then, skimming the ground they’d already covered in conversation, and flying past. The kiss of exploration morphed into desire.

  Jesse eased away from her, indecision swimming inside him. The smell of coffee and temptation hung in the air.

  Marissa reached for her purse and jacket. “Where do you want to go?”

  He shook his head, nixing the idea. “I’ve got to be on the road by six a.m.” That was lame.

  She stopped halfway out of her seat. He doubted she got turned down often.

  She stood beside the table. “I showed up at the stage door, but you invited me here. What were you thinking?”

  “Give me your number. I’ll call.”

  “Right.” She rolled her eyes. “I could have had an extra half hour of sleep if you’d told me this at the club.” She dug for her keys in her purse. Her dark lashes lifted for a moment, and he thought he read hurt under the anger.

  “I’m serious. I want your number.”

  “You had your chance.”

  She strode across the hardwood floor. Bells clattered against the glass door and his nerves as she exited.

  His phone vibrated in his pocket and he pulled it out. A text from Avra. He’d texted her about forgiving his dad. He pulled up the message. God smiled.

  He looked at the door Marissa had gone out. Yeah, He did.

  Drew poked his head into Avra’s room. “Cisco’s here—on the porch.”

  Her eyes darted to the clock. Eleven thirty p.m. She hadn’t met him this morning, hadn’t answered his calls. If he felt half as ripped in half as she had all day, no wonder he was here. Her prayer was still dumped out on the floor challenging her to follow Drew down the stairs.

  She glanced at the cross and breathed in its strength. Help me.

  She stepped out the door, pulling on her sweatshirt jacket. One look at Cisco’s haggard eyes and she knew he’d been as miserable as she was today—maybe more so.

  He stood with his hands in the pockets of his jeans. “Just let me say what I came to say. You didn’t show this morning, didn’t answer my calls. I’m not stupid. I know we’ve come to the end of the line.”

  Her breath stopped in her chest. Her skin went clammy. Were they over? She’d been mad, not choosing to end it. Did she want a permanent break?

  “You never need to talk to me again. But just do one thing.” He took her hands.

  Her body shivered as if she was cold, but the night was warm and Cisco’s grip on her fingers warmer, still.

  “I’m begging you, Avra—for your sake, for mine—will you forgive me?” His eyes pleaded with her.

  “I—I forgive you.”

  He stood there, frozen for a moment, his eyes glistening in the porch light. Then, he folded her shoulders in his arms and held her against his chest.

  She inhaled his scent and a thousand flashes from their past.

  “Thank you.” His voice was rough. He released her and stepped back toward the edge of the porch. He stared at her while her heart hammered. “See you around.” He jogged down the steps.

  A minute later she heard the sound of his engine start, and then his car pulling away from the curb.

  Oh, God, I still love him.

  Chapter 30

  Jesse glanced around Zig’s garage while the guys settled in behind their instruments. Fingers tense, he strummed the melody of the first original song he’d brought to the band. The bare light bulb dangled over him like a stage spotlight.

  Finally, Zig, then Bailey and Mac, turned toward him. He breathed in one last breath of mildew-laced air and launched into “Lookin’ for Forever.”

  The steam rises from our coffee

  While a girl who barely knows me

  Offers more than the kiss I’m takin’.

  But I’m achin’ for love that lasts,

  A girl who knows my soul, my past ...

  He’d poured his heart into this song all night. Was it coming through? Mac pinged the rhythm on the high hat. Jesse moved into the chorus.

  Oh, I’m lookin’ for forever,

  ’ Cause forever’s been hidin’.

  I’m lookin’ for forever

  Lookin’ for forever

  And I’m goin’ home to find it.

  Two verses and three runs through the chorus later, the last note faded. The wind tossed leaves against Zig’s garage wall. Mac twirled a drumstick, his eyes fixed somewhere over Jesse’s shoulder. Bailey opened his mouth to speak, then stopped. Instead, his eyes shifted to Zig.

  “Song’s good, Jesse.” Zig nodded thoughtfully. “Really fine.”

  Jesse’s fingers still pinched a guitar fret. He did a double take at Zig, weighing his sincerity. Zig’s jealousy ran a brackish current under everything they did. Warmth eased into his chest. “Can we use it for the Florida State Competition?”

  Zig rubbed the two-day growth on his chin. “We want to win that recording contract.” He glanced at Bailey, then Mac.

  “And I don’t?”

  “I’ve never seen a ballad take that show. We’re doin’ ‘Crush Vanity.’“

  “That song’s loud and simple.”

  Mac tapped the “Crush Vanity” rhythm on his drum pad. Jesse wanted to grab the sticks out of his hands and hurl them.

  “‘Forever’ can win it. It’s probably the best song I’ve ever written.”

  “Don’t get me wrong, it’s a cool tune. We’ll put it in our concert lineup—” Zig said.

  “Not good enough.” Jesse was sick and tired of being under Zig’s thumb. “Forever” was an intricate song whose lyrics had substance—which was more than could be said of fifteen repetitions of Crush vanity, crush vanity, vanity’s comin’ down. “I quit.”

  “You what?” Zig gaped.

  Jesse laid his guitar in its case and snapped the latches shut. “I quit.”

  Mac’s jaw clenched. “The contest is going to be our ticket to the big time”

  Jesse stepped toward the cobweb-matted door. “Later.”

  “We can’t find and train a replacement in a month!” Zig slung at his back.

  “Not my problem.” Jesse walked through the door into the oleander-scented wind.

  A knee-jerk decision, but he’d been headed in this direction for months. He really was looking for forever, and he wouldn’t find it on the road with a band, with a bobblehead, even with Marissa. And he sure wasn’t spending forever with Zig. The moon illumined white oleander blooms dancing in the wind on the ne
ighbor’s bush—his personal liberation celebration. He filled his lungs with their perfume and headed for his car.

  During the first set at Beach Rats’ reunion concert, Jesse spied Kallie crossing Beachin’ Willie’s parking lot in front of his parents, Cal, and Missy who leaned against Mom’s Dodge Caravan. He hit a wrong chord. Two. His fingers clamped against the fret. Billy and Cisco ended the song without him.

  Kallie said something to Avra and sat behind the sound table without glancing at the stage.

  Dad crossed his arms.

  He hates the music.

  He motioned Billy over to Cisco at the drums. Dad would freak if they did their heavy numbers. “Guys, finish the set with “Lookin’ For Forever”—I’ll solo because you guys don’t know it—“Spinnin’ on a Kiss,” and “Kallie in the Clouds.”

  Cisco shot a glance toward the corner of the parking lot where Jesse’s family stood. “Got it.”

  “‘Ice Girl’—” Billy said.

  “Sorry.” He wasn’t singing “Ice Girl” and “Neon Green” with Kallie there.

  His fingers picked the first notes of “Lookin’ for Forever” as he headed for his mic.

  He scanned the lot for Kallie while he played the intro to “Spinnin’, ” but Avra sat alone and Kallie was nowhere in sight. Crap. He closed his eyes, blocked out Dad sitting on the curb, and sang the song to her.

  Two kids—a stratosphere apart—

  Connected by a slender thread

  That weaves through then and forever.

  In the middle of “Kallie in the Clouds” he spotted her curled in a ball on a bench facing the Atlantic. His voice caught. As he sang the last lines of the song, Kallie’s head turned toward him, but she was too far away to see her expression. “And I still care, still care for you.” The words were as true as when he wrote them.

  His family stood, dusting sand off their backsides.

  “Take fifteen,” he said to Cisco and Billy.

  Time to get this over with. He headed toward Mom’s van. With any luck at all, they’d be packing it in before the next set. Mom liked to be in bed by nine and it had to be after ten.

  Cal shook the sand out of a flip-flop. “Hey Bro. Dude, most excellent tunes. Geez, would you do some up-tempo? It’s not a funeral. Hey, can I catch a ride or drive your wheels home?”

  “Whatever,” Jesse said. Dad never would have let him come home past midnight when he was sixteen. Or wear his hair to his chin. He could take a lesson from Cal in handling Dad.

  “Later.” Cal headed toward Beachin’ Willie’s.

  His mother smiled. “Good job, Jesse. Those original songs?”

  He nodded, her praise warming him.

  “Lot of talent in this family.” Mom said.

  “You’re just saying that because we get it from you—” He glanced at Dad. “The artistic thing. You dance, Cal paints—”

  “I’m me!” Missy chimed in.

  Jesse chucked her on the arm. “Somebody had to get the short end of the talent stick.”

  Missy took a swipe at him with her foot.

  Mom dropped an arm around Missy’s shoulders. “Come find the restroom.”

  “You did get some things from me, you know,” Dad said as Mom and Missy walked away, discussing whether Missy truly needed an Orange Crush.

  “I didn’t mean—”

  “I know. You’re a hard worker. You’ve put a lot into your music. Not many people learn an instrument, write songs, form a band, land gigs.”

  “I thought you were going to tell me I was going straight to hell.”

  Dad gave a little shake of his head. “The flip side of being a hard worker is workaholism. I should have spent more time with you when you were growing up and you’d know me better than that. I should have been to all your games, come to a concert a year ago, patched things up between us long before that. I’m going to try harder with Cal and Missy. With you—if it’s not too late.”

  “It’s not.”

  Dad chuckled. “This was family night. Cal wasn’t having it till we mentioned JB’s Fish Camp and your concert.”

  “Rock’s not a sin?”

  “Haven’t seen any type of music nixed in the Bible. The dancing—” He gestured toward the lot where kids had been dancing. “Pretty sure this wasn’t how David danced before the Lord. But, the important thing is what’s going on between you and God. So?”

  “Détente.”

  “Could be worse.

  “Has been worse.” Jesse braced himself for a sermon.

  “I’m praying for you.”

  Avra was too. He was pretty sure. “Thanks.” For skipping the sermon.

  “I’m proud of you, Son.”

  Kallie closed her eyes and let Jesse’s voice spill the unfamiliar song over her.

  But I’m achin’ for love that lasts,

  A girl who knows my soul, my past.

  Oh, I’m lookin’ for forever,

  ’Cause forever’s been hidin’.

  I’m lookin’ for forever,

  Lookin’ for forever,

  And I’m goin’ home to find it.

  All the months of purging Jesse wiped out in two minutes. Desire—to be the girl who knew his soul, his past, the one he came home to find—throbbed against her heart. But she wasn’t that girl. She’d known him less than two years. The no he’d said in Denny’s clattered in her chest.

  I have to get out of here. She headed for the beach. She’d have to move away from New Smyrna Beach to break free of her fixation on Jesse. Graduation couldn’t come soon enough.

  The intro to “Spinnin’ on a Kiss” froze her feet to the seawall. She sunk down on a bench.

  “I wanna know you’re gonna be there ...”

  Unfortunately, I’m still here for you, Jess. But I won’t be for much longer. I promise.

  “Walkin’ ‘round in my soul ...”

  At least that’s not happening anymore. One glimpse of your needing me and I’ll lose any ground I gained in the last three months.

  “You’re sweetness and edginess, the muse in my veins ...”

  Not anymore.

  “You’re the song I’ve yet to sing ...”

  A song you’ll never sing.

  “Don’t wanna break your heart, girl ...”

  Too late.

  “Don’t want you body and soul ...”

  Obviously.

  “Just wanna be your friend, maybe your best friend ...”

  I can’t do it.

  “Don’t wanna say good-bye. I wanna hang on ...”

  I’m a masochist. She needed to get up, walk the length of the parking lot, get into Mom’s car, and drive home. Sitting here was like carving her heart out of her chest with a switchblade.

  Jesse sang the first line of “Kallie in the Clouds,” the song that made her break up with Zack, and she hugged her knees to her chest. Oh God. She needed to run to the car. Now. But she couldn’t move. She’d never heard him sing it.

  Emotion spilled out in his voice, warm yearning, wrapping around her so much tighter than his arms had, and there was no way she could brush him off and run away.

  She twisted around.

  Jesse looked in her direction, but he probably didn’t know she was sitting here. Just for a minute, she would pretend Jesse meant the words he sung.

  “You gotta know that I’m still here, and I still care, still care for you.”

  Love me.

  Chapter 31

  Beach Rats congregated at Avra’s after Beachin’ Willie’s. Avra glanced around the room to see if anybody needed anything. Billy sat in a chair facing Cisco on the sofa. Kallie chatted with her besotted brothers, Kurt on the loveseat beside her, and Drew sprawled on the floor at her feet. The front window sheers ruffled in the breeze; two-liter soda bottles and Styrofoam cups littered the coffee table.

  She’d thought Cisco would disappear from her life after their Saturday night drama or that seeing him would be mega awkward. But neither happened. True, he didn’t
come on Saturday mornings. He quit pursuing her. But she saw him at church on Sundays, ran into him around campus and town more than she had in months.

  It seemed pointless to tell him she hadn’t meant for him to stop coming on Saturdays since she still didn’t know if she wanted to go out with him. But now, post-forgiveness, she had peace.

  She answered the door to Jesse, who leaned against the doorjamb as if he might fall asleep standing. She stepped back to let him in and handed him her untouched pizza on a paper plate.

  The concert had strung Kallie out. She stiffened when she saw Jesse and turned her back on him.

  Jesse took a long look at Kallie before he flopped down on one end of the sofa and reached for the Pepsi.

  The only seat left in the room was beside Cisco. Avra’s shoulder pressed against his arm when she sat. She sucked in a breath.

  Cisco stopped what he was saying to Billy, “Yeah, well—” when her arm connected with his. He looked at her and smiled, seeming to forget about Billy.

  She put out a hand toward the Sprite, but settled back against Cisco’s shoulder without pouring it. She didn’t want to break the connection. Conversation swirled around them and she lost track of time.

  Billy said his good nights and left.

  “You ready?” Jesse said to Cisco, “I’m beat.”

  “Yeah.” Cisco turned toward her, breaking the contact. “This was nice. Thanks for sitting by me.” He bent toward her.

  He was going to kiss her in a room full of people? When they weren’t even spending time together anymore?

  He jerked to a stop as if he realized what he was doing. He squeezed her hand and stood. “I’ll see you at church.”

  Jesse stood with his hand on Avra’s doorknob. Cisco had slumped back on the couch, his eyes on Avra as if he’d forget what she looked like if he didn’t take a good look now.