Audition & Subtraction Read online

  “Do you care if I go?” Her eyes flickered toward Michael and then back at me.

  I forced a shrug. “If you want to …”

  She pushed back her chair. “You’re sure?”

  “Yeah, I’m sure.” But before I’d gotten the words out, she was already gone.

  Chapter 3

  “You alone?” Aaron’s shoes crunched on the gravel as he walked over.

  “Lori decided to wash for a few,” I said. “Aren’t you supposed to be doing signs?”

  He slid into her chair and dragged it closer to the table. “I bungee-corded them to the light posts.”

  Aaron wore green gym shorts and a red T-shirt that said EINSTEIN WAS A SPACE CADET, TOO. He wasn’t a loser—he just dressed like one. I couldn’t imagine Aaron with his shoelaces untied. He had a nice face, not that you could see all of it. His reddish-brown hair always hung halfway over his eyes, though today he’d stuffed it under a baseball hat.

  “So how much have we made?” he asked, opening the metal box.

  “Fifteen dollars.” I watched two more cars pull around. Jenny turned on the hose, and there were shrieks as the water sprayed wild for a second. Lori stood in the middle of it all. It was like looking at someone I didn’t know, some pretty girl with shiny blond hair and a wet T-shirt, laughing so hard even I could hear her. How could that be Lori? When had she ever wanted to be in the middle of anything without me being there, too?

  Mr. Wayne walked over with a stack of one-dollar bills. “From the SUV driver,” he said, handing it to Aaron.

  “Nice,” Aaron said. Instead of charging a set amount, we were asking for donations. So far, it seemed to be paying off. He waved the bills at me. “I’m guessing we can make big bucks. Look, another customer.”

  A blue van pulled up. Michael grabbed his board and a wet rag and skated along the side of the van, washing as he went. Then his wheels hit a towel someone had dropped and he flipped off. Lori busted up.

  “You think that’s funny?” I heard him say. Then he grabbed a bucket and launched a sheet of soapy water at her. She screamed and turned, but she was laughing her butt off.

  Her eyes flashed over my way.

  I half waved.

  She peeled the wet bangs off her face and said something to Kerry. Then she ran toward the money table. Unexpected relief washed through me—she was coming back.

  She stopped short of the table, breathing hard. A line of soap dripped off her shoulder. “You good here?” Before I could answer, she yanked off her shirt. “Keep this for me?” With a wide smile, she dropped the shirt on the table. “Thanks!”

  I watched her race back, her flip-flops leaving wet prints like a trail I couldn’t follow.

  “Go wash,” Aaron said softly. “I got this.”

  I lifted my shoulders for a shrug, but that only reminded me of the suit under my tee. I’d look stupid wearing my shirt when everyone else was in a bikini. “I will in a while,” I said as I hung Lori’s shirt over the back of my chair.

  Aaron nodded even though I could tell he didn’t believe me. Which was okay. Aaron was pretty cool. I’d known him forever, but this past year we’d gotten to be good friends. Sometimes I wanted to punch him for always being so smart, but mostly he was easy to be around.

  He finished counting out the dollar bills in the box. “So the new guy seems okay.”

  “I guess.” I slouched back in my chair. “I just wish he didn’t play clarinet.”

  “You’ll make District Honor Band,” he said. “You made it last year.”

  “Barely.” I chewed at the inside of my cheek. Aaron didn’t have anything to worry about. He’d finished first last year. I’d eked out third place—by one point! The only reason I’d done that well was because I had Lori as my duet partner. I got nervous on my own, but Lori was so good she made me sound good, too.

  The funny part was that I had talked Lori into band in the first place. My mom had signed me up for clarinet lessons when I was ten. I figured the music experiment would turn out like the ballet lessons, cheerleading camp, YMCA soccer, and tumbling—in other words, humiliating.

  Instead, I loved it. I loved how solid the clarinet felt in my hands, the smell of the reed, and how my fingers could turn notes on a page into actual music.

  Lori decided on the flute, and wouldn’t you know—she turned out to be a natural. I tried not to let it bother me that it came so easily for her. Besides, even if you’re not a natural, that doesn’t mean you can’t make up for it by working harder. But sometimes, I still worried that no matter how much I practiced, it wouldn’t be enough.

  Next year, most of us would go to Adobe High, and kids like Lori and Aaron would make Wind Ensemble, the school’s top performance band. They’d go on to be selected for Regionals and even All-State. Me, I’d probably end up in Concert Band, the basic, no-cut band. I’d be one of those kids who was good, but not good enough.

  Maybe that was why District Honor Band felt so important. It was my chance to sit on that stage with everyone as if I were a natural—and not just someone who wanted to be. Up until a week ago, I’d been pretty sure I could squeak out the third spot again. But that was before Mr. Youth Symphony showed up.

  No wonder I was face-scrunching in my sleep.

  I blinked as a kid ran over wearing SpongeBob pajamas and waving money. He paid Aaron with two crumpled five-dollar bills. Aaron wiped the jelly off one of them.

  “If you’re worried,” Aaron said, “you should do a solo.”

  I fake shivered. “I’d rather eat out of a litter box.”

  “You score higher with a solo,” he pointed out.

  “Not if you pass out in the middle of it.”

  “You won’t pass out!”

  “No,” I agreed, “because I’m not doing a solo. Besides, I don’t need to. Lori’s my secret weapon.”

  I paused while a woman with pigtails, overalls, and orange platform sandals walked up. Then she paid with a twenty and refused any change, so I forced my eyebrows back into place. It didn’t feel right to make fun of her.

  I studied Michael as he soaped up another car. “He doesn’t look like he’d be that good.”

  Aaron adjusted the brim of his hat. “You can tell that from a car wash?”

  “No,” I said. “But he’s got pouty lips. That’s bad for the embouchure.”

  “Pouty lips?”

  “Yeah.” I shoved him with the heel of my hand.

  Aaron laughed. “Do I have pouty lips?” He puckered like a blowfish.

  “No.”

  “So what kind of lips do I have?” He puckered again.

  “I’m not some kind of lip expert,” I said. But I looked anyway. At his lips. It was no big deal except I suddenly thought about how in movies right before a big kiss, the girl looks at the guy’s lips, and then there’s this pause. And here I was, looking at Aaron’s lips, and there was a pause.

  Heat flooded my cheeks at the whole weirdness of it. “I don’t know,” I said, looking away. “You have regular lips. Clarinet lips.”

  “Clarinet lips?”

  “Yeah. From practicing all the time.”

  “You want to know about your lips?”

  “No.” I folded my arms over my middle. “Can we stop talking about lips?”

  “You brought them up,” he said.

  “I was asking if you thought Michael would be any good.” I shifted to face him. “Aren’t you worried that he might be better than you?”

  “Yeah,” he admitted. “But we won’t know until Monday when he auditions for Mr. Wayne. Why freak out about it now?”

  “Because that’s what normal people do,” I said. “Not that you’d know that because you’re a freak.”

  Aaron grinned. He was impossible to insult. In fact, Aaron actually was a freaking genius. He was in all my honors classes, plus the only guy in science club to build a rocket that actually launched.

  My ears registered a laugh just then, and my eyes tried to follow. Lori was doub
led over with laughter as Michael said something. I wished I could read lips. A deaf person would know exactly what he was saying, but to me it looked like “pickle wee chicken.”

  “If Mr. Wayne does put him behind us, I hope he’s not a spitter,” Aaron said. “You never know with those pouty lips.”

  I smacked him.

  “Ow,” he said, pretending to be hurt. “You better watch it, or I won’t share the extra cash with you.”

  “What extra cash?”

  “The extra cash we’re going to collect for a tub of Baskin-Robbins brownie chunk ice cream.”

  I glanced behind us. I could see the Baskin-Robbins sign in the strip center. I couldn’t see how we were going to get the money, though. “You can’t take it from the cash box. That’s stealing.”

  He gave me a hurt look. “I wouldn’t steal from the band.”

  “So where are you getting the money?”

  “People are going to give it to us.”

  “Why would they?”

  “Because we’re cute.”

  I laughed. He actually did look cute with his hat on crooked and his hair sticking out around his neck. “We’re too old to be cute,” I said.

  “You don’t believe me, then watch.”

  I settled back in my chair, curious. Besides, it was better than trying to read Michael’s lips and wondering why Misa and Kerry kept sending me thumbs-up signs.

  Another lady made her way to the table, a wad of ones in her hand.

  “Thanks,” Aaron said, taking the money. “Would you consider contributing to our dairy fund?”

  Her brows knit together. “What’s that?”

  “Well,” he said, a serious expression on his face, “we spend hours with instruments in our mouths, and it’s really hard on our teeth. In fact, it can cause horrible disfigurement.” He flashed her a smile that showed off his braces. “See what I mean?”

  Her lips twitched at the corners.

  He nudged me, and I opened my mouth, pointing to the metal retainer glued to my bottom teeth—the remains of two years of dental torture.

  The twitch turned into a smile.

  Aaron folded his hands together and went on. “Scientists, working around the clock to help save band members across the country, have discovered that large doses of dairy products could strengthen teeth and prevent this horrible plague.”

  A grin had worked its way across her face. “A plague, huh?”

  Aaron nodded. “It’s worse than plaque.”

  The lady laughed. So did I. That was pretty quick, even for Aaron.

  “Fortunately, there’s a Baskin-Robbins over there,” he finished.

  She shook her head, but she pulled a dollar from her bag. “Cute. Very cute. You should go into sales.”

  Aaron took the dollar. “Thanks.”

  After she walked off, I grabbed the dollar from his hand. “I can’t believe you just did that!”

  “What did I tell you? Cute. Very cute.”

  I sat back and waited for the next customer, still smiling. Wait until I told Lori.

  Then I glanced her way and caught her standing on Michael’s skateboard. Lori? On a skateboard? I blinked as if I could bring her back into focus. Because Lori on a skateboard … never. At least, never before.

  A second later, Lori wobbled backward and shrieked as she fell off. The board shot out, and Michael caught it. The others all applauded.

  “He’s kind of a show-off, isn’t he?” I said.

  Aaron shrugged. “Lori doesn’t seem to mind.”

  “She’s supposed to be spying,” I muttered. “For me.” Only, it didn’t exactly look that way.

  A breeze swirled up out of nowhere. Aaron grabbed a loose dollar bill that fluttered in the cash box. It was a warm breeze, but I still shivered. I couldn’t help it. It made me think of something my dad used to say.

  The Winds of Change.

  It was his favorite expression when I was little. He’d hold up a finger as if to feel the breeze. As if there really were Winds of Change. And then we would move to a new state. We moved from California to Colorado to New Mexico and then to Arizona. I hated moving, hated new cities and new schools and new friends. For a long time, I didn’t understand it was because of Dad’s job as a pilot—I really thought it was the wind. Because of that, I grew up afraid of storms. Every time one came, I worried that a wind would blow in, and off we would go like some creepy version of Mary Poppins.

  Dad hadn’t held up a finger to test the breeze when he and Mom announced they were separating. But he might as well have. Everything had changed. And I hated it. I hated every threatening gust of newness.

  I watched Lori and Michael and shivered again.

  Chapter 4

  In the fifty-two days since Dad had loaded two suitcases in his truck and drove off, my house had become a weird place to be.

  Except for Saturday nights.

  Every Saturday night, Lori slept over. It was the one time when things felt normal. We ordered pizza for dinner, watched movies, and stayed up late, talking.

  Tonight, Lori hadn’t come over until after dinner because she had to watch Katie, her little sister. And this afternoon, she’d gone right from the car wash to her private flute lesson. So it was after nine o’clock, and we still hadn’t talked about the day.

  Or him.

  Finally, it was just the two of us in my room. Lori sat on the pop-up trundle, and I sat across from her, a plate of brownies I’d baked that afternoon between us.

  I’d turned off the light, but my room glowed so much we could see each other fine. Lori said my room at night felt like the inside of an alien spaceship. My bedside clock gleamed with green letters, and my night-light flashed red, green, and blue. Plus, on the ceiling, a galaxy of stick-on stars shone down on us.

  I loved stars. I always had. When I grew up, I wanted to be an astronomer. I was going to discover a new solar system and name the stars after all my friends. Lori would get first pick.

  She leaned back, resting her weight on her hands, and let out an exaggerated sigh. I knew the feeling. No matter what had happened during the day, when we were hanging out just the two of us, I could let down my guard and just be.

  “So why did you have to watch Katie?” I asked.

  “My parents.” She wore a long gray sleep shirt with NEW YORK PHILHARMONIC in black lettering. I wore the same one, only in blue. Lori had brought it back for me after her trip last summer.

  “It’s so humiliating,” she said. “They started dance lessons.”

  “Seriously?”

  “At the studio next to Dominic’s Pizza. The one with all the big windows, so the world can see my dad step on my mom’s feet.”

  I imagined my parents dancing out in public, but instead of horror, I felt a stab of sadness. “At least your parents are there together.”

  Her eyes glowed a dark blue in the alien light. “Sorry, Tay. Anything new with your mom and dad?”

  I shook my head. “I don’t know how they’re supposed to work things out if they never talk.”

  “Maybe they’ll miss each other more that way.”

  “Mom misses him enough already. I heard her crying again yesterday.” I picked the edge off a brownie and let the chocolate melt on my tongue. “If she’d just leave him alone about his job, he’d come home.”

  “Except he wasn’t home much, right?”

  “It was still better than this,” I grumbled. Being a pilot for FedEx meant Dad was gone a few nights every week. But after six years, it was part of the routine. And then this new job came along—corporate pilot for some software company in China. No more night flights, better pay, and Dad would get to fly a Gulfstream 5, whatever that was. But it meant he’d be gone a lot more—sometimes a month at a time. I figured that’s what had started the separation talk.

  “At least they’re not using the D word, right?” Lori asked.

  “You mean the D words?” I said. “Because there are a bunch.” I ticked them off on my finge
rs. “Divorce. Dissolve. Disintegrate. Demolish. Destroy.”

  “I’m sorry, Tay. Honest. I wish I could do something.”

  “I know,” I said. “I wish there were something I could do, too.”

  I’d tried pretending Dad was just working. But the house felt weird, because stuff that used to be there suddenly wasn’t. Mom snuck into the laundry room to cry, and Andrew acted like everything was fine, but even he walked around the house as if he were looking for something but forgot where he put it.

  Why can’t Dad just come home?

  I blinked back tears, suddenly so glad Lori was there. “We have to stop talking about this before I go insane. Tell me about today, instead.” I shifted, careful not to wobble the plate. “What’s the new guy like?”

  She shrugged, but the corners of her mouth twitched, and I wondered if she knew she was smiling. “It’s hard to be sure, but he seemed pretty cool.”

  She’d left her braid in, but more wispy pieces had pulled loose. I’d tried to braid mine this afternoon, but so much hair stuck out I looked like the victim of an electrical shock.

  “Did you talk about band stuff?”

  “A little.” She broke off the corner of a brownie. “He’s definitely auditioning for District Honor Band.”

  “He said that?”

  She nodded. “I guess music is a big deal in his family. His parents are divorced, and his dad plays trombone in an orchestra in New York.”

  “Wow.” My throat tightened. “So he’s good, huh?”

  “Maybe,” she admitted. “But he also said he’s only been serious for about two years. Except …” She reached for more brownie, then stopped and crossed her arms over her chest.

  “Except what?”

  “You have to keep those brownies away from me. You shouldn’t have made them in the first place.”

  “I know, but we always used to make brownies every Saturday. Remember? I figured one brownie wouldn’t kill us.”

  “I’m not worried about dying. I’m worried about fat thighs.”

  “You don’t have fat thighs.”

  “I do, too. Michael showed me a scar on his leg, and all I could think about was how my thighs are nearly as big as his.”