Jake squeezed my hand and slid out. “Hope it was a good nap,” he said.
I nodded. Sarah tugged on my arm. “Let’s
go
!” she squealed. “This is so
exciting
!”
Her enthusiasm was contagious, and I was grateful to share it with her. I let her propel me down the bus aisle and into the street. The night air was cold and crisp. Around us, the stores and restaurants were shuttered and dark, their neon signs black and skeletal against the windows. The equipment truck was parked a little ways down the block.
Sarah and I walked toward it, rubbing our shoulders, breath fogging. When we grabbed our uniform bags, the band parents handing them out told us that we’d have to get in line for warm-ups in ten minutes.
We raced to get dressed, and I left Sarah to get my mellophone out from under the bus. Above the luggage bay, the dark bathroom window gaped, a reminder of what happened earlier that day. It
felt
like it had happened in another lifetime. Sleeping in those weird bursts and being outside so late at night had my internal clock all messed up; I had no idea what time it was or whether or not I was supposed to be asleep or awake.
I found my mellophone case and put my instrument together, snapping the clasps and shoving the empty box under the belly of the bus just as AJ started shouting for everyone to set up. Quickly, I scurried through the lines to my spot between Punk and Steve.
“You two are
so
dead,” I growled at them.
“Dude, Elsie, you weren’t supposed to go in there!” Punk whispered at me through gritted teeth. “We
told
you!”
“I have major plans for the two of you,” I rumbled. The expressions on their faces were hilarious. Wait ’til they see what’s up my sleeve, I thought.
AJ called us to attention.
“We’re going to run through fifteen minutes of warm-ups,” he began, “then we’re going to march to the parade review area. There are residences all around, so I expect that you will play softly while we’re here, and when we march over we’ll be using a one-snare tap to keep time. The review area is lit for filming. We’ll march in to our regular cadence, perform our parade pieces, and march out. Got that?”
Not that we could answer or anything.
All through warm-ups, it felt as if an entire marching band was doing drill in my stomach. I was nervous, excited, terrified—anything and everything you could imagine. Plus, I was still thinking about that kiss (okay,
those kisses
) with Jake. There was so much emotion messing with my heart and brain, I had to concentrate extra-hard to play my instrument.
AJ cut us off, gave us an “instruments down” command, and counted off the drums so we could march to the taping area. The cracks of the snare echoed off the dark buildings in sharp snaps. It was eerie, marching along in total silence with such a big group of people in a huge city in the middle of the night. I expected something from a movie to come get us—a giant, man-eating reptile, or a ball of flame to shoot from the sky—it was so surreal.
What was even
more
surreal? Turning around a corner and seeing an entire city block lit up like it was high noon, packed with people and TV cameras. If it hadn’t been for the hours and hours of marching and drill instruction I’d been subjected to since August, I would have stopped dead in my tracks, wrecking our parade block and everyone’s good mood. Instead, my legs carried me forward automatically while I peered at the scene from under the brim of my shako.
Giant banks of lights stood on spidery legs attached to portable generators. They were so powerful that the shadows cast on the street were extra-sharp, as though someone went over them with a black permanent marker. Thick orange electrical cables held down with patches of duct tape snaked all over the street. Two cameras hung off mini-cranes—were they called booms ?—and people scurried in a zillion different directions in the shadows behind the lights.
“Whoa,” I heard Steve mutter. “This is the big time.” My thoughts exactly.
AJ stopped us just short of a huge section of the street that had been painted blue and gold and detailed with the Darcy’s sunshine logo and “The Eighty-fifth Annual Darcy’s Department Store Thanksgiving Day Parade” across it. From years of watching the parade on TV, I knew we were in front of the big Darcy’s store, but a set of portable bleachers blocked the main entrance. The review stand, I guessed.
Even though I was sure they’d probably been checked a hundred times for stability, my stomach quavered when I saw those risers.
AJ called us to attention. A guy wearing a headset and carrying a giant clipboard came over to him. He spoke so loud, it was easy to hear him.
“Okay, Hellcats. On my mark, you’ll begin your parade feature, march into the performance space, play your piece, and then march straight out to your cadence. Do not stop playing your cadence until you reach the corner of Lexington. Got it?”
AJ nodded curtly. I took a deep breath. Was he as nervous as I was right now? He didn’t look it. In his uniform, jaw set, AJ looked—well, pretty amazing.
“Instruments
up
!” AJ called. We were ready.
Headset man stepped away and AJ shook his arms out, eyes never leaving the guy’s face. Mine didn’t either. Headset brought a hand to his ear, tilted his head in a quick jerk, and pointed straight at AJ.
We were on.
“One! Two! One-and-two-and—” We stepped off and came in.
Like it had during the fateful field show competition weeks earlier, the band just clicked. The feeling was absolutely electric, but we were in control. The Sousa marches sounded light and fun—exactly the way they were supposed to—each note separate and distinct. Kip had taught us a fancy move for when we hit the center of the performance area—the kids in the outer perimeter of the block would march clockwise, while the kids two rows in would march counterclockwise. Basically, I’d stay still while Steve and Punk marched. The color guard spun their flags inches from our heads and danced a two-step. Everyone else marked time, marching in place.
During my “Stars and Stripes” solo, I found my playing zone. My fingers danced over the valves, and the notes were light enough to leap across a stream on pinheads.
The song ended and the cadence began. AJ marched us out of the performance area and down the block. I risked sneaking glances at Punk and Steve. Both were in perfect parade formation: eyes forward, back straight, faces set and determined. But I sensed the joy coming off them.
When we finally got to the “clear zone,” AJ stopped us and put us at ease. Immediately, a roar rose from the band. We’d done it!
“That was amazing!” AJ shouted over us. “Ab-so-flapping-
lutely
amazing!”
We screamed and jumped up and down, everyone hugging one another and cheering, until, from above us came a shout.
“Knock it off! I’m sleepin’ here! It’s three a.m.!”
“I can’t believe we just did that,” Sarah squealed. She came from the front of the block, flag flapping, to find me. “And you sounded incredible!” She hugged me.
Jake and Hector appeared from behind her, hats hanging from their arms by the chin straps and uniforms partially unbuttoned, smiling crooked smiles.
“Awesome. Just awesome,” Jake said. Hector slapped high fives.
I was so pumped, I’d never need to sleep again. And this wasn’t even the real thing.
38
AJ, Mr. Sebastian, and the band parents corralled us and ushered us back to the buses so we could change and have breakfast. At four a.m. On Thanksgiving.
I didn’t care. I’d never felt this good about any performance I’d done: field show, orchestral, or otherwise. I was flying higher than the Empire State Building, reliving every moment with my friends as we ate pancakes and French toast . . . and as I swigged most of Jake’s coffee. Banned substance in my house or not, I knew I’d need the caffeine to get through the morning.
Everyone’d said the same thing over and over again: “And that’s with no people out there! This is going to be crazy ! !” And every single person had something nice to say about my solo, which was awesome. It wiped Shining Birches from my mind—for the time being.
What felt like minutes later, I was changing back into my uniform next to Sarah and preparing for warm-ups as streaks of sunlight bled across the night sky. Exhaustion crept in. I could see it on everyone’s faces—and I’m sure mine looked the same way: dark circles, skin slightly paler than usual, eyes a touch red.
We were back on the bus, weaving through blocked-off streets to the spot near Central Park where we’d line up. The parade began at nine, but we had to be in our spot by six thirty so they could clear the buses out and fully close the streets. I nudged Jake and pointed at the people huddled under blankets and sitting on folding chairs along the route. They’d already staked out parade spots!
“Pretty awesome,” he said. I agreed.
The bus stopped.
“Everyone off!” AJ yelled.
We spent the next few hours huddled in groups, chatting and keeping ourselves—and our instruments—warm by standing over the subway grates, which would occasionally let out a blast of hot air. The way that the performers were staged for step-off, we couldn’t see any floats or balloons—just the other high school marching bands in front and behind us. Supposedly, though, rock star Theo Christmas would be on the Toasty Oats Cereal “Holidaze in the Jungle” float in front of our band. Sadly, we’d never see him, though—balloons and floats entered the parade via a different street.
By eight, both the early-morning post-performance high and the “check out that other band” competitiveness had worn off, and all that was keeping me going were caffeine-infused jitters from Jake’s coffee. When AJ told us to form our block, I was grateful that the day was almost over—and it hadn’t started yet!
We lined up and the band parents swept through, offering sips from water bottles and a final lint brush swipe. AJ counted off, and the cadence began, a little sluggish at first. We marched down the block, past the groups that were farther back in the parade than us, and then, when we turned a corner, I saw:
The canyon of buildings rising up from the street.
The people stacked at least ten deep on the sidewalk.
The viewers hanging out on fire escapes and balconies.
The ginormous SpongeBob balloon floating a block in front of us.
Adrenaline electrified me. This was the biggest, coolest, most amazing moment in my life—and I realized that very few would ever beat it. And it was because of marching band.
Luckily, my marching brain was still paying attention, because suddenly I found myself playing. I’d barely been aware of AJ’s command, but my body had responded automatically. We had a three-song program: the HeHe High fight song, a Christmas tune (after all, the parade officially kicked off the holiday shopping season), and the Sousa medley. AJ created simple hand signals to delineate which one we were supposed to play at any given time, which was good, because the roar of the crowd made it nearly impossible to hear him.
We marched at a slow pace and had to stop at every half block as groups farther up the line performed at the review stand. I didn’t mind. It gave me the opportunity to try and capture the experience, burn it into my brain.
About thirty blocks of marching later, we approached the performance area. AJ cut us off, giving our chops a break from the near-constant playing. My lips and cheeks buzzed, and I needed to gear up to tackle that solo again. During the night—morning?—a camera guy had been right in my face, and when we were live everyone would know it was me playing that solo. My mom and dad would see
me
. On TV. I swelled with pride and excitement.
“It’s go time!” shouted AJ. I could barely hear him over the crowd.
He gave the signal and the snares snapped:
Crack! Crack! Crack-crack-crack
!
We stepped off.
39
The review stand was packed tighter than a whale in a bikini. The band marched into the performance field, Sousa medley sounding just as good as it had at our three a.m. rehearsal. I played conservatively to be safe, reining in so I could let loose during the big solo, but my cheeks and lips ached from the long day.
The rotating boxes began. Punk and Steve stepped off, leaving me alone, marking time. A flag spun perilously close to my head as a color guard member stumbled, but I didn’t even flinch. The roar of the crowd faded into a low buzz as I honed in on the music. Our sound enveloped me just as it had on the first day of band camp, awing me with its power and beauty. Swiftly, I stripped off my gloves and stuck them in my sleeve—I’d found it easier to play the solo without them.
Right before the solo, the entire band turned to face the crowd. I was ready: lost in the pride and intensity of the march, the high from the crowd, the amazingness of the whole experience. All the parts of our performance—the music, the solo, marching, Sarah and the color guard’s flag work—meshed together in a complex arrangement that created art and music in a way no orchestra ever could.
And right then, like the largest lightbulb in Times Square had turned on in my brain, I finally understood what marching band was all about: the band. It was bigger and cooler than anything I could ever do alone.
Even though the majority of the band wasn’t half as serious as I was about music, what we achieved as a group brought all of us much further than our individual accomplishments. Even though I wanted to play my best for
me
, I also wanted to play my best for them. No one would remember who I was after the solo, but they might remember the band. The Hellcats, with their weird traditions and mayhem, accepted me for who I was
as well as
what I could bring to them. The revelation nearly knocked me back on my heels.