I took a lap around my poster-covered room, passing all of the classical composers on my walls. I nodded at Beethoven, offering silent appreciation for the fact that he was too deaf to hear my awful playing. Okay, he was dead and on a poster too, but why split hairs ?
I sat down and started again. Better. The notes tumbled over one another with ease, like river rocks. My tone was as mellow as the butterscotch I loved on sundaes, and according to the blinking light on my metronome I was right on time.
And then I came to the andante movement. I sped up a little, but there was a run of notes in there—basically, a quick scale—that I just couldn’t hit. My fleet fingers may as well have been mittens.
I tried it three times.
“Bah!” I cried, and pulled the instrument away from my mouth and scowled at it. “You sound like
garbage
! ”
“Elsie?” Dad’s voice came through my bedroom door, followed by a late knock.
I had no idea that he was home! Since I had gotten into honors band in sixth grade, I never practiced with my dad. When I was first learning the horn we played simple etudes and duets together, but now it even stressed me out when he listened to me from somewhere else in the house. After all, he was the first chair of the BSO! I didn’t want him to hear my mistakes—just see me onstage, playing well, the same way I saw him. And since this was one of the selections for my Shining Birches audition . . . well, it had to be perfect.
“Uh, yeah?” It’s not like I could pretend that it wasn’t me, even though I wanted to.
“You need some help?”
I didn’t answer right away. I mean, obviously he heard me struggling, and so yes, I did need help—but I didn’t want him to be the one to help me. He was probably thinking that this was another sign that I wasn’t ready for Shining Birches. It was so embarrassing.
“We can go through it together,” he added. “Can I come in?”
I sighed, resigned. “Sure.”
My door opened, and there he was, horn in his hand, like he knew I’d invite him. Kind of like a horn-vampire. Uncomfortable, I stood.
“Just let me get another chair.” He rested his horn on my bed—made in 1921, it was a silver Geyer. I bet it cost more than some people spend on their cars.
He returned with a straight-backed chair and a wide smile. After setting it next to my stand, he took his horn into his lap and waited for me. I still stood in the center of the room.
“Let’s take a look at this,” Dad said. He patted my chair.
That caused me to jerk forward and sit down.
“How about we play it together, half-speed?” he said. I nodded, my voice locked inside of me. What if I couldn’t do it? What if I made a mistake—again? What would he think? He always said that mistakes revealed a lack of preparedness, and he spent ages listening to recordings of pieces and making notes on his sheet music. “You should know how a piece of music sounds before you play it,” he’d told me a thousand times.
Dad readied his horn and glanced at me out of the corner of his eye, from behind his glasses. I raised my instrument to my lips. Dad tapped his foot at the speed that he wanted us to play and counted to four.
“Dum-da-da-dum-da-da . . .” We played the run slowly, my fingers and mouth working together and getting all the notes right. Then Dad increased the speed slightly. And again, faster. I was still able to keep up, but a light sweat broke out on the back of my neck. Playing with him was weird. It was like I forgot that he was my dad who mows the lawn and accidentally set the grill on fire last summer. All I could think of was his Boston Symphony job—the job I wanted more than anything—my missed youth orchestra audition, and Shining Birches. How would I ever do what he did, be what he is, if I couldn’t master this piece? My heart rate increased and I had to gasp to take a breath—right in the middle of the run.
Dad stopped. “You want to make sure that you time your breathing so that—”
But I didn’t let him finish.
“I know. I know. I think I got it, okay? Seriously,” I added, when the expression on his face read that he didn’t believe me at all.
“Elsie, honey, everyone messes up sometimes,” he said. “Learning a new piece takes time.”
“I know.” I crossed and uncrossed my legs, eyes on my music stand, but my brain echoing with the words I’d heard him say on the phone—that I “couldn’t handle” Shining Birches. I wanted him to know I could handle this. I
needed
him to know that.
He smiled a thin, forced smile.
“Great, then. I’m glad you’re all set.” He sat there, not moving. The metronome tock-tock-tocked, counting the beats of silence between us.
I squirmed.
“Thanks for coming in and helping me out,” I directed to the music stand. I didn’t look at him. After another few tock-tock-tocks from the metronome, he picked up his chair and left, closing the door softly behind him. And I felt like the biggest idiot ever.
Shame washed over me. Why’d he have to be home? Between classes and marching band practice, my private rehearsal time was scarce and my playing was starting to suffer. This little episode was all my father needed to reinforce his theory that Shining Birches was too much for me. I clenched my jaw in frustration as I packed up. Unless I was positive that he was out of the house, the horn would stay in its case.
9
After three days of freshman-only lunchtime orientation sessions—meet your guidance counselor, here are good ways to manage your time/deal with stress (ha!), and an intro to the computer lab and library services—the school finally let us have a regular lunch.
And, after three days of being in high school, I had no idea what to do. In junior high, I ate alone in the band room and practiced after finishing my sandwich. When I’d stopped by this morning to drop off my horn and ask Mr. Sebastian if I could practice at lunch, he told me he had a meeting and the band room would be closed. So I waited for Jake after history, hoping that he’d include me in whatever plans he’d made.
“Lunch?” I said, feeling and sounding stupid. It just came out stiff and formal-y.
“Yes,” he said, and slung his backpack over his shoulder. Okay, as vague as my question was, his answer was too. Should I follow him? Did he want me to eat with him? I had to go to my locker and
get
my lunch, plus I didn’t want to lug my bag around with me for the whole period, but I didn’t know if that’s what high schoolers did. So I settled for waiting, mouth closed.
“I’ve gotta stop by my locker. See you in the lunchroom ?” he asked. I nodded, and Jake disappeared into the crowd.
The HeHe caf was not at all like the junior high lunchroom with its round tables and high windows. Instead, picture a mass of students lounging around tables, more noise than a tuning symphony, and a cloud of that thick, fried-food starchy smell. I stood off to one side, clutching my treble clef lunch bag, feeling young, young, young. How was I supposed to find Jake ?
And then I heard it: “Buck-buck-ba-gawwk! Buck-buck-ba-gawwk!” To my left, halfway across the room, was a group of band people clustered around a table, waving.
Seriously, did they have to
cluck
?
“Hey, Chick-chick.” It was Steve, my section leader.
“I thought this lunch period was only for freshmen and sophomores,” I said, plopping my lunch bag on the table. As soon as the words were out of my mouth I realized how snarky they sounded. Steve’s a junior.
“Happy to see you too,” he snapped. “I have AP chem this year, so to accommodate the lab I have first lunch.”
“Oh.” I didn’t look at him, instead scanning the rest of the table, which had gone quiet since my arrival.
Jake, Sarah, and Hector sat with brown-bag lunches spread out in front of them. A couple of girls from the woodwind section huddled over Diet Cokes and salads, and two of the drummers draped over their chairs like dirty laundry.
“We were just talking about our favorite movies,” Sarah said, probably trying to restart the conversation after my snark attack. “Hector was going on and on about
Star Wars
.”
“Not the newer ones,” he jumped in, leaning over the table. “The originals. Which are actually numbers four, five, and six in the series.”
“Did you know that John Williams lifted a lot of the themes in the
Star Wars
score from classical pieces?” I offered.
“Really?” Hector leaned forward in his chair, and Steve and Jake turned to me, interested. Sarah, I noticed, kept her eyes on her sandwich. She’d been cool toward me ever since band camp, like whenever she saw me she thought of the junior high articulation incident. I wasn’t sure if she liked me, and I wasn’t sure why that bothered me. It hadn’t last year.
Now I blushed. “I don’t know much about the movies, but John Williams, who wrote the score for them, was the conductor of the Boston Pops for years. Wagner and Holst, and a bunch of other classical composers, inspired him.” I hummed a few bars of Holst’s piece “Mars: The Bringer of War,” then “The Imperial March,” Darth Vader’s theme in the movies, for them.
“That’s so cool!” Hector cried. I blushed deeper, and dug into my sandwich.
Hector and Steve then spent the rest of the period debating whether or not tauntauns could actually keep you alive on Hoth, while Sarah and I listened. Jake would chime in every few minutes with some bizarre and totally wrong comment—like “Didn’t Captain Kirk do that?”—and Hector or Steve would throw a napkin at him and shout “That’s
Star Trek
!”
Maybe it was because for once I didn’t have to worry about practicing or Shining Birches, but I kind of had fun. Even if I didn’t say much.
The bell buzzed, ending the period.
“Where’re you guys off to?” Steve asked.
“Elsie, Hector, and I have biology,” Sarah said. She gave me a tentative smile. Maybe she’d finally gotten over the articulation incident? I hoped so. I didn’t think I could eat with them very often if all I had to listen to was
Star Wars
talk.
Jake had math—honors geometry. “I’m a math geek as well as a band geek,” he said with a grin as he gathered his stuff. “You know, Jake of all trades, master of none.” Everyone else laughed, but inside, I was kind of jealous. I could never make fun of myself like that.
All of us made our way back into the main hall and Jake and Steve split off to go to the science and math wing.
“May the force be with you,” Hector said to them.
After the good feeling I got at the table, I hoped it would be with me too.
On Monday, at our next band practice, we lined up on the field to learn how to march in for our field show. You’d think it’d be easy—stand shoulder to shoulder across the “away” team’s sideline (amazing how many sports terms you had to learn to be in band), step off together, and walk straight across the field, stopping when you reached your spot.
Unfortunately, it seemed that no one could walk a straight line to save their lives, and since everyone was still double- and triple-checking their spots, it was total chaos.
After the fifth time through, when we
still
couldn’t get it, Mr. Sebastian and AJ were nearly apoplectic.
“What is the
matter
with you people?” AJ shouted. “You’re not playing, you’re
not even holding your instruments
. You’re walking! Can’t you
walk
?! The Minutemen will
walk away
with our trophy if this is the best you can do!” He jumped up and down on the podium like a toddler throwing a temper tantrum. I couldn’t help it; the sight just cracked me up. I laughed. Out loud. We were supposed to be at attention.
“Who thinks this is funny?” AJ shouted. “You think this is
funny
? Oh, it’s hysterical that you guys stink so bad! Who laughed?”
My veins went icy, and a crawly sensation danced through my stomach. Uh-oh.
“Spill it,” AJ said, “or you’ll
all
do laps tonight.”
Everyone stood stock-still, holding at attention, barely breathing. A hot flush crept out from my collar to cover my face.
“I’ll count to three,” AJ barked. “One . . .”
Should I step forward? Raise my hand? Wave? Do nothing? The people around me—Steve and Punk—had to know it was me who laughed. We were standing too close together for them not to. I slid my eyes in Punk’s direction. The corner of his mouth twitched. I didn’t know what that meant. Did he think it was funny? Was he mad that he might have to run because of me?
“Two . . .”
Oh, whatever. It’s marching band. It’s not like it’s real band or anything.
I tensed my leg to step forward.
Punk did, instead. “Dude, it was me,” he called. “You look like you’ve got freakin’ ants in your pants up there. Chill!” He laughed again, like he was making his point.
“You ?” Even from where I was standing—about twenty yards away—I could tell that AJ didn’t believe Punk. We have totally different laughs. Mine is a lot higher, and Punk’s sounds like, well, the way you’d expect a guy with pink hair and safety pins hanging from his ears and nose would laugh—cackly and scratchy.
Punk nodded. My stomach flipped. Why was he doing this for me ? Should I stop him ? Was he going to be mad at me later? I had no idea what to do or how to react.
AJ cocked his head like a dog.
“Five laps, then,” he said. Punk tucked his elbows into his sides and jogged toward the sidelines. As he took off, I swore I heard him utter a soft “Buck-buck-ba-gawk.” I caught a snatch of muffled giggles from the woodwinds nearby.
That did not make me feel better.
“The rest of you,” AJ said, “back to the line. Let’s run this again. And I mean
run
! ”
We raced back to where we began and did the drill again. And again. And every time he entered my field of vision all I could focus on was Punk, gangly legs flapping as he loped by. Thankfully, it didn’t take him long to run the five laps, and soon he was back in his spot next to me. Of course, as soon as he started jogging in my direction, I realized that having him in line was worse than watching him run. I felt so awkward, I couldn’t say anything. I tried to whisper “I’m sorry,” to him, but the words stuck in my throat. I kept my eyes on the ground, or locked on AJ, worrying that Punk was mad, stressed that I’d get caught even though Punk took the blame for me, and just feeling like an idiot. Stinking it up on the field didn’t help my mood either.