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She looks at me with those laser beam eyes of hers. “You know, I thought about that a lot these last couple of years,” she says in a choked voice. “About who was there for you. Who held your hand while you grieved for all that you’d lost?”
Mia’s words rattle something loose in me and suddenly there are tears all over my damn face again. I haven’t cried in three years and now this is like the second time in as many days.
“It’s my turn to see you through,” she whispers, coming back to me and wrapping me in her blanket as I lose my shit all over again. She holds me until I recover my Y chromosome. Then she turns to me, a slightly faraway look in her eyes. “Your festival’s next Saturday, right?” she asks.
I nod.
“I have the two recitals in Japan and one in Korea on Thursday, so I could be out of there by Friday, and you gain a day back when you travel west. And I don’t have to be at my next engagement in Chicago for another week after that. So if we flew directly from Seoul to London.”
“What are you saying?”
She looks so shy when she asks it, as if there’s a snowball’s chance in hell that I’d ever say no, as if this isn’t what I’ve always wanted.
“Can I come to the festival with you?”
TWENTY-TWO
“How come I never get to go to any concerts?” Teddy asked.
We were all sitting around the table, Mia, Kat, De
“What’s that, Little Man?” De
“I was looking at the old photo albums. And Mia got to go to all these concerts all the time. When she was a baby, even. And I never even got to go to one. And I’m practically eight.”
“You just turned seven five months ago.” Kat guffawed.
“Still. Mia went before she could walk. It’s not fair!”
“And who ever told you that life was fair?” Kat asked, raising an eyebrow. “Certainly not me. I am a follower of the School of Hard Knocks.”
Teddy turned toward an easier target. “Dad?”
“Mia went to concerts because they were my shows, Teddy. It was our family time.”
“And you do go to concerts,” Mia said. “You come to my recitals.”
Teddy looked as disgusted as he had when De
“The Mufflers have been retired, I’m afraid,” De
“You could come to one of my shows,” I said, forking a piece of salmon.
Everyone at the table stopped eating and looked at me, the adult members of the Hall family each giving me a different disapproving look. De
“Teddy can’t stay up that late,” Kat said.
“You let Mia stay up that late when she was little,” Teddy shot back.
“We can’t stay up that late,” De
“And I don’t think it’s appropriate,” Mia huffed.
Immediately, I felt the familiar a
“Appropriate? Did you just say that it’s not ‘appropriate’ for Teddy to come to my show?” I asked, trying to keep my voice level.
“Yes, I did.” She couldn’t have sounded more defensive or snippy if she’d tried.
Kat and De
“Okay, first off, you’re sixteen. You’re not a librarian. So you’re not allowed to say ‘appropriate.’ And second of all, why the hell isn’t it?”
“All right, Teddy,” Kat said, scooping up Teddy’s di
“No way, I want to watch this!”
“SpongeBob?” De
“By the way,” I said to De
Kat’s expression softened. She nodded. “That does sound fun.” Then she gestured to Mia as if to say: But you’ve got bigger fish to fry.
The three of them shuffled out of the kitchen. Mia was slunk all the way down in her chair, looking both guilty and like there was no way in hell she was going to give an inch.
“What’s your problem?” I demanded. “What’s your hang-up with your family and my band? Do you think we suck so badly?”
“No, of course not!”
“Do you resent me and your dad talking music all the time?”
“No, I don’t mind the rock-talk.”
“So, what is it, Mia?”
The tiniest rebel teardrops formed in the edges of her eyes and she angrily swatted them away.
“What? What is the matter?” I asked, softening. Mia wasn’t prone to crocodile tears, or to any tears, really.
She shook her head. Lips sealed shut.
“Will you just tell me? It can’t be worse than what I’m thinking, which is that you’re ashamed of Shooting Star because you think we reek to holy hell.”
She shook her head again. “You know that’s not true. It’s just,” she paused, as if weighing some big decision. Then she sighed. “The band. When you’re with the band, I already have to share you with everyone. I don’t want to add my family to that pot, too.” Then she lost the battle and started to cry.
All my a
Mia relented. Her whole family came to the festival. It was a fantastic weekend, twenty Northwest bands, not a rain cloud in sight. The whole thing went down in infamy, spawning a live recorded CD and a series of festivals that continue to this day.
Teddy had insisted on wearing the Mufflers, so Kat had spent an hour grumbling and digging through boxes in the basement until she’d found them.
Mia generally liked to hang backstage at shows but when Shooting Star played, she was right in front of the stage, just clear of the mosh pit, dancing with Teddy the whole time.
TWENTY-THREE
First you inspect me
Then you dissect me
Then you reject me
I wait for the day
That you’ll resurrect me
“ANIMATE”