Sophie's Encore (9 page)

“How far
do
you want to take this?” Rachel demanded. “What about going back to
Read London
?”

“I don’t know.” I hesitated. “I… It feels good to do something different. From, you know, before. Rick wants me back, of course. But…if I could earn money a different way…if I could perhaps gain a small income from doing sound engineering in a few months’ time…maybe that would be better.”

“Better than a deputy editorship or freelance work for a great newspaper?” Rachel wasn’t buying it.

“Well. Yes. Maybe.
Not
, if you put it like that, actually. But…”

“But what?”

I sighed. “It’s too painful to go back. I can’t do it. It brings back too many memories. It was really difficult, working-part time, and I struggled even with Steve there to help. He changed his shifts and he came home every night at witching hour and…” I gulped but tried to go on. “Without Steve…”

I welled up, angry with myself at shedding tears yet again.

“Oh sweetie, I am sorry.” Rachel’s voice was gentle but carefully devoid of pity. She had dropped the sympathy act a year ago. Unlike Dan, she had decided a long while back that I should stop mourning and that pitying me would only perpetuate my grief. Therefore, she had shelved the whole empathy angle although right at this moment, I swore her voice wobbled.

She spoke again. “I never made that connection. I’m sorry. Perhaps it is good to make a fresh start, try something new.” She grinned wickedly. “Especially if it makes you so happy
and
it involves a totally hot rock star who, let’s face it, still has the hots for you. After all this time!”

I rolled my eyes. Why did she keep bringing this up? “He does
not
. He totally doesn’t. We’re only working together.”

“Yada, yada, yada.” Rachel pretended to be bored. “I think he has the hots for you, and I am
never
wrong.”

“I think you’re totally post-birth hormonal and you’re totally wrong, not to mention out of order,” I responded. There was nothing between me and Dan, and I didn’t want her putting ideas in my head that would…complicate matters.

“Methinks the lady protests too much,” Rachel teased, but in a good-natured way.

“Methinks the new mum needs to mind her own business,” I warned, but also in a good-natured way. “I’m not ready to see anyone else, least of all Dan, and I’m not interested.”

Rachel grabbed my hand and looked me squarely in the eye. “Oh God, Sophie, I don’t give a damn if he’s got the hots for you or not, as long as you have that lovely glow in your eyes, a little spark of life, and you can get excited and happy again.”

She might as well have poured a bucket of ice-cold water over my head. Her off-hand, light-hearted comment rocked me to the core, but I tried not to let on.

“You sound like the kids,” I commented.

Rachel giggled. “There we go,” she concluded. “We’re all agreed. I drink to Sophie’s new venture, and to falling into a whole new career.” She clinked her coffee cup to mine. “And in time, who knows, you might just fall for a certain someone.”

“You are a notorious matchmaker,” I admonished. “Leave this here widow well alone.”

“Widow, yes. Dried-up old prune, no. Mark my words, you shall flower again.” Rachel grinned wickedly.

“You and your dirty talk, honestly. Methinks you’ve regressed fifteen years.”

“Maybe I have. Maybe
you
should!”

Chapter Fourteen

Discussing my new career ambition with Rachel gave it greater weight and made it seem less flight-of-fancy. On an impulse, I rang Mum and Dad to tell them about it as well.

“Sophie, love,” my Mum exclaimed when she heard my voice and immediately launched into detailed news on all the developments down Newquay way. All the while, I jiggled and twiddled the sofa cushions, nearly dropping the phone a few times and wishing I could get a word in edgewise. Eventually, though, even Mum had to stop for a breath, and I blurted out my news, rather abruptly and completely without preamble. “I’ve got a new job.”

The surprised silence at the other end spoke volumes, but Mum rallied quickly.

“Congratulations, sweetie, that’s wonderful news.” She halted, probably uncertain where to go next. “I…we didn’t think you were ready to go back to work? It’s none of our business, of course. You know we’re behind you every step of the way… It’s only…well, now that you’ve said it… Would you tell me more?”

I blushed with embarrassment. How come I had put my Mum into a position of apologizing for asking perfectly normal questions? Had I really shut my parents so completely out of my life in the aftermath of Steve’s death? They had rushed down to see me, as shell-shocked at the atrocity as the rest of the world and devastated on my behalf. They had given every conceivable form of support. Mum had even moved in with me and Josh and newborn Emily for a while, sharing with Dan and Rachel the burden of propping up the grieving widow. And yet, as soon as I could cope, I had sent her away, and it occurred to me now that I had gone out of my way to avoid seeing her or Dad.

Why?
I couldn’t honestly answer that question. Perhaps it was too painful seeing my Mum and Dad so happily together after decades of marriage, something that I now would never experience. Or perhaps I was trying to prove a point. I had never once considered that I might be hurting my parents.

I tried to mask my sudden emotional turmoil with a cheery laugh. “A
job
is probably an overstatement at this time. I’m working with Dan right now. He’s teaching me to be a sound engineer.”

“That’s such a wonderful project,” Mum offered after a moment’s consideration. “I don’t quite know what it means, but I imagine it’s creative and musical, and it gets you out of the house, and perhaps…”

“Perhaps what?” I prompted when she didn’t finish her thought.
Please don’t go on about how Dan is such a nice man, Mum
.

“Perhaps it’ll take you out of yourself a little. I’m sure it’ll do you good.”

Exhaling softly so she wouldn’t hear my relief, I began explaining what I had been doing and what my plans and hopes were going forward. She didn’t ask about
Read London
, so I volunteered my reasons for not going back to my old career, and Mum understood.

“It’s probably not my place to say this, but I’ve been thinking for a while that going back to your old job might not be such a great idea.” She spoke hesitantly but firmly. “For what it’s worth, I think you are doing the right thing, trying something new. And if you can turn it into a paid position some time, ever so much the better. The only thing that worries me is…”

“Go on, Mum, you can say it, whatever it is,” I encouraged.

“If you’re sure… All right, I’m simply wondering how the job, were there to be one, would fit around the kids. Don’t sound engineers work crazy hours?”

They certainly did, and this was a worry that had been playing on my mind. I knew the hours Dan kept, and I knew a sound engineer had to be in the studio with the band at all times, so if that was going to be my chosen career, how would it work with family life? I hadn’t discussed this with Dan yet because, at the moment, the sound thing was merely a project, something that we did in the mornings for the fun of it. But if I wanted to take it further, how
would
I make it work?

“They
do
work crazy hours, Mum,” I admitted. “And I’ve no idea how that would work for Josh and Emily, but maybe I’ll figure it out. Or maybe I won’t, but for now, I’m simply enjoying learning a new trade. Who knows where it’ll take me.”

Mum broke into my little speech before I had an opportunity to get mired in self-defense. “It doesn’t really matter, does it?” she offered. “You don’t have to have it all figured out at all times, do you? Just go with the flow for a bit and let life come to you again. The rest will surely work itself out.”

Let life come to you again
. She certainly had a way with words. Her joy at talking with me frankly about new beginnings was touching, and I wondered how long
she
had been secretly hoping that I would shelve the grieving-widow act. We talked for another hour about the kids and school and all manner of inconsequential little things. I rang off excited, energized, and relieved. I had been so lost lately that it was good to get approval from people who cared about me; it was good to know I hadn’t lost my mind, and it was okay to start a new chapter of my life.

Chapter Fifteen

I was a little late getting to Dan’s house the following Monday morning. My alarm clock hadn’t gone off, probably because I had neglected to set it the night before. Josh had finally woken me up at quarter to eight, fully dressed and demanding his breakfast. The resulting madness had surpassed any previous Monday morning panic, and I felt grumpy and thoroughly discombobulated by the time I dropped Emily at playschool.

For the tiniest flicker of a moment, I considered bailing out of this morning’s sound engineering session, but I gave myself a stern ‘buck up’ talk. Needless to say, I was thoroughly disappointed when, after all that, I found Dan’s house empty. Well, empty of Dan, at least.

Jenny, the housekeeper, let me in and laughed good-naturedly at my disgruntled expression. “Steady on, love, Dan ain’t here,” she informed me.

My heart plummeted. After all this effort and stress, now I was to go home after all? But no.

“He’s left you something to do in that studio of his,” Jenny told me. She gave an indignant sniff. The studio was the only part of the house she wasn’t allowed to clean, and I didn’t think she had set foot in it in all the years that she had worked for Dan.

“Oh. Okay, so I’m supposed to go down there, am I?” I gabbled, slightly at a loss. “By myself, like, right now? Is that right?”

“Looks like it, dunnit?” Jenny concurred. “He must really trust you. The likes of me aren’t even allowed to open the door!”

I smiled. I didn’t think she was really upset. She normally quite enjoyed ribbing Dan about the sanctity of his studio. But she had hit the nail on the head; Dan really trusted me if he wanted me to work in there on my own. I didn’t know whether to laugh, cry, or turn tail. In the end, I did neither, but rather made my way downstairs to find out what Dan wanted me to do.

I found a hand-written note taped to the door.

Morning, sweetness
, it read.

Sorry I can’t be here this week. Jack has booked us into a studio in Seattle, but I’ll be back by the weekend. There’s some stuff for you to play with ~ show me what you can do! Loveya,

Dan XXX

I tore the note off the door and, with shaking hands, entered Dan’s sanctum and sat in his swivel chair to read his missive all over again. As I took in its full meaning, a bewildering range of emotions assaulted me, one after the other.

Disappointment featured high on the list, although I couldn’t work out what exactly I was disappointed about. Was it simply that I had been deprived of my routine morning task spent in agreeable company?

At the same time, I was touched. It was nice to be addressed with ‘sweetness’ and I simply adored the hastily scrawled kisses and the completely innocent,
loveya.
While there was
obviously
no deeper meaning, it was lovely that someone should care about me enough to use a term of endearment.

There was also a bit of anger in the mix. He had to have known about the Seattle trip for a while. In this day and age, you couldn’t decide on a Monday morning that it would be
quite
nice to go the States for a few days. You needed to book flights and arrange visas, and if the band were recording, they probably needed work visas, which took weeks,
months
to organize. So why hadn’t he told me? We had seen each other almost every day for the past few weeks. How could a
little
detail like a trip to Seattle have slipped his mind? He wasn’t a thoughtless person, or a mean one. Since Steve’s death, he had always made a point of keeping me informed of his travels lest I feel alone and abandoned, which was how I felt right now. So what had changed?

Had he deliberately set me up? But why? Had he perhaps not wanted to annoy me, or upset me? Well, I was more upset now than I would have been any other way.

I shook my head. It was a mystery, and would remain so until he got back. There really wasn’t much point in getting worked up. It was simply one of those Dan things.

Leaning back in the chair, I used the mixing console for a bit of leverage to give myself a good swivel round. Disappointed, touched, angry, alone, sad. And
anxious
. Dan wanted me to work on something. I was to manipulate the buttons and dials, faders and sliders, all by myself.

A flash drive sat on the side of the console. It was labeled,
Sophie’s Project,
yet there were no further notes or instructions, not even a song title. Reaching out, I touched the black plastic casing with my index finger.

“I am to do something with you,” I addressed it as though it could help me.

Turning the flash drive over and over, I had another swivel in the chair while I waited for my emotions to simmer down and an overriding response to emerge. When it did, it was excitement. I actually relished the thought of cutting my teeth as an independent sound engineer in the safety of Dan’s home studio. I was keen to find out what was on the flash drive and eager to do something with it.

Breathing deeply, I considered the best strategy. In past sessions, Dan had had me explore a number of ways ‘in’ to the song. We had played the song title association game; we had listened to a whole song before talking about it; we had played with a song on first hearing. I didn’t know which way I wanted to turn today, although song title association was not an option as Dan hadn’t given me one. A clue, perhaps, that he wanted me to listen to the song first? Or go straight into engineering?

I nibbled at my thumb.
Go with your instinct
, I heard Dan’s voice say in my head. My instinct was to get the song playing, first of all. Therefore, my task was to get the DAW working and the song transferred and playing.