The Sound of Letting Go (28 page)

I turn on my stereo,

let the car fill with the sounds of jazz.

I could dance, disappear into every note:

“So What”—the first track from
Kind of Blue
—

telling me, like it always does, to reach, to try, to go on.

“Miles Davis wasn’t just about his music,” I tell Dave.

“He was about his musicians,

the people he talked with through sound.

He chose people who would challenge him.

Make him better.”

He slides his hand along the back of my neck.

His fingers tangle into my hair.

“Like you make me.”

The grief of loss—

from divorce,

from sending away your only brother,

from running from a future you don’t want,

from trying to find hope, a dream,

after everyone gives up on you—

isn’t something that goes away.

It just evolves.

You have to return to whatever life you have left,

even if your ears cringe at the unaccustomed blare

of a normal-volume alarm clock

rousing you from bed in the morning;

even if your well-trained lungs struggle to fill with air,

or your body aches.

Dave waits, a little possessively, in the egg chair

while Cal and I complete our project

in the study room nearby.

Jeremy has become the son of a slave woman

and her red-haired master.

He has freckles, like Justine’s, over his nose

and a mute brother.

He is growing into our lives,

and we talk about him like we see him

standing in the study room before us.

“So, it’ll be all of a piece. Our slave, Jeremy,

on his first free Thanksgiving Day,

the first Thanksgiving Day since Lincoln declared it.”

Cal scribbles furiously onto a yellow notepad.

“I think there should be some ‘before.’”

I page through the books we’ve piled onto the table.

“Some explanation of the life he left.”

Cal nods. “And the after—

what he hopes freedom will bring.”

His eyes get that faraway look

that tells me he’s missing his little brother.

“Let’s give our slave a big dream. A big future.”

Justine and Ned

and Dave

come for dinner at my house.

It feels surreal, all of us sitting around the table,

with forks and knives.

Mom has even put out real glass tumblers

and flowers in the middle.

Dad helps her set the fancy ceramic tureen on a trivet,

fills our salad plates from the serving bowl.

We eat spicy black bean soup,

pungent with cilantro,

topped with crispy, organic corn tortilla chips,

and nobody minds the exotic smells,

the sound of crunching,

or the laughter.

We are a little cramped, six around the table,

but no one moves to the island.

“This feels like Thanksgiving!” I say.

“Better food, though. I hate turkey,” Dave adds,

with a nod of praise at my mother.

She dabs her linen napkin to her face

to hide her flattered smile.

Her eyes still flash the bewildered expression

she wore home from Holland House,

guilty to feel happiness, relief,

yet happy, relieved nonetheless.

Gratified by Dave’s compliment,

yet wishing, somehow,

to also be serving mac and cheese,

to be collecting pictures of a household of four

for her scrapbooks.

“Don’t expect me to cook like that, Dave.

I make music, not soup.”

I struggle to amuse her, mock a menacing fist,

then stop, let my fingers unfurl.

The memory of real violence in this kitchen is too close,

too clear.

Justine reaches across the table, squeezes my hand.

Changes topics in her imperious yet magical way.

“I’ve found two pink dresses

for the Black-and-White Dance.

I couldn’t decide which I liked best, so I bought both.

I’ll return whichever one I don’t wear.

Maybe you could come over this week and help me choose.

It’s less than two weeks away.”

“It’s good you never asked Cal O’Casey,” Ned comments

in his size-enormous-foot-in-mouth, Jasper-nosy way

that I only tolerate because I adore Justine.

“I hear he’s gotta go back to Ireland.”

“Why?” Dave asks.

“Mrs. Ackerman is pregnant, on bed rest,

and she and Mr. Ackerman can’t handle a houseguest

much longer.”

“Oh, the poor Ackermans,” Mom says.

“I’ll whip up a nice pie to bring over to them tomorrow.”

“It’s a shame,” I say,

despite Dave’s look of

I-know-she-said-they-were-music-friends-but-

I’m-seething-with-jealousy,

which doesn’t exactly make me sad.

“He’s an amazing saxophone player. Even Aggie says so.

You should hear him on the bari.”

“He must be good,” Mom says. “We all know

Daisy isn’t one to throw compliments around.”

“He’s that talented?” Dad asks.

“Enough to help us win Battle of the Bands in the spring,

if he could find a new place to stay,” I tell him.

In the long beat that follows,

Justine glares at Ned,

Dave stares curiously at me,

Mom looks confused,

and Dad clears his throat.

Then my nearly-silent-since-he-sent-Steven-away father speaks.

His voice sounds a little soft but decisive, matter-of-fact.

“Maybe this—Cal’s his name, right?—

maybe this Cal fellow could stay here next semester.

We’ve got an empty room.”

“But the Holland House people said that soon,

Steven might be able to come home for visits,”

Mom jumps in.

“Cal could sleep on the family room couch then.

Doubt he’d mind.

And Daisy and Evergreen High can win that band battle.

We can talk to Mr. Orson about it tomorrow.”

What words follow that?

Under the table, I pull Dave’s hand onto my knee,

lean my head on his shoulder.

Nobody quite knows what to say,

except my mother:

“I made peach upside-down cake

and homemade whipped cream.

Anyone still hungry?”

After Ned and Justine have said their good-byes,

Dave and I move to the family room.

The television is tuned to HBO,

where a movie starlet is slipping out of her dress.

Blushing, I turn the television off,

pretty sure now that cable doesn’t have all the answers about love;

ready to be a real girl, with a real boyfriend,

to make my own heat.

I drop beside him on the couch.

“I’m not crazy about Cal O’Casey

being your roommate,” Dave says.

“His dad wants him to leave America, give up on his dream.

I—we—know how terrible that feels.

We can’t let that happen.

Besides, you can trust me.”

“Oh, I trust you. It’s
him
 . . .”

I laugh and plant a kiss on his nose.

“Don’t worry, Dave.

My parents are experts at watching people,

and I couldn’t handle a complicated house.

I’m still getting used to feeling safe,

not having to ask permission to stay late

after school . . .”

“Well, I have something to ask you,” Dave says.

He scratches his head

until his hair goes from gorgeous to insanely goofy,

then takes my hands in his.

“I don’t have the money to rent a tux or anything, but

would you be my date to the Black-and-White Dance?”

I jump onto his lap like that night in the Fiesta,

run my fingers through his mane to set the goofy right.

I can meet Dave at the pits, have him take me to a dance,

kiss him knowing that my being out at night won’t

imprison Mom in our house,

that I won’t spend the hours afraid

that my parents are fighting,

that, maybe, they’ll be watching the clock,

waiting for me to get home on time.

They’re only a hallway away now, still,

I kiss my boyfriend’s warm mouth

with all the relief and longing

of a hallelujah because,

“Dave, I’d really like to be that.”