7. Waiting for a Girl Like You
CHAPTER 7
Waiting for a Girl Like You
KEY
Fourteen Years Ago
“D usty, there you are,” I say, rushing up the balcony stairs to find her in the back row. It’s been a month since I saw her last. A month of sitting in school and wondering where she is and when I would see her again. “Why are you all the way up here?”
Her face lifts and she smiles when she sees me. Butterflies escape in my belly and I nearly trip over the last step. “Hey, Keith. I just wanted to be alone.”
“Oh.” I stop. “Do you want me to go?”
She shakes her head. “No, I was hoping you’d find me.”
I dip my chin and take the seat in the pew next to her. She’s wearing a blue dress today, and it makes her eyes shine brighter than I remember. I think of what my mom said on the ride home the day I met her. How her hair was unruly and wild. That she was glad Dusty wasn’t enrolled at my school, because she’d probably give lice to all the kids. But that’s not what I see at all.
I see an angel. But . . . something’s wrong.
“Hey,” I say pointing to her face. “What happened to you?”
She pulls her hair forward to cover the side of her face and the bruise on her temple. “Oh, nothing. I just . . . I tripped and hit my head on the edge of the counter. I’m fine.”
“Are you sure? That looks bad?—”
“I’m fine, Keith.” Her voice is hard, but she doesn’t yell.
I nod, swallowing down what I was going to say next. “I missed you the last few weeks. I thought maybe you were never coming back.”
She shrugs. “Mama left that night. After church that day.”
“I . . . what?”
“I-I think she knew she was leaving and wanted to talk to god or . . . ask forgiveness, maybe. But she’s gone,” she says, staring through the floor.
“Well, when is she coming back?” I ask, outraged.
She scoffs and shakes her head. “She’s not coming back.”
We’re quiet for a really long time. The truth is I have no idea what to say. There have been times when I’ve wished with all my heart my parents would disappear, but I can’t imagine them actually leaving me. Finally, Dusty sighs and blinks quickly.
“He feels guilty today. My dad,” she adds at my confusion. “He’s the reason she left. He’s the one who . . .” She almost touches her temple but stops herself. I understand enough, though. That her dad did that to her. That he hurt her. I could kill him. “Anyway,” she continues, “he must feel guilty because how else could I have gotten him to agree to church when he hates it so much?”
“Yeah,” I offer. What else can I possibly say?
“I heard you sing today,” she says suddenly, and I sit up in surprise. “You’re really a very good singer.”
Heat creeps into my cheeks. “Yeah?”
She nods and smiles, the first real smile she’s given me since I sat down. “It was my favorite part of today, listening to you sing.”
I rub the back on my neck at the compliment. “I write music sometimes. In my head, or on the piano at home. It’s not church music though, so they’d never let me sing it here.”
Her eyebrows lift and I catch the flinch as her bruise contorts. “Really? What kind of music?”
I shrug. “I don’t really know. Just melodies and some lyrics. My parents won’t let me practice anything that isn’t a hymn in the house.”
At this her eyes seem to light up. “Oh, is it a secret?”
“Yeah, I guess it is,” I say, smiling at her enthusiasm.
“I love secrets. Will you sing something you wrote for me?” she asks.
Those fluttering butterflies in my stomach turn into a full-blown tornado. “Oh, I uh . . . I don’t know?—”
“Come on, please?” She pouts and bats her long eyelashes. “For me?”
I don’t think I could deny her anything—even if she asked for the cross on the top of the roof, I’d find a way to get it for her. And if it’ll help keep that smile on her face after all she’s gone through . . . “Okay,” I say, grabbing the notebook from my back pocket and flipping it open. “But remember, these are just rough ideas.”
She turns and crosses her legs under her skirt on the pew next to me as her finger twists in the gold chain around her neck. Her hands come up under her chin, giving me her full attention, and I take a deep breath. My hands shake as I try to hold the paper still, but after two attempts to sing, my voice finally works. I have to be quiet. The congregation echoes below us for the after service social and the ceilings are too vaulted and might carry the sound. So I half sing, half whisper the melody that’s been churning in my head for months.
The words that seemed like poetry when I wrote them down suddenly feel juvenile and stupid on my tongue, but I push on anyway because Dusty is watching me, waiting. I wish I had my piano. It would be so much better if I could play the notes at the same time. When I finish, I let the notepad fall into my lap and my face scrunches as I wait for her verdict.
“Wow,” she says breathlessly. “You wrote that?”
The muscles in my face relax. “Yeah, I guess I did.”
“Are you sure? It sounds like a grown up wrote it.”
Heat flares in my cheeks. “I wrote it. I swear.”
She examines me carefully. “Well, it’s amazing.”
Something sticks in my throat. “You really think so?”
She nods. “Absolutely. Totally groovy. People should call you Key. Like piano keys.”
I grin so wide my cheeks pinch. I’ve never had a nickname before. “I like it. Don’t think my parents will though.”
“We can use it just between us then.”
“Okay.”
“I think if you had some guitar and drums,” she continues, “it could be on the radio someday.”
I tear the page from my notebook and hand it to her. “Here.”
Her smile fades. “What?”
“I want you to have this,” I say, holding the paper out to her.
“But, you need it. To turn it into a real song.”
I shake my head. “No need. I’ve got it locked tight up here,” I say, tapping at my forehead. “Come on, I want you to have it. You’re the first person I’ve ever told about it.”
“Me?”
Nodding, I take her hand and press the paper into her palm. She stares at it for a long moment, and I start to think maybe she doesn’t want it. That she’s just being nice. That she’s just spying on me, and will end up telling my parents about what I’ve been doing in secret.
“Why are some of these letters mixed up?”
My stomach drops like a lead balloon, hurtles through the floor to drag me down under the earth. What was I thinking? Giving her something I wrote? I’m such an idiot. Now she’s going to think I’m stupid just like everyone else does. She’ll never want to talk to me again. I reach for the page and try to take it back.
“Actually, I need that back?—”
But she holds it out of my reach. “And some of these words are . . .” She looks at me and tilts her head. “But your songs. They sound?—”
I lower my head into my hands and sigh. “I swear I wrote them.”
“I believe you,” she insists. “You sometimes talk like a grown up. You sound smart.”
“No one else thinks I am. All they see is this . . .”
She twists her lips. “It’s not so bad. Yeah, some of the letters are in the wrong places, but it’s still?—”
“It’s terrible! I know, trust me, I know!” I blurt out. “And I try so hard but I don’t know why, my brain just gets jumbled up sometimes. I don’t even realize I’m doing it. I tried to explain to my parents. I study every day but my marks are always so bad they don’t believe me, and then . . .” I hold out my hands and turn them over, showing her my palms. The red scars criss-cross my skin. “My dad, he—well . . . he says this will help me learn.”
She lowers her outstretched arm and places the page on her lap. Her hand takes one of mine, her finger gently brushing over the jagged lines. I flinch away as she traces a particularly rough ridge.
“Don’t be ashamed,” she tells me, low.
I shake my head. “They’re ugly.”
“No, they’re part of you. That makes them beautiful. Also,” she says, looking at me through her long eyelashes, “no one who composes songs like that can be stupid.”
Her words are like ice cream on a hot day. Sweet and soothing. No one’s ever made me feel good about myself before. “I listen to the radio a lot,” I admit. “ The National Radio Theater , NPR and stuff. It’s easier for me to learn when I can listen.”
She smiles. “Maybe I need to start listening to the radio too. I don’t want to fall behind you.”
Our hands linger for as long as I dare until I awkwardly pull mine away, my palm suddenly sweaty. She picks up the page and holds it out for me.
“Here. You can have it back if you really want it.”
I bite my lip and make a choice. “No. No, you can have it.”
“I can?” She holds it to her chest and smiles. “Thank you. I’ll keep it safe.” She tucks it into her pocket and it feels as if she’s tucked away a piece of my heart too.
“Okay,” I start. “Your turn now.”
Her eyes widen. “What?”
“I told you my secret. Now you need to tell me one of yours. It has to be even.”
“I don’t have any secrets.”
As my head tilts, I pull my legs up, my toes pointing toward her. “Come on, you must have one.”
A pretty blush spreads across her cheeks. “Well, there is something.”
I clap my hands. “Tell me.”
“But you have to promise you won’t tell anyone, okay?”
Holding out her hand, her pinky finger lifts and she waits, eyes serious. I hook my pinky with hers and nod. “I swear to never tell another living soul.”
She sighs. “I want to be an actress.”
“An actress?”
“Like Grace Kelly. She’s so beautiful and talented. Do you know she married a prince? She’s like a real life Cinderella.”
I stare at her beautiful face. Her freckles and her button nose. Her red hair that seems as untamable as the wind.
“Actually,” she adds. “Just anything to do with movies. They’re my favorite thing in the world.”
“You could do it,” I say.
She shakes her head. “No, I couldn’t.”
“Why not?”
“Daddy would never let me. He hates Hollywood.”
I shrug. “Maybe when you’re older you can go.”
“Go where?”
“To Hollywood! Run away and be an actress and marry a prince.”
She grins. “Would you come with me?”
My eyebrows lift. “Me?”
“You can sing your music and I’ll be in movies and we can live happily ever after.”
I can almost see it. The two of us running away and hopping on a bus to California. We’d be celebrities and kids everywhere would hope they could be us. But then I think of how far away that is. She grabs my hand and my fingers slip through hers.
“Promise we’ll do it someday,” she whispers. “Promise we’ll do everything we want to do.” Her necklace swings forward and I can see the little golden sun. It sparkles as it catches the light from a nearby window and reminds me of the first time I ever saw her. How her hair was like a glowing halo of sunlight.
I realize then and there that I would wait an eternity to make her dreams come true. I squeeze her hand. “I promise.”