7. Chapter Seven
Chapter Seven
The next morning, Callie was still tuning up the instruments when she heard a light knock at the boathouse door. She smiled warmly at Danny, who took a tentative step inside. He didn’t meet her eyes, and he hovered near the door as if things had changed, now that their meetings were official. Roscoe broke the ice by padding over and nudging Danny until he came the rest of the way inside. Then he resumed his napping position and thumped his tail a few times on the floor.
“Hey, Danny-boy,” she said. “Come on over here and tune up your guitar.” She patted the seat beside her, and Danny brightened. He seemed relieved, ready to follow her cues. Taking the lead was an odd role for Callie. She had been content for too long to follow the lead of someone else. Yet here she was, putting Danny at ease. It felt good.
He managed to get his arms around the full-size guitar, but she made a mental note to ask her father if they could borrow a smaller one from the school.
“Have you ever used one of these before?” she asked, holding up a tuning fork.
He shook his head .
“Well then you’re in for a treat. We’re going to tune our instruments the old-fashioned way.”
He looked skeptical.
“Once you learn how to tune this way, you can tune anywhere, anytime, even if you don’t have one of the fancy electronic tuners with you. Like now, for example. Do you have a tuner in your pocket?”
He shook his head again, looking sheepish.
“Me either. I guess we’ll have to make do with this old thing. Okay?”
“Okay,” he answered, lifting her spirits with a single word. She swallowed hard and continued the lesson.
“Hold it by the handle,” she began, handing him the ancient tuning fork. “Try not to touch the top part, where it splits into two, or the ball on the end of the handle. And hold it gently—no squeezing—so it can vibrate.”
He held it gingerly, as if it might break.
“Now hit the top part on something hard, like the back of the bench.”
She laughed at the surprised expression on his face.
“Go on, silly. You won’t break it.”
He shrugged, then hit the top part on the bench, which started the vibration.
“Now touch the ball to your earlobe, while it’s still vibrating.”
Danny gave her a ‘you must be joking’ look.
“Seriously, touch it to your ear. Quickly, before it stops.”
He clearly didn’t believe her, but he lifted it anyway and touched the ball at the end of the handle to his earlobe. He jumped, startled, and then laughed.
“It works!”
Callie laughed, too.
“Of course it works. Try it again, but this time, after you hear the note, hum it back to me. ”
When he had mastered catching the note on his ear, she showed him another trick.
“This time, instead of touching the ball to your ear, try touching it to the body of your guitar.”
He did as she asked, without the skepticism this time, and laughed delightedly when the guitar sang the note back to him.
“The tuning fork is giving you an A. Now all you need to do is make sure that your A-string matches it.”
She gave him a few minutes to practice catching the note—sometimes on his guitar and sometimes on his ear—then humming it back and adjusting the tuning on the A-string.
“Can you hear the way your humming and the guitar oscillate together?” she asked.
“What’s ‘oscillate’?” he asked.
“It’s the vibration of the note in the air,” she answered. “Keep humming while you’re tightening the peg, and listen to the way the two notes interact.” She reached over to loosen up his string a bit. “Try it again,” she instructed.
He did as she asked, and she let him listen before she continued.
“Right now, the notes are close but just different enough that it sounds like they’re fighting with each other. Can you hear that?”
He nodded.
“Good. This time, keep listening as you tighten the peg. When it sounds like the two notes have relaxed together—like they’re not fighting anymore—you’ll know that they’re in tune with each other.”
His freckled face scrunched up as he caught his note and then concentrated on doing all three things at once: humming, tightening, and listening to the oscillation. After a moment, he looked up at her in triumph.
“I did it!” he crowed. “I tuned the A-string.”
She grinned back at him .
“Yes, you did,” she agreed, then jumped at the knock on the door. Roscoe barked half-heartedly from the floor, once again displaying his complete lack of watchdog skills.
It was Adam, and he was carrying a guitar case. For a moment, Callie had the sinking feeling that he was going to intrude on the lessons, but then she got a good look at the guitar case. She smiled, motioning for him to come inside. That was an awfully small guitar for a full-grown man.
“Good morning,” said Adam. “I’m sorry to intrude, but I thought you might need this.” He held up the case. Danny looked mystified. Callie wanted to hug him.
“What a nice surprise!” she exclaimed. “I was just thinking that my guitar was a little much for Danny. Why don’t we take a look at what you’ve got there?”
Callie rearranged the instrument cases on the floor to make an open space in front of Danny, and Adam laid the case at his feet, snapping open the latches and revealing a gorgeous three-quarter size acoustic guitar.
“It’s perfect,” she breathed, amazed that Adam would know how to choose the right guitar.
Adam got pink around the ears. “I had help,” he admitted. When she raised a brow in question, he continued. “Your dad told me what to look for, which music shop would have it, everything.”
She nodded. Of course her father would offer good advice on instrument selection, but when had they spoken? How had she missed it?
Danny picked the guitar up reverently and placed the strap over his shoulder. He reached for the tuning fork and immediately began tuning the A-string. Callie could tell that Adam was impressed by Danny’s quiet confidence and his newly acquired skills.
Adam had remained on one knee after opening the guitar case, observing Danny without towering over him. Danny had eyes only for the guitar, paying no attention to the adults in the room. Once he had tuned the string to his satisfaction, he turned expectantly to Callie, anxious to learn the next steps. Adam stood abruptly, his expression closed.
“I won’t stay,” he said gruffly, ruffling Danny’s hair. “Just wanted to make sure the guitar worked out.” He moved toward the door and Callie’s heart ached for him. He so clearly wanted to connect with Danny, but didn’t know how to make it happen.
Callie poked Danny and gestured toward Adam, silently pushing Danny to say something. He looked confused, so she mouthed the words, “Say thank you!” to him.
He looked panicked, and shook his head no. She nodded vigorously back, determined to win the silent debate before Adam left. When Danny looked like he was going to be stubborn, she put her fiddle aside, leaned back, and crossed her arms, clearly signaling that she wouldn’t play if he wouldn’t say ‘thank you.’
Adam was opening the door. It was now or never. Danny gave her a grumpy look, then cleared his throat. At the sound, Adam paused and looked back over his shoulder.
“Thank you,” said Danny, his voice so soft that Callie could hardly hear him. But he had said it—out loud—and Adam had heard him. Several different expressions chased across Adam’s face before he smiled at Danny.
“You’re welcome,” he replied. He met Callie’s eyes and gave her a silent nod before making his exit.
When he had gone, Danny turned back to Callie and gave her a ‘Happy now?’ kind of look. He was clearly impatient to play. She placed her fiddle back in its case and picked up her guitar. Now that they had two guitars to work with, she knew exactly what they would play this morning.
Before they resumed the tuning lesson she said, “Thank you for saying thanks to your uncle. I know you don’t talk much, but it’s really important to let people know you appreciate them. Otherwise they might think you don’t care.”
He was quiet for a moment.
“Sometimes it’s hard to talk,” he whispered.
“I know,” she said softly. “But when it’s important, you need to speak up.”
Instead of going back to the cottage, Adam headed for the barn. He couldn’t sit still while his whole future rested in Callie’s hands. He needed to do something.
He found himself fascinated by this all-grown-up Callie. She had always reminded him of a rushing stream, full of life and tumbling headlong toward her future, whatever it might hold. But she had changed. All that rushing and tumbling had filled a pool so deep and so still that he couldn’t tell what she was thinking or feeling. He needed to know, and not just because of Danny.
He had made cautious progress on the Speakeasy over the past week, completing some smaller sections before he tackled the rebuild of the damaged stern. Adam chased away thoughts of Danny and Callie by getting to work. If he could fill his mind with the details of the restoration, there would be no room left for what-ifs or regrets. He removed the transom bow carefully. Most of the hardware had rusted, and the wood around it was crumbled and rotten, requiring him to get creative in order to remove it intact. Once freed, he cradled the wood gently so it wouldn’t crumble before he could measure out the new planking for its replacement. Rather than steam-bending a large beam, he planned to laminate four three-quarter-inch mahogany planks together. The process would be simpler, and in the end the four planks working together would be stronger than a single beam on its own .
It was the layout tool that derailed him. He grabbed it without thinking, using it to pinpoint the holes for the dowels that would anchor the four planks together. As he marked the final hole location, he was distracted be the sight of his father’s hand, holding the tool. He blinked and the hand was his own again, but the haunting image remained. His gut twisted, and he dropped the tool. He had to get the hell out of the shop.
Outside, the cool air helped, but he couldn’t purge the picture from his mind. He strode to the crest of the hill and looked out over the water. He was not his father. He might have the old man’s hands, and he might use the old man’s tools, but that did not require him to follow the same path. It did not automatically make him a drunk, or a monster. Genetics was not destiny.
He could almost feel Evan’s hand on his shoulder.
‘Take it easy, man. He’s dead. He can’t hurt us anymore.’
Adam barked out a laugh of disbelief. He shrugged off his brother’s comfort, as he had so many times when Evan was still alive, and headed down the hill. But Evan’s ghost wouldn’t give up so easily, dogging Adam as he hauled open the garage door on the boathouse and dragged out the kayak. It would take only another moment or two before he could escape onto the calm surface of the water.
‘You can do this. I know you can, ’ Evan’s voice whispered as he folded himself into the kayak.
Adam dug in with the paddle, his powerful strokes launching it away from the shoreline—and his memories—as fast as he could go.
‘We’re counting on you.’
The echo of Evan’s voice chased him across the water, but he outran it, stopping only when he reached the center of the lake. He rested the paddle across the cockpit rim, his breathing ragged. He stared unseeing at the far shore. Instead of water and trees, he saw the dusty gloom of their secret hideout under the basement stairs. When things got bad—which they had on a regular basis—he and Evan would crawl through the gap in the drywall and wait out the storm. Mom would fade away to the land of happy-pills. Dad’s rage would eventually blow over and he would pass out in front of the TV. While they waited, Evan and Adam would tell each other stories of the ‘opposite life.’ One day, they would both be free. They would get good jobs. They would marry strong, brave girls—girls who didn’t run away from problems, or take pills to make them disappear. They would keep their children safe. They would never, ever hit their children. They would live in clean houses with sparkly kitchens like the ones on the TV commercials. Their refrigerators would be full, and they would never forget to make dinner. In fact, they would sit down to a family dinner every night. With dessert. On the weekends they would visit each other. Maybe they would even live on the same block. Their wives would make cookies for the kids, and Evan and Adam would teach the kids how to play basketball.
Adam shook off the memories, only to be confronted by a more recent image. He saw the hospital room where he had said goodbye to Evan, gripping his hand and promising that he would give Danny an opposite life, just like they had planned.
He could do it. Adam knew he could do it, but he didn’t know how to do it alone.
Now Callie had come home, along with a boatload of memories, and thrown him a lifeline. But at what cost? Did it matter?
Turning the kayak back toward home, Adam made his decision. His best chance of connecting with Danny was to spend more time with Callie. Danny was different around Callie, and she might be the bridge that they needed. He would have to get comfortable with all his old baggage because nothing—not even the risk of ripping open old wounds—was more important than Danny.
Callie was just grabbing lunch when she heard a car coming down the driveway. Dora walked into the kitchen looking smug.
“That must be your sisters.”
“Great,” she said weakly, as her stomach sank down to her toes. After a year and a half of being treated like distant cousins, her sisters would not be satisfied with a nice chat over lunch. They would get her away from Mom and Dad and have her spilling her guts within the hour.
A car door slammed. The next few minutes were lost in a flurry of greetings and hugs and fussing over Roscoe. He could not have been happier.
When they were all settled around the kitchen table, Callie realized they had each taken their usual spots, seamlessly picking up the rhythm of family life that extended back as far as she could remember. Until this moment, she had felt disconnected from all her former selves, stretched too thin over too much time. But now, like the figures in a human paper-chain doll, all her former selves slammed back together in a rush. She felt like herself again, the last year and a half of self-imposed isolation somehow irrelevant.
She could sense her sisters’ questions bubbling beneath the surface of the conversation, but they would have to wait. Mom and Dad didn’t need to know all the details.
“You really didn’t have to come up,” said Callie, feeling unexpectedly weepy. “I could just as easily have come down to the city to see you.”
Mel snorted. “Like that would ever happen.”
Callie couldn’t think of a snappy comeback. Really, what could she say? Mel was right. Ever since things with Brian had gotten really bad, Callie had pulled back, as if not talking about it would make things more bearable. Besides, there was a limit to how many times she could stand to hear ‘I told you so. ’
After lunch, her sisters insisted that they wanted to take advantage of the nice weather and build a bonfire down at the fire pit before dinner. Callie allowed herself to be dragged outside. She gathered an armful of logs from the woodpile while Tessa and Mel grabbed their jackets from the car. They grabbed something else as well: stacks and stacks of newspapers. Tabloids, to be precise. Callie groaned.
Not ready to discuss it, she marched ahead of them down to the fire pit and began arranging the logs. They didn’t say anything either, at first. They simply twisted each tabloid into a neat tube and tucked it in between the logs. When they had finished, Mel pulled a lighter from her pocket, snapped the flame to life, and touched it to one of the tabloids. Then she sat back on the log bench and the three of them watched the fire grow.
Tessa was the first to break the silence.
“Want to tell us what’s really going on?” she asked.
Callie thought about not answering. Somehow the feeling of shame and failure was stronger here, under a clear sky, than it had been down in Nashville. But she had been in denial for too long. The time had come to be honest, with her sisters and with herself.
“Brian and I have been living a carefully negotiated lie for a while now. We put on a good show for the press, but in private we’ve led separate lives. One of the terms of our truce was discretion in personal relationships. That’s been easy for me. I don’t have anything to be discreet about.” She made a face. “Brian, on the other had, can’t seem to keep his pants zipped if there’s a camera around. Frankly, I’m sick of playing the long-suffering, ever-loyal woman.”
“What an ass,” said Mel.
“What made this last time different from the others?” asked Tessa gently. Callie smiled at that. All the years of training to be a counselor had left Tessa unable to express an opinion. All she could do was ask open-ended questions.
“I don’t know,” answered Callie. “There’s just something about not being able to use my voice that makes me crazy. So I left. My voice needs a break, and so do I.”
“And then what?” asked Tessa.
“And then I go back,” said Callie simply “This is our moment. I need to ride the wave with the band for a few years before I can strike out on my own. In the meantime, I need to stay strong.”
“In the meantime,” said Mel, “we need to kick Brian’s ass.” She poked at the fire and it blazed higher.
“Where did you get all these papers anyway?” asked Callie, neatly redirecting the conversation. Mel was a fighter. She would never understand Callie’s need for harmony.
Tessa and Mel exchanged conspiratorial looks.
“The gas station,” admitted Tessa.
“The one in town?” asked Callie. “Ugh. I didn’t think the poison had spread this far north.”
“We didn’t want them corrupting local youth with stories of celebrities behaving badly,” said Mel. Callie laughed.
“Speaking of local youth,” said Tessa, “Mom said that you’re giving music lessons to Danny Reese.”
Callie stilled. A part of her really didn’t want to talk about Danny—or Adam—with anybody, not even her sisters.
She nodded slowly. “That’s right.”
“Who takes care of Danny now?” asked Tessa. “We came up for the funeral last summer….”
“Adam is taking care of Danny now,” she answered, keeping her face expressionless.
“Well that’s an interesting development,” said Mel. Callie shot her a look, but couldn’t be sure what she was implying.
“How do you feel about seeing Adam again?” asked Tessa, in full-on counselor mode .
Suddenly Callie felt surrounded. Suffocated. She had never told them anything. How could they possibly know?
“What are you talking about?” she asked, sounding too defensive. She had given herself away.
“We’re not idiots, you know,” said Mel. “Something happened between you and Adam. Sure, it was a long time ago, but these things leave their mark.”
“I don’t—I mean, we never— arggghhh! ” sputtered Callie, burying her face in her hands. “How could you guys possibly know anything about it?” Her voice was muffled by her hands.
“We didn’t need a full confession to know that something was going on,” began Tessa.
“Of course we knew,” said Mel. “Do you have any idea how many times we covered for your sorry butt?”
Callie picked her head up.
“You did?” she asked.
Tessa nodded.
“First we thought it might be Evan,” continued Mel, “but he was always stuck on Lainey. It didn’t take long to figure out who turned you into a space cadet.”
“But I thought—”
“No, you really didn’t,” said Mel. “Adam would show up and your brain would shut off.”
Tessa smiled.
“We worried about you when he left for that overseas job,” she said.
“You did?” Callie couldn’t quite absorb the idea that they had known all along.
They nodded.
“Oh,” was all she could think to say.
“So I’ll ask you again,” said Tessa. “How do you feel about seeing Adam again?”
Callie would love to know the answer to that one.
“It’s complicated,” she hedged .
“Isn’t it always?” asked Tessa.
“What do you want me to say?” asked Callie. “That I still have feelings for him? Fine, I do. I just don’t know what they are. I’m not even sure I want to know.”
“So how does this affect your time away from the band?” asked Tessa. “Would you call it a welcome distraction or an unwanted complication?”
“I don’t know,” said Callie. “Do we really need to answer that question today?”
Tessa backed off. Mel poked at the fire again. As Callie watched the flames climb higher, she thought about the tiny flame that had carried her nine-year-old wishes up into the sky. Technically, one part of her wish had come true. She made music for a living, and that was no small feat. Maybe, instead of whining about the rest of her life, she should focus on the things that had gone right.
Maybe she should write herself a theme song. “Down in Flames”? “Up in Smoke”? Maybe “Crash and Burn.” She smiled wryly to herself. There was a song here in the fire somewhere. Maybe, once she had the damn thing written down, she could rise like a phoenix from the ashes and start over.