Chapter 10 The Song of Nora and Raul
TEN
THE SONG OF NORA AND RAUL
SEBASTIAN
As I closed the door of the rental Volkswagen behind me, I could only see Mila and Mom standing in the driveway, waving.
I’d hoped Alex would come downstairs one last time, but maybe it was for the best that he didn’t.
Nothing would’ve changed. All I could do now was to keep my promises once I got back to Las Vegas.
I settled into the backseat next to three backpacks and a guitar case that certainly hadn’t been there when we arrived at the airport.
Raul ran his fingers over his goatee before shifting the gear into drive.
Instead of returning his right hand to the wheel, he moved it onto Nora’s knee in the passenger seat, caressing it gently.
The car rattled as we slowly rolled down the gravel road.
“What’s with the new luggage?” I asked.
“You won’t believe what we found in that antique store,” Nora replied.
Her red hair band brushed against the headrest as she turned around and beamed at me.
“It’s an original Gibson. Standard model from freaking 1958.
They had no idea what it was. The woman running the place told me it had been sitting in a corner for years.
Best four hundred dollars I’ve spent in my life. ”
“Are you shitting me?” In good condition, the guitar would be worth ten times what she paid for it. “What store?”
“I don’t know. It was the little shop next to the road, the one…” She twisted her head and looked out over the valley, trying to find the right direction to point—only to shake her head after a few seconds. “Somewhere around here. Everything looks the same, so it’s hard to tell.”
“It does, doesn’t it?” The whole area was just mountains and trees, so it was easy for someone unfamiliar with it to get lost. Back when the hotel was still open, local volunteers hiked through the mountains every day to help lost visitors.
I went once with my dad when I was eleven or twelve.
That day, I wandered off, completely confident in my navigation skills, and got hopelessly lost. It took me three hours to find a road, and then another thirty minutes before someone noticed me walking along it and gave me a ride home.
Dad didn’t let me out of his sight for years after that.
“Not that Seastone is ugly or anything,” Nora added.
There was a time when I loved the view of the mountains and the trees.
When I was still a kid, I stared at them from my room every morning for a few minutes, enjoying the peaceful bliss of easier times.
But since those were the only things I saw every day, I began to wonder what else was out there.
Moving away was a hard step, one I felt I had to fight for with every ounce of will I had—which makes sense to me now, since there were literal mountains to cross.
Now, every time I come here, it feels like I’m taking a step back.
It’s as if this place tries to lure me back in and persuade me that it’s nice and cozy and that nothing that happens outside matters.
But that’s not what real life is like. Everything matters.
There are so many more places to see and things to do out there that Seastone could never offer.
“How was it, guapo?” Raul asked, using that word again that he only used for me when he thought I needed some soothing.
Guapo. Handsome. He calls Nora the same thing every other sentence.
He started saying it to me after I cried about never finding someone to flirt with me the way he did with her. “Did they spare you the trauma?”
His question brought the weight back onto my shoulders. I had opened up to the two of them before we came here, which had led to our decision to come together.
“No, they did not,” I said. But I didn’t regret coming here.
Now that it was over, things were different.
I got to see another side of my Dad—the fun one he shows everyone but me—which made me at least question whether there was more to him than I had thought.
I wasn’t mad at my sister anymore for all her sarcastic comments over the years.
Seeing my mom’s sadness made me swear to call her more often.
And I met someone I already missed more than was probably good for me.
“Vale, it’s over now,” Raul added, stepping on the gas as he merged onto the highway. “So off to Ashbourne we go.”
“Fuck yeah!” Nora howled, beating her hands against the dashboard. “I’ve got quite the evening planned for us.”
We sped past a faded sign with a painted image of a deer family standing in front of pine trees and mountains. Above it, in bold letters, was written:
See you soon in Seastone!
Those words lingered with me for a while, because when I came here yesterday, I was sure this would be my last visit for a long time. Now, thanks to Alex, I wasn’t so sure about that anymore.
The moment I saw the flashing neon light in the shape of a microphone above the door, I tightened my grip on the straps of my backpack, ready to throw it at Nora.
She had played me. Hard. And I wasn’t allowed to complain.
I looked daggers at her while she hid half her body behind Raul, grinning smugly.
“Don’t look at me like that. It was your idea to divide the planning between all of us.” Her head tilted between the entrance and me. “Besides, this is one of the highest-rated places in this town.”
“I haven’t even said anything. Yet.”
Raul’s eyes darted between her and me. “Can someone fill me in?”
“She!” I raised my voice and pointed at her, which caused her to giggle and hide behind Raul. “She always tries to convince me to sing in front of her.”
“Why?” Raul looked over his shoulder, making her duck down further.
“Because she once eavesdropped on me when I thought I was home alone,” I explained. “And ever since then, she keeps bugging me about it.”
Her plan was actually genius. In a karaoke bar, you had to present your voice to the world.
It didn’t matter if you were good or bad; you had to shake off all your social inhibitions and let loose, if you didn’t want to be a spoilsport—and Nora knew I’d do whatever it took to avoid that label.
But she hadn’t seen what I was capable of yet.
Maybe I’ll choose a screamo song or one of those irritating nursery rhymes.
Nora slid past us and hurried into the foyer toward the hostess, clearly anticipating that I wasn’t going to make a scene in front of a stranger.
Raul grabbed the door before it closed and motioned for me to go in first. “Friends can be weird, no?”
As I walked past him, Raul threw his arm around my shoulder.
Even after knowing each other for six months, I still wasn’t used to it.
He did it on the first night we met at a club when I was out with Nora, and I misinterpreted it badly.
It wasn’t until the next morning that I found out why he didn’t return any of my advances—when he walked out of Nora’s room wearing only his boxer shorts.
Ever since then, he had been a regular guest at our place, which I liked.
Because first, he wasn’t shy about walking around in his underwear, even though he knew I was gay, and second—which was my actual reason—Nora had been smiling a lot more since he came into her life.
The hostess, a woman around our age with a nose ring, smiled at us. “Just the three of you?”
“Yes,” Nora replied, clinging to the countertop of the hostess stand as if it could save her from my wrath.
“Perfect. You’ve got booth number ten. Please follow me.”
She handed each of us a pair of earplugs that had the same microphone as the neon sign printed on them.
I put them in my jacket pocket. We followed her through a small, wooden-paneled corridor with indirect lighting.
For a karaoke bar, it was surprisingly quiet, but when we walked past the doors on our left and right, I understood why.
Through the windows in the doors, we could see disco lights filling the room, food and drinks on tables, and people singing their hearts out.
“Is this your first time with us?” the hostess asked.
“It’s our first time in town,” Nora replied. “At least, for him and me.” She pointed at herself and Raul, then nodded toward me. “You’ve probably been here before, huh?”
“In Ashbourne, more times than I can count. Not in this bar, though.”
“It’s good that you finally made it here!” The hostess pulled open the door with the number ten emblazoned above it. “After you.”
We walked past her into the small room, and Raul released me from his embrace.
In the right corner were two benches, each big enough to seat four people, surrounding a table with a built-in display.
On the opposite side of the room, a screen welcomed us with soothing images of cherry blossoms against the backdrop of Mount Fuji.
In front of the screen, a microphone waited for a lucky person to show off their talent.
Nora and Raul squeezed themselves onto the bench opposite the door, and I made myself comfortable on the other bench.
The hostess positioned herself in front of the table. “Welcome to The Toshiro Karaoke Bar. Inspired by the Japanese tradition of private booth karaoke, you get to spend an evening full of entertainment. Let me show you how it works.”
She leaned over the table and walked us through the karaoke machine’s menu.
The display had two main functions: selecting songs and choosing whether to play them in karaoke or music video mode, as well as ordering food and drinks, so we wouldn’t have to wait for a server to check in on us between songs.
“If you need any assistance, you can also press this button to call your waiter.” She pointed to the blue silhouette of a person in the upper right corner of the screen. “Any questions?”
We all looked at each other, and eventually Nora spoke up. “No, thank you.”