Harp's Song (6 page)

Leaning over to me, Connor scoops his arm under my legs and wraps his other arm around my shoulders. He places me on his lap and I curl myself into his chest, “Harp, I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you. I just want to protect you. I don’t know what I would do if something happened you.”

I put my hand on his chest, and look up at him, smiling into his beautiful, sincere face. “I love you too Connor. You’re my best friend.”

His expression changes from joy to confusion at my words. I don’t know what I’ve done but it doesn’t matter, he pulls me close to him again and we sit there in his room for a few minutes until my stomach growls. We laugh before leaving to get some food. Even then, that shift I felt this morning is back. I don’t know if it’s a shift in him, both of us or just me, but its presence is definitely there, thick and heavy like a hot humid summer day.

“Did you finish that paper for English?” Connor asks after I hop into his truck. Monday mornings are usually a little rough. Combine that with the paper that is due in English class today, and well, I knew he was going to be grumpy.

As much as Connor doesn’t like English, he does like Ms. Anderson—well, most of the guys in school like Ms. Anderson. She is younger than the other teachers, probably mid to late twenties, tall and thin with thick black hair, and piercing blue eyes. She always dresses in the latest trends—pencil skirts, skinny pants and heels—and needless to say, even if they hate English, the guys love being in her class. I am not sure they are learning much of anything with all the staring, and daydreaming they do though. Beyond her physical beauty, I really like her too—she’s a good teacher.

“Yeah. Did you stay up all night writing your paper?”

Rolling his eyes, he slumps himself over his steering wheel, “Yeessss … I don’t see the point though, it was a dumb assignment.”

I blatantly disagree with him. We had just finished reading one of the required books for the curriculum, and she was giving us a break to write about one of our favorite memories. We’d had a week to do the assignment, so I had done mine throughout the week and knew Connor would procrastinate and wait until Sunday night.

“Oh, so learning how to write and understand the English language is useless to you because you’re too good for it?” I throw back at him. I love teasing Connor about how much he hates English, only because next to music it is my favorite subject. The tables turn on me when it comes to math and science though. Connor is a brainiac in those subjects, and always has to help me with my homework in those classes.

“Seriously Harp? You gonna rag me about English on a Monday morning?” he says, shaking his head.

“Ok, ok, I’ll go easy on you—here,” I reply holding a blueberry muffin in his direction.

“Thanks! You’re the be…” he exclaims shoving the muffin in his mouth. I have an obsession with baked goods and almost every Sunday I make muffins, cookies, banana bread, whatever sounds good and then share it with Connor on the way to school. Plus, I always feel bad that he drives me to school and back every day, so I figure it’s the least I can do since he won’t accept gas money from me.

Pulling into a parking spot at school, I look around enjoying the normality of it all. Even though I’m not outgoing, I love being at school instead of my house. As soon as Connor gets out of his truck and starts walking toward the doors, ding-dong girls, or members of the baseball team accost him.

Connor had been scouted throughout his junior and senior years, finally accepting a scholarship to play for the University of North Carolina—which I am happy about because he’d had offers in California. Being that far away from him would have been horrific. While UNC isn’t around the corner, it is only eight or so hours from where I will be, and that I can handle.

I shake my head looking at Connor, who is surrounded by people as he walks to the doors, but as my best friend does every morning, he holds the door open and waits for me before we walk to our lockers. At the end of last year, Connor sweet-talked the office secretary into assigning our lockers next to each other … again.

Of course he did.

As we approach them, I see Ethan, which is unusual because his locker is in the other senior hallway, and we usually don’t see him until lunch.

“Hey man, what’s up?” Connor greets him as soon as he sees him.

“Hey,” he says nodding to Connor, “Hi Harp.”

“Hi Ethan, thanks again for your help Friday night.”

“Oh yeah, sure Harp, no big deal, but that’s why I’m here.”

Connor and I share a puzzled look, “What’s up?”

“Well, you know Justin’s cousin from the party?”

We both shake our heads.
How can I forget?

“He’s a new student here. He’s starting today. I saw him and Justin come in together this morning, and I wanted to tell you guys so you can keep an eye out for him.”

I am stunned because I thought Vincent looked older, but obviously I was wrong. Well, hopefully he will stay away from us, especially after Connor set him straight. I turn to open my locker and Ethan turns his back to me to continue talking to Connor. With the noise in the hall increasing and the way they are talking so low and closely with each other, I can’t hear what they are saying. I get my books and turn to them.

“Hey, I’m going to go to class, I’ll see you there in a few minutes.”

I can clearly see the worry in Connor’s face. I wonder what he and Ethan are talking about. I’m sure he’ll tell me once he gets to class.

“Ah, Miss Evans, you’re early today. Did you have a good weekend?”

“Hi, Ms. Anderson, yes, thanks.”

After we exchange greetings, I sit in my seat and re-read my paper for the hundredth time. I’m sure most of the kids had a hard time picking one favorite memory to write about because they have a lot of good memories to chose from. But I didn’t. I was always happy playing music, and had nice memories of amazing performances, but that wasn’t the same.

My happiest, most favorite memory was the vacation I went on with Connor’s family last summer. I’d enjoyed all of it, the drive there and back, and the three weeks we spent there. Especially our time at the beach lying out in the sand, swimming in the ocean and watching Connor and Patrick toss a football. Well, I mainly watched Connor toss the football, secretly fascinated with the way his stomach muscles stretched when he brought his arm above his head aiming his toss. Like I said, I’m not blind or dead. I understand why girls throw themselves at him, and I’m so thankful he’s my best friend.

Before we started the trip, I was filled with anxiety that my mom was going to change her mind, so it wasn’t until we were actually packed in the van, and on the highway that I started to relax. I’d never been outside of Iowa before, and as crazy as it sounds, I was looking forward to the almost seventeen hour drive. Connor hated it and now that he was old enough to drive, his mom made him take shifts with her so she didn’t have to do it all.

Our plan was to stop about halfway for dinner and stay the night in a hotel. It all seemed surreal to me and so … normal. Patrick and I played games for a long time, but after a while he fell asleep. Connor had just gotten done with his shift driving and was taking a nap too, so it was just Catherine and I awake. I put my headphones in and listened to my favorite classical pieces while I watched the other cars on the freeway. Sometimes, we would be next to cars with families, other times it was just truckers, or one or two people to a car. I found myself making up stories for all of them before wondering what their real story was.

I specifically remember one family driving alongside us—and like our car—most of the people inside were asleep, except for the driver and all but one of the kids. She was in the back of the station wagon probably only four or five years old. Her face was dirty and I could tell the family wasn’t very well off because the car was on the clunky side, but the little girl looked so happy. She was playing with a doll and I could see her lips moving like she was talking to it. As we started to pull away from them, she looked up and saw me. I’ll never forget the huge grin that spread across her face as she caught me staring at her before she waved.

I don’t know why that memory stuck with me, but I felt really at peace and happy for that little girl. I think it gave me some sort of hope that real happiness did exist and could exist for anyone. That had me thinking about what my story could be.

From an outsider’s perspective, it looked like we were a happy family—mom, sons and daughter on our way to vacation. That made me sad because it couldn’t have been farther from the truth. I was escaping my real life and had never been happier. How messed up was that? I promised myself not to think about my mom the whole trip, but instead to have fun and live the outsider’s story. Pretend to be part of the Williams’ family.

“You are not reading your paper again, are you? I’m sure it’s fine. You are such a perfectionist.”

I shake my head at Connor and smack his arm. Feigning injury, he rubs the spot where I hit him and frowns.

“Good morning everyone. Please pass your papers to the front of the class and then we’ll begin our lesson for the day,” Ms. Anderson addresses the class.

Grumbling can be heard throughout the room as people hand their papers to the person in front of them and so on until all the papers reach the person in the front of each row. Ms. Anderson collects them all and starts her lesson for the day. Once class is over, I get up and ask Connor what he and Ethan had been talking about.

“Nothing—gotta run, I forgot my history book in my locker so I’ll catch you at lunch.”

I watch Connor file out of the classroom and frown—something is up. He is definitely avoiding me. I wonder what else he and Ethan talked about, and when is he going to tell me.

I make it through second hour with the world’s most boring teacher, and I’m on my way to orchestra when I look up and see Vincent in the hallway coming toward me.
Crap
. I was really hoping to avoid him as much as possible. I put my head down hoping he hasn’t noticed me yet, and keep walking down the hall.

“Hi Harp.”

I glance up to find a sneering Vincent in my face. He laughs and tugs on a strand of my hair before continuing on his way to his next class.

Exhaling, I shake my head and think that it could have been a lot worse, but I am definitely going to find another way to get to orchestra, even if it does take me longer. Settling into my favorite class, I greet a few of the other students and am warming up when Mr. Holcomb comes in.

We do our scales before he has us play the piece we’ve been working on for our district competition. I am excited about it because I love it, but also because I have a solo. I love the phrasing of it, and how it fits within the whole composition. Once we’ve run through it and Mr. Holcomb is happy, he passes out new music that we work on until the bell rings. Since I have lunch next, I take my time putting my cello and music away.

“Harp, great job today,” Mr. Holcomb says without looking up.

“Thanks Mr. H, I really like the piece a lot.”

“How’s your solo going?”

“It’s coming along. I’ve got the music memorized so now I’m working on phrasing and interpretation. Should be ready by the competition.”

“Good, well, if you want to schedule any practice time after school, I’d be happy to listen and give you any thoughts I have that could help.”

“Yeah, thanks Mr. H, that’d be great. Maybe next week?”

“Sounds good, just sign up on the sheet taped to my office window and I’ll be there,” he says gathering his things and turning to go into his office.

Mr. Holcomb is my next favorite teacher after Ms. Anderson. He is also on the younger side, in his thirties, tall with brown hair and warm brown eyes. His primary instrument is the violin, but he can play just about anything, even some of the band instruments. He also teaches the music theory class I’m in. He is completely devoted to the music program and his wife even helps out a lot when we have performances off school property. Because they love what they do, they make our orchestra feel like one big family. I think that’s a big part of why we are the best in our district and arguably, the state.