The Funeral Singer (14 page)

“No, not Maria. Sadie.”

“Sadie? As in goth girl Sadie?” She’d never sung solo in her life, and now she was going to sing my lines at All State? “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

“Come on, Mel. She’s good.”

“She’s good? Did you really just say that?”

“What do you want me to say? She
is
good. And she works hard.”

I hung up.

The bus was pulling up at the stop ahead, so I broke into a run. “Summer” sounded again. I ignored it. Pete was my best friend in chorus. If Ms. Jensen ever even thought of giving one of his parts to someone else, I’d be livid. I’d protest. I’d boycott freaking All State. I certainly wouldn’t say, “He’s good” or “He works hard.” What was that supposed to mean, anyway?

I bounded up the bus steps and squeezed into one of the last open seats. Across from me was a balding guy with a crooked tie and a briefcase on his lap. He smiled. Did he recognize me from the videos, was he a perv or was he just being friendly? I was never quite sure anymore. I turned and stared out the window. Rush hour traffic was full on, and the bus crept slowly down Route 50.

“A wisp of beauty all alone, in a world as hard and gray as stone.” I whispered my lines. Sadie’s lines. I shook my head. How could Ms. Jensen do that? I was puking.
Puking.

The bus rocked unsteadily beneath me as it trundled along. I peered into the sky to find the moon but couldn’t see it. Either it was too early or there was no moon, or maybe my window was facing the wrong direction.

I leaned back and closed my eyes. I needed some hope. Hope that Tex would offer to manage us. Hope that things would work out with Zed. Hope that … that I would be prom queen? I opened my eyes. I suddenly wanted it. Really wanted it. I wasn’t quite sure why, but I did. A few weeks ago, the phrase “Melanie Martin, Junior Prom Queen” would have made the punch line of a cruel joke, but now it was a real possibility. Me, out of all the girls at Edison.

I glanced down at the traffic below me. Two lanes over, in a dark green minivan, a girl who looked like she was about eleven or twelve was staring at me. When she saw me notice her, she gave a huge smile and waved. A fan. I waved back, and she rolled down her window, yelled something and then said “I love you” using sign language.

“I love you,” I signaled back. I could see her squealing as the van pulled away. I smiled. Screw Ms. Jensen and Sadie Landon and Pete Sanderson. Who cared about two little solo lines in a high school chorus concert? I was nominee for prom queen, I was a YouTube star, I was a backup singer for The Grime, and I had fans.
Squealing
fans.

I checked my phone. Pete hadn’t left a message. I looked at my texts. Nothing there either. I felt a small knot forming in my stomach, but I ignored it. Screw them all.

***

Mom gave me a hug as soon as I walked in the front door. “Honey, are you okay?”

“Um, well. You know.” I stalled. What did she know, and how did she know it? Had Patrick spilled? Or was it Dawn? Or maybe the nurse had decided to call after all. I walked into the kitchen and poured myself a glass of juice, buying time, hoping Mom would say more.

When she did, it wasn’t what I expected. “How’s Lana doing? Poor thing.”

“Lana? She’s okay, I guess. Why?”

“You mean you haven’t heard?”

“Heard what?”

Mom leaned against the counter and sighed. When she spoke, her voice was thin, strained. “Her grandmother died. Patrick brought the body in this afternoon.”

I set my glass down. Oh, no. I walked over to the table and sat down. Lana’s grandmother. That’s why the little girl in the photo had seemed familiar. It was a nine-year-old Lana. “I can’t believe this.”

“I’m sorry, honey. Were they close? Maybe you should give Lana a call.”

“No. I mean, yes, I’ll call her, but no, they weren’t close. She hasn’t seen her grandparents in years.”

Mom raised her eyebrows. “But they live right here. Why wouldn’t—”

“I’m not sure. Something to do with her stepdad. He didn’t get along with them.”

Mom nodded and looked up at the ceiling. I could see her mind digesting these new details. She’d seen enough split families come through the funeral home to know this would complicate things. She was probably already working out her approach to the after-care meeting.

I escaped into my bedroom, lay down on the bed and stared at my cell phone. Why did I have to send Lana that stupid text about the “body run”? No doubt as soon as she’d heard the news, she put two and two together and realized I had sent her a tasteless joke about her own grandmother.

How much should I tell her about what happened during the removal? No reason to mention the fact that I’d seen her grandmother naked, but what about the conversation with her granddad? He was so sweet. Maybe she’d want to know about that.

As I lay there trying to decide what to say, the phone rang. Lana.

“Hey.”

“So, you probably know by now, right?” She sounded calm, casual.

“Yeah. Mom told me. I’m so sorry.”

“It’s okay. She was getting up there. I think Mom said she was seventy-six.” Her voice grew thin. “How was Grandpa doing? Did you see him?”

I clutched my pillow. “Yes. He seemed fine. Upset, obviously, but fine. He showed me some photographs of the two of them when they were younger. They had a picture of you, too … ”

I waited for Lana’s reaction. Did she want to hear this? Was she handling things as well as she sounded? If only I could see her face.

“I practically lived with them when I was in the first and second grade, you know.”

I closed my eyes. I didn’t know.

“After Dad left, they babysat me a lot while Mom did the single-mother thing.” She paused and sniffed. “I should have visited them. I almost did this past Christmas. I drove over to their house, but I never got out of the car. The only one who knew I was there was their cat. He saw me through the window.”

“Dumbledore,” I said.

“Dumbledore? That’s so … Grandma. She read the whole series to me when I was little. I swear she loved it more than I did.” Lana’s voice strained. “So Dumbledore knows I was there, but Grandma never will. She died thinking I didn’t care about her.”

“Lana, I’m sure that’s not true. She knew you were caught in the middle.”

“A few years ago, maybe. But what about now? I have a phone. I drive. I could have called or visited them anytime I wanted. To hell with Randy. When do I ever listen to him anyway?”

The pain in her voice cut straight through the phone and into my gut. “It’s not your fault,” I said. “Please, don’t beat yourself up.”

She gave a light sob, thanked me, and said goodbye.

I set down my phone. I hated to admit it, but part of me was glad now that I couldn’t see her face.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

The funeral service was short and sweet. About a dozen people were there—Lana and her parents, her grandfather and a bunch of women who’d played bridge with Mrs. Waldron every Thursday night for the past fourteen years.

Dad made an exception and let me sing. Mr. Waldron wanted just one hymn: “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot,” one of my all-time favorites. He requested that it be sung at the very end, as the pallbearers wheeled his wife’s casket out. The rest of the service was to have recorded organ music.

As I waited through the service, I watched Lana warily. The tension in the chapel was so thick I could feel it all the way up in the balcony, and it was all directed toward her family. No doubt their feud had been the topic of many Thursday night bridge sessions.

Lana didn’t seem to notice the daggers and whispers. She stared at her grandmother’s casket the entire service. Her eyes were dry, but her fingers fidgeted with a tissue. Sitting beside her, Randy looked bored and uncomfortable. Her mother was a mess, crying and sniffling and blowing her nose every ten seconds. If Lana felt guilty, I could only imagine how she must have felt. The puffiness around her eyes told me she’d been crying since long before the funeral.

I spent the entire service trying to avoid thinking about Mr. Waldron and the cake he’d smashed all over his china doll’s chin. When it came time for my hymn, I focused on a bouquet of gorgeous peach roses as I sang. My dad’s hired pallbearers had no trouble at all with the casket, and out of the corner of my eye, I could see them proceeding slowly down the aisle in perfect time to the music.

Swing low, sweet chariot,

Comin’ for to carry me home.

The old gospel hymn always gave me the chills. It was one of the only songs I knew that was sung from the point of view of the dead person. As I sang, I felt like I was offering a final prayer of hope from Mrs. Waldron, giving her the voice her lifeless body couldn’t.

When I finished, I glanced over at Lana. She was hugging her mom and crying. Between its music and its lyrics, that song usually did the trick, but I didn’t feel my usual sense of satisfaction. I felt nothing but sorrow.

***

By the end of the burial service, my knees were wobbling and my head felt light, but I forced myself to walk to the edge of the grave and give Lana a hug. “You going to be okay? Do you want to go somewhere and hang out for a while?”

Lana smiled weakly. “No. Mom and I are going to spend some time with Grandpa this afternoon.”

The tightness in my chest loosened a little and I took my first easy breath of the day. I hated myself for it, but I was relieved. “Do you think everything’s going to be okay? I mean, between you and your parents and your granddad?”

She shrugged. “I hope so. He needs us now. And I think my mom really needs him.”

I could tell she was about to lose it again, so I gave her a quick hug. “Good luck. Let me know if there’s anything I can do.”

As I escaped across the cemetery toward the parking lot, I checked my cell phone for the first time all morning. There was a missed call from Zed but no message. I was about to call him back when I noticed a text from Andrea Little: “Congratulations. Plz call me at the station asap.
”

Congratulations? For what? I climbed into my mom’s Jetta and drove to the far side of the parking lot before dialing her number.

“Melanie!” Andrea answered the phone on the first ring. “Thanks for getting back to me. Zed told me your news. You must be very excited.”

What had Zed told her? I didn’t want to sound like an idiot. “Thanks,” I mumbled.

“We’re going to have our cameras there, and I want to make sure I squeeze in an interview with you either before or after the show. Does that work for you?”

“I guess.” Show? What show? I wished I’d called Zed back before calling her. “I’m sorry, Andrea, I’m about to pull into some heavy traffic. I have to call you back.” I hung up before she could reply and dialed Zed. No answer. I left him a message to call me and hung up.

I sat and watched as Lana and the rest of the mourners climbed into their cars and pulled away until the only other vehicles left in the lot were the my dad’s limo and a pick-up truck with the “Heaven’s Rest Cemetery” logo on the side. I could see Dad and the cemetery workers in the distance, clearing the chairs and flowers away from the gravesite. One of the workers climbed into the backhoe and began filling in the grave with dirt. I closed my eyes said a quick prayer for Lana’s grandmother.

I looked over Jordan

and what did I see,

comin’ for to carry me home?

A band of angels comin’ after me,

comin’ for to carry me home.

The phone rang; it was Zed.

“Zed? What’s our news? Why is Andrea Little congratulating me?”

“Oh, man. I’m sorry about that. I didn’t want her to be the one to tell you.”

“Tell me what?” If I had to wait any longer to find out what was going on, I’d scream.

“Are you sitting down?”

“Yes! Tell me!”

Zed waited a full five seconds before speaking. “Tex is signing us,” he said finally.

“Whoa.” I almost dropped the phone. “That’s amazing. What did he say?”

“He said he thinks ‘Medium Well’ was no fluke. He said we’re really good. And he said
you
add a vibe that’ll take us from being really good to being a serious money act.”

“No way. He said that?” I bit my fist to keep from squealing.

“He did. And you do. And it’s a good thing Tex is gay or I probably would’ve gone into a jealous rage when he said it.” Zed sounded happy and flirty, and I allowed myself a girly giggle. “Oh, and there’s more good news,” he said. “Tex has a show lined up for us already, on May 4 at the 9:30 Club.”

“Oh, wow. The 9:30. That’s … ”

“Incredible.”

“Totally.” So that was the show Andrea had mentioned. The 9:30 Club
was
incredible. Not huge—it only fit about twelve hundred people—but it was known as one of the top concert bars on the East Coast. Bob Dylan had played there. And Paul Simon and the Red Hot Chili Peppers and the Smashing Pumpkins and Death Cab for Cutie and, in less than a month, The Grime. It was surreal.

It was also the night before All State.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

“This is amazing. You look like a real band.” Lana held up one of my Grime posters and touched Bruno’s face. We were sitting in the cafeteria and I had a line of about a dozen people who wanted autographed copies.

“Who do I sign this to?” I asked the next girl in line.

“Candi, with an “i.”

Candi, Stay sweet. Mel.

I added a smiley face for the dot above the “i,” because she looked like the kind of girl who might appreciate that, and handed her the poster. “Thanks, Candi. Come out and see us on May 4 at The 9:30 Club.”

The last couple of weeks had been insane. Tex had set up a bunch of promo ops for us—an early-morning interview on ROC 94, a YouTube trailer video that got more than a million hits in the first two days, an “impromptu” appearance at an open mic night in Arlington and my favorite, the poster shoot. We’d all piled into some semi-famous photographer’s van and headed over to Great Falls. It was impossible to hear the guy’s instructions with the falls roaring behind us, so he had to show each of us what he wanted us to do. It was hilarious. How he ever got off such a great shot was a mystery.