A Piper's Song: The Pied Piper Tales

by C. K. Johnson

  Nothing bad could ever happen here, I thought as I took in my surroundings. I laughed when I saw the chair Kelly slept on last night did indeed have a rose print cover. I felt out of place in this crisp, clean room. Awkward. I was alone. No boys to contend with for a little quiet time.

  I peeked in the bathroom, saw it was clear, and ran inside. A rosy warmth greeted my feet as I walked on the tile and I sighed. I could get used to this. I tossed my t-shirt on and slipped into another pair of jeans, then headed downstairs to find my brothers. I followed the sound of laughter and the strong aroma of bacon down the hallway.

  Conner stood over a big mixing bowl and busily stirred what looked like dough. He was covered from head to toe in flour and I wondered if there was more in the bowl or on him. As he worked, he prattled on about everything and anything that popped out of his mouth. This was not my shy little Conner.

  “You know elephants would be so much cooler if they could be in green and brown camouflage, because then they could be secret weapons against the jungle cats,” he said, following it up with a roar that wasn’t quite an elephant sound.

  He saw me and vigorously beckoned me toward him. Unfortunately, the hand he waved with held the spoon he had been using to stir. Bits of sticky dough flew through the air and landed on various counters, clothes, and an unsuspecting cat.

  The cat bunched itself into a ball of fur before hissing at him and running away, McKennan and Maggie burst into another round of laughter. McKennan leaned forward and grabbed the spoon to stop the mayhem. Then he began plucking globs of brown dough out of Maggie’s hair. She smiled and absentmindedly wiped the counter.

  “I’m making biscuits, and there are eggs and bacon on the stove. We saved some for you. And Maggie called school and said we were sick. So we can play all day,” Conner said. He looked at Maggie with adoring eyes.

  “You have to appreciate the sacrifice it was to save you any food at all,” Maggie said. “It was like beating off a pack of wild wolves, but we managed to put some food aside for when Sleeping Beauty awoke,” she said, smiling. Her eyes crinkled in the corners when she laughed.

  The reference to wolves started Conner off on all he knew about them, which turned out to actually be quite a bit. I thought he was a smart kid, but hearing him talk like this, I couldn’t help but be surprised. It was nice to see what Conner could be once out from under the thumb of our strict father. Kelly was right. Things were already getting better.

  McKennan grinned when I met his eyes. I shook my head in amusement, ruffled Conner’s hair and walked to the stove. My stomach growled as I picked up a couple of pieces of bacon.

  I dished the food onto a plate and gulped it down in a very not-lady-like manner. I used to have to swat my brothers away while I ate and felt spoiled eating all this food as leisurely as I pleased. When I finished, I leaned back on the wooden barstool and enjoyed feeling full and even a little peaceful.

  “So you’re Kyra,” Maggie said, looking directly at me. She paused and glanced at Conner before continuing, “I’ve heard you’ve had a bad time of it lately. My parents are out with Kelly now, helping him look for a place. They’ve got a family friend that might be able to help out with a job, too. Besides, with some of the things Kelly said, it’s probably best you guys moved out of your house anyway. After they—” she stopped when McKennan cleared his throat.

  Maggie said, “McKennan, why don’t you take Kyra on a tour of the property while Conner and I finish the biscuits?” She glanced at Conner before giving me a nod. What was that about?

  McKennan shrugged but got up anyway and pushed his barstool under the breakfast bar. “Come on, Kyra. Time’s a wastin’.” He started down the hall. I hurried to catch up, giving Maggie a brief wave as I left. She flashed me a cheerful smile, then turned back to Conner and started picking dough out of his dark brown hair with a quizzical expression.

  The door didn’t even fully close before McKennan dropped the bomb. “Something about what you did the other night made Father lose it. While you were at school yesterday, he went through the house and smashed all the musical instruments to pieces. Molly said the kids were trailing behind him, begging him to stop, and he roared at them to mind their Master. I couldn’t get Molly to say anything more, but she wouldn’t stop flinching.” He paused. His clenched jaw and his tightly closed fists told me all I needed to know about his thoughts on the matter.

  When his hands relaxed, he let out a deep sigh. “I think it hurt Conner the most. Father broke his flute. By the time I got home, Conner had wet his pants and was sitting in the corner. He was shaking so badly I couldn’t leave him like that. It’s why I sent Kelly to pick you up. I was still trying to get him to let go of the pieces of his flute. You should have seen it; it was as if one of us had died.”

  I balled my own fists, hoping to squelch the storm building inside me. I pushed back tears as I imagined the pain my father had inflicted on Conner because of me. Because I let my crush get the better of me. My raging emotions broke the surface. I yelled in a strangled voice, “He had no right to do that. No matter what I did, he had no right!”

  Any pity I once felt for my current situation morphed into outrage. For Conner. “How could he do that to him?” I asked, knowing it was something McKennan couldn’t answer.

  The flute hadn’t even been a family instrument; it was Conner’s. Every day as we passed the music store, he had stared at it wistfully. Kelly, McKennan, and I had put aside money bit by bit until we were able to get it for him. I remember the yearning in his eyes, the yearning for something to call his own. I had felt it, too. We came together to give him the one thing we could make happen for him.

  McKennan tilted his head, watching me. He waited before responding, but he smoothed the hair on his arm down. It was odd but I could have sworn it was standing on end, like it was electrified; it stuck out as if he were chilled. I didn’t know if he had paused to gather his thoughts, or to wait to see if I had really finished—maybe a little of both.

  “So you see why we had to take him. Father would have broken him, and I couldn’t allow that,” said McKennan in a monotone voice. His eyes were closed and his muscles taunt. I’d seen this look only a few times before. Once when a kid had beaten Kelly black and blue and the second time, when father had come home drunk and threatened to go back to the clan. Neither time turned out good for the offending party. I threw my arms around his waist, wrapping him in the best hug I could.

  He stood still; he wasn’t really the brother who gave or received hugs. After the initial surprise wore off, he wrapped his arms around me and we stayed that way until a car pulled into the driveway. We dropped our arms and glanced around as if we had only just been admiring the state of the lawn.

  A man, slightly shorter than McKennan, with greying hair and kind blue eyes, stepped out of the car before opening the door for a woman in the passenger’s side. He offered his hand to help her out and shut the door softly behind her.

  He looked at her the way I imagined all the heroes in my favorite books looked at their heroines. She was his sunshine, his purpose. It was how I had wanted Mark to look at me. It is how Mom and Father probably were in the beginning.

  My thoughts of love stories carried me away and I almost missed Kelly getting out of the backseat.

  “Hey guys,” he said as he came over and patted my shoulder. He nodded to McKennan, “Mr. Jacobs was kind enough to hook us up with a job. We’ll start tomorrow. We also found a place that should be in the same school district—Mrs. Jacobs will do some more checking on that. One of her friends is willing to rent it out for a discount if we help around the complex a bit,” he said to McKennan more than me. He winked at me and said, “See, living in that horrible house did have an upside. We can fix just about anything.”

  Kelly ruffled my hair. He knew I hated it when he did that. I gave him a friendly shove , then I remembered the Jacobs were watching us. I self-consciously took a step closer to McKennan.

  “We keep te
lling Kelly to call us by our first names, but he’s always so proper. You are welcome to call me James, and this is my wife, Meredith. We missed you this morning at breakfast,” said James.

  “Can I just give you a hug? I feel like I know you already with how much Kelly’s talked about you,” Meredith said as she wrapped me in a hug that reminded me so much of my mother’s that I found myself missing her. She even smelled like her, a light lily scent that Kelly had given Mom for the last two years. I pushed down my sadness and focused back on the here and now. I didn’t want to add to my growing list of embarrassments that I started bawling in front of complete strangers.

  She let go and took a step back beside her husband. He wrapped his arm around her waist and pulled her a little closer.

  “How do you know Kelly?” I started, but they both broke into laughter before I could say more.

  “Sorry. Maggie had a little, shall we say, infatuation with Kelly in the beginning. He was so kind about it. She seemed to fall in love with him overnight, fawning over his every feature. Let me tell you, I never heard someone wax on about how perfect someone’s facial hair is. She was certain, or so she endlessly told us, he was the love of her life and she would die without him,” said James, rolling his eyes.

  Meredith looked over at Kelly with a barely suppressed grin and said, “He took it so well. He came over almost every day for several months until your family moved. I think it was about then he started working so hard. Still, he’d make sure to send her a letter every week. I guess her crush faded over time to deep affection, but by then, he had become so much a part of our lives.”

  She paused, resting her hand on his shoulder. “Poor Maggie has complained so much about how little she sees him, I think it made the news sound all the better. Can we say we are absolutely thrilled he is back and that he brought you all along with him?” The longer she talked, the deeper his blush became. He turned from a slight pink to a brighter shade of scarlet red.

  I started putting together Kelly’s earlier confession to me with the Maggie I had just met. Even though he had called the song back, he must have defied Father and stayed in touch with her. What other things are my brothers keeping from me?

  “Let’s go inside. Maggie’s been kind enough to keep an eye on Conner for us while we strolled the grounds,” McKennan said, nodding at the Jacobs and Kelly before pushing me in the direction of the front door.

  “So that’s the girl,” I whispered to McKennan as he closed the door behind us.

  “Yep,” he said as he continued into the kitchen.

  We stayed with the Jacobs a week. It was weird waking up to a homemade breakfast, and a ride to school. I even came home one day to a sack full of “old” clothes from Maggie that looked far nicer than anything I owned. James put a couple of blow-up mattresses in the room for Kelly and McKennan, and life began to feel good. They even helped us go to a few yard sales for some second-hand furniture.

  The day we moved into the apartment, they sent over an old bed for Conner to sleep on, along with the air mattresses. It reminded me of how right Kelly’s words were. Life had changed, and although I still couldn’t say what I did to Mark was any sort of good, my life transforming, becoming more normal, was more than I could hope for.

  School changed as well. My wallflower days were over. Ben’s unexpected attention followed by Mark’s daily apologies was the start of my existence in the eyes of my schoolmates. I felt like a walking magic trick. The piper song had been my abracadabra and suddenly, I had appeared. Maybe being a piper wasn’t so bad, as long as I could keep it under control.

  Ben didn’t mention that night again, and he kept all of our conversations to school-related topics. The only sign he hadn’t forgotten was a large leather-bound copy of Grimm’s Fairy Tales he carried around.

  Maggie popped by several more times with “old” clothes that somehow included clothes for McKennan and Kelly, and a small, beautifully wrapped present for Conner.

  Conner jumped up and down in excitement and had trouble ripping off the gold bow and then the thick blue paper. He had never received a present just because. I caught him glancing over at Maggie, several times, as he opened it as if to check whether she changed her mind and would take it back.

  Inside lay a shiny new flute. He burst into tears and flew across the room, throwing himself in Maggie’s arms. It took several minutes before he let go of her and showed it to us.

  The rest of the day, he carried it around in his hands. Occasionally, when he had to, he’d slip it in his pocket. That night, he became upset at our suggestion he leave it on his nightstand until morning. In the end, we let him take it to bed with him. He held it right next to his body as if it might disappear during the night.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Control

  THE FOLLOWING DAY, KELLY DECIDED TO make good on his promise to our father. He would teach me the piper ways the only way he knew how.

  I mastered the art of ignoring the sweet, addicting sensation as it hovered anxiously in my throat. I pushed it down as I sang in the shower or hummed while I walked to school. It was time to face my curse. It’s a gift, I told myself. It had turned out good for Kelly and his secret girlfriend in the end.

  Kelly lasted for three lessons, after which he shook his head and went to find McKennan. It didn’t take me long to realize McKennan could do what Kelly could not. He could, and would, take me to task for every little thing. There was no room or tolerance for getting distracted during his lessons.

  McKennan strolled into the living room, and looked me up and down in the same way I had seen him look at any number of broken items at our old home. So what, I was broken now?

  “First rule. No playing anything until you get your voice under control.”

  “But I’ve been getting better,” I pleaded, flashing what Kelly called my puppy dog look. McKennan raised an eyebrow but didn’t dignify my protest with an answer. I was pushing it, but I wanted to try one more time; maybe a little compromise would soften him up.

  “Okay, what if we split it up fifty-fifty, part singing, part—I don’t know, guitar—or something until I work up to a pipe?” It seemed to me the faster I could get to the pipe, the faster I could master the piper ways, and then everything else would fall into place.

  “Close your eyes.” He barked the order with such authority, he could give an army drill sergeant a run for his money. My eyes snapped shut and I waited for Drill Sergeant McKennan to continue.

  “Think about the moment I told you what happened to Conner. I want you to remember what you were thinking, how you felt, and the song that was running through your head. Once all those details are in place, just nod.”

  I had a hard time focusing beyond the thud of his heavy footsteps as he started to pace back and forth in the room. It wasn’t until I tried to remember the song, filled with chords so dissonant their sharp ends cut each other down even as another wave rose up to take its place, that my memory, too, rose up in vivid detail.

  “Now look around you. Is anything off? Listen for what you didn’t hear before.”

  It felt funny to squeeze my eyes closed in my memory, but the look on McKennan’s face kept fueling my rage and distracting me from my mission. I went through the scene as if it were a giant checklist, ticking off item after item.

  The something off wasn’t McKennan, or at least I doubt he’d take the time to point that out to me. It wasn’t me either, I knew I had lost my temper. So what was I missing? What hadn’t I heard?

  Songs flipped through my head like a stereoscope, combining the images the songs made with the things I had seen. Trees, birds—wow, the sun was sort of interesting to hear, and unfortunately, none of the three felt off.

  Once around and above were covered, I moved on to the one place I hadn’t taken in: below. There at my feet, the shriveled song that escaped while I was verbally venting fizzled out and drifted away, leaving the blackened ground behind it. My song had leaked out and burned the grass all around me.


  “I didn’t even realize I had a song going through my head,” I whispered, trying to focus on that instead of letting myself wallow in the pain again.

  “We all don’t at first. This is why we must gain complete control over our voice before we even try with an instrument,” he said, his point more firmly made than anything else he could have said.

  If a moment of thoughtless anger could do this without me even noticing it, what else could happen? I never considered how much my family had to watch their every word. Upon this revelation, all the men in my family speaking so gruffly started to make sense. They were all trying to stop the music from spilling out as they spoke.

  My three sisters dealt with it differently, by going silent when they were unsure if they could control their power. I had to laugh at the irony of our family. We were pipers, with the ability to control our environment through sound, and yet our own family legacy was silence.

  McKennan continued on, drilling me on notes, chords, scales, and the basic principles of music. “You call that a scale?” he repeated so many times, I found myself saying it before he could, parroting the way he’d raise his eyebrows and shake his head at me.

  I became dependent on the word, “Again.” Hearing it was sort of a compliment, a sign that I had done something right and could be trusted to do it again.

  McKennan was way too big a fan of the number ten. If I messed up even once, it was back to the beginning until I could get through ten attempts. Yet, gradually, I started to gain control over each note. The constant scales were teaching me how to move from note to note without any of my power slipping out unintentionally.

  By early November as the heart of winter rolled in, I dreamed of scales.

  I wanted so badly to skip to the fun part, but he insisted that we focus on laying a foundation. The day he said, “Good,” I squealed. I had never worked so hard for a good in my life.