by Julie Blair
“Taste this.” Her sister, Hannah, came toward her from the far end of the large kitchen, holding a spoon of chocolate frosting. “You broke your arm?”
“Wrist.”
“Oh, Lizzie, that’s terrible. Is it going to be all right?”
“I hope so.” She licked the frosting off and glanced from the spoon to the conspiratorial grin on Hannah’s face. “Looks like chocolate but tastes like—”
“Chocolate-raspberry ganache. Ta dah.” Hannah bowed, her perfectly highlighted wavy chestnut hair flowing over her shoulders.
“Don’t let Kevin find out,” Rebecca said, putting two pans of lasagna in the oven.
“Find out what?” Kevin walked in from the direction of the living room. By the sound of it, his boys were playing video games.
“Nothing,” Hannah said.
Kevin dipped a spoon in the bowl of frosting. “What the—” He worked his mouth as if it were full of peanut butter. Banging the spoon down on the counter he said, “Dad likes chocolate cake with chocolate frosting.”
“And he’ll get chocolate cake with chocolate frosting. Just dressed up a little.” Hannah’s hands were on her hips, and frosting dripped from the spoon she held.
“Can’t you stick to anything?”
“It’s cake, Kevin. Lighten up and live dangerously.”
“Look what living dangerously got you.”
“It. Wasn’t. My. Fault.”
“Your boss finds you in bed with his wife, and it wasn’t your fault?”
“You’re jealous because I have more fun than you.”
“And welcome to it.”
Hannah’s face tightened. She tossed the spoon into the bowl and stalked out of the kitchen.
“She’s trying to contribute,” Liz said.
“She’s ignoring tradition. Like always.” Kevin rubbed the back of his neck and took a healthy gulp of wine.
“Where’s Karen?” She hadn’t seen her sister-in-law.
“Home. Sick.”
“Oh, no.”
“Yeah, whatever,” he said, his mouth a hard line. It was a shame they’d missed their weekend getaway.
Benny Goodman blared from speakers in the living room, and seconds later Hannah bounced into the kitchen. “Dance with me, Kev.” She grabbed his waist and whisked him through the kitchen and into the dining room, around the table, her yellow dress twirling out around her as she sashayed to the swing beat. Music had always been her family’s salve and bond, and not even Kevin could stay mad in the midst of all that jazz.
A timer went off, and Hannah dashed into the kitchen. Opening the convection-oven door, she stuck a toothpick into the cake. “Perfect,” she said, reaching for a hot mitt.
“Dare I ask what you did to the cake?”
“Nothing Dad won’t like.”
An hour later Rebecca carried pans of lasagna to the table, Hannah close behind with the salad and garlic bread. It was her dad’s favorite meal. The back screen door banged and Sammy walked in from the kitchen, his wavy black hair hanging over the turned-up collar of his trench coat. He looked rough but played tenor sax like an angel, and his puppy-dog eyes were a hit with the band’s younger female fans. “Happy Birthday, Pops.” He shrugged out of his coat and hung it on the back of his chair.
Regan, his twin sister, appeared in the archway between the kitchen and the dining room, dressed head to toe in black, the only color she wore. “Hey.” One hand was in its usual position half in her jeans pocket, and the other held a present. Her dark good looks and broody manner made her a heartthrob, especially with the fans savvy enough to know her preference for women. She was grinning. In the four years she’d known Regan, Liz had rarely seen more than a half smile.
“Saved you the best seat,” her dad said, pulling out the chair to his left.
Regan set the present on the sideboard with the others. She stood next to Liz and held out a folded piece of letter-sized paper. “Read it.”
Keeping her left forearm under the edge of the tablecloth, Liz took it with her right hand and snapped it open. An email printout. She frowned, read the “from” line, and peered up at Regan, who was rocking back and forth, still grinning. Liz read the first sentence. Her heart stopped and then started up, pounding like that of a horse about to jump a fence. By the time she finished the three paragraphs, her hand was shaking. The table was quiet, everyone staring at her.
“What is it?” Her dad asked.
She handed him the paper and stared at her plate, unable to speak, as confusion and anger collided in her stomach. Regan shouldn’t have done this without asking her.
Her dad’s smile grew as he read. “Congratulations!” He stood and waved the paper. “Up Beat is invited to perform at the Monterey Jazz Festival!” There were confused looks and then clapping as everyone asked, “how” and “why didn’t you tell us?”
“I sent it,” Regan said. “Teri put it together.”
Liz shot her eyes to Regan as the shock tumbled through her. Teri had done this? How? When? Why hadn’t she said anything? Why hadn’t they discussed it? Promise you’ll keep playing. No, no, no. This couldn’t be.
“Well, I’ll be damned,” her dad said. He squeezed Liz’s shoulder and held up his glass. “Here’s to the future of Up Beat!”
“What about your wrist?” Hannah asked. The table went silent.
“Nice timing,” Kevin said, sarcastically.
Regan tilted her head, her fork halfway to her mouth.
“Collies,” Liz’s youngest nephew said. “I drawed on it.”
She pulled her arm from under the table, and the excitement on Regan’s face shut off so fast it was as if someone had flipped a switch.
“Damn,” Sammy said. He set his fork down and chewed his bottom lip. “Damn.”
“Excuse me.” Liz bolted out the back door. Monterey Jazz Festival? They’d appeared there with their first quartet and had planned to submit for this year, but…Teri had managed that in the weeks—She walked faster around the house to the street, hugging the cast to her stomach, feeling sick. This was too much for her to handle on her own.
Regan fell into step beside her, head down, hands shoved all the way in her pockets. “Does it hurt?”
She resisted the urge to send Regan back. “Not too bad,” she lied. Regan had faced plenty of tragedy in her life, and none of this was her fault. She caught a glimpse of the deep-brown eyes capped by shaggy bangs. Vulnerable wasn’t an attribute she normally attached to her emotionally distant bass player.
“She wanted you to be happy, to have everything you worked for.”
“Happy? She thought I could be happy again?” Liz laughed, the sound brittle, aware she was close to losing control.
“I couldn’t tell her no. It’s what we worked for. It was part of—”
“The plan.” A CD release party in January. Follow-up tour on the West Coast for the live album. End the summer at the Monterey Jazz Festival if they were accepted. Fall tour. Take a break over Christmas to compose new material. Back on the road in the spring. A new studio album next summer. She wanted to sit down on the curb just thinking about it all. And without Teri? “No. I can’t do it.”
“She said to give you this.” Regan pulled a small envelope from her back pocket.
A tremor went through Liz’s heart and washed down her arms. Out of the corner of her eye she saw LIZ in the center of the lavender envelope in Teri’s all-capitals printing. She shook her head, fighting the throbbing pain in her wrist, the crushing pain in her chest, and the horrible emptiness of being alone. This wasn’t fair. It was half a block before she took it. She shoved it in her blazer pocket. She couldn’t read it now.
“I loved her, too. I miss her. I miss you. I’ve barely seen you since—”
“I’ve been busy.” It was a lame excuse. It was hard to be around Regan and Sammy, the four of them now the three of them.
“The band. It’s my life.” What Regan wasn’t saying screamed through the silence. Don�
��t let my dream go. Don’t send me back to the nowhere I came from. “You’re the family Sammy and I never had.” Regan turned away as she brushed the back of her hand across her eyes.
Liz had never seen Regan even close to tears. What she wanted no longer mattered. That paper on the dining table changed everything. Dreams. Everyone’s dreams hinged on the Monterey Jazz Festival and the album. She put her hand on Regan’s shoulder. “We’ll do it. We’ll make her proud.” She infused the words with confidence she didn’t feel.
She smiled at all the expectant faces when they returned to the table. She downed another pain pill and managed to eat, forcing herself to join in the conversation. Today was about her dad. Hannah sulked and Kevin gloated when her dad said the cake was interesting.
“Open this first,” Liz said when they’d gathered in the living room. She pointed to the painting and slid in between Hannah and Kevin on the couch. Hannah put her arm around her shoulder.
Her dad pulled the wrapping off the painting. “It’s beautiful.”
“I met the woman who painted it.” She gave him the card from Peggy. “She lives a few blocks from Grandma’s and took lessons from her.”
“Good job,” Kevin whispered.
Something she’d done right. And alone. And she’d met Jac because of it. Should she let Jac listen to the recordings? No. She didn’t have time to waste with a layperson. Regan and Sammy didn’t have the skills to help her, and she was afraid she’d cave in to her dad’s need to get it done quickly if she let him help. She was on her own. Why did you do this, sweetie? She knew the answer. Love.
“This is from me and Regan, Pops.” Sammy handed him a present. Regan worked in a used-record store, and Liz knew she’d been looking for rare jazz records to give him for his birthday.
“Mine next,” Hannah said, handing her dad a present wrapped in paper Liz recognized as some she’d bought last year.
“Well, I’ll be,” her father said as he read the front of the CD. “I heard this was coming out. Unreleased Wes Montgomery. How’d you get it?”
“It’s who you know,” Hannah said, beaming a smile.
“Nice,” Liz said to Hannah. She wanted to be irritated with her for keeping it to herself, but that was Hannah. Even as a kid she’d always had an extra present for their parents at birthdays and Christmas that she was careful to say was just from her.
“Let’s get over to the club,” her dad said. “Customers to take care of.” He was already putting on a sport coat and helping Rebecca into her raincoat.
They walked across the street to the jazz club her dad had opened last year, a longtime dream that had helped him get over his wife’s death. She wanted to go home, but two of her friends’ bands were performing as a birthday tribute to her dad. Parties exhausted her as much as they’d exhilarated Teri. So many ways they were different, but they’d blended those differences into something magical.
She settled at the far end of the bar that took up most of one side of the long, narrow space. The club was packed, and her dad made his way through the closely spaced tables, shaking hands and accepting birthday wishes. She took another pain pill with half a glass of wine after her dad announced they’d been accepted to the festival. She endured the congratulations and questions about her wrist, trying to act excited instead of worried. It was after midnight when her friend Cassie’s band finished their set and she was able to leave, so exhausted she could barely drive to her condo.
Too tired to care about the laundry basket blocking the door from the garage into the kitchen, or Hannah’s shoes littering the hall, she went to her bedroom and collapsed on the bed. The envelope crunched in her pocket. Sitting up, she took it out and scooted up against the headboard. Her heart skipped beats as she traced her finger across her name. What was it about someone’s handwriting that made it feel like they were still here?
Opening it, she pulled out a card. A cartoonish pianist hunched over a piano, notes flying from the inside of the piano. It was a joke between them—Teri finding cards with piano themes. Tears rolled down the well-worn paths on her cheeks.
Hi, baby. I just finished putting the packet together. If you’re reading this, then you were accepted. I know you didn’t expect it, but I hope you’re smiling right now. Come on, please? I love it when you’re trying to be serious and I can get you to smile.
She let the corners of her mouth pull up, but smiles weren’t supposed to feel sad.
I watch you trying to hold it all together—taking care of me and enduring the intrusion of our family and friends. I know it’s exhausting. You’re so gifted and I can’t bear the thought that you’ll give up. We’re so close and, for the second time, I’ve let you down. I want to give you a reason to keep playing. I want to help you get everything we worked for.
She went to the bathroom for Kleenex. To have Teri’s words in her neat handwriting made her seem close enough to touch, but she wasn’t.
“Spring Time” is playing from our first album. Do you remember where we were when you wrote it?
“I’ll never forget it,” Liz whispered. Spring of their freshman year. The hour drive to Daffodil Hill. The picnic afterward in the secluded meadow Teri took her to. Making love. All the promise of that day, all their hopes and dreams, were in that song.
I’m tapping the bed, always backing you up, baby. I’ll be clapping for you at Monterey. All my love, Teri.
She put the card back in the envelope. Of course Teri would do this. She was the driving force—marketing, promoting, setting gigs, managing the million things so Liz could do one—compose. She had to make Teri’s final wish come true. “I’ll make you proud, sweetie.”
She put on Teri’s T-shirt, washed too many times to have her scent. She took another pain pill and tried to sleep, but her mind wouldn’t stop cycling through everything she needed to get done. Midterms this week. A recital for her private students on Thursday. No time to work on the CD. Spring break next week. Could she get the songs chosen? Maybe start mixing them? She’d have to contact her sound engineer about his availability. The million things Teri did were now her responsibility. She finally wore herself out and sleep captured her.
She woke snuggled up against—
“Don’t get up yet.”
Her heart flailed wildly at the injustice of it. Not Teri’s voice. Of course not.
She needed a pain pill but instead closed her eyes and pulled Hannah’s arm tighter around her. Hannah had slept with her every night for weeks after Teri’s death. She’d forgotten how good it felt to be held. Her mind picked up where it had left off, listing all the things she needed to do this week.
Chapter Seven
Liz checked her watch again. It looked wrong on her right wrist. So did the ring she’d had to force over the knuckle on her right ring finger. No way was she not wearing it. Their appointment was an hour ago. “Dad, the recital’s in an hour.”
“You have no idea what I had to do to get us in to see him.” He crossed his arms.
She covered her mouth as she yawned. A nap would have been heaven. She’d been barraged during her office hours with students needing help, which meant she couldn’t get midterms graded at school, which meant she’d been up late every night grading them. She’d lost track of how many phone calls she’d returned from parents nervous about the recital. And always the worry about her wrist. And the CD. And finding a drummer. The million things.
“Mr. Randall?” A young woman with cats on her scrub top held a door open across the reception area.
They followed her down a white-walled hallway. This wasn’t a hospital and they were just here for information. She knew logically that a broken wrist and leukemia were different, but her churning stomach didn’t. Specialists couldn’t always make things better.
“Sit.” Dr. Russell, tall, with salt-and-pepper hair, stood from behind a large desk and gestured to two chairs. No smile. No handshake. A bookcase behind him was filled with books. Diplomas and certificates hung on the wall. Proof h
e was an expert.
She sat in the chair, cast resting on her lap, flexing her puffy fingers. Did he know anything about being a musician?
“I reviewed your medical records.” Dr. Russell typed and then angled the computer monitor toward them. “X-ray is useless beyond confirming the fracture. It can’t predict healing. Your break is close to the joint, which increases the risk it won’t heal properly. Surgery is your best option. It’s predictable.”
Predictable. The word clattered around in her head. He was wrong. Nothing was predictable. She studied the X-ray, vaguely listening to the conversation between the doctor and her dad: open reduction internal fixation, volar plate; yes, there’s always the risk of infection but it’s slight; yes, compressive neuropathy is a rare complication. Her father knew the right questions to ask. That thin line of black across the end of the white bone. Such a tiny flaw. Surely the ends of the bone would knit together. She tried to imagine screws sticking out of it. Her stomach rolled and she pulled the cast against it. Treatment options. Risks. Odds. Her mother’s battle with a benign brain tumor. Teri’s with leukemia. Both lost in spite of the experts’ odds.
“How soon can you do the surgery?” her dad asked.
Dizziness made her close her eyes. Weren’t they just here for information?
“I had a cancellation for Monday.”
No. Carmel. Ten days to pick the songs, walk on the beach, and spend time with Peggy and Jac.
“Nothing sooner? She’s playing at the Monterey Jazz Festival in September.”
“What instrument?”
“Piano.”
Dr. Russell’s face tightened into an expression similar to the ER doctor’s. “Monday’s the best I can do. She’ll need to come in tomorrow for pre-op workup.”
“Good enough.” Her dad shook the doctor’s hand.