Libby’s Got the Beat
StreetLights
by Robert Rayner
James Lorimer & Company Ltd., Publishers
Toronto
For students and staff at Blacks Harbour School, New Brunswick
1
Worst School in the Province
Libby Meek sat at the breakfast table, watching the clock on the kitchen wall.
It was 8:55 a.m. on Saturday, and she wanted to play the piano.
She longed to play the piano.
She was dying to play the piano.
If she didn’t play the piano soon, she was going to explode. Then, when bits of her were dripping off the walls and from the ceiling, her parents would be sorry they said she couldn’t play until 9:00 a.m. on the weekend.
She practised every morning and every day when she got home from school. She practised at her weekly lesson with old Ms. Cattermole next door, and any time on the weekend she wasn’t playing with her friends, Etta and Celery.
Any time after 9:00 a.m.
Weekdays weren’t so bad. Then she was allowed to play after 6:30 a.m.
For a long time, she’d started at 6:30 a.m. on Saturday and Sunday, too. But then one morning, her father appeared beside the piano, with his hair in even more of a mess than usual, and closed the piano lid over the keys. He said, “Not until nine o’clock, please, sweetie.” By the time Libby spluttered, “Why?” he was on his way back to bed.
Libby’s parents didn’t have breakfast until 8:00 a.m. on the weekend, when, as far as Libby was concerned, half the day was already gone.
Libby looked at the clock again. It was 8:56 a.m. Maybe she could get away with starting to play now. Four minutes hardly counted. And anyway, the clock was probably four minutes slow.
She eyed her parents, who were reading the newspaper while they ate breakfast. Libby had finished eating fifteen minutes earlier. She cleared her throat to get their attention and rolled her eyes from the clock to the piano, which she could see through the doorway to the living room.
Her parents didn’t seem to notice.
She drummed her fingers on the table, cleared her throat, and rolled her eyes from the clock to the piano.
Nothing.
She hummed a few bars loudly, drummed her fingers on the table, cleared her throat, and rolled her eyes from the clock to the piano.
Were they ignoring her?
Libby decided she had nothing to lose.
“Why —”
Without looking up from his newspaper, her father said, “Because your mother and I like to sleep late on Saturday and Sunday mornings.”
“I didn’t finish my question,” Libby protested.
“You didn’t have to, sweetie.”
She held her hands in front of her, palms up. “But, Edwin, you always say you love to hear me play the piano — right?”
“Right, dear.”
“So — why don’t you love to hear me play the piano before nine o’clock? What’s the difference?”
Her father lowered his newspaper and smiled at her. “I like to be fully awake when I hear you play, so that I can truly appreciate your performance.”
Libby looked at him suspiciously before tackling her mother. “Charlotte, why —”
“Because I say so.”
Libby turned back to her father. “But, Edwin, why —”
“Because your father says so, too,” said her mother before he could answer.
Libby rolled her eyes.
She was good at rolling her eyes. She practised in front of the mirror in her room every morning, just before practising the piano.
“Miss Nightingale says the most important word in children’s vocabulary is ‘why,’ and every time they are denied an answer, a learning opportunity has passed them by,” Libby announced, quoting her grade five teacher at Pleasant Harbour Elementary School.
“What Miss Nightingale forgot to add is that there is a law against children asking ‘why’ before nine o’clock on weekend mornings,” her mother said.
“No, there isn’t,” said Libby.
“Yes, there is. I just made one.”
“Why?” Libby demanded.
“That’s enough,” said her mother.
Libby rolled her eyes again.
“How many times must I tell you?” said her mother. “It’s rude to roll your eyes.”
“Why?” said Libby.
“Because I say so.”
“Why?”
“It’s 9:01,” pointed out Libby’s father.
Libby leapt from her seat.
“Uh-uh!” her mother said in warning.
Libby sat back down. “May I please be excused?”
“Of course, dear.”
Libby thought about rolling her eyes again, but her mother was watching her.
She bolted from the kitchen to the living room and sat at the piano. She lifted the lid and touched the keys lightly. She loved the cold, smooth feel of them, even the ones with the chipped edges that sometimes caught her fingers. She loved the smell of the old wood. She even loved the worn and lumpy cover of the piano stool.
Ms. Cattermole, her piano teacher, had found the piano for Libby. It had been in a church hall for nearly a hundred years, until the church planned to tear down the hall. Ms. Cattermole told the minister that she knew a home the old piano could go to. The minister said Mr. and Mrs. Meek could have it for nothing — if they moved it out within a week. Mr. Meek got some of his friends from work to help, and together they moved the piano to the Meeks’ house on Farm Hill. As he and his friends staggered in with it, he told Libby, “If I have a heart attack moving this piano for you, I hope you’ll play at my funeral.” Libby promised to play “Rockin’ Boogie and Blues,” and one of Mr. Meek’s friends said he’d dance while Libby played.
Sometimes Libby got her father to take the front off the piano so that she could watch the hammers bounce against the strings, sending tiny clouds of dust into the air. Then she imagined she was a bar girl in a western movie, playing the piano in a saloon.
She launched into a song called “I Love Lovin.’” She thought she might play it at her Youth Group’s next Talent Night.
Mr. Meek, who was still reading the news-paper, said, “Could you play a little quieter, please, Libby, dear?”
Libby played quietly for a few seconds before the volume rose again.
“Libby!” Mrs. Meek said sharply.
Libby stopped playing. “What?”
“I think you should practise that nice, quiet Mozart minuet you’re learning with Ms. Cattermole, and not that boogie-woogie.”
“It’s not boogie-woogie, Charlotte,” Libby explained. “It’s a pop song called ‘I Love Lovin.’”
“It sounds like boogie-woogie to me,” Mrs. Meek said.
“Boogie-woogie is a series of improvised melodic variations over a rhythmic bass of eighth notes in quadruple time,” Libby explained loftily. “It’s nothing like a pop song.”
“What else did you learn from Ms. Cattermole this week?” her mother asked.
Libby played Mozart’s “Minuet in G” once through before throwing herself into “I Love Lovin’” again, even louder than before.
Mr. Meek sighed.
“Mozart, please, Libby,” said Mrs. Meek firmly.
Libby returned to the Mozart.
Mr. Meek said, “That’s nice, Libby.”
“Thank you, Edwin,” Libby said.
Libby had started calling her pa
rents Edwin and Charlotte as a joke. She’d gotten the idea from a movie she’d seen once. Soon, calling her parents by their first names had become a habit.
Suddenly Mrs. Meek gasped and sat up. She stared at Libby.
“What?” Libby exclaimed, surprised.
“You’re bottom!” Mrs. Meek said sternly.
Libby giggled. “What about my bottom? I’m just sitting on it.”
“Not your bottom. You are bottom,” said Mrs. Meek impatiently.
“Bottom of what?”
“What is it, dear?” Mr. Meek asked.
She pointed to an article in the newspaper. “It says here that Libby’s school is ranked bottom of all the schools in the province, according to the provincial assessment written by grade five children.” She looked at Libby. “When did you write this test?”
“I don’t remember,” said Libby.
But she did remember. It was a month before, in April, when Miss Nightingale handed out a letter to the class. The teacher had said it was very important that they take the letter home and give it to their parents. Libby remembered reading “Provincial Achievement Assessment” at the top. And she remembered thinking, More boring school stuff. But she couldn’t remember what she’d done with it after that. Had she put it in her backpack? Or maybe she’d used the back of the paper to write notes to Etta in class.
Libby did remember taking the test, however. “This is nothing to worry about, children,” Miss Nightingale had said seriously. But that had made them worry all the more. Libby even remembered that halfway through the test, she’d found herself sucking her thumb like a baby. She remembered seeing Emma Binns holding her stomach and moaning softly, and Kyle Hanley twisting and pulling his hair so hard that some of it actually came out. She remembered Celery going to the washroom at least three times.
And Libby remembered just yesterday when Miss Nightingale had handed out another letter. At the top it read:
Provincial Achievement Assessment
Student: Libby Meek
Student’s Score: 47%
That letter was still in her bag, under the remains of the tuna sandwich she’d taken for lunch.
“Why wasn’t I told about this test?” Mrs. Meek demanded.
Libby shrugged.
Her mother reached for the phone. “Let’s see what the principal has to say about having the worst school in the province, and not even telling parents about the test.”
“You can’t call the principal,” Libby protested.
“Why not?” said Mrs. Meek.
“He’s away,” said Libby. “He went to a principals’ workshop yesterday.”
“Then he’ll be back home by today.”
“It was somewhere far away . . . in . . . in . . . Saudi Arabia.”
Mrs. Meek slowly put down the phone. “Is there something you’re not telling us, Libby?”
“No.”
“Are you sure?” Mr. Meek prompted.
“Uh-huh.” Libby rose from the piano stool. “Can I call Etta and see if she can play? I’ll
just . . .”
“You’ll just stay right where you are, madam,” said Mrs. Meek, dialling the number for the
principal.
Libby sat and listened to her mother’s half of the conversation with Mr. Knott, her school principal. “Disgraceful test result . . . very concerned parents weren’t told about the test . . . Oh, so parents were notified . . . a letter? . . . should have received another letter with student’s mark yesterday . . . seems to have been a communication breakdown at this end . . . talk to Libby about it . . . I absolutely agree, yes, results are not good enough . . . Yes, of course, we’ll be there!”
Mrs. Meek put down the phone and said sternly, “Libby —”
“I think the house is on fire,” said Libby.
“Libby —”
“A hurricane’s coming. I can hear it —”
“Libby!”
“A tidal wave —”
“Libby!”
“I feel sick.”
And she really did. She fought the feeling by putting her thumb in her mouth and sucking hard on it.
Mrs. Meek said gently, “Libby, may I please see the note with your test result?”
Libby went and got her bag. She pulled the crumpled letter from it.
Mrs. Meek smoothed out the paper and gasped, “Forty-seven percent!”
“Can I call Etta and see if she can play?” Libby asked again.
“You may — but this is not the end of the discussion, young lady. Your father and I will discuss your mark, and we’ll talk to you about it later. On Monday, we’re all going to a meeting to hear what Mr. Knott plans to do about these disgraceful marks.”
As her mother spoke, Libby found herself sucking her thumb again.
2
Sound Like a Band
Libby took the phone up to her bedroom. She had chosen orange for the walls after reading that it was girls’ least-favourite colour.
Her father had complained about the colour. He’d complained again when she had plastered posters all over the freshly painted walls. She had posters of Canadian jazz pianists Oscar Peterson and Oliver Jones and D.D. Jackson, whose CDs Ms. Cattermole had played for her. There was also a very old poster that said “Live — at the Montreal Jazz Festival, Harmony Cattermole.” It showed a pianist in a long dress and a headband — Ms. Cattermole before she got old.
Libby sat on her bed to call Etta.
Etta answered on the first ring. “Yo,” she said.
“What are you doing?” Libby asked.
“Getting yelled at about the test and for playing my bass too loud.”
Etta had scored 19%. She’d grinned in class on Friday as she’d shown Libby her mark.
“What are you doing?” Etta asked.
“Getting yelled at about the test and for playing the piano too loud.”
“Let’s see what Celery’s getting yelled at for,” Etta suggested.
Celery was in Miss Nightingale’s class, too. His real name was Celio, but Libby and Etta called him Celery because he was tall and thin, and his skin was so pale, it was almost white. They thought he looked like a stick of celery.
“If he’s getting yelled at, it won’t be for his mark,” said Libby.
Celery had scored 100%. He always seemed to score 100%, whatever the test was on.
“See you on the hill?” said Etta.
“Sure,” said Libby, hanging up.
Like Ms. Cattermole, Etta lived next door to Libby on Farm Hill, only on the other side of the Meeks’ house.
On the way out, Libby passed by her bedroom mirror. She stopped to practise her eye rolling. Looking at her reflection in the mirror, she saw that her hair was a mess. She didn’t know how that had happened. She’d brushed it before going down for breakfast, knowing that her mother, whose golden hair was always perfect, would tell her no breakfast until she did. But already it seemed to be sticking out in all directions.
After six good eye rolls, Libby set her busker’s cap carefully on her head. She’d fallen in love with the cap as soon as she saw it, although she hadn’t known what a busker was until Ms. Cattermole explained that it was a musician who played on the street. The cap was shaped like an engineer’s cap, with narrow grey and white stripes. It had a flat top and a leather band around the edge. With the cap, her skinny black jeans with patches, her orange striped top, and long black knitted vest, she thought she looked like a musician.
She skipped down to the back door.
“Is that an elephant on the stairs?” her mother called from the kitchen.
“Ha ha,” said Libby. “I’ll be somewhere on the hill.”
“Have fun, dear,” said Mr. Meek.
“And don
’t slam the door,” Mrs. Meek added.
Libby tried to stop the door from slamming behind her, but it was too late.
“Whoops,” she muttered, and set off running across the grass between her house and Etta’s.
At the same time, Etta appeared, running across the grass towards Libby. Etta was wearing jeans with holes in both knees, a red Toronto FC soccer shirt, and a red Toronto FC cap over her wild, shoulder-length hair.
“Hi,” Libby said.
“Hey,” said Etta.
There were only four houses on the hill. They were all surrounded by big lawns with neatly trimmed grass, except Ms. Cattermole’s, which had long grass and lots of trees and bushes around it. They set off up the hill towards Celery’s house. Libby bounced as she walked. Etta, although shorter than Libby and striding to keep up, still found time to do cartwheels every few steps.
“What are you doing for your talent at Youth Group?” Libby asked.
“Dunno yet,” said Etta. “I might do some soccer drills.”
As they approached Celery’s house, they heard a low, mournful sound coming from the basement. Crouching down to peer through the window, they saw Celery in the laundry room, playing his cello.
Libby tapped on the glass and motioned for Celery to open the window.
“Why are you playing your cello in the laundry room?” she asked when Celery had opened it.
“Dad said I sounded like a pregnant cow and he couldn’t stand it any longer and would I please play in the basement with the door closed,” said Celery. “I told him he was inhibiting the creative potential of my free-flowing imagination.”
“What did he say?” Etta asked.
“He said I could be as free-flowing as I liked, as long as I did it in the basement.”
Libby peered in at Celery’s sheet music. “What are you playing?”
“It’s ‘Minuet in G,’ by Mozart. But I’m adding stuff,” Celery explained. He started to play.
Libby said, “I can play that!” She hummed along as Celery played.
Etta joined in, making thunk-a-thunk sounds and swinging her hips as she pretended to play her bass guitar.
Celery reached the end of the song and started again. Libby and Etta started again, too. They got louder and louder, until they heard Celery’s father call, “Celio, please.”
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