She sang to them, willed them to join her. This world, she told them, is full of broken things, but together we can mend them. She meant it, every word.
When it was time for the next verse, Blue turned forward. As she moved her head, she saw the man in the blue shirt, still grinning, and she sang even harder.
I got a dollar in my pocket, fifty cents of that is yours. / I got a sleeping bag in my pack, with room for just one more. Only it had room for so many more, for all of them.
They’d reached the chorus again. Blue motioned with her guitar. Why would any of them join her? Fame waited for them as long as they ignored her. This world, she sang, and she could see beyond the dark and into the empty spaces of the cities and boarded-up houses; then beyond those places, to where the invisible go. To abandoned barns filled with light and music for just one night, where musicians played what was in their hearts to save one another from the cold.
She heard Jill before she felt her. Jill’s voice chased Tish’s harmony, her hand on the small of Blue’s back as she joined her at the mic.
Two verses gone, three to go, with Cass still in the wings.
They came before she’d even reached the end of the next verse—Jed, and the man the women had talked about at Yarrow’s—and they joined the chorus from the start, delving deeper, their voices the shovels that broke the ground at Beyond. They were the men who were not Rat, or Andrea’s husband, who came to help and not to destroy, and in doing so, saved themselves.
Another verse, another chorus, and still no Cass. If she didn’t come, she’d win the show by default, because the other contracts were already broken. All Blue had was their mother’s guitar and her own voice to call her.
But that wasn’t true. Blue had the others onstage, and now, growing, the voices from the audience like the ocean rolling in. For the first time, she tried to see them, the crowd hidden in the darkness before her.
At the final verse, The light covers you, covers me, Tish and Roe pulled back, letting Blue sing to Cass on her own. She could see Cass wavering when she turned, and she stepped toward her.
Around her, darkness crawled across the stage. The man in the blue shirt no longer lurked in the shadows. He stood between Blue and Cass. The darkness that came with him brought a chill that traveled into her. She’d never had the power to change anything, it told her, never had a chance.
“Buyer’s market,” the man in the blue shirt said. His teeth glistened as he spoke. “I told you that before. Everyone’s selling so cheap. The few you’ve saved, they’re nothing. A few pebbles on a gravel road. You make your stand here, and you’ll be forgotten within days, if not hours.”
Could be the end is coming, could be time to go, / Could also be change running, beside us on the road. Blue sang because there was nothing else to do, because the words were hers, and because she had no other way to reach Cass. She forced her fingers to keep going despite the cold; her lips to move despite the frost that grew on them; her heart to beat despite the fear that closed round it.
“Sing all you want, little girl; but you lost, long ago. This world dances to our tune these days—and face it.” His grin stretched wider as the odor of decay wafted from his mouth. “One girl with an old guitar means nothing to anyone anymore.”
The chorus. Around her came the voices of everyone, candlelight in the dark. This world, she began; but despair swept in as she turned back to face the audience.
Until she heard the voice that mirrored her own. She didn’t turn. The sensation of feathers spread over her skin, her hope rising like wings. The voice came closer, Cass pressing a shoulder against Blue as she leaned in to share the mic, singing the way they had as children. From somewhere far away, Blue heard a roar so huge it drowned out everything. At first, she thought it was the man in the blue shirt, come to destroy them all; but then someone swung a spotlight over the audience, and she could see hundreds of people on their feet, their applause shattering the ice inside her.
That night they waited until after the crowds had emptied out and the cameras had been packed away before trying to leave the building.
Jed and Jill left before them. “It was exciting, but it wasn’t going to change things,” Jill said. “Instead of the backup singer, I was the singing girlfriend. That’s not what I’m looking for.”
“And I’m totally not the guy they were selling,” Jed said. “The thought of always living like that . . . no way.”
“Where’s Bet?” Blue asked.
Within Jed’s face something trembled, a seismic shift that hurt her to see. “I thought she’d be here. I assumed, I guess. I haven’t really talked to her in—”
“Way too fucking long,” Jill finished for him. “We both screwed up on that one.”
“Big time,” Jed said.
Only then a noise came from the back of the theater, a door opening, and Blue could see Bet standing back there. Jed jumped down from the stage and ran toward the back. Jill picked up his guitar and hugged Blue before following him out. The last Blue saw of them, they’d each had an arm around Bet.
That left the four of them—Blue, Cass, Roe, and Tish—to meet Rick Rafael as he headed out to his limo. He studied Cass carefully before speaking.
“I don’t see Clary much in you. I wouldn’t have seen myself, either, without Tish pointing it out.”
They stood there, Cass looking him over just as thoroughly. “I thought it would be different,” she said finally. “Silly of me.” She turned to walk away.
“Is that it?” he called after her.
“You were never my father, not in any real way. Not any more than Donor 707 is Blue’s.”
A lone woman approached, cutting through the tension. She wore a black blazer unbuttoned over a blue silk shirt, and she held out her hand to Blue.
“Let me congratulate you on one hell of a performance. You have real star quality, Miss Riley. Kind of rough in the presentation department, but with some coaching and a little wardrobe help, you could be big. I’d love to talk more with you. I think we could make a deal, get you recording soon.”
Blue touched her throat and rocked a little in her boots. She thought about the feel of singing in front of the Major Chord audience, the moment when she’d heard their applause. Without help, she’d never get that back. Once in a lifetime, if that, you could steal onto someone else’s stage and play. Perhaps this evening would always be the best, the brightest moment in her life, already gone by, unless she made a deal.
“Um, I’m not sure. Do you have a business card or something?”
“Yes, but I’d really love to talk with you soon.”
“Not tonight,” said Blue, taking the card from the woman’s hand.
On a street corner ahead of them, a lone man began to play a banjo. She watched with curiosity as he started to sing. She knew the song in her bones, even if the words were unfamiliar.
“Just a minute,” she said to the others; and she ran to him, feeling around in her pockets for change. But she saw no case or cup to drop money into. The man nodded at her. She tilted her head to read the words written on the body of the banjo: “This Machine Surrounds Hate and Forces It to Surrender.” For a moment, the air was filled with the whispers of thousands of songs, voices, instruments played and gone, a river of echoes. Music made, lives lived: Mama’s, Willy’s, everyone’s. Blue nodded in return.
If she closed her eyes, she could see the lanterns of Barn Magic and hear the music play as the chili heated on the woodstove. Success is what you define for yourself. If that was true, how did it look for her? What did she want from this life: what the woman had to offer her, or what she had yet to find on her own?
She looked at the card in her hand, then tore it neatly in two pieces, four, eight. She emptied the shreds into her pocket.
Maybe the answer was as simple as this: maybe every voice had a role to play, a song each could use, a way to keep making things better. Maybe what seemed like the best was only the beginning.
A
cknowledgments
A book, like a writer, is shaped by a thousand hands. While I’ll mention individuals below, I’d like to provide a more general appreciation first. Every day we are offered so many ways to make a difference to someone else: to be generous even if it slows us down, to be gentle when we see fear, to be respectful when confronted with something outside the range of our experience, to be real when it is easier to pretend. Those kindnesses—the ones I’ve experienced or witnessed throughout my life—have paved the road for this book. Thank you all for them. You’re spectacular.
My gratitude for my agent, Alice Speilburg, is limitless. The fact that I finished writing Devil and the Bluebird is due in no small part to her patience, support, and sheer enthusiasm. I count myself lucky to have her as adviser, cheerleader, and advocate.
Thank you to my editor, Anne Heltzel, for recognizing the heart of this story and believing in it. Her vision helped to clarify my own and made this a far better book. Thanks also to the whole team at Abrams and, in particular, Alyssa Nassner. They took my humble, double-spaced, Times New Roman manuscript and made it into a beautiful, well-designed book. I honor their hard work.
While it is possible to write without ever interacting with another human, the road toward publication is one best traveled with friends. I am deeply indebted to Christine, who reads with heart and mind and challenges me to write for both; to Abigail, who understands that there is dark and light in all journeys; to Nancy, without whom I might still be writing stories in secret; and to Jenna, who has listened and supported endlessly.
To Hilary and Stone Pony Farm, my gratitude for quiet space and a warm woodstove and the smell of horses and hay.
To Ed, many thanks for stories about trains and for thoughts on Blue’s travels.
The support of my parents has been essential to me as a writer and a person both. Thank you for believing in your eccentric daughter. Likewise, thank you to my brothers and their families for their own unique brands of cheerleading.
I know of no words graceful and strong enough to explain what my children, Daniel and Acadia, mean to me as a writer or a mom. Without them, my stories and my life would be so much less.
And to Jonathan—my truest reader and dearest friend—so many thanks, so much love.
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