by Leigh Tudor
“I don’t know anything about music, In my line you don’t have to.”
― Elvis Presley
Cara lifted the hamburger patty with her fork and sniffed.
That couldn’t be right.
Amarilla sat across from her, making eyes at the football players at the table next to them, while Ally sat next to Cara, also staring skeptically at her tray as if it were teeming with toxic waste rather than a hamburger and fries.
Cara had opted to sign up for summer school, hoping to eventually graduate early and end her dismal public school experience. On her first day, she had been surprised to see just how many students had signed up, but soon learned that most of them had done so due to failing grades as opposed to academic aspirations.
Amarilla waved her fingers at one of the players, who responded with an arrogant chin lift. It should come as no surprise she was one of the students attending summer school for failing grades.
Cara had no idea what Amarilla saw in the ego-inflated muscle heads. Their antics were mean-spirited and uninspired, as they preyed on the weaker students and celebrated their social downfalls.
Cretins.
One of the meatheads particularly grated on Cara’s nerves: Landon Standish.
He was the team quarterback, and his list of worthless achievements included making all-conference and was rumored to be in the running for being voted all-state. It was advertised on the daily how he was being scouted by some of the larger college teams.
And he was only a junior.
The town of Wilder wasn’t all that large, and to boast having an undefeated football team playing against much larger school systems, and winning, was quite the accomplishment.
Although the season wouldn’t be in full swing until September, the players attended daily practices during the summer. After attending summer school classes, of course. And not due to academic aspirations.
So Landon considered himself the crowning glory of the Wilder High kingdom, with the lowly students being his personal serfs.
Cara didn’t fully understand the intricacies of the divisions and rankings and frankly couldn’t care less. The extent of her interest in the sport was as it pertained to the marching band, which she had to quit at the first of the year and once Loren was taken from Wilder. Madame had deemed it safer for her to come straight home from school as opposed to traveling all over southeast Texas and performing at pregame and half-time shows.
She wondered if any of her other schoolmates suffered from the same vexing predicaments.
And then Haley, Marleigh, and Nate arrived, and she became their unofficial after-school babysitter.
So much for her first year of attending a real school.
She had gotten straight A’s. No one noticed.
She had won several music awards and contests she had signed up for. No one showed up. Granted she never told anyone, but you would think they would hear about her achievements and ask.
Winning seemed ridiculously easy, to the point where she felt guilty taking all of the trophies and leaving the other contestants feeling dejected and less than talented next to her explosive performances.
So she stopped competing.
She was even in the running for salutatorian. But no one knew, or at least they didn’t mention it. Again, she shouldn’t have to say anything.
Madame wasn’t even aware of her grades or the milestones she’d achieved as she seemed inundated with the life and times of her far older, more interesting sisters.
She had turned fifteen in January but didn’t blow out a single candle for Loren and Mercy were busy blowing up a drug cartel organization and rescuing orphaned children back at the Center.
How could her lackluster high school experience compete against that?
Her sisters were beautiful and strong. Virtually superheroes.
Who was she?
Nobody, that’s who.
The girls in her class dressed better than her and went to all the popular kids’ houses for parties while she and her friends stayed at home and did nothing but play and listen to music.
On top of that pile of feces sandwich, she was the last to know anything going on with her family, and she was sick to death of it.
When Vlad had showed up, no one had bothered to explain who he was or why he was there. She’d learned about Mercy’s migraines by eavesdropping on a conversation between Madame and Vlad. And then she was the last to know that Loren was pregnant and that Madame was not only the daughter of a duke but their actual, freaking grandmother.
And when she’d made that fateful call to Madame Garmond, asking her to come to Wilder, the woman had come all right. But her attention had instantly shifted from Cara to Loren and Mercy. She didn’t even have Madame’s undivided attention anymore.
Her life had been so much more exciting when she’d been the inimitable Charlotte Halstead, traveling the world and playing the piano for kings and queens and celebrities. Why, she used to be a celebrity herself. People used to pay big money to sit at her table during charity dinners.
Now, she was a band nerd who no longer played in the band and instead came home and played the piano to an empty house.
That wasn’t to say that she would ever want to go back to her old life. She loved her sisters and living in Wilder. She just wished people were more aware of her existence.
Namely her family.
“Hey, Cara,” a deep voice rumbled.
Cara rolled her eyes and turned toward Ally as opposed to the voice of her nemesis standing next to her. “Do you think if I ignore him long enough, he’ll just go away?”
Ally looked from Cara to the person standing next to her and shook her head. “He’s still there. And he can hear you.”
She sighed irritably and turned toward the six-foot quarterback with jet-black hair and dove-gray eyes.
Landon Standish.
She hated him.
“Hey, Cara. How are you?”
“I’m fine. Don’t you have middle schoolers to harass?”
Holding his tray, he shook his head in confusion. “I haven’t harassed middle schoolers since I was one.”
“Don’t you have some poor unsuspecting math nerd to dunk head first in the boys’ restroom toilet?”
“Why would I do that? I’m president of the math club.”
“Okay, how about Nate? I saw you messing with him yesterday in the cafeteria. It’s not his fault his IQ dwarfs that of most of the morons in this school, and he has to take advanced classes with the older kids.”
Landon looked at Cara and then toward Nate, who sat by himself at another table. “I wasn’t messing with him. I was asking him if I could sit with him. He’s a good kid and seemed lonely.”
“Sure,” Cara mocked. “And then did you give him a wedgie and tip his tray?”
“No, I ate with him.”
“Of course you did,” she hissed skeptically.
Ally leaned toward Cara. “He really did. He’s super nice to Nate, making sure the other players don’t pick on him.”
Her eyes shot back up to him, catching another character flaw. “Why? Do you need tutoring from him or something? Failing your summer classes?”
Landon seemed uncertain how to respond. “As of this morning, I have a three-point-five grade point average. I’m taking summer classes because I happen to enjoy learning.”
“Brag much?”
“Hey, um, I just wanted to check to see if any of you had seen Samantha,” Landon added. “Wanted to make sure she was okay.”
Cara would have liked to know if she was okay as well. Samantha wasn’t taking any of their calls, and rumor had it that she was staying with family in Alabama while her dad was being held without bail and her mom was still recovering.
“We haven’t heard a word from her, Landon,” Ally responded.
“That’s too bad. She’s a nice girl. She doesn’t deserve what she’s been through.”
Ally nodded as Cara felt her heart turn at the kindness coming from someo
ne she was determined not to like.
“So, hey, Cara, I wanted to know if I could walk you to your next class,” Landon said, losing balance of his tray and nearly spilling the contents on the floor, but righting it just in the nick of time.
She rolled her eyes. So much for quick reflexes from such a celebrated quarterback.
Before Cara could respond, Amarilla scooted back in her chair. “You can walk me to my class, Landon.”
The heinous excuse of a human being hesitated as if unsure how to extricate himself from Amarilla’s attention and return his focus on Cara.
“Go on,” Cara said with a wave of her hand. It was probably all for the better. “Or is Amarilla not good enough for you?”
“No,” Landon stumbled. “I mean, yes.” He sighed and held his hand out, indicating to Amarilla that she should lead the way. He gave Cara one last lingering look before following a chatty Amarilla.
Ally shook her head. “Why are you so mean to him? He’s a smart, junior jock who has a thing for you, a lowly freshman, and you treat him like he’s got the plague. What has he ever done to you?”
“Please, he’s a self-absorbed jock, who thinks the world revolves around him.”
“Oh, really? Did you know his mother is suffering from MS and his dad’s a doctor who runs a free medical clinic on the weekends?”
“That makes it even worse. How can perfectly nice parents raise such a jerk?”
“Landon Standish is the nicest boy in school. He gets good grades, and he looks after Nate and, if you haven’t noticed, he’s crazy about you.” She took a timid bite of her sandwich and muttered, “Why, I’ll never know.”
“He’s not crazy about me. He’s just trying to make me think he is so he can embarrass me in front of the school and then laugh at me.”
“I think you’ve watched too many high school, coming-of-age movies.”
“I think they call it ‘art imitating life.’” Cara turned toward Ally and started counting off with her fingers. “Ten Things I Hate About You.”
“Bianca ends up with Cameron. Kat and Patrick hook up, and Joey ends up with a broken nose.”
Cara pulled down her next finger. “Sixteen Candles.”
Ally rolled her eyes. “Sam and Jake end up together. And, by the way, have you noticed how much Landon looks like Jake?”
“Maybe,” she said with a grimace, yanking on her third finger. “Mean Girls.”
“You mean the movie where Cady ends up with Aaron, the cute boy in her calculus class?” Ally took a sip of her milk. “I can do this all day.”
“Quit typecasting Landon as the good-looking nice guy, when he’s anything but.”
Nate suddenly appeared with a lunch box and sat where Amarilla had been moments ago.
“Afternoon, ladies. Mind if I join you? Safety in numbers.”
Ally leaned forward as Nate opened his lunch box and began to pull out containers. “What are you eating?”
“A chickpea salad with smoked salmon and a green juice,” he answered, producing his own fork. “The food they serve in this place is the worst possible for growing minds. You should bring your own instead of financially supporting this swill.”
Ally sipped on her straw. “Have you eaten my brother’s cooking?”
“Hey, did Landon leave?” Nate asked, taking another bite. “I wanted to ask him something about homework in AP Chemistry.”
“Cara scared him off.”
Cara’s gaze shot up. “You can thank me later when you’ve grown up devoid of mental scars from being bullied.”
Ally pointed her fork toward Cara. “She’s convinced Mr. Boy Wonder is actually an evil bad boy waiting to expose his true self to everyone.”
Nate swallowed a bite of food. “Catastrophizing.”
Cara stopped chewing her piece of desiccated beef as Ally asked, “Catastra-what?”
Nate swallowed. “Catastrophizing is a cognitive disorder where one assumes the worst will happen. A habitual and unconscious way of thinking that’s skewed. In Cara’s case, it’s a negative exaggeration as it pertains to a certain quarterback she secretly admires but is afraid to admit her feelings for.”
Ally chuckled. “Omigod.”
Nate added, “I’ve had to come to terms with the fact that she’s secretly in love with him.”
Cara fumed. “I’m not in—”
“He’s actually doing me a favor, as high school girls run through, on average, three-point-five serious boyfriends before settling on their ‘one true love,’ which would be me, of course.”
“Wow,” Ally said.
Cara repeatedly tapped her fork on her tray in irritation.
“I just need to bide my time and be ready when she is. In the meantime, if she suffers from psychological disorders pertaining to boys six inches taller than me, can throw a football like a bullet, and have hair best described as a crowning glory, so be it. Gives me time to catch up.”
“You’re rather confident in your assessment,” Cara said, deadpan.
“Has nothing to do with confidence. It’s all based on science and math,” he argued, taking another bite and pointing his fork toward her. “Tomorrow, I’m going to start packing your lunch.”
Oh God, no. “Please don’t, kids will talk…”
“The nutritional value of the food you eat now will affect the intelligence of our future children. Trust me, I’ll be doing us both a favor. We don’t want kids that randomly lick drainpipes and are incapable of doing simple math.”
Ally reached with her fork toward his bowl and took a bite of his salad. “That’s really good. Will you bring me lunch, too?”
“Sure, any friend of Cara’s is a welcome nutritional challenge of mine. Do you have any food allergies?”
“Just Brussels sprouts and broccoli. Basically, anything green.”
He twisted his lip to one side. “I see you don’t understand how food allergies work. Nor have you enjoyed the taste of a properly cooked green vegetable.”
“Sounds like an urban legend,” Ally said with a grimace.
Cara checked her phone for the time. “While you two discuss your gastronomic preferences, I’m going to class to learn something practical like diatonic chords in natural and melodic minors.”
“What?” Nate asked, uncharacteristically stumped.
“Advanced Music Theory.”
“They offer that as a summer course?”
“It’s not a bad class. I’ve been enjoying it,” she defended.
Nate chuckled. “Good luck making a living doing that.”
Cara took a deep breath.
If only.
After summer school let out, Cara walked to Trevor’s house. She had a daily standing gig to show up after school, retrieve the girls from Mrs. Calhoun. It was an easy gig, one where she made sure Marleigh and Haley didn’t eat glue or dye Sugar Plum dark green while Nate holed up in Trevor’s office, hacking into his laptop to monitor foreign markets and option multi-leg strategies.
Whatever that was.
Today, she was surprised to see Mercy sitting on the front steps with Nate, who had his nose in his laptop, and the two girls practically in her lap as if she were about to break into song like from a scene in The Sound of Music.
Cara dropped her book bag to her feet. “Does this mean you’re driving me home instead of Mr. Forrest?”
“Sorry, no can do,” Mercy said as Marleigh lifted her hair on one side to touch her new earrings. “Just got an SOS call from Loren. She’s at the farmhouse and having a gestational breakdown. I foresee this becoming a common occurrence at least until mid-October.”
“I kind of needed to talk to you about some things,” Cara said, feeling uncomfortable reaching out to Mercy. Her sister was never very embracing when it came to sharing one another’s feelings, but her options were limited these days, with Madame spending her free time with Levi and Loren working through her own issues.
“Sure,” Mercy said, standing up just as Trevor’s new truck
pulled in front of the house.
Mercy appeared instantly nervous. Shoving her hands in the back pockets of her shorts, she watched the girls run to Trevor after he jumped from the driver’s seat, screaming at the top of their lungs as if he were the world’s most perfect human being to ever draw breath.
He picked one up in each arm. Marleigh patted his cheeks, and Haley tucked her head in the crook of his neck.
“Hey there, Cara,” he said as he was systematically adored by the two little people, but before Cara could even respond, he turned to Mercy. “What a nice surprise to see you here, Mercy.”
“I was just leaving,” she responded, walking toward the car and forgetting Cara’s request to talk.
“Hey Trev-Man, I’m looking at the butterfly spread, and some of our stocks are in high volatility for the short leg. Take a look,” Nate blurted.
Trevor turned to Cara, his attention divided. “I stopped by to… check on the girls.”
Translation: his spy-neighbor, Mrs. Calhoun, had called to tell him Mercy was at the house and so he’d rushed home from work. Cara wasn’t stupid.
“Could you get them their snack while I sit with Nate?” Trevor asked as he lowered each girl to the ground. They grabbed Cara’s fingers and pulled her up the front porch stairs.
“Guess so…” Cara said, over her shoulder to Trevor, who kept glancing toward an escaping Mercy.
He held up his finger to Nate, asking him to wait a minute, and then rushed over to Mercy’s car door, giving her the gesture to lower her window.
“Nate, you want to supervise the making of their afternoon snack?”
Nate glanced up from his screen toward Trevor, who was bending over the driver’s window of Mercy’s car. “Sure, there’s no telling how long these two will take. They possess the emotional intelligence of doorknobs.”
Cara glanced at an icy Mercy, who was looking straight ahead, while Trevor bent down to his haunches so he was at eye level with her.
“Yeah, this is going to take a while. Who wants PB&J and Doritos?”
The girls started to clap with unreserved excitement, and then they saw Nate’s dour face.
“Who wants vegan crisps and almond butter?”