My “entourage” has been anything but attentive as of late.
“Oh. It’s starting,” Daphne says, pulling me out of my frustrated reverie. She squeezes my arm with happy excitement.
How can she be so confident?
We watch as the mayor walks out on the temporary stage that has been erected for the night’s entertainment in the middle of Olympus Row. Each end of the street has been blocked off to make the festival a pedestrian event. The crowd quiets as Mayor Winters announces the lineup for the entertainment. Tobin will perform first, then Daphne and I, followed by a group number by Lexie and the Sopranos, and then a few more students—but I am too distracted to catch their names. Distracted by the look of disappointment that crosses Daphne’s face as she scans the people in the crowd.
I think I know whom she wishes to see.
“He’ll come.”
“You don’t know that.” She gives me a weak smile. “Things have been going well between us. We eat breakfast together every morning and we go to school together.…”
I nod. Joe had been visiting music class each morning, running through songs and assigning some of the parts. I’d even seen him bring Daphne lunch on a couple of days.
“I just thought he might come tonight.” She washes down the last of her cookie with a swig of water from a bottle. “But I guess that’s what I get for hoping on Joe,” she mumbles to herself.
“It’s not our turn yet. There’s still time. He’ll come.” I hope for her sake that I’m right.
“Funny,” she says. “Just a couple of weeks ago, I wouldn’t have cared if he never heard me sing again.”
Tobin takes the stage, to much applause from the audience. Surprisingly, Daphne doesn’t light up as she usually does when she sees him. Almost like there’s a fresh strain between them. Tobin performs a rocked-out version of one of the older songs in my new music collection. He starts out kind of stiff, like something is agitating him, but once he gets into it, I would be lying if I didn’t admit that he’s good. The audience seems to agree, clapping enthusiastically when he finishes.
I take the pumpkin cookie—poisoned or not—and shove it in my mouth. (Anything to help stop my urge to run and hide.) Surprisingly, it’s the first thing I’ve eaten in the mortal world that doesn’t make me want to gag. Actually, I could eat about ten more. I eye the box sitting next to Daphne.
She looks at me and smiles in the strangest way.
“What?”
“You’ve got chocolate on your mouth.” She reaches out and brushes her fingers over my lips. “There,” she says. “That’s better,” and she absentmindedly sucks the chocolate from the tip of her finger.
If it were possible for an Underlord to spontaneously combust, it could have happened at this moment.
“Come on. We’re up,” Daphne says, taking my hand.
My mouth runs dry and I regret having eaten the cookie. I down half a water bottle as she leads me to the stage.
Her friend Iris joins us there. Daphne asked her to play the violin in the background, while Daphne is on the piano, and I am the guitarist. Once we’d started rehearsing the song, and I discovered that my voice is supposed to carry the bulk of the lyrics—with Daphne joining in, complementing mine in certain parts—I wasn’t sure I could pull this off.
“You can do this,” Daphne had said after a few failed attempts during rehearsal. “Your voice is perfect for the song and your playing is technically spot-on. You just need to open yourself up to the emotion of it all. Let the words fall through you—like the song says.”
I try to remember that now as I start the intro on the guitar. The first few lines of the song are mine alone, and then Daphne joins in. The timbre of her voice makes me tremble. It sounds like how I imagine her caress might feel. I close my eyes briefly, calming myself. As I play, I concentrate on nothing but the sounds of our voices. Iris’s violin in the background fades away, and as far as I am concerned, the audience disappears. All that remains are our voices mixing together—no, more like clasping. Like two lovers who have found each other’s hands in the darkness. It’s a reaching, yearning sound that makes a wanting ache burn inside my chest.
This time, there’s nothing uncertain about it.
When the final note of the song falls, the audience erupts in applause. The sound startles me. I have almost forgotten that Daphne and I are not alone on the edge of her couch, rehearsing. The moment had felt like such an intimate one to me that cheers from the crowd feel intrusive.
Daphne takes my hand and I follow her lead, bowing to the audience.
“Your song,” she says, leaning close to me, as if listening to my heartbeat. “It’s beautiful.”
I tilt my head, studying her face, not sure what she means. Daphne smiles at me, but then her gaze flits to the audience, who stand on their feet, clapping for us. She’s still looking for Joe.
I can feel her mounting disappointment until I hear a loud, sharp whistle from the back of the crowd. My gaze follows Daphne’s as she finds Joe standing near the kettle corn booth. The smile returns to her face.
“That’s my girl!” Joe shouts over the applause. “That’s my daughter!” He starts making his way through the crowd. Daphne’s smile folds into a frown. Joe’s steps are too heavy, lumbering, and he almost pushes over an older man in his haste to get near the stage.
“That’s my daughter!” he shouts again. The volume of his voice strikes me as inappropriate, and his voice is tinged with anger. He holds a long-necked, brown bottle in his hand.
“Oh no, Joe,” Daphne says under her breath.
“That’s my daughter. She’s perfect. She’s everything a man could ever want in a child. And I gave her up. I traded her for fame and fortune.”
Mayor Winters suddenly appears on the stage. She takes a microphone. “The Joe Vince, everybody! How about a round of applause for our local rock star?” She leads the crowd in an awkward spatter of applause. A couple of camera phones flash.
Joe looks around, jerking his head back and forth as if he can’t figure out why people are clapping for him.
“Did you all know that Joe Vince is writing the school musical?” the mayor goes on, trying to defuse the situation. “Isn’t he fantastic?”
“What? I’m not fantastic. Don’t clap for me!” Joe shouts. “I’m nothing but a lying, worthless son of a …”