Honeycomb Read online

  “Well, the lyrics stay the same,” Harper says. She hurries over to her bag to get the music, which she hands to Ingrid.

  Jess shakes her head, dismissive. “But the emotion behind the chorus can change, depending on what’s happened in the verse before it. I already know that.”

  “Maybe you know that here”—Ingrid reaches up and taps Jess’s head—“but not here”—she taps her stomach. “I could hear that on your CD.”

  We take that in. Ingrid must have been one of the judges if she heard our CD.

  “Sing the bridge and the final chorus.”

  Starting at the bridge means starting with Harper on melody. Better her than me.

  “I need my guitar,” says Jess.

  “Let’s focus on the voice for now. And you girls are good enough to find the notes without help,” Ingrid says, cutting off what was likely Jess’s next protest. “Go ahead.”

  There’s no escape. Harper sings the bridge, Jess and I come in on the proper lines of the chorus, Harper finishes on the last swept me away.

  “Perfectly adequate,” Ingrid says. “Now, take each other’s hands and close your eyes.”

  Jess snorts. Even Harper looks skeptical.

  Ingrid says, “Yes, I’m sure this all feels too kumbaya for words. Do it anyway.”

  We join hands. I’m surprised at how cold Harper’s are. Cold and slightly shaky. Could she be nervous? Jess’s grip is loose, which makes me hold tighter. I close my eyes. I have to trust that Jess and Harper do too.

  “Your closed eyes will help you listen to each other. Harmony takes listening. It will also help you concentrate on your breathing.” Ingrid’s voice is surprisingly gentle. “Breathe right down to the very bottom of your belly. Take a few breaths now, before you begin.”

  We do. It’s strange at first, then calming, hearing nothing but Jess’s and Harper’s breathing so close by. We have to count on each other.

  Ingrid says, “Start with all of you singing the bridge this time.”

  Harper hums the opening note for us and we begin: “But the clouds, you brought them on / and the words you wrote, now they are gone / you’ve left me here, no sign of dawn…”

  Jess sings: “With your blue skywriting…”

  Jess and I sing: “Bright blue skywriting…”

  Harper joins us: “Blue skywriting…”

  Then she finishes: “Swept me away.”

  “Better. Now, open your eyes. Sing again,” Ingrid says, wasting no time. “Full, supportive breaths.”

  As soon as we hit you’ve left me here, no sign of dawn, Jess’s eyes rim with tears. She blinks hard and takes a deep breath for the next two lines. Her voice comes out so rich that Harper’s high melody sounds glassy over it, almost in danger of cracking. At the end, Harper’s solo line, swept me away, sounds truly alone. The way the songwriter means it to.

  I get it.

  Jess pulls away and gives her eyes a quick swipe.

  Ingrid hands the music back to Harper, who takes it without a word. “Think of what we can do when we get to the full songs, Jess,” Ingrid says lightly. “See you girls next week.”

  * * *

  Jess powers down the stairs ahead of us.

  Not that Harper notices. “That was amazing. Ingrid is intense! I’m already more aware of my voice.”

  Harper’s so loud everybody in the building is probably aware of her voice. “I never knew how hard it was to breathe properly,” I say as we follow Jess outside.

  “It’s not that hard, Nat.” Jess’s voice is cool. The wind blows her dark hair across her face.

  “Okay, maybe not hard.” I tuck my own hair behind my ears. “But I know you felt the difference when we—”

  “The voice is an instrument, you know, Jess,” Harper interrupts. “It takes as much practice as a guitar.”

  “Oh yeah? How much guitar do you play?” Jess heads toward the bus stop.

  Harper steps in front of her. “I play piano, my mom plays piano, my dad plays guitar and about five other instruments, Grandma Barb plays guitar and piano. I’m surrounded by instruments.”

  Jess does two slow claps. “Bravo. You’re a frigging musical dynasty.”

  “And you’re a frigging pain in the butt.”

  “Stop it!” I get between them. “We had a good session with Ingrid. At least, I thought it was good. We get to play at Tall Grass. Why do we have to fight about what an instrument is?”

  Jess looks at me as if I’m clueless. “Because, Nat, we wasted an hour making zombie noises and feeling things when we should be working on our harmonies and making sure the guitar is balanced with the vocals.”

  “So you don’t think there need to be feelings in a song?” I hold her gaze.

  “For the audience.” Jess doesn’t blink. “When the notes are right, the feelings take care of themselves. A musician’s job is to get the notes right.” She crosses her arms. “You were flat in the chorus.”

  There’s a weird pause in the wind. I feel off balance.

  “Nice, Jess. Really nice,” Harper says.

  Jess goes on. “That’s the sort of stuff we need to work on. Not Ingrid’s stupid exercises.”

  I put up my hands. “Okay, Jess, I get it. Ingrid bugs you. Harper bugs you. I bug you. Fine.” I shove my hands in my pockets and back away. “You know what? I’m going to head over to the café. If anyone else needs a great big hot chocolate right about now, they’re welcome to join me.”

  “I’m coming,” Harper says.

  “Great.”

  The wind blows a dirty coffee cup into my path, and I kick it aside.

  Thirteen

  Harper picks the table by the window, the same one Gabe and I sat at our first time here. I wish I could talk to him right now. I sit, still shaky from whatever it was that just happened between me and Jess.

  Harper raises her cup. “Here’s to Nat.”

  “Okay.” I raise my cup and Harper clinks it. “Why, exactly?”

  “For not taking crap from Jess.” Harper adjusts her windswept curls. “Ingrid puts her in her place and she takes it out on you—‘you were flat.’”

  “Maybe I was.”

  “You definitely were not. Trust me, I’d tell you if you were.” She warms her hands on her cup.

  “Wait. Did Harper Neale just compliment me on my singing?”

  “Ha-ha,” she says, sarcastic.

  I take that as a yes. I’ll take anything I can get to feel better about my place in the trio.

  “You know what, Nat? Jess holds you back.”

  I stop basking in the glow of Harper’s semi-praise. “I don’t know about that.”

  She sighs. “You’re going to say, ‘Jess and I are BFFs. Why would she hold me back?’”

  “I would not say BFFs.”

  Harper ignores my comment. “But if you honestly felt she wasn’t holding you back, you wouldn’t have stood up to her. That was fierce, Nat.”

  I shift in my chair, uncomfortable. “Thank you, Dr. Neale. What do I owe you for this session?”

  Harper sits back and sips her hot chocolate. “You know I’m right.”

  “But I’m doing what I want to be doing—prepping for Tall Grass, improving my singing.”

  “You’re doing it, but are you feeling it?”

  I give a little laugh. “Feelings again.” I glance out the window. A woman walks by, clutching her coat closed against the wind.

  “Are you excited about Honeycomb? About Tall Grass?”

  “Of course!” I turn back to Harper.

  Her voice goes quiet. “So why don’t you show it?”

  “I do.” Harper’s expression doesn’t change. “Don’t I?”

  “You try. But”—she holds up her fingers as she makes her points—“Darrell says we should try out for Tall Grass. You get excited; Jess walks out. We get into Tall Grass. You get excited; Jess tells you to stop. We make a breakthrough during a session with Ingrid. You get excited; Jess shoots you down.”

  Ha
rper’s words sit there like cards snapped down on the table. She takes a last slow sip of her hot chocolate.

  “Jess feels things differently than I do.”

  Harper jabs a finger onto the table. “That doesn’t mean she should tell you how to feel.”

  Jess does get annoyed when I’m too enthusiastic. But she’s also had my back from the time we were kids. Until lately.

  “That’s it, let my wisdom sink in. ’Cause now I totally need to pee.” Harper laughs and stands up. “Be right back.”

  The baristo comes by, picks up Harper’s cup and points to my half-empty one. “You done with this?”

  I nod. “It was a bit too much for me.” I glance out the window.

  And see Gabe walking into Crescendo Music.

  “Tell my friend ‘sorry, but something came up.’” I’m out the door before the guy can answer.

  * * *

  Gabe’s back is to me, his head bent as he flips through a book. He’s wearing the same plaid shirt he had on at Harper’s after-party. I have to stop myself from reaching out to touch it. “Hey. Good book?”

  He turns. His face shuts down so fast I’m tempted to bolt. But I keep smiling.

  Gabe doesn’t smile back. “I don’t know. I haven’t read it yet.”

  “Right.” I swallow. “I was across the street and saw you and…I wanted to say hi. See how you’re doing.”

  “I’m fine. Still banjoing away.” He looks past me. “You and your bandmates still arguing?” He says “bandmates” as if he’s forgotten their names.

  I wish I hadn’t decided to follow him in here. “No.” It’s not a total lie. Harper seems to be suddenly on my side.

  “Well, good luck keeping that up.” Now he smiles.

  “Uh, thanks.”

  “At least as a solo act I’m free of that crap.”

  “I guess that’s a good way to look at it,” I say, missing the guy who talked about people being happy together at Tall Grass.

  His cheeks flush. He looks down at the book and hefts it. “Think I’ll get this. See you.”

  He starts to walk away and I say, “Gabe?”

  He turns.

  “I’m not the reason you didn’t get into Tall Grass.”

  Gabe bites his lip. Looks away. Looks back. I can barely hear him when he says, “I know.”

  I watch him until he’s at the counter, talking with Bushy-Beard. I can’t leave the store without going past him. I go to the other side of the book rack, crouch down and pull a random book off the lowest shelf. I try not to cry.

  * * *

  A week later, Harper and I stop outside the closed orange door. I was sure Jess would be here already, but she’s not.

  “You’re at school with her all week,” Harper whispers angrily. “You’re basically joined at the hip but she doesn’t tell you she’s going to be late?”

  Jess and I haven’t spoken this week. I whisper back, “When I got to her place her mom said she had left an hour earlier. Maybe she had stuff to do and she’ll be here any minute.”

  “Any minute will be too late.”

  The orange door swings open. Harper grabs my hand like we’re in a horror movie.

  “Are you unfamiliar with how doorknobs work?” Ingrid is barefoot and in tights again, but with a droopy sweater that looks like it’s knitted out of spider webs and poodle hair.

  Harper ducks into the room ahead of me. Ingrid must be the first person who’s ever intimidated her.

  “Sorry Jess isn’t here yet,” I say, figuring it’s best to get the bad news out quickly.

  “Jess won’t be here.” Ingrid turns her back and closes the door with a firm click. “She phoned here and told Robert she wasn’t well.”

  “Huh.” Harper looks at me.

  But all I have are questions. Jess went out, so she can’t be sick. So where did she go? And why didn’t she tell me?

  Ingrid strides over to the window and presses a button on a timer that’s perched on the windowsill. Green digital numbers begin to count down our hour. She puts her hands on her hips. “Today we are going to work at your passaggio. Do you know that term?”

  “It sounds familiar.” Harper squints, trying to squeeze the answer out of her head. I can’t even pretend to know what it means.

  Ingrid prowls around the room. “The term is Italian, obviously, and refers to the place in your register where the chest voice shifts into the head voice.”

  “Oh! The vocal break,” Harper says.

  Ingrid purses her lips. “‘Break’ is the wrong term. The shift must be smooth, continuous. A passage. Passaggio.”

  Harper nods. It’s odd to see her look happy while being told she’s wrong about something musical.

  “Nat, you need to work on this more than Harper does,” Ingrid says.

  That perks Harper up even more.

  We do a short vocal warm-up. Then Ingrid orders me to the middle of the room. “Sing the first verse of ‘Blue Skywriting’ for me.”

  “That’s actually my part of the song,” Harper says.

  But Ingrid waves that aside. “You should all know every part of the song.”

  So I sing the verse. I feel my chest tense when I have to hit the higher notes. Of course, the telltale crack happens.

  “There.” Ingrid pounces.

  “When I’m more relaxed I can—”

  Ingrid holds up a hand. “I know. I’m not punishing you—I’m helping you. Now do me a favor. Repeat after me.” She sings, “Boo-boo-boo-boo-boo,” three notes up, two down.

  I do the same. We go up through a few octaves this way.

  “Nice and smooth. That’s why I start with narrow vowels. This gets more difficult with open vowels.” She sings the line “Said you had to astound me,” putting a break in her voice on “had” and “astound.”

  “I never thought of the vowel sounds as being the hard part. I thought it was the notes.” Now that I seem to have done something right, I don’t mind if I say something stupid.

  “It’s both, of course. But the back of the throat has to make a different shape for the different vowel sounds. The ah requires a higher larynx, and the ooh a lower one. But enough mechanics.” Ingrid glances at the timer. “Harper, come join us.”

  Harper stands beside me.

  “We’ll do what we did with boo, but using bah. You’ll both be my little sheep.”

  I can imagine what Jess would say to that.

  Ingrid leads us through scales of bah, interrupting with “Support it with your breath” or “Don’t think steps, think passage.” She moves the entire time, while Harper and I stand in the center of the room. Hardworking sheep.

  I love it. My voice gets stronger and freer with every breath.

  Ingrid stops in front of me. “Now. Sing your line again.”

  I breathe in. “Said you had to astound me.” No cracks.

  Ingrid claps. “You see? Lovely. Keep working on this, girls. Every day. Always work. To astound your audience.” She winks at me.

  Harper and I high-five each other. We’re a team. Without Jess.

  * * *

  Alone on the bus going home, I get a text from Gabe. Was jerk when I saw u. Actually hope practices for TGrass going good.

  I feel a smile take over my face, then look around at the other passengers, as if one of them will tell me not to let Gabe off so easily. I wait until the end of my ride before I answer, You were. They are.

  He immediately answers, :-)

  I put my phone away, content to leave it at that for now.

  Fourteen

  When I get to the Tall Grass office the following Saturday, Robert says, “Your bandmates are out in the square today.”

  “We’re having our session there? Like, outdoors out?”

  “Precisely outdoors out.”

  I hurry over. I’m determined to be completely professional today. I’ve been doing my breathing and passaggio exercises all week. And avoiding Jess. That hasn’t been difficult. I think she’s avoiding m
e too. Neither of us called the other about getting here today. Whatever. I’m focused on music.

  I reach the square and see Ingrid at the far end. She’s wearing a multicolored poncho and shooing three sullen smokers away from the bandshell. Jess sits on a bench, absorbed in her usual guitar tuning. Harper stands away from both of them, sipping from a water bottle. When she spots me, she hurries over and grabs my arm.

  “Have you talked to Jess lately?” She speaks from the side of her mouth, like she’s afraid Jess can lip-read.

  “Harper, I want to concentrate on our rehearsal. I don’t want to talk about Jess holding me back or whatever.”

  “Oh yeah? Would you rather talk about Jess and Gabe coming out of Darrell’s together?”

  I pull my arm away. “What?”

  “I was on my way here. My bus goes past DBML. The two of them stroll out, laughing.” Harper points her water bottle at Jess. “I bet that’s why Jess missed last week with Ingrid. It’s why she didn’t tell you. Jess wasn’t sick. She’s been busy with Gabe.”

  Ingrid sees us. “Ah, now we are complete. Let’s get started.”

  “You need to talk to her,” Harper says and jogs to the stage.

  Jess ambles over to me. “I think rehearsing outside is a fantastic idea,” she says. “Better than that stuffy room over at the Tall Grass office.”

  “Did Ingrid give you a hard time about missing last week?” It’s as close as I can get to asking her about being with Gabe at Darrell’s.

  “Nope.” Jess steps up onto the stage, next to Harper. “I just wasn’t up for it last week. I’m feeling better now.”

  “Gee, I wonder why?” says Harper.

  Jess either doesn’t hear or chooses to ignore her.

  Gabe texted me just after the session with Ingrid. Was he with Jess then? Was that why he asked how our practices were going?

  Ingrid throws me an impatient look. The music, I remind myself, joining Harper and Jess. Focus on the music.

  * * *

  Ingrid stands about forty feet away from the bandshell. “Let me hear that again. I know you’ll have mics at Tall Grass, but you still need to project more. Wind direction can toss your voices around, so it’s good to be prepared.”