Playing For Keeps (9 page)

“Have you seen my planner,” I asked Diya, when she came in.

She looked at my closet door pointedly. “It’s hard to miss.”

“Not that one. My portable one. It’s yellow.”

“Ah. I thought I saw it yesterday. But not since then, sorry.”

“It’s okay.” I was unsettled. My whole life was in my planner and it wasn’t like me to leave it somewhere. I scrutinized my closet schedule, instead, but by that point, I couldn’t remember why I’d wanted to check it in the first place.

6.

At five in the morning, I grabbed my phone and went into the living room. I brushed a strand of hair out of my eyes and tucked my legs under me, settling on the sofa. It had been a long time since I’d heard this particular, raspy-deep voice, but I needed to hear it. I needed my questions answered and, if I was being honest with myself, I needed approval. I scrolled through my contacts until I found Local Jackson’s name.

He answered my call with a series of gruff laughs. “My California girl! How you holding up all the way out in that Sunshine State?”

“Hiya, Local.” My voice was hoarse and my head threatened to explode into a zillion phlemy pieces. I only just realized how much I was missing home. I didn’t go back to Louisiana last summer because I was doing a business internship at a tech company in Seattle, but Local’s familiar voice brought it all back: the sounds, the smells, the way everyone put their arms around you when they saw you. Sometimes it was a little bit claustrophobic, but most times it was just right. “Things are good here.”

“All right. That’s what I want to hear. They ain’t working you too hard? You have time to play?”

“I make time to play,” I said, and Local laughed again. Agreeing that that’s how it was done.
Make
time. “That’s actually kind of what I’m calling about. There’s this guy here, this musician. He’s pretty famous. He saw my band perform and he wants to give us a trial shot. To make music for real.” I cringed. That wasn’t what I meant to say. Especially not to Local Jackson. Just because he wasn’t a big time musician didn’t mean he hadn’t been making real music his whole life. Even more, the kind of music Jimmy Keats played was probably something Local would scoff at. Only a jerk would say something like that to their mentor, to an old friend.

But Local didn’t even seem to notice the slip. “Sign on with a producer, huh? Big time.”

“Yeah. This guy, he’s part of a popular boy band. But he wants to branch out with his own projects.”

“You’re one of those projects.”

“Yeah.”

“Who is this guy, anyway? Can’t keep secrets from me, girlie.” Laughter.

“I wasn’t trying to. I just don’t think you’ve heard of him. His name’s Jimmy Keats.”

Local could always laugh. He laughed when the sun came up, as though delighted to be blessed with a new day. He laughed when squirrels chased each other and he laughed when fireflies lit up the night sky. He even laughed at funerals. Lives are to be celebrated, he always said, before launching into the funniest story he could think of about the deceased.

I thought he would laugh now. Tell me how everyone knows who Jimmy Keats is, even an old guy like him. But he was quiet, chewing over what I’d said to him. And then, out of nowhere, a brief chuckle did escape. “I ain’t no simpleton, Courtney Dreger. I know exactly who Jimmy Keats is. His family…well, he’s almost a local boy hereabouts, ain’t he? Besides, do you think we don’t have radio down here? I’ve heard all them songs he sings. They ain’t all too bad, neither.”

“You like them?”

“Girlie, a dance groove is a sacred thing.”

It was my turn to laugh, and doing so lifted a huge weight off my chest.

“He wants to work with me…with my band. He likes our style. I have a feeling we’re going to have to meet in the middle though. A little of what we play, a little of what made him huge.”

“Well, there’s a whole lotta paths to take in life and in music and ain’t no single one the right one. You do what looks good from where you’re sitting and let the Lord take over on the rest of it.”

I picked at a loose thread on the hem of my pajamas. “You wouldn’t be disappointed in me for doing this?”

“Disappointed for making a name for yourself?” He made a sound. It wasn’t exactly a sound of approval, but it wasn’t a scoff, either. “That don’t even make sense. I’m proud of you, girlie. Proud of the way you play, proud of you getting into that college of yours. Just proud.”

“That means a lot to me, Local. Thank you.”

We said goodbye—Local promised to be first in line to buy the new album, whenever that happened—and I pattered into the kitchen. It was just starting to get light, with a typically hazy L.A. sunrise. My DG sisters would be up soon, rushing to get their showers, wiping off the foggy mirrors so they could get dressed for the day, begging to borrow someone’s lipstick, pens or calculator.

I prepared batch after batch of surprise smoothies for them, handing them out with a smile as each lady came in for breakfast. It was nice to take a moment out of my busy schedule to do something unexpected for them. To be a little less selfish. I needed that. I needed to always remember to find these moments, no matter what happened with Ladies in Waiting.

*

I hardly had time to register anything that day, or the next, when I finally took stock of the mountain of papers I had to write by the end of the week and the half-assed notes that threw me for a loop in my notebooks. And that was okay. Because work replaced thinking about anything else. Replaced wondering about my feelings. The ones that wriggled distantly with doubt and desire. That made me want to examine them more, even though I knew I couldn’t. I didn’t have the time. I cut off the outside world, when I could, and holed up in the library, where even Bea didn’t find me.

Diya found me, though, late into the night, and slipped me a burrito, wrapped in foil. It was still hot to the touch.

“Why are you so amazing?” I asked, as she joined me at my shadowy corner table.

“Girl, if I knew the answer to that, I would bottle it up and make a billion dollars.” She leaned in close. “Don’t let the librarians see you eating that. I already have a rap sheet here and I can’t afford to get kicked out. Again.”

Her eyes darted side to side and I stifled a giggle.

As I sank my teeth into my dinner, I wondered again if part of my motivation for not telling Bea about Jimmy Keats stemmed from guilt. If I was hiding from Bea because I was a jerk to continue a relationship with a guy she had a crush on, because I could have ruined our band’s chances. But I stamped those thoughts down as soon as they rose up. Not because I didn’t want to examine them beyond the idea that celeb crushes are hardly
real
—it’s not like he was her ex or anything—but because if I let myself think about them for too long, I ended up drifting into daydreams of kitchen counters and warm, dark skin on my tongue.

If someone asked me what was on my class exams that week, it would be impossible for me to remember. I played with my phone on a regular basis, always meaning to call Bea and clear the air between us. But the longer I left it, the harder it was for me to come up with the perfect words. And the worse I felt.

Bea avoided me that week, not stopping by the Delta Gamma house like she usually did, not meeting me at our favorite lunch spots between classes as was our normal schedule, before. I told her she was busy. She had to fit her voice lessons in, somewhere. I knew I needed to call her, and I knew it would be easy to tell her what Jimmy Keats and I talked about. It was the rest that was hard. Admitting I was wrong not to hope. Admitting I might even sell-out for the chance at stardom. Admitting that I wanted the band…and the boy.

I really needed Bea to be my rock. It scared me to think about tossing aside my time at UCLA, when I was so close to graduating, to take this chance. I’d convinced myself, for the past couple of years, that business was what I wanted to do. I had a head for numbers, for delegating. I enjoyed looking for and solving problems. I looked great in power suits. But what if that was all a cover? What if, really, I was hiding from what I truly loved because I knew how hard it was to make a living at it? If my indifference to all of this was a way to protect myself in case everything fell through. Of course music was what I wanted to do. Had been since I was a teenager. I was struck, not for the first time, by how brave Bea was. Had always been. She was the heart and soul of Ladies in Waiting, and she’d never given up on the dream.

Diya and I were studying Wednesday night when I said, out of the blue, “This kind of music is my life. It has been for a long time. I just thought I was supposed to do something more, you know, practical.”

Diya turned a page in her textbook and shrugged. “I mean, you can do both. Music and a career. Or…you can jump on this chance because no one gets a chance like this. No one.”

“But it’s scary. We’re so close to finishing our degrees. This would be such a diversion.”

“Maybe it’s a detour, instead. A road that swerves off to the side, but reconnects with the road you were on before at some point. If you want that. If things do work out, I’m sure you could come back to your work at UCLA. You don’t even know, things might not progress so fast that you’d have to leave it before you graduate.”

“Maybe not. I’m worried, though. About more than just that.” I picked at my cuticles. I was having a hard time forgetting the way Jimmy Keats looked at me, touched me. “What if I can’t work with him after…what we did? What if I don’t want to draw a line, really?”

Diya gathered a stack of flash cards and began writing words on one side. “Well, first you be honest with yourself. For real honest. And then you be honest with everyone else.”

“That means telling Bea I’m not sure about…anything.”

“So?”

“She counts on me to be sure of things.”

Diya looked up and squinted at me. “I don’t mean this to come off as rude, but that’s some serious back-patting you’re doing. Look, we both knew Bea’s high-strung, but she also has a good head on her shoulders. She just needs to know what’s going on. She’ll be fine when she knows. Otherwise, she’ll imagine every possible bad scenario and they’ll all be, like, apocalypse level bad.”

“Oh Lord, that is exactly what she does.” I nodded.

“Right. So freaking
call
Bea, already. And then quiz me. I need someone to keep my brain on this stuff and off the upcoming holidays and you need to keep your grades up just in case the music doesn’t work out.”

“Um, the holidays are two months away.”

Diya stood and sighed. “I know. But it gets harder to go back every year, you know?”

“No, I don’t know.” Diya always talked about how much she loved to go home for the holidays. Her family ran a restaurant in Park City, Utah. Diya told stories about being in the kitchen with her dad and serving cute ski families. We all knew she loved to cook and loved the snow.

“It’s not a big deal. Just…my parents are so proud about med school but I don’t know. That might not be the right thing for me, after all. They don’t get it, though. ‘Do you want to work a hundred hours every week for your whole life making food?’ they say. Well, maybe I do!” Diya shook her head, her laugh fading into something a little sad. “Going home is a reminder of what I love but then I have to deal with them pushing me in a different direction. You get it, with your music and all.
Anyway
.
You
make your phone call. I’ll see you when you’re done.”

“Right.” I gave Diya a mock salute and went into the hallway.

I toyed with my phone for several minutes, thinking about how to start this conversation. Bea and I had never gotten into a real fight before. We’d argued over what movie to see or snipped over trivial things, but this felt deeper. We weren’t talking at all. Hadn’t in several days. And I could see why this created a bigger division than anything else: it was tied to our dreams. Things we desperately wanted. Perhaps most importantly, we needed each other to succeed, and that made us feel vulnerable. Easier to ruffle.

In the end, though, it was all over a simple misunderstanding, wasn’t it? I hadn’t known who he was the first time. And I hadn’t known he wanted to go through with a trial for our band until the morning after our second meeting. Still, I could see how my one-on-one time with Jimmy Keats would upset Bea. It might have upset me, too, were I in her shoes. There was more to it than I was admitting to myself and to Bea, and I needed to clear that up. With both of us. And I would, once I’d figured it all out. For now, though, I just had to say sorry. My stomach leaped with nerves. I couldn’t lose my best friend. Not over this. I dialed Bea’s number.

She picked up on the first ring. I couldn’t keep a grin back. A new, light feeling exploded in my chest. The first ring. I knew everything was going to be okay.

“Let me explain and don’t interrupt,” I said by way of greeting. Then I told her the same things I told Diya, and more. I said I was confused about what to do with my life. I told her I was scared. I even told her that Jimmy Keats unnerved me. Made me want to do sweetly dangerous things.

She didn’t say I told you so or give me crap about coming around on the whole pop music thing I used to always say I despised. She didn’t even pull me up for the way Jimmy Keats made my head spin. That part, she got. She just was Bea: awesome and excited and supportive.

“Okay, so first of all, I love you, stupid girl. Second, I’m excited about this chance. Duncan called me. He sounded…encouraging. Third…” she hesitated. I could hear her nibbling on her nails through the phone. “I’m not too sure what to say about number three. Do you even like Jimmy Keats?”

“How could I like him? I don’t know him. I sort of despise everything he’s done in his career.”