Rules to Rock By (16 page)

But when she sang, none of that mattered. I watched her as she went into the
nah nah nah nahs
of the outro, and I could tell she wasn’t even
trying
to hit it out of the park. It just came naturally to her. She followed where the music took her, and when I listened to her sing “Hey Jude,” it was like I was hearing the song’s true meaning for the first time, feeling all the emotion that Paul McCartney must have felt when he had written it. Crackers reached deep into the heart of the lyrics about cheering up a sad little boy, and made it sound like a love letter to the whole school. I was blown away. So was Jonny, and so was the audience. Christine, without even trying, had everybody eating out of the palm of her hand.

“Crackers! Crackers! Crackers!” the audience chanted. Suddenly the lamest nickname in the history of man had been transformed into total coolness.

When we finished, the placed erupted. We bowed
three times
, and Mrs. Harris wiped a tear from her eye. “That was amazing!” she said.

As I put away my bass, the crowd was still going bonkers, and I remembered that we needed a drummer.

I walked up to the mic and said, “Hey, everybody, we need a drummer. If anybody’s interested, find us in the halls!” But nobody could hear me above the chants. I looked at Jonny, and he shrugged as if to say,
Good luck, there’s no way you’re getting heard in this crazy scene.
So I gave up and followed Crackers and Jonny back to our seats in the stands. As we made our way through the crowd of fifth graders sitting on the floor in front of the first row of bleachers, I could see that kids were looking at all of us differently—not just at Christine, but at Jonny and me, too. They stared at us, respect in their eyes, and in Crackers’s case, actual awe. I had figured we’d be either ignored or ridiculed, but never worshiped in this Egg Mountainy way. We had barely rehearsed the song and had been making mistakes up until the last minute of rehearsals. Before today, we hadn’t even been worthy of teasing. Now Crackers was a full-on Federal Hill rock star, and Jonny and I stood in her glow. It wasn’t quite how I’d imagined this particular scene, to say the least.

Following Crackers up the steps was like following Moses through the Dead Sea: the crowd of kids had instinctively opened up a lane for her to pass through. It was nuts, like a middle school version of the red-carpet treatment.

The three of us sat down in a row in the back, all eyes on us. Christine looked around, unsmiling and nervous.

“It’s just a Beatles song,” she said.

But Jonny basked in the new celebrity, beaming.

“This is awesome,” he whispered. “Count me in.”

“What?” I said.

“The band. I’m in. A hundred percent.”

I don’t know how to describe what I felt at that moment. It felt great to get noticed, and it was even better to have Jonny as a full-time member of the band. But my worst nightmare had become true: I was just the bassist. I was just a member of Crackers’s backup band.

Rock stars don’t play second fiddle. To anybody.

(No matter what the Rules to Rock By say!)

DARIUS THE HILARIOUS AND THE
REFUGEES OF RAISING CAIN

The Monday after the open mic, I could still see people looking at me differently, like I was actually cool or something. People watched me as I went down the hall in a way they never did at PS
44
3, where the hip-hop kids had never heard of Egg Mountain, despite our being well-known around the city. One Federal Hill kid stopped me and said, “Nice bass playing, Annabelle.” That felt good. But was I really just the bass player? Didn’t anyone realize that I had
formed
this band?

The feeling boiled over in Mr. V’s room, where Christine got an ovation from the entire class. “Excellent singing, Christine, really,” said Mr. V, who started off the round of applause himself. I didn’t pay much attention to what happened in class after that. I just sat there, doing nothing. This was lame, I admit.
She’s not THAT GREAT!!!
I wanted to yell, but instead I sank into the background.

“Ms. Cabrera,” said Mr. V as I was walking out. “Come here.”

I stood in front of his desk, impatient, knowing he was probably going to hand out some of his E.T. wisdom. But he surprised me.

“Nice performance, young lady. But next time, I hope you’ll be performing one of your
own
songs. I’ve heard ‘Hey Jude’ enough to last me
two
lifetimes.”

I wondered if he would have complained if we had picked “It’s My Life” or some other ridiculous Bon Jovi cover.

Ronaldo pinged me that night:

EggMtnRckr:
So Mr. V and I have the same master plan for you, eh?

Bassinyrface:
Ha, I guess. I’m totally trying to write songs. You realize, ya? It’s not so easy!

EggMtnRckr:
Oh, I totally forgot. Here’s some good advice my dad told me once: try writing a BAD song.

Bassinyrface:
huh?

EggMtnRckr:
Well, if I know you, Belle, and I obvz do … you probably sit down, write a little, then are mad when it doesnt sound as good as Happiness Is a Warm Gun, God Only Knows, or Hey Jude. Am I right?!?!

Bassinyrface:
I’m mad when it doesn’t sound as good as Deerhoof!

EggMtnRckr:
exactly! U are a total perfectionist.

Bassinyrface:
Yeah, I guess. I just want to write a great song, but none of them are even good.

EggMtnRckr:
Here’s the thing. I followed my dad’s advice and it totally worked.

Bassinyrface:
What do U mean, did U write a good song, or what?

EggMtnRckr:
I wrote like three horrible songs, but
something happened while I was doing that. Like, since I
was actually trying to write a BAD song, I stopped thinking about it. I just let it come out of me.

Bassinyrface:
yeah … and then?

EggMtnRckr:
and then after writing three lame songs, I wrote a couple good ones. And the more I did it, the better the songs got. Make sense?

Bassinyrface:
Yeah, I guess.

EggMtnRckr:
Just try it.

Bassinyrface:
K.

EggMtnRckr:
So the open mic was amazing?

Bassinyrface:
Yeah, except that Crackers is a total rock star now and Jonny and me are like roadies.

EggMtnRckr:
she killed it, huh?

Bassinyrface:
She was pretty amazing. There were people, like, crying in the audience. It was nuts.

EggMtnRckr:
That’s great. How’d you and J play?

Bassinyrface:
Fine. It’s an easy song.

EggMtnRckr:
so what’s the problem?

Bassinyrface:
I guess I want them to clap for me … not for her!!! Is that so bad?!? I mean,
I STARTED THIS BAND.

EggMtnRckr:
Belle, you gotta get over that. It’s AWESOME that people like Crackers. Now you have TWO good singers in your band, and that’ll only bring more and more people to you.

Bassinyrface:
yeah, I guess.

EggMtnRckr:
Cheer up, Grumps!

Bassinyrface:
Okay, okay, youre right! CRACKERS RAWWWKS!

EggMtnRckr:
THE BUNGLES ROCK!!! Like the name, btw.

Bassinyrface:
Thanks! Oh, and P.S. EGG
MOUNTAIN ALSO RAWWWKS!

EggMtnRckr:
Finally! Thanks for backin me up, girl!

Bassinyrface:
NP. Ronaldo, how’s it going with Anthony? Is he good?

EggMtnRckr:
Well, he needed a little coaching at first. It took him way long to learn the songs. Not like you. You’d basically memorized our whole set list before you even played with us.

Bassinyrface:
True, true. But he’s settled in now?

EggMtnRckr:
Yeah, he has awesome feel for the songs. I mean, he’s no Annabelle Cabrera, but we’re definitely happy with him now. He’s doing great.

Bassinyrface:
got it.

EggMtnRckr:
why do you ask?

Bassinyrface:
No reason, just want to make sure
I left you in good hands. Catch you later, R!

EggMtnRckr:
Later, Belle. Have a good one …

The next Saturday began with a familiar request from my mom: to take care of X during a Benny and Joon gig.

“But, Mom, I’ve got drummer tryouts today,” I said. “I’ve had to babysit X five weekends in a row. It’s not fair.”

“I know it’s not. But we don’t have the money for a babysitter, sweetie. You know how it is. And we have to take every gig we can get.”

“Can’t you bring X with you?”

“To a twenty-one-and-over club? I don’t think so.”

“But it’s a day gig.”

“There’ll still be drinking in there. It’s against the law for us to bring him.”

“But I can’t take him to Don’s, either!” Don had been nice enough to let us use the percussion room for our tryouts. “He practically tore down the store last time.”

“Annabelle, I’m sorry, but I can’t continue this conversation. We’re going to be late.”

There’s nothing worse than being up against someone you know is wrong but not being able to do anything about it. I knew half the stuff my parents did was bad, but what was I going to do about it? Call child services? Get X and me sent to a foster home? No way. It’s not like they were beating us up or anything. They were just ignoring us. We had to deal. Plus, my mom had now given me the option of moving back to Brooklyn, so it was almost like she could get away with anything. She had offered me the perfect escape route, and if I wasn’t taking it, it was my own fault.

But today, even though I hadn’t yet decided if I was staying in Providence, I just wasn’t in the mood to babysit. I looked over at X, who was sitting on his skateboard and unsuccessfully trying to get a spoon to hang from his nose.

He caught my eye. “Hang out with me, Belle,” he said. “I’m bored.”

I looked into his eyes. He looked so lonely.

And I ditched him anyway.

It was a really stupid idea, especially since we were having tryouts at Don’s, where despite X’s earlier outburst, I knew he would have had a pudgy, long-haired babysitter all too happy to look after him, not to mention a host of percussion instruments that would occupy him for hours. But I was tired of hanging out with him, or tired of being the only person in the family who was willing to. I hadn’t been alone, truly alone, for weeks. Between school and home, where X had become nearly a daily responsibility, my only real alone time was spent for seven or eight hours in the middle of the night, with my little brother snoring just a few feet away. I was his sister, not his mom, and it wasn’t my fault that his actual parents were paying even less attention to him than they were to me.

As soon as my parents left, I bailed. X would have to figure out how to spend the day alone for once.

“Don’t burn the house down,” was all I told him.

I practically ran all the way to Don’s. I was filled with hope that today might be the day the band would find its missing link.

When I turned the corner onto Thayer Street, I did a double take. It wasn’t even ten a.m. yet, and there was a whole mess of kids hanging out in front of Don’s, waiting to get in. They couldn’t all be there auditioning for
my band
, could they? They couldn’t
all
be drummers. I saw a scrawny white kid I recognized from Mr. V’s class. He had long, greasy brown hair, a navy cable-knit cap pulled down tight over his forehead, and torn jeans, like a heavy metal reject from an old
Simpsons
episode. He twirled drumsticks in the air, with more than a bit of skill, and I wondered where this little guy had been for the last two months. Where had
any
of these people come from? A tiny blond girl in pink jeans and a Donnas T-shirt leaned against a wall and pounded out sidewalk paradiddles to the music playing through her earbuds. A seriously old-looking indie rocker guy—he had to be seventeen—with a green trench coat, wild frizzy hair, and about five days of peach-fuzz growth slumped on the ground next to her. When he saw me, he perked up.

“I think that’s Annabelle,” he said to the stick twirler.