“Is that what you’d usually be doing now?” she asked. “Rehearsing?”
“Yeah, I do an hour of practice after school and then another hour after dinner,” I said. I actually do more than that some days, but I didn’t know if Heidi would think that was weird.
“Wow,” Heidi said. “I wish I was that good at something. Or that I liked anything enough to spend that much time on it. I mean, I like dogs, but that’s not going to win me any awards or anything.” Her face lit up. “Hey, maybe if I was playing with Trumpet, she’d let you practice without howling so much.”
“Maybe,” I said doubtfully.
“Do you want to try?” Heidi offered. “I could take her outside while you play. Unless you don’t feel like practicing now.”
“I’d love to practice,” I admitted. “But you don’t have to —”
“That’s OK!” Heidi said, jumping to her feet. “It’ll be fun! Practice as long as you want! Come on, Trumpet.”
Trumpet looked at Heidi, then at me and the piano, then back at Heidi. She slowly stood up and jumped down from the chair, but instead of going to Heidi, she came over to me and pawed at the piano leg.
“Go play with Heidi,” I said. “Quietly.”
“Here, this might help,” Heidi said, pulling something out of her pocket. It was brown and square. She broke off a piece and held it out to Trumpet.
“What’s that?” I asked.
“Um … dog treats,” she said, blushing.
“You carry dog treats around with you?” I said.
“I know! I’m crazy! I just like dogs!” she said. “I like saying hi to the ones I meet on the street. And I always think maybe I’ll find a sad stray who’s all alone and then I’ll offer him treats and he’ll follow me home and we’ll live happily ever after. But why would he trust me without treats? So I have to have them with me, just in case.”
“Heidi, you really are crazy,” I said, but I smiled so she knew I meant it nicely.
“I know,” she said, “but it’ll be worth it one day.”
Trumpet snarfed the treat, wagging her tail, and then followed Heidi out into the yard, keeping her nose as close to Heidi’s pocket as she could get. I could see them through the window. Heidi tried throwing the tennis ball again, but Trumpet still didn’t get it, so Heidi went back to the soccer ball. Soon they were chasing each other around the yard.
I took a deep breath. I really didn’t think this was going to work, but it didn’t hurt to try. I started playing “Alhambra” from the beginning again. I was so surprised when I made it all the way to the end of the first line that I stopped and listened. No howling. No barks. Only muffled growls from outside as Trumpet tried to attack the soccer ball. She hadn’t even noticed that I was playing.
I kept going and sang the whole song all the way through. Then I did it again, and then I sang “The Last Rose of Summer,” and then for good measure I sang all the songs I’d learned in the last year. It was sort of thrilling, like when your favorite TV show comes back after being in reruns all summer and you realize how much you missed all the characters. I felt like myself again.
When I finished the last song I looked at the time. Forty-five minutes had passed. If I were really being good, I should practice for another fifteen. I checked out the window.
Nikos Stavros was in my yard!
I nearly had a heart attack. And then I imagined Tara’s face if she knew about this. Miss Bendy Ballerina wouldn’t look so pleased then!
Nikos and Heidi were kicking the soccer ball back and forth in the sunshine. Trumpet chased it from one of them to the other. She couldn’t get her mouth around it, but she kept trying. Or she would pounce on it with her front paws. When they slipped off and the ball flew away from her, she barked in surprise and chased after it. Sometimes she was able to herd it away from Nikos (who wasn’t as good at guarding it as Heidi was), but then Heidi would run after her and kick it back.
Heidi looked up and saw me in the window. She waved, and Nikos looked up, too. I kind of wanted to dart back to the piano, but I waved back. Nikos smiled and motioned for me to come outside.
I was torn. I knew I should practice while I had the chance. And it was much safer to sit inside at the piano instead of going out there. What if I said something stupid in front of Heidi and Nikos? What if they were talking about something I didn’t know anything about, like sports or pop music or video games? What if I got out there and then they thought I was boring and wished I’d stayed inside instead?
Avery Lafitte thought I was boring. Tara and Natasha probably did, too. But Trumpet didn’t. She finally figured out where Nikos and Heidi were looking. When she spotted me, she barked and wagged her tail like she wanted me to come outside, too.
I closed my piano books and went out into the yard.
I didn’t need to worry that Nikos and Heidi would be talking about something like sports. They were talking about Trumpet. Heidi could probably have talked about her for a year and never gotten bored.
“I wonder if she’d like Parker’s new dog,” Heidi said, dribbling the soccer ball. “Wouldn’t it be funny to get them together? Merlin’s a lot bigger than Trumpet, but I bet they’d like each other.”
I sat down in the shade, and Trumpet came over to me. She flopped down on the lawn right next to me, with her legs sticking straight out behind her. She rested her head between her white front paws. Her long ears lay in velvety folds on the grass. She closed her eyes and sighed contentedly.
“Looks like she’s had enough of ‘Trumpet in the middle,’ ” Heidi said.
“We tuckered her out,” Nikos said. “Sorry, Ella.” His dark hair was all rumpled from running around. It was kind of cute. Not that I noticed.
“No, that’s awesome,” I said. “A tired Trumpet is a good Trumpet.”
He sat down on the grass next to me and then lay down on his back, like this was totally normal, like people came over and hung out in my yard all the time. He put his arms behind his head. “I can’t believe you’re not tired, Heidi,” he said.
She grinned, kicked the ball to the other end of the garden, and chased after it.
“It’s kind of weird to be out here instead of studying,” Nikos said. “Or playing video games.”
“I know!” I said. “I feel like I should be inside playing the piano.”
“Did you decide what you’re going to play for the talent show?” Nikos asked.
“Not yet.” I hadn’t really had time to think about it. I’d been thinking about Trumpet instead.
Heidi came running up to us. Trumpet opened her eyes and woofed halfheartedly. But she must have decided it would take too much energy to make a bigger fuss, because then she went back to sleep.
“Hey Ella, where’d these come from?” Heidi held up my dad’s old drumsticks. I’d forgotten that I had left them next to the tennis ball can.
“I found them in my dad’s closet,” I said. “You said you liked drums.”
“Uh-oh,” Nikos said jokingly. “Heidi plus a drum set? Sounds like chaos waiting to happen.”
“So totally!” Heidi said, beaming. She sat down, took one in each hand, and started drumming on her thighs. “Ow. OK, I might need to practice on something besides myself.”
“You can borrow them,” I said. “I’ll double-check with Dad.” This was another normal-friend thing to do — lend something to someone. It implied that you would hang out with that person again. That you were friends who could trade stuff back and forth. Heidi didn’t even think about it.
“Awesome, thank you so much,” she said. “I’ll bring them back next time I come over.” Next time I come over. Like there was no question about it.
“Or whenever,” I said. See? I can act normal, too. Like we’ve always been friends like this.
“You are the best dog in the whole world,” Heidi said to Trumpet, patting her soft head. Trumpet made a breathy rumbly noise and rolled over so Heidi could rub her stomach.
“She’s good when you’re here,”
I said. “It’s too bad you can’t live here and distract her all the time.”
“I wish!” Heidi said like she really meant it. “We can trade if you want. My parents would love you.”
“If they’ll take me to New Zealand, I’ll love them, too,” I said. “Or France. Or India. I’m agreeable.” Nikos and Heidi laughed.
“So what do you guys think of Mr. Peary?” Nikos asked.
And there I was, hanging out in my yard with my dog and two classmates, talking about normal things — things like school and TV, instead of symphonies and minor chords. That’s where Mom and Dad found us an hour later when they got home. Dad’s eyebrows nearly flew off his face.
“Hello, hello!” he said, beaming at Heidi and Nikos. Nikos looked a little embarrassed. He said good-bye to us and Trumpet and scooted off to his own house pretty quickly. I asked Dad about the drumsticks and he said absolutely Heidi could borrow them. Then she called her mom and ended up staying for dinner, and Mom didn’t say anything snobby about music, and Isaac didn’t completely cover his face with food, and Dad didn’t sing about the spaghetti, and it was a lot more fun and a lot less disastrous than I thought it would be.
Plus I saved half a meatball and slipped it into Trumpet’s food dish when Mom wasn’t looking. Heidi saw me do it and gave me a thumbs-up. Trumpet gobbled it down like she’d never been fed before. Her tail swished back and forth the whole time she was eating.
After Heidi’s mom picked her up, I asked Mom how the will reading had gone. She stopped stacking the dishwasher and sighed. Trumpet snuck up behind her and sniffed the plates that were down at her level. Mom didn’t notice.
“There was some kind of legal mix-up with the documents and timelines,” she said. “Apparently Golda changed her will just a few months ago, after she got Trumpet, so there were complications. We have to go back again next week for the final details.”
“Oh,” I said. “So I guess we’ll keep Trumpet at least until then, right?” Trumpet had clearly been thinking about licking the plates she could reach, but when she heard her name, she looked up at me and wagged her tail.
“Right,” Dad said cheerfully, bringing glasses in from the table.
“But only until then,” Mom said. “After that, our lives go back to normal.”
Normal for us, that is, which wouldn’t look normal at all to anyone else. Then there wouldn’t be any reason for Heidi to come over anymore. But I would also be able to get back to practicing. After all, I had my whole future singing career to think about.
I did my homework lying on my bed with Trumpet sprawled out beside me. She was still tired from running around all afternoon. I thought maybe she wouldn’t even notice if I put on one of my Sarah Brightman CDs. I was careful not to disturb her as I got off the bed, turned on the stereo, and sat down again. I kept the volume low.
It looked like it might work at first. Trumpet snoozed through the first verse. And then … her ears twitched. Her nose twitched. Just as Sarah got to the really romantic part of the song, Trumpet suddenly rolled over, sat up, lifted her nose, and howled soulfully at the top of her lungs.
“Shush,” I said, trying to clamp her mouth shut with my hands. That didn’t work. She could still make horrible muffled noises. Plus she thought it was a game and tried to lick my hands as I reached for her. Then she tried to chase my hands around the blanket, snuffling and woofing. She trampled all over my math worksheet. She tried to chew on my pencil when I started to write. Probably I shouldn’t have bonked her on the nose with it, because then she was sure it had to be a toy. And every time Sarah Brightman sang, Trumpet would start to howl. I turned off the music and she snuggled up next to me, putting her head on my lap.
How could a dog be so sweet and so bad at the same time? Why did my whole life have to change if I wanted to keep her?
On Friday, all our teachers made announcements about the talent show being one week away. There was a sign-up sheet posted outside the cafeteria. Danny put his name with Troy’s and Hugo’s at the top of the list, with “skit” beside it. I heard Mr. Peary tell him he would need to run it by a teacher first. Yumi wrote down “dance.” Maggie Olmstead was going to bring her cat and show off what it did in commercials. (I’ve seen a couple of those commercials. Pretty much the cat sits or stretches or purrs. It’s not exactly an Oscar-winning performance. Sorry, Maggie.) Tara put her name and “ballet.” Kristal wrote “movie.”
My hand shook a little as I wrote down “song” beside my name. I would not let Avery Lafitte scare me away from my calling. He was wrong. He was. He didn’t know anything about music. That’s what I told myself, but I still kept hearing “BORING!” in my head.
Then it wasn’t in my head anymore.
“Oh, no,” Avery’s loud, mean voice said behind me. “You’re going to do another whiny song, Finegold? I guess I know when I’ll be catching up on my sleep!”
I put the cap back on my pen and shoved it into my pocket without turning around to look at him.
“Cat got your tongue?” Avery said. “Can it keep it until after the talent show?”
I was very close to running away — I was just trying to decide which way to run — when suddenly I felt someone put an arm around my shoulders. The first thing I saw was the untied shoelace on her sneakers, so I knew it was Heidi.
“Avery,” Heidi said firmly, “go away.”
There was a pause, and then I heard Avery’s boots scuffling on the tile as he walked away. Nothing has ever surprised me more in my whole life. It was like Heidi had superpowers or something.
“Don’t listen to him,” Heidi said to me, shaking my shoulders a little. She squeezed and then let go. “He just wishes he had talent like yours. That’s why he’s so mean about it. Everyone’s jealous of how amazing you are.”
“Oh, I’m not — I mean —” I started to say. I still felt like I might be about to cry.
“Whatever!” Heidi said. “You’re like our own American Idol! Or something better than that. Man, I wish I could whip out a real Broadway star’s name right now.”
“Idina Menzel,” I suggested.
“OK, yes. Her,” Heidi said. “You’re like our own that person.”
I laughed, but it came out in a kind of sad gasp. Heidi looked down the hall, saw Tara and Natasha coming, and steered me into the nearest bathroom. “Don’t cry,” she said. “You shouldn’t let Avery make you cry again. He’s like, whatever, he’s just a guy. He has problems.” She grabbed some paper towels and pressed them into my hands.
“Wait,” I said, “how do you know Avery has made me cry before?” There was only the one time, after the talent show, and … hadn’t I been alone in the bathroom?
“Everyone knows,” Heidi said. Then she looked guilty. “Didn’t you know that? I’m sorry. Cadence heard you. Well, she tried to pretend that she got a message from the universe, but really she was right outside the door. And you know her, she told everyone. But in a nice way! Everyone felt bad. It only made people dislike Avery more.”
I could have killed Cadence Bly. It’s not fair that someone so gossipy should have such a pretty musical name. Plus she is crazy. She’s convinced that she’s psychic and she wears these big sunglasses and dangly hoop earrings all the time and she’s always telling stories that she says she got by reading people’s minds. She was just lucky she was in Miss Woodhull’s class and I couldn’t, like, stab her to death with a violin bow.
At least being mad meant I didn’t feel like crying anymore. “Well, that’s embarrassing,” I said.
“Not as embarrassing as pretty much my entire life,” Heidi said. “And you’re not the only one. Avery made fun of Maggie’s cat and she was so upset.” I felt a twinge of guilt for making fun of Maggie’s cat, too … but at least I only did it in my head!
After school I had another lesson with Mrs. Mehta. She tried to help me choose between the two songs for the talent show.
“ ‘Alhambra’ is very pretty,” she said. “It’s sort of unusual an
d exotic. I would think the judges would like that.”
“Yeah, maybe,” I said. Lip-synching to Hannah Montana wasn’t exactly unusual and exotic. I wasn’t sure the judges would like either of these songs, now that I really had to decide. I wasn’t sure the audience would like them either.
“But ‘The Last Rose of Summer’ is terribly sweet,” Mrs. Mehta said. “And appropriate for the end of summer and the beginning of the school year. Is that what you’re thinking?”
Actually, I was thinking about whether I could learn a Miley Cyrus song in under a week. But I smiled at Mrs. Mehta and said, “Yeah, I’m just not sure. Neither one feels right yet. I’ll keep practicing and think about it.” Except how was I supposed to practice over the weekend with Trumpet around?
“I wish Pradesh loved music as much as you do, Ella,” Mrs. Mehta said, shaking her head. “Thank goodness for my talented little Kamala!” She smiled fondly at her daughter, who was sitting at the kitchen table, doing her homework. Kamala beamed back. I felt kind of bad for Pradesh. My mom would never say something like that about me and Isaac.
“Well, at least Pradesh is good at lots of other things,” I pointed out. “You know, like spelling. Unlike Isaac, who hates music and is also the biggest brat in the world.”
Kamala giggled. “I can spell, too, you know,” she said.
“Come here and play your piece for Ella before she leaves,” Mrs. Mehta said.
Kamala didn’t sing along with her piece, but it was very pretty and complicated for a nine-year-old. It made me wish I had a little sister who could play duets with me, instead of dopey, irritating Isaac.
That night after dinner I sat down at the piano. Trumpet jumped onto her chair and waited. Her tongue hung sideways out of her mouth as she panted and grinned. Her ears hung down like big cymbals on either side of her head.
After a minute, when I just sat there without playing, she jumped down and trotted over. She touched the piano leg with one paw and looked at me.
“What’s the point?” I said. “You’re not going to let me practice.”
She stuck her nose under the piano and snuffled at the pedals. Her whiskers tickled my bare feet. I peeked down and saw her stand on one of the pedals. She sniffed up and down the bottom of the piano. Then she wriggled her way out again backward. She sat down and looked up at me with very serious brown eyes.