Jane's Harmony (Jane's Melody #2) Page 4

  “Oh God, Caleb.” Jane sighed, dropping her phone back into her purse. “Get off your high horse.”

  He narrowed his eyes at her. “And what’s that supposed to mean?”

  She knew she should stop. That she had crossed into territory where sharing her opinions had the potential to do irreparable harm. But she had put so much work into this surprise—learning video editing software so she could send in just the right clip, writing the perfect bio for him—and she had been so excited to see that they had chosen him for an audition, so eager to tell him, that she just couldn’t help but be angry.

  Jane tried taking a deep breath. “It means it’s just an opportunity to get some exposure.”

  “No, what did you mean, ‘get off my high horse’?”

  “Nothing, Caleb. Nothing, okay? But just so you know, there’s no law of song that says you have to be broke and struggling all the time to be a real musician.”

  Caleb walked away from her and stood looking out the window. Several quiet moments passed, and when he spoke again, his voice cracked with emotion. “I see now what this is really about.”

  “Come on, Caleb. That’s not fair.”

  “No, it’s not fair,” he said. “But it’s true.”

  Then he went into the bedroom and came out again a moment later, carrying his guitar.

  “Where are you going with your guitar?” Jane asked.

  “Out,” he answered, passing her by.

  “But what about our makeup sex?”

  He paused at the open apartment door with his back to Jane. Her mind raced to find something to say that might erase the damage that she had done. But before she could, he was gone.

  Jane just stared at the door. She thought maybe it would open and he would come back in, that they would apologize to each other, then make love. This had been their first major fight, and she was so overwhelmed with emotions that they seemed to all collide in her chest and cancel one another out so that she felt nothing at all. Eventually, she noticed the bag of groceries still on the counter and finished putting them away, almost in a trance, mumbling to herself that there was nothing at all the matter with Whole Foods.

  Then, for reasons she didn’t really understand, she began cleaning the apartment. She cleaned the bathroom and the kitchen. She moved the furniture and vacuumed. She washed the windows, even though she knew it was a wasted effort. Hours went by, and still he didn’t come home.

  She collected their dirty clothes and went down the hall to start a load of laundry. An hour later she went back to put them in the dryer, but her wet clothes were piled on top of the washer, and someone else’s load was already spinning in the dryer. When she opened the dryer to see who had bumped her, a familiar pink robe tumbled out and she was hit with the sour odor of warm puppy pee.

  “Unbelievable,” she mumbled, taking the robe and storming down the hall.

  She pounded on her neighbor’s door for five minutes, but the only answer was the constant barking that already haunted her dreams. When her hand was tired of knocking and the anger had finally subsided, she went back to the laundry room, threw the robe in the trash, and carried her damp laundry into her apartment and draped it over the furniture to dry.

  She replayed their argument as she worked. First she was mad at herself. Then she was mad at him. But by the time she had played it out six or seven times in her head, she felt nothing but sad. There wasn’t anything left to clean, so she started again. She made and then remade the bed. Then she finally ran out of steam, sat down on the fluffed comforter, and cried.

  They passed without talking like strangers in the night.

  Caleb came home late, crawled into bed, and slept with his back to her. Jane rose before the sun and sneaked away with her laptop to do her job hunting from a café. She felt as though they were caught in some kind of childish standoff where the next person to speak would lose the fight.

  She walked the town all day, not wanting to go home and face him, not wanting to stop moving and face herself. She had intended to continue her job search, but her confidence was shot, and by late afternoon the count of résumés in her bag hadn’t diminished by even one.

  When the sun had dropped behind the buildings and the streets had grown shaded and cool, she came upon a kid in a doorway playing a guitar. She stopped to listen. He reminded her of a younger version of Caleb, cool and calm and lost in his song. She reached into her purse and held out a twenty-dollar bill. The kid just smiled and shook his shaggy head and went on playing. She would have been embarrassed if his simple gesture hadn’t broken her heart. She remembered when she had first met Caleb, playing that lonely song on that lonely Seattle street. He was right. He did make music because he had something to say, not because he wanted to be some kind of pop star. And she had been wrong to meddle in his career and in his art.

  She put her money back in her purse, left the young man playing, and headed home to make peace. She stopped along the way for a box of Caleb’s favorite doughnuts, just in case.

  Jane was shocked when she walked into the apartment.

  The first thing she noticed was how dark and cool it was inside. Then she noticed a loud popping noise coming from the bedroom. She set down the doughnuts and her purse, then went and opened the door to investigate. Caleb was standing on a stepladder, attaching empty egg cartons to the bedroom ceiling with a staple gun. More than half the ceiling was already covered, and it looked as though he had enough egg cartons stacked against the wall to finish the job.

  “Oh, hi, baby,” he said, pausing with the staple gun in his hand and looking down at her.

  “Hi,” she said. “What’s going on?”

  “Well,” he said, looking at the egg cartons and scratching his head, “I was watching Cool Hand Luke, and I got inspired by Paul Newman to see how many eggs I could eat. Now I’ve got to do something with all these empty cartons.”

  Jane stood looking up at him, wondering if maybe he had finally lost his mind.

  “I’m just kidding.”

  He tossed the staple gun onto the bed and stepped down from the ladder. “Boy, you didn’t think I was serious, did you?”

  “Of course not,” Jane said, laughing. “What would you know about Cool Hand Luke? You weren’t even born when it was made.”

  Caleb bent and kissed the top of her head. “And neither were you. Come on and let me give you the tour.”

  He walked her into the living room and swept his arms out to indicate the dark blue curtains he had hung. “These keep the sun out when it drops below the roofline in the afternoon.”

  “It feels much cooler already,” Jane said.

  Caleb smiled proudly. “That’s because of this,” he said, crossing to the main window and pulling back the curtain.

  A window-mounted air-conditioning unit was installed, trimmed out and plugged in, and quietly pumping cool air into the room.

  Jane threw her arms around Caleb. “I love you, I love you, I love you.”

  “Wait,” he said. “There’s more.”

  He walked her back into the bedroom and pointed out the curtains there. “I made sure they were thick enough to block some of the noise. The egg cartons are ugly, I know, but Mr. Zigler had a pallet of them at the warehouse from some old Easter deal, and they really do help mute the sound in here. And then I got you this.”

  He stepped over to her side of the bed and switched on a sound machine. The sound of ocean waves filled the room, and Jane couldn’t have been happier if she were sitting with Caleb on a beach somewhere, sipping on a virgin piña colada.

  “And if you get tired of waves,” he said, “there’s rain and birds and even a waterfall too.”

  Caleb switched the sound machine off and looked at Jane with a hopeful expression on his face. She knew this was his way of apologizing and that he was waiting to see if she might accept it.

 
But it’s me who needs to be apologizing, she thought, even though her doughnuts now seemed wholly inadequate.

  “Oh, Caleb, I love it. All of it. Thank you.”

  He came to her and wrapped his strong arms around her and hugged her tight. When he pulled away and looked at her, his eyes were sad even though he was smiling.

  “I’m sorry, Jane. I never want to yell at you like that ever again. I remind myself of my dad when I raise my voice, and I hate it. I promise to try and do better.”

  “No,” she said, shaking her head, “it’s me who should be sorry. I never should have been so ungrateful about this place to begin with. And you’ve been so kind to not even charge me rent while I’m looking for work. But mostly, I’m sorry about meddling in your business and sending your tape to that silly show. I just wanted to do something for you, you know? I should have asked first. Can you forgive me?”

  When she finished talking, he didn’t answer right away, but stood there instead, just looking deep into her eyes. Then he said, “I decided I’m going to do it.”

  “The audition? Really? Are you sure?”

  “I’m sure,” he said, nodding.

  “What changed your mind?” she asked.

  “Do you remember when you told me what your friend Grace had said? In Paris. She asked you what would you do if you weren’t afraid, or something like that.”

  Jane nodded, remembering it clearly.

  “Well, I asked myself that same question, and the answer is, if I weren’t afraid, I’d do the audition. You were right. I have nothing to lose. And being on a show, or being discovered or whatever, none of that has to change one thing about who I am or what I do with my music.”

  Jane reached up and took Caleb’s cheeks in her hands, then planted a long, slow kiss on his lips. “I love you. You’re a wise and sexy man, and I love you.”

  “Does this mean we get to have that makeup sex now?”

  She nodded. “That’s exactly what it means.” Then she saw Caleb’s eyes widen at something he saw over her shoulder.

  “Hey,” he said, “are those Gourdough’s doughnuts?”

  “Yes. They were going to be my peace offering.”

  “Did you get a Funky Monkey?”

  “Three. And a Fat Elvis and a Mother Clucker too.”

  “Oh, this is on,” he said, stepping past her.

  “Oh my God,” Jane said, shaking her head and following him from the bedroom. “We’re not even married and the honeymoon is officially over, I guess.”

  “Why would you say that?” he asked, lifting the lid on the box of doughnuts.

  “Because you just passed up sex with me for doughnuts.”

  “No, not for doughnuts, baby. For Gourdough’s doughnuts.”

  Jane laughed, then flopped down on the couch and switched on their small TV.

  “Well, bring them on over here so we can get fat together. Maybe Cool Hand Luke is still on, and we’ll see how many doughnuts we can eat without puking.”

  Chapter 4

  Jane hadn’t expected a line of people stretched around the block. And judging by the disappointed look on Caleb’s face, he hadn’t either.

  The convention center had been turned into a circus—thirty-foot banners had been draped from the roof advertising the show, media trucks lined the street with satellite dishes extended, and men in yellow “Crew Member” shirts hustled in and out of service doors with cartloads of equipment off-loaded from idling trucks. Several off-duty cops stood in the street, blowing whistles and directing traffic, even though it was at a complete standstill. Jane stood next to Caleb on the faded outdoor red carpet that marked the entry line, fanning herself with the printed e-mail that was their ticket inside.

  “What’s that thing say my call time is again?”

  Jane unfurled the e-mail. “Says ten fifty-five.”

  “Why do you suppose they do that?”

  “Do what?” Jane asked.

  “They always make it a really specific number, and then they just make you wait anyway. It’s like the doctor’s office. Why can’t it just be eleven?”

  The line inched forward and Jane inched with it. Caleb slid his guitar case up with his foot, sighing. “What time is it now?” he asked.

  Jane glanced at her phone. “Eleven twenty.”

  “Maybe we should just go,” Caleb said.

  Jane turned to look at him and saw that he was frowning. “Oh, baby,” she said. “You’re nervous, aren’t you?”

  “I’m not nervous. I just don’t have all day to stand here and wait on these clowns.”

  “Is Mr. Zigler expecting you at the warehouse later?”

  His shoulders slumped and he looked at his feet. “No.”

  Jane reached and pushed a strand of hair away from his face and tucked it back behind his ear. For just a moment, she could see the boy he had once been.

  “You’ll be fine. They’ll love you. Everyone loves you.”

  The people in front of them fell quiet, and Jane looked up as a fat man with a clipboard emerged from the building and began walking up and down the line, checking call tickets while shouting instructions like a carnival barker.

  “Running a little behind, people,” he called, “so have your tickets and your ID ready when you get to the door. They’ll have a waiver for you to sign at the desk—nothing special, just says that any part of your audition today can and may be edited in any way and broadcast on national or international television, cable, Internet, or via any other means, whether you’re selected to participate in the show or not. But that’s why you’re all here anyway, right? No biggie. Standard waiver. Nothing special. If you need to read it before signing, please step off to the side so that others can go ahead. I’ll say it again, if you don’t want to be passed up, have your call tickets and ID ready . . .”

  It was thirty more minutes before they made it into the convention center, where they were sorted and grouped and given a colored lanyard. Then they had to wait another thirty minutes before being herded along with the others into a large room. They took seats in front of an enormous projection screen, and a woman told them to pay close attention to the video, then she dimmed the lights. The screen blinked on and a sheet of music appeared and caught on fire. When the paper had burned away, these flaming words remained:

  SINGER-SONGWRITER SUPERSTAR

  The video went on to explain the show.

  Today they were filming acoustic or a cappella auditions in front of their panel of five music industry executives. The judges would vote with thumbs-up or thumbs-down, and each artist needed a perfect score of five thumbs-up to advance. The winning artists from each city would then be flown to Los Angeles the following month to participate in the show, where they would compete against the other acts for America’s votes and a half-million-dollar recording contract. The acts could be solo artists or duos but had to perform only original material.

  When the video finished, they were hustled through another door just as a new group was being ushered in behind them. It reminded Jane of livestock being moved at the fair. Next, they were corralled into a windowless room and asked to sit and wait again. Caleb leaned forward with his elbows resting on his knees and his chin resting on his hands, an unnatural pose for him. Jane sat beside him and gently rubbed his back. She wanted to encourage him somehow, if she could only find the right words, but she decided that maybe it was best to just let him feel whatever he was feeling.

  Jane looked around the room. You could tell the musicians from their families because the musicians were all nervous. Some had their heads bowed. Others were silently mouthing their lyrics, as if worried they might forget them. A few cocky ones were bouncing around and jabbering on about how they couldn’t wait to get to the live show. One nervous punk rock girl with a black lace dress and sparkly red shoes had a large plastic clock hanging around her ne
ck, and she kept holding it up in front of her face and closing one eye and looking at it, as if she might be late for something.

  Everyone froze when the door opened.

  An energetic man entered and called for all the musicians to come with him. Caleb stood and picked up his guitar.

  Jane threw her arms around him. “I’m proud of you.”

  “But I haven’t done anything yet,” he replied, kissing the top of her head.

  She pulled back and looked into his green eyes. “Yes, you have.”

  Caleb smiled at her and she knew that he would be just fine. He glanced back before leaving, and Jane gave him two thumbs up. He grinned and walked through the door.

  Several minutes later, a woman came and took the family and friends out to an area not far from the soundstage marked off with yellow ropes. She ordered them to silence their cell phones and be quiet. Several LCD monitors showed what the stage looked like on camera, and Jane had to admit that it was a slick set—the panel of judges sitting in an elevated and ornate theater box looking down on the polished and gleaming stage backed by a wall of old-fashioned bulb lights that spelled out the show’s name. But when Jane looked away from the monitor, the perfectly framed camera shot disappeared and she saw it for the illusion that it was—the walls propped up by ugly metal stands, the flimsy false ceiling hung from wires, the makeup artists standing just off camera with their powder and brushes ready. So this was what you didn’t see on TV.

  “Everyone quiet on the set! Three, two, one, rolling.”

  Even though they could see the actual stage from where they were standing, Jane and everyone else turned to watch the screens. The young girl with the clock around her neck trotted out onto the stage first. Jane couldn’t believe it, but she was actually chewing bubble gum.

  “Well, hello,” one of the judges said. “What’s your name, young lady?”

  “Amanda,” she said meekly. “But people call me Panda.”