Chapter 5: Send Me the Deed

I took a seat in the last row of the school auditorium, and Cynthia saw me before I'd put my coat down.

"Jo!" she called, loud enough for three rows to turn. "You came!"

She was in the second row beside Blaine's mother, in a cream blazer, with her phone held up and a gold hoop in each ear.

She waved with the hand holding the phone.

"Don't worry, honey, it's for Birdie," she said. "Nobody's counting this one."

Everyone in the second row was counting it.

Blaine sat on the aisle with his eyes on his program.

His mother looked at me once, turned her head and did not look again.

I had driven five hours in Carly's car with the heater broken.

I would have driven ten.

The lights went down, and a girl in a blue dress played a song with too many sharps.

Then a small blonde girl in a yellow cardigan came out from the wings.

She walked to the piano like it was a cliff.

She sat down, found me in the dark, and her whole face opened.

I held up two fingers and tapped them against my chest, our signal for "I'm right here."

She played "Für Elise," the easy version.

She got the middle section wrong and went back and fixed it without a pause.

I pressed my hand against my mouth so no one would hear me.

When the last note faded, I stood up before the clapping started.

She bowed too low, nearly tipped over, and ran off stage with her braid flying.

Two minutes later, a small, solid weight hit me in the stomach.

"You came," Birdie said into my coat. "You came, you came."

"I wouldn't miss it."

"Dad said you might not. You only had six minutes on the phone yesterday."

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