A World Without You(22)

There is less than fifteen minutes left of class, so everyone starts packing away their music stands and instruments.

“Good job,” Kasey says as she examines the worn strings on her bow next to me.

“You too,” I say. I’m the first-chair cello, though Kasey sometimes beats me. I think if she challenged me this week, she’d bump me down to second chair. But Kasey never cares about the rank.

“The concert is only one month away,” Mr. Ramirez calls over the excited chatter of the students. “And while this piece is acceptable, we’ve got more work ahead of us. Cellos, don’t forget to practice your suites!”

“Have a good weekend?” Kasey asks as I pack away my cello. “Where were you Friday?”

At a memorial service for some dead girl in my brother’s class. “Eh, nowhere,” I say. “What’d you do?”

Kasey focuses intently on snapping her cello case shut. “Mr. Ramirez wanted me to try out for this summer camp thing.”

“Summer camp?”

“I guess it’s more of a program. For musicians,” Kasey says, still not meeting my eyes. “I told him not to bother with me, that you deserved it more, but he said I should audition.”

“Dude, that’s awesome,” I say. I don’t know why she’s acting so shifty about it. Just because I’m first chair doesn’t really mean I’m better than her. I have the technical side of playing the cello down—I know the notes and when to hit them. But I’m basically following directions. I have no more skill than a cook following a recipe.

But Kasey—she hardly ever looks at the music. She just feels it. The only reason she’s second chair is because she doesn’t bother with Bach. She’s too busy playing the music in her head to practice the symphonies of guys who are long dead.

“Congratulations,” I say again, hoping that she can see I mean it. “You’re amazing. I hope you get in.”

She smiles, relieved. “Thanks,” she says. “I guess I’m going to shoot for Juilliard or something when I graduate. You?”

I snort. “I’m nowhere near your level, but it’s sweet of you to pretend I have talent.”

“You do!” Kasey protests, but she’s wrong. Technical skill isn’t talent. I can’t play without sheet music, and I can only do what the notes tell me to do. Kasey plays a million times better when it’s just her and the cello, and that’s the difference.

“Besides,” I add, “I don’t think I’m going to keep playing once I get to college.” I only signed up for orchestra because I wanted to look well-rounded for colleges, and marching band required too much extra work. They play at every game; we play two concerts a year.

My phone buzzes in my pocket. Rosemarie and Jenny are planning to grab ice cream after my orchestra practice is over and want me to hurry up.

“You should keep playing; you’re really good!” Kasey says. She lugs her cello over her shoulder.

I shrug. “It’s not like I’m going to major in music,” I say.

“What are you going to major in?”

I readjust my own cello’s strap. I wish people would quit asking me that. I’m not like Kasey. I don’t have a talent. I don’t have this burning passion to dedicate myself to one thing. Kasey’s going to be the next Yo-Yo Ma and spend her whole life in music, and I doubt she has ever even stopped to think about how lucky she is—not just because she has talent, but because she knows exactly what she wants to do with it.

I mean, I guess I have some talents. But I don’t have passion, not the way she does.

Kasey stays behind to tell Mr. Ramirez how she did at her summer program audition, and I head to my locker. I know my brother thinks I’m weird for liking school, but I do. High school is simple. I know the way things work. Just like playing the notes to Bach on the cello, I can play the teachers and the classes. It’s easy to see just how to act, how to be, how to get by in high school. I understand the patterns.

I had talked to Jenny and Rosemarie at the beginning of the school year about how Bo was going to be attending a different school than me, but they didn’t ask any follow-up questions, and I didn’t supply any additional information. Part of me wanted to confess everything to them, to tell them that things are a mess and I can’t make them right and please, please, please just listen.

But a larger part of me prefers to escape here every day. I go to school, and I pretend like everything’s okay, like I’m an only child, like I live in a world without Bo. People joke with me, and I do my schoolwork, and during those hours, from eight to three, nothing’s wrong. If I tell anyone about Bo, they’ll treat me different. I don’t want sympathy. I want to pretend that I’m just Phoebe. Just Phoebe. Not Phoebe, sister of Bo. Not Phoebe who can do nothing more than watch as everything falls apart around her. Just Phoebe, the junior orchestra geek who participates in too many clubs and doesn’t take her eye off the prize: Graduation. College. Escape. I like that Phoebe.

But that Phoebe always goes home.





CHAPTER 13




The next morning, I’m summoned to Dr. Franklin’s office before breakfast is over. I snatch an apple before I leave the common room, where the breakfast buffet is spread out. The others watch me go, no doubt wondering why the Doctor couldn’t wait the fifteen minutes until the start of our group session.