A Song for Julia

  Sometimes it seems like my entire life since then has been lived in regret, serving out a sentence because of my lack of emotional control. Because if I hadn’t fallen in love … if I hadn’t let Harry … ugh. I don’t like to talk about it. I don’t even like to think about it.

  I was only fourteen. But fourteen isn’t too young to ruin your life. It isn’t too young to end someone else’s. And I wasn’t foolish enough to ask anyone—even myself—for forgiveness.

  So, despite the fact that I knew it was going to be ugly, I dialed my mother’s phone number. It rang once, and she picked up.

  “Julia? Where are you?”

  “Hello, Mother. How are you?”

  “Where are you?” she asked, her voice firm. I stiffened my back, anger washing over me. Yes, so I screwed up. My whole life was one big screw-up. But maybe once in a while I wanted a mother and not a warden. My response was rigid, excessively literal, and laced with sarcasm.

  “I’m on the Acela train back to Boston. At the moment, we’re passing somewhere through New Jersey. If you’d like, I can ask the conductor for our precise location.”

  She was silent for maybe ten long seconds, then burst into words, her tone that of a mother speaking to a small, misbehaving child.

  “Don’t you dare take that tone with me, young lady. Explain yourself.”

  It’s possible she was a little bit loud. The man who sat across from me sat up straight, his eyes darting up to my face, meeting my eyes. He flushed and looked away, back down to his laptop.

  Did that really just happen?

  “What exactly would you like me to explain, Mother? I’ve been on the train all morning, so I have no idea what you are talking about.”

  Okay. We all know that I knew exactly what she was talking about. This was a stalling tactic. The odds were roughly fifty-fifty that my mother wouldn’t be able to bring herself to say it. Which would be nice. The downside was—if she was angry enough to go forward anyway, I was really going to hear it.

  She was that angry. Her next words came at a shout, and I had to jerk the phone away from my ear.

  “Julia! Explain why I woke up to find you on Maria Clawson’s website! On the home page! In a photograph nearly having sex in front of the White House with some drug addict!”

  I winced. The guy across the table from me heard the entire thing. He was full on blushing now. In an academic sort of way, it was kind of hilarious. I didn’t know guys could blush like that. It was cute.

  I sighed. “Mother, we were not having sex in front of the White House, we were kissing.” The guy across from me jerked in place, not even pretending to type anymore. I don’t know what got into me, but I continued. “Believe me, Mother, I know the difference.”

  “I’m sure you do,” she said, her voice laced with contempt.

  I winced. The barb hurt, just as similar comments from her had hurt before. She knew just where to dig in, just what buttons to push, didn’t she? She always had. My mother rarely missed an opportunity to rub it in.

  Well, maybe I also knew how to push buttons.

  “Actually, Mother, we didn’t have sex until we got back to your condominium. Your bed is so much softer than the ones in cheap hotels.”

  She gasped, and I snapped the phone closed and turned it off.

  It was a cheap victory, and it would cost me in the long run. But for a second, I felt such a sense of satisfaction.

  The guy across the table was staring openly now.

  I smiled at him—a false, professional smile that I had practiced over the years because it was what people expected. “I’m so sorry you had to hear all of that,” I said in as pleasant a tone as I could muster.

  He shook his head, and gave me a charming, off-center smile. “It’s quite all right,” he said, in a plummy, upper class British accent that made my stomach wrench. “I’m sure you said it simply to infuriate her.”

  “I said it to shut her up.”

  “I imagine it worked.”

  His accent was Eton College—wealthy, insulated, and powerful. Relaxed, drawling. It made me want to vomit. It brought back way too many unpleasant associations. I still had nightmares about a boy with an almost identical accent. A beautiful, amazing boy, who I let destroy me.

  He smiled again, still just as charming. Blonde hair, a little on the long side. Blue eyes. Tailored suit with cufflinks, not buttons. He was damned good looking. Which wasn’t an asset. He held out a hand. “My name is Barrett Randall.”

  Against my better judgment, I shook his hand. “Julia Thompson. And let me apologize again for the show.”

  “There’s nothing to apologize for. I was eavesdropping, which was unforgivable.”

  “We should both stop apologizing now.”

  “Agreed. Perhaps a change of subject? What takes you to Boston?”

  “I was visiting Washington for the weekend. I live in Boston.”

  “I see … business trip?”

  I smiled. “Not exactly … I was there for the anti-war protest.”

  “Ah, yes, I heard there was one. Though it seems it was drowned out in the news by the sniper.”

  “Yes. But that doesn’t take away from the importance of what happened.”

  “No doubt,” he said, but his face didn’t match his words.

  “You look skeptical.”

  He shrugged. “To be honest, I think your President is set on going to war, no matter what. And no number of protests is going to change that.”

  I sighed. “You’re probably right.”

  “To be perfectly fair, it’s not as if Mr. Blair is any better,” he said. “He seems to want to go along with whatever your President wants.”

  “You’re not a supporter?”

  “Of launching a war with Iraq? Hardly. But I am in Boston for business, and like a lot of people, I’m far too preoccupied with my own life to get much involved. Are you a student?”

  “At Harvard. You?”

  “Eton, then Oxford. And now I’m working for my father. I’m visiting the United States for some business meetings.”

  I shouldn’t ask. I shouldn’t. But I did. “What year were you at Eton?”

  “I matriculated in 1996.”

  I felt a twinge of anger. “You must know Harry Easton?”

  He blinked and then raised his eyebrows in surprise. “I do, indeed. We were on the same floor our first two years at Eton, before his father was transferred to the Embassy in Beijing. How do you know him?”

  Now I was going to vomit. Harry. Why did I bring him up? Was it simply curiosity? Wondering what had happened to him? Did I still have feelings for him? Hardly, unless you count disgust, hatred, rage.

  “We attended ISB together …” At his puzzled look, I said, “International School of Beijing.”

  He raised his eyebrows. “I see. What took you there?”

  “My father was the US Ambassador.”

  He smiled. “Then it’s a very small world, indeed. Your father is Richard Thompson?”

  I nodded. “Yes.”

  “My father and your father know each other,” he said. Then his face froze for just a second. And I cursed myself. He’d just put it together: I almost heard the neurons clicking as he dredged up the old mess out of his memory. I was a minor when it all happened, so the press never got my name, though they had my father’s. None of the newspapers ever ran a single story about it. But the diplomatic community is pretty small, and it was a big enough scandal that everyone knew about it.

  It seemed that Barrett Randall was too well-mannered to broach the subject, thank God. He said, “I haven’t seen Harry in a couple of years. He ended up going to university in Switzerland, and we’ve lost touch.”

  I nodded, not trusting myself to say anything. Besides, my mother always told me that if I didn’t have anything nice to say, I should say nothing at all. Though, now that I think about it, my mother was very good at saying one thing and doing the complete opposite. But that was another subject.

&n
bsp; “I’ll be in Boston for a few weeks, I think. This isn’t business we’ll be able to wrap up very quickly. Could I persuade you to join me for dinner or coffee? It would be nice to know someone in the city.”

  My mind went through a sort of rapid-fire train of thoughts. Randall reminded me entirely too much of a time in my life I’d just as soon forget. On the other hand, he seemed like a reasonably nice guy and somewhat safe. I broke up with Willard back in the spring … a breakup as passionless as our relationship was in the first place. It would be nice to have a date, even if it was going nowhere.

  Especially if it was going nowhere.

  “I’d like that,” I said.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Awesome that way (Crank)

  Work on Monday was whack. First of all, I’m a short-order cook, not a frickin’ waiter. But we were short two waitresses and only one cook, so out onto the floor I went. Instead of grooving to music in the kitchen and being left alone, which I prefer, I was running this way and that, getting drinks, mopping up spills, and making an ass of myself.

  Times like this I wish I’d stayed in school.

  I had a table of four: two mommies and their brat kids. It goes like this. One mommy asks for a refill. I get it. Then the other one wants a refill. I get that. Then the kid wants a piece of pie but can’t decide what type. So I wait, and I wait, and the kid dithers, and I wait some more, and finally the mother says he can’t have any pie at all. That starts a tantrum, disturbing the rest of the restaurant, and I’m trying to get their check together when the kid swings his arms and four plates covered with the remains of their food crash down on to the floor.

  Let’s just say up front—I’m not very good with people.

  I managed to get out of there before losing my mind and without hurting any small children, or their mothers. Barely. But not without snarling at my boss. I knew it was my turn, but seriously? Am I the person you want serving food to your kids? I don’t think so. Maybe if you wanted to scare them.

  Whatever.

  I caught the green line back to Roxbury. The four of us rent a crappy little warehouse there, where we live upstairs and practice downstairs. It works mostly, but sometimes it’s a little too incestuous for my taste. Mark and Pathin are always bitching at each other about something or other, and sometimes the tension between Serena and me is thick enough, you could cut it with a steak knife. She knows how to piss me off, too. Not that pissing me off is that hard. Plus, they were all bullshit at me, because I’d cancelled Tuesday practice to buy a car, which I’d been saving toward for more than six months. I was sure there’d be bitching about that.

  When I got there, the scene was exactly what I expected. Pathin was sitting at his drum set, arms crossed over his chest. His eyebrows were drawn together, and he had a deep frown on his face. Mark stood a few feet away, face red. He was not quite shouting, but his voice was tense, raised just a little, as he spoke.

  “You don’t understand!” he said. “What I’m looking for is … integrity. We’ve been building up a fan base around our own music! We don’t have to do covers any more.”

  Pathin said, “We have to pay the rent.”

  “I know that! But the EP is doing better now.”

  “Not enough to pay the rent.”

  I stopped and looked at the two of them. Serena, who was tuning her guitar across the room from them, sat her guitar down, slid out of her seat and walked toward me. Her hips swayed as she walked, and she caught my eyes. She was an attractive girl—long, flowing black hair, milk chocolate skin and a body that just wouldn’t quit. When we performed, she wore heavy mascara, black leather, spike heel boots, and usually a camisole or tank top that highlighted the tattoo that rose from between her breasts. Another small tattoo above her eyebrow depicted a small butterfly. When we weren’t doing a show, she leaned toward loose flowered dresses and flip-flops.

  “How long have they been going on like this?” I asked.

  She frowned. “All afternoon. I’m going out of my mind.”

  “Sometimes I think all of us living together is a bad frickin’ idea.”

  “You’re just realizing this now?”

  I shrugged. Her words always had double meanings, and I was sure this did, too. She’d been hinting at wanting to be more than friends and bandmates for a year. I wasn’t interested. It’s not that she wasn’t a wonderful girl and a good friend. It’s that I didn’t want to lose one of my only friends. Not to mention, risk blowing the band up just as we were starting to get some traction.

  “Guys!” I shouted.

  They looked up for all of about a quarter second, and then Mark started bitching again.

  “Guys!” I shouted again. “Knock it off. We aren’t going to resolve this argument today. We’ve got a show to get ready for.”

  “What?” Mark said. “When?”

  Pathin shook his head in disgust. “If you hadn’t been drunk the other night, you’d know, asshole,” he said.

  Serena sighed. “Friday night,” she said. “Metro in Cambridge.”

  “Crap, I hate that place,” Mark said. “The acoustics suck.”

  “They pay well,” Pathin replied.

  “I know, I know …” Mark said. He looked at Pathin and said in a mocking voice, “We have to pay the rent. Whatever.”

  “Will you two just shut up for five minutes?” Serena demanded. “We’ve got work to do.”

  I muttered a curse, collapsing into a ratty couch we’d picked up off the side of the road a year before.

  “What’s your problem?” Serena said.

  I shook my head and rubbed my hand across my temples. “Just tired, it’s been a long day.”

  “Well, it’s time to man up. We’ve got a show to get ready for. Half the reason these two won’t stop bickering is we were waiting for you.”

  I loved these guys sometimes. Emphasis on sometimes.

  I got up, broke out the guitar, and started tuning it up, ignoring the quieter than before bickering between Mark and Pathin. Finally finished, I cranked up the amp, ran a couple of scales, and said, “I want you guys to hear something. It’s a little different.”

  Serena looked up, and Mark and Pathin turned toward me. “Go for it,” Serena said.

  So I started playing. Actually, it was a lot different. I’d spent most of the drive up from Washington, DC, in the back of the van, playing with some licks, then wrote lyrics after getting home from my dad’s Sunday night. The sound was more compressed, somehow, than the stuff I usually wrote. Still plenty of grunge, but it had kind of a catchy beat. The lyrics … well, the song was about the girl I’d met in Washington. Julia.

  I was about a third of the way, belting out the chorus, “Julia, where did you go?” and all three of them were staring at me, stunned expressions on their faces. I stopped right in the middle of a measure.

  “What?” I asked.

  “Don’t stop,” Serena said, waving her hands at me impatiently.

  “Yeah, keep going,” Pathin said.

  I looked back at them, feeling a little alarmed by their reaction, then backed up a few measures and picked up the song again.

  When I finished, the warehouse was dead silent.

  Finally, Pathin said, “That’s bloody brilliant.”

  Serena nodded her head quickly, a huge smile on her face, eyes shining.

  Mark said, “Frickin’ sell-out. It sounds like a pop song.”

  Pathin shook his head. “No … it’s brilliant. That may be the best song Crank’s ever written.”

  “Who the hell is Julia?” Serena asked.

  “No one,” I replied.

  She snorted and gave me a grin. “You’re so full of shit, Crank. But who cares? That song was amazing. We’re performing it Friday.”

  “It’s not done yet, I still haven’t even worked out…”

  “Then finish it. We’re doing it Friday night. Mark will be happy … we can replace one of the covers.”

  Mark looked smug.

 
“I agree,” Pathin said. “But I’m also very curious who this mysterious Julia is.”

  “Dude, it’s just a song,” I said.

  Mark muttered, “I never thought we’d be playing Top 40 crap. But if we can get rid of one of the covers, I guess I’m okay with it. But you’re still a sell-out, Crank.”

  I gave him the finger.

  He muttered, “Shit monkey,” and sent the finger right back.

  Serena pointed at him and gave him the look. Yeah, that look. The one that made all of us feel like ten-year-olds caught in the cookie jar by our mothers. Mark shut up. Serena was awesome that way.

  “Can you play it through one more time?” she asked me. “I want to get the feel for it. Pathin, you caught the end? It needs some pretty powerful drums there.” Serena was in her element. Disorganized, crazy, sometimes inspired, she often acted as the band’s artistic director, if we had such a thing.

  “Yeah,” he said. “I’ve got it.”

  So I played through it again. And then a third time. On the fourth, Serena jumped in with a strong backup rhythm, and Pathin and Mark came in with the drums and bass, and suddenly it was a real song. And I loved it. It was the quickest and easiest I’d ever written a song before. And possibly the best.

  Even Mark looked excited by the time we did a run through. “I’ll admit,” he said. “It is powerful. Even if Crank is a complete asshat.”

  “Powerful is not the word,” Serena said, her voice droll. “Heart-wrenching. The girls are going to be ripping their clothes off for Crank.”

  I snorted and Mark said, “So what’s new about that?”

  “Knock it off, Mark,” I said.

  “I’ll knock it off when you stop bringing drunk groupies back here after our shows. I’m tired of having to listening to them giggling and thumping through my bedroom wall.”

  Then he did an imitation, thumping rhythmically against one of the wood benches with his foot while he cried out, “Oh! Oh! Crank! Oh!”

  “Shut up!” the rest of us yelled.

  Mark smirked. “Let’s get the rest of this set done.”

  “About time,” I muttered.