The Passenger by Jacqueline Druga (the giving tree read aloud TXT) 📗

of the church where an older man stood back with folded arms.

“Is that a security guard?”

Marge laughed. “No, that’s Burgess he’s just keeping an eye out. I don’t know why. It might be the mixing center. I don’t know the technical stuff. Don’t worry about it, Chip.” She patted his hand. “They’re all learning.”

Jonas looked at the band, then back at Burgess. Again, he felt this ‘drawn’ feeling and he slipped from the row.

“Chip,” Marge whispered his name. “What are you doing?”

Jonas lifted a finger to her mouthing the words, ‘I’ll be back’ and walked straight toward Burgess.

When he arrived back there, he saw what Burgess was standing by. A table that held a large music mixing board and a small laptop computer. He could see the words to the song scrolling, they seemed to be about three seconds faster than what the band on stage played.

Burgess had his arms folded as if he was conveying, “I’m not touching this.’

Jonas approached him. “You know if you pull back the drums, it will sound better.”

“What do you mean pull back the drums?”

“I don’t know,” Jonas replied. “I don’t even know why I used that term.” His eyes shifted to the gear on the table. “Can I?”

“Oh, I don’t care. Pastor Rick may get mad, but if you know what you’re doing, go for it”

That was the point, Jonas didn’t know if he knew what he was doing.

He looked at the large board. Sliding levers with a row of turning knobs above each lever. They were labeled as well. Drums one, bass drum, snare drum, lead guitar and so forth.

Every level was the exact same including the microphone for the singers.

The first thing Jonas did was look at the laptop. He reached over and hit the spacebar, pausing the scrolling words. He didn’t know the song, not at all, but he listened and hit the spacebar again to restart it. It wasn’t a close match to what the band sang, but it was better.

Swept over by one of those memory feelings, and not understanding how or what he knew, Jonas took a seat behind the mixing board.

Following that ‘Feeling’ Jonas started moving levers, turning knobs on high ends, low ends, mids …

It took until the beginning of the third song and things clicked. It was like a puzzle he had to solve, pressing buttons, changing things until it sounded right.

“Chip?” He heard Haley’s voice right behind him. She actually sounded panicked. “Chip. What are you doing?”

Jonas froze, his hands slowly lifted, he closed his eyes for a moment and turned around. “I’m sorry, Haley. I don’t know why I … I’ll stop.”

“No.” She shook her head. “I was going to say, whatever you’re doing, keep going. That sounds amazing. Thank you.”

“Really.”

“Yes. Pay attention.” She pointed to the board, then stood next to him.

“Something tells me if I knew the songs, I could even do this better.”

“We’re gonna have to change that then. But for now …” She pointed down to the board. “Just keep it up.”

Jonas smiled at her. He honestly didn’t know how he was doing it, or even what he was doing. He was following that feeling, following the sound, and it just felt right.

FIFTEEN

Jonas wished he knew if he ever felt in his life as appreciated as he did that moment after the contemporary service, when everyone told him what a difference it made the second he jumped in to work the controls.

“Finally,” someone told him. “We could hear the pastor. I thought he had a toothache or something before.”

Then again, Jonas didn’t remember anything, technically, it was the first time in his life he could recall feeling so good.

With that came a new job.

Pastor Rick asked if he would work the board for services and rehearsals. But Jonas had to learn the songs a little better and the program that projected the words on a screen from a laptop that was running on an outdated operating system.

They used the pastor’s office because he had an extensive library of music plus, he subscribed to one of those unlimited music plans.

Haley told Jonas he reminded her of those ‘Reaction’ videos she always watched online.

He didn’t know what they were, and she explained that it was videos of people listening to a different type of music or song they had never heard. She loved watching someone just freak with joy. Not that Jonas was freaking with joy, but he had reacted a lot according to her.

He didn’t think he did. The music didn’t sound shocking to him, so much so he was convinced at some point he had been exposed to it.

“What do you think?” Haley asked. “It’s older, but one of my favorites.”

“Is this all you listen to?” Jonas asked.

“What? Do you mean like is Christian music all I have on my playlist?”

“Yeah.”

“No, I like country and old boy band stuff. Though I have to say your haircut took me back.”

Jonas grumbled a ‘thanks’.

“You know I’ve been thinking,” she said. “The way you naturally went to the mixing board. I wonder if you were a DJ coming home from a gig. I mean, I can’t explain the gardening, but if you think about it. It was late and … there’s a rave outside of Lincoln. Raves are notorious for people slipping stuff into people’s drinks.”

“That’s actually a good theory,” Jonas said.

“How does it feel to you? Does it ring a bell?”

“Not really. Though I’m kind of stuck on the fact that you just told me there is a rave in Lincoln, Nebraska. It’s almost like an oxymoron.”

Haley laughed, then turned her head when there was a knock on the arch of the door.

“Dinner is just about done,” Pastor Rick said.

“Dad? Isn’t it early?” Haley asked.

“Ping pong league starts back up tonight,” he said. “How’s it going? You’ve been at this for a couple days.”

Jonas answered, “I want to be ready for rehearsal tomorrow night. Who picks the songs?”

He lifted his hand. “Me. I do. I pick them. You