The Music of Bees by Eileen Garvin (free ereaders txt) 📗

then pulled out his phone and dialed. Noah Katz picked up on the second ring and acted like they had just spoken the day before, calling him the usual host of disparaging names. Like a true friend, he didn’t mention the months that Jake had avoided his visits and failed to return texts, emails, and phone calls. Good old Katz.

After trading insults for a couple of minutes, Jake got down to business.

“Listen, bro. I need a favor,” he said. “Can you come by today for, like, an hour? And bring someone with you who can lift things? Right. Cool. Yeah, now-ish would be great! Oh, and I’ll need to give you directions. I moved.”

Jake hung up. It was so like Katz to say he could come right over, that he was already headed that way on some errand. Katz always had his back, even when he didn’t deserve it—like when Mr. Schaffer kicked him off the band bus in The Dalles for fucking around on the way to a football game. What had he been doing that time? Oh, right—lighting matches and flicking them at Matt Swenson in the back seat. The band director’s thin face was red with anger as he ordered Jake off the bus in the Walmart parking lot and told him to call his parents for a ride. He would not be performing with the jazz band at the HRVHS game against The Dalles, which would be the last game of his senior year. Schaffer hoped he understood that.

“Poor me!” Jake said as he rose to leave. “No more football. Wah! Wah! Wah!”

The girls around him tittered, and Schaffer flushed redder. Jake grabbed his trumpet case and slouched off the bus.

“Later, skaters!” he yelled over his shoulder. Once off the bus he found Noah on his heels, leaving in solidarity. Schaffer yelled at Noah to get back on the bus. Noah just shook his head and waved, smiling. The band director slammed the door of the bus and drove off. Jake called his mom for a ride. While they waited, the two of them busked in front of the Walmart.

Jake remembered how happy he felt to have Katz stand by him, even when he was being a jerk. Then his mom showed up, tight-lipped with disappointment, and Jake felt the deep, hollow regret of missing the last game of his senior year. At his mom’s suggestion, he’d apologized, and Schaffer had agreed to let him play in the spring concert, which was scheduled for the week after he had ended up in the hospital. Busking at the Walmart with Noah was the last time he had played his trumpet for any kind of audience.

The two boys had always shared music, ever since they were in band as little kids. In high school, Noah had gotten more into old school jazz while Jake leaned further into the hard-core punk stuff—the Misfits, Black Flag, and the Dead Kennedys. He turned it up loud when he skated or when he was at home to drown out his father’s voice and the drone of the TV.

Noah was the one who had turned him on to Slapstick, a Chicago band from the nineties that mixed punk and ska. He liked the way the trumpet worked in there as the band laughed at itself for what it was or wasn’t, like in the song “Almost Punk Enough.” That described Jake. So much of it was posturing, for him. He knew that—the music, his hair, his clothes. But he did truly love his trumpet. As they sat in front of Walmart that day, Katz played the melody line of “Almost Punk Enough,” and Jake played mockingly over the top on his trumpet.

“You need to start taking yourself seriously, Mr. Stevenson!” Schaffer had yelled at Jake’s back.

Jake scoffed, but he knew Schaffer was right. Schaffer was the one who had suggested Cornish College of the Arts in the first place. It was Schaffer’s letter of recommendation that helped him get in, he knew. The band director came to see him once in the hospital, and Jake pretended to be asleep. What could he possibly say to him?

Jake watched Noah’s truck descend Alice’s long driveway and smiled at the familiar sight of his beefy friend unfolding himself from the cab. Goofy Noah with his big hair and toothy smile. Jake groaned inwardly to see Celia in the passenger seat. He hadn’t banked on Katz bringing her. Jake thought he might have rounded up one of the guys to help.

“Dude!”

Noah high-fived Jake and leaned down for the acceptable man-hug shoulder bump. He stood back and appraised him. “The hair is looking super sad. What’s up with the ponytail? And look at this place! What the hell? You’ve gone country on me!”

“You know it’s been my lifelong goal to be a farmer,” Jake said, leaning back and bracing his hands on his knees. “I’m just exploring my 4-H dreams.”

“You are rocking it, dude!” Noah said, gesturing at Jake’s skinny jeans and Doc Martens. “I barely recognized you.”

The passenger door creaked opened, and Celia, who everyone called Cece, climbed out. He had to smile at her, though he wished she hadn’t come. She leaned in to hug him, and Jake breathed in her girl smell of minty gum and perfume.

“Hi, Jake! It’s so good to see you!”

She looked down at him and pulled on her long black braid with one hand. Her brown eyes shone, and she looked like she might cry. Jake felt a flash of anger. Why did people think it made him feel better that his life made them sad? He threw up his hands in mock outrage.

“Jesus, Katz! I told you to bring someone with muscle. Not this skinny little girl. La flaca, wey? Cece es la flaca. Maybe you shoulda brung your grammy instead.”

Noah laughed, and Celia squealed in protest.

“No soy la flaca, wey! Órale!”

She flexed her muscles and gritted her teeth. Jake laughed. That was better. And Celia was strong enough to