Chapter 8

The next day I was sitting in Mr. French’s office again, eating lunch and talking about music, when we both jerked up at the sound of a knock at his office door. Neither of us had heard the main door to the choir room open and we were caught off guard.

I was surprised to see Kat standing there, balanced on one foot with the other hooked around her ankle, grasping her hands in front of her again. I recognized the body language. It was one of the things she did when she was working up the courage to state an opinion, or ask someone to do something.

“It’s Ms. Moore, right?” Mr. French asked, putting his food down. “What can I do for you?”

“Umm ... she said, looking away and trying to keep from making eye contact. “I know you and Charlie work on music at lunch sometimes, but I was wondering if some days I could come here and tutor him at lunch.”

Mr. French looked over at me, a confused expression on his face.

“Kat used to tutor me during study hall, but I was told I couldn’t use the student tutoring program while I was dealing with the restraining order. Something about limiting access to school functions. Apparently, they’re afraid Aaron might get lost and end up in the library at the same time I’m there studying,” I said before turning back to Kat. “I thought you were going to keep coming by and helping me study on the weekends?”

“I am, but you were doing three days a week before, and if we study on Sundays and Saturdays, that’s only two. I know you feel like you’re getting caught up, but I still think you’re too smart to settle for C’s. You’ve got a lot of ground to make up if you want to start getting A’s and B’s and we need more than one or two days a week to get you there.”

I could see her point, but I found the lunch breaks working with Mr. French to be some of the best progress I’d made on making my own music before. Willie was a big help, but he just did things that felt natural when it came to writing songs. Mr. French explained the technical reasons for doing things in music in a way that really helped me understand why things worked and didn’t work. I really didn’t want to give up my time with him, since once this whole restraining order thing was over, I wasn’t sure if I’d be able to keep meeting with him every day like this.

“Kat, I appreciate...”

“Actually, that’s not a bad idea,” he said, interrupting me. “Charlie, I really enjoy our talks, but she’s right. We’ll keep working at lunch, but you need to take your schoolwork seriously. I know a lot of musicians just want to get out there and do it, but I think you’d really benefit from studying this stuff at a higher level. To do that, you need to get good enough grades in the next few years to get into a good college program. I think more musicians would benefit from a college education, not just in theory but also in business. I swear the place where most musicians have things fall apart is on the business side of the industry and not in their creativity. I’ve seen a lot of talented people sign awful deals that basically guarantee they’ll never break big just because they didn’t understand what they were agreeing to.”

“But...” I said, still trying to find a way to keep our lunchtimes from becoming studying sessions.

“Nope, no buts. You need to focus on school, first. The fact that you have a young lady willing to track you down and make you study is a huge step in the right direction. You should listen to her.”

“I do,” I said with a sigh, realizing I was beaten. “How many days a week do you want to study?”

“I’m sorry,” she said, her voice quivering. “I should have asked first, I just...”

She turned and started to run out of the choir room. Mr. French looked at me confused as I got up to chase after her.

“I’ll explain later,” I said over my shoulder.

She was already halfway down the hallway when I ran through the choir room door and shouted after her.

“Kat, stop!”

She skidded to a halt and put her hands to her face, not looking back at me.

“Come here, please,” I said, trying to sound gentle but still authoritative enough that she’d listen to me.

She paused for a second before turning and walking slowly back towards me, like a condemned man to the gallows. She stopped in front of me, hands clasped in front of her again, keeping her head down to hide her face behind her hair. She was in full-on defensive mode, trying to hide from me. It’s what she did when she thought she’d done something wrong or upset someone, since she knew being confronted with that disappointment would send her into a full-on panic attack.

“You think I’m upset about losing some of my time with Mr. French working on music, right?” I asked in a gentle voice.

She nodded, keeping her head down.

“Hey,” I said, taking her hands in mine. “I’m not upset with you at all. Was I a little disappointed that I would lose some of my lunches to doing school work instead of working on music? Yes. What did I tell you when we agreed you’d keep tutoring me after our new arrangement?”

She said something I couldn’t hear.

“Kat, I’m not mad at you. Not even a little bit. What did I say when we’d agreed you’d keep tutoring me?”

“That ... that you liked how I took charge when we did school work, and that I was the boss when we were studying.”

“Right. So, you making sure we’re getting enough study time is doing just that. You’re doing exactly what you are supposed to do. I know it was really hard to come in and tell Mr. French you wanted me to study with you during some of the lunches. I’m so proud of you for being able to do it. I’m not even a little bit upset with you.”

“Really?” she said, looking up, her cheeks still wet with tears.

I wiped them off with my sleeve and said, “Really. Even if you ask me to do stuff I don’t want to do, like homework, I could never be mad at you. How could I? You’re looking out after my best interests, after all.”

“So you’re not mad at me?”

“Not at all.”

“Promise?”

“Cross my heart. Now, should we go back inside before Mr. French decides he needs to come and chase me down?”

She nodded yes, wiping her eyes and taking a deep breath. I kept holding her hand as I led her back into the choir room. Mr. French was standing in the doorway to his office, still looking perplexed.

“Everything okay?” He asked when we came back inside.

“Yeah. It’s hard to explain. Kat was just worried she was getting in the way of music time because I was being difficult. You’re both right, of course. School comes first. Would it be okay if, a few days a week, Kat comes and tutors me here?”

“Sure. I really should be doing work during these times anyway.”

“Ohh, I’m sorry. I didn’t even think. I didn’t mean to cause problems,” I said.

“You’re not. I enjoy the work we’ve been doing and I’m not really that far behind. I haven’t had a chance to do this kind of work in years; and honestly, I’ve missed it. I still get everything done, so it’s a win-win.”

“I know Charlie wants to keep working on his music as much as possible,” Kat said. “We don’t need to work every day, especially if we keep working at his place on Saturday mornings. We could probably do two days a week and you two could work on music the other three, if that’s okay?”

She wasn’t looking at the floor anymore, which was a good sign. She was still nervously fidgeting with her hands, clasped in front of her, but this was a really good step. She’d been making progress asking me for things she wanted, but this was one of the first times I’d seen her do it for someone else. Of course, it was partially tutoring-related, which was an area she felt comfortable in, which helped. Still, it was a big step.

“Works for me, as long as Charlie gets all the study time he needs. I’m serious about that.”

“Kat won’t cut corners. She takes tutoring very seriously.”

“I can see that. Weekends and tracking you down at lunch is pretty dedicated. Okay, you two go study, I’ve got work to do.”

That night I was at Hanna’s house eating dinner, which was something I did a few days a week. Mom occasionally worried that I was overstaying my welcome with them, but Mrs. Phillips had assured me enough times that she was happy to have me with them that I’d decided to just take their word for it. At this point, I felt almost as comfortable at their house as I did at my own. Better actually, at dinner time, since what they had was almost always better than three-day-old leftovers or a sad sandwich.

Tonight, it was Brunswick stew, a North Carolina staple. She’d made chicken the other day and this was one way to use the leftovers so you didn’t have to keep eating the same chicken for several days. She’d had a house to show that afternoon, so I’d gotten to their house around the same time as she had, and she’d let me help finish and season the stew. After working in the kitchen at the Blue Ridge with Chef, I found I actually enjoyed cooking. Although I didn’t have time to do that anymore, Mrs. Philips sometimes waited for me to cook with her, which was nice.

“So, did Chef say what he was going to do to help?” Hanna asked.

We had the same routine when I ate with them, and I assumed they did it when I wasn’t here. We took time telling each other what was going on in our lives, starting from the last time we’d all eaten together. The other two would eat and listen intently and then ask follow-up questions. Each person had to ask at least one question, which had a way of making everyone pay attention to the person talking.

Hanna found it annoying and wished they’d just eat in silence, but I loved it. When we were traveling with Dad, I ate in the kitchen while Dad played, if they had one, or back in the RV if they didn’t. Mom was with Dad most of the time during gigs, so I was always by myself. Since moving here, I ate with Mom more often, but most of my meals were still by myself, ‘cause she had to work so much. I found these mealtime conversations almost relaxing. It was almost like something out of an old TV show.

“He didn’t say, just that he’d talk to some people and see what he can do. We have until next month to submit our reply, or whatever. I’m not really clear on how it works but Mom said she was going to wait until the last moment to go through with her bankruptcy plan, to make them sweat. I think she’s just hoping a better option comes up between now and then, which tells me how bad an idea this really is, regardless of what she said.”

“It isn’t great, that’s for sure. If you have to move, a bankruptcy will make it harder to rent a new place,” Mrs. Philips said. “Depending on how much of a hardass your landlord is, it could be a problem next time you have to renew your lease. It’ll also make it harder to get any job that does a credit check on her. On the flip side, she’s right to be looking for another way out. If they want to, the Campbell’s lawyers could drag things out and really drive up the cost of fighting it. Hanna’s father did that during our divorce, just to make me spend more money.”

“Mom,” Hanna said, warningly.

“I know and I’m not talking about it. I was just trying to give Charlie an idea of what could happen.”

Hanna didn’t like talking about her dad, even in passing. She was furious he’d left them and basically written them off. Since the divorce, he’d had no contact with her at all. No birthday presents and no Christmas cards. It’s one thing to divorce your wife, but it took a special kind of bastard to completely walk away from your child. Dad, for all his faults, still wrote me from prison every few months. Her dad was walking around living in Florida somewhere, just pretending Hanna didn’t exist. I didn’t blame her for not wanting to deal with the bastard.

“Well,” Mrs. Phillips said, continuing. “I’m confident Chef will come up with something. That man is nothing short of a miracle worker when it comes to protecting his kids. He’s come through for Hanna several times.”

Hanna shot her mother another look. She also wasn’t a fan of her mom talking about her in the third person when she was there. Actually, Hanna seemed to find a lot of things her mom did annoying, which I didn’t get. I thought Mrs. Phillips was amazing; but then, I wasn’t her kid. I’m sure she wouldn’t find the stuff my mom said embarrassing, but sometimes it drove me up the wall. I think that was probably true of every kid and their parents.

“Hanna got back her first acceptance letter today,” Mrs. Phillips said, which elicited another eye roll from Hanna.

“Isn’t that a good thing?” I asked Hanna, who was obviously not into the idea.

“It’s from Florida State. I do not want to go to live in Florida.”

“Then why’d you apply?”

“‘Cause she made me.”

“Hanna’s plan was to just go to the community college in Asheville and get an associate’s degree. Her grades may have fallen last year, but not enough for that to be necessary. I tried to explain to her that in today’s workforce, you really need a four-year degree if you’re going to make it in your field.”