“Good morning, Riverside students.” Ms. Clarkson’s voice was always particularly cheery on Fridays. “Spring soccer starts in a few weeks. The girls’ team is looking for players. It’s a good time for anyone who hasn’t played before to try out. And we have had a great response to the talent-show registration. But today is your last chance to get a form. They must be returned to the office, with the fee attached, by Monday noon.”
Molly felt inside the pocket of her jacket. The twenty-five dollars her dad had given her was there. She had thought about giving it back to him. After Murphy’s last game, she’d decided that competition was okay for Murphy, but not for her. She would have to find another place to sing.
“This morning I want to have a discussion about the talent show,” Mr. Bahli said when the announcements were finished. “Has anyone in this class entered?”
Veronica, a worried-looking girl who sat in the far corner of the room, put up her hand and nodded.
“Veronica?” Mr. Bahli said, looking surprised. “Wonderful! What’s your talent?”
“Piano,” Veronica quietly said.
“That’s fantastic!” he said, walking down the aisle toward her desk. “Have you performed before?”
“Yes,” she said. “I’ve been doing piano recitals since I was four years old.”
“Really! Tell us about them.”
“Some are good. Some aren’t so good,” she said. “During the Christmas holidays, I went to Toronto to compete for a place in a summer music school. Last week I got an acceptance letter in the mail.”
“Wow! That’s so great,” Molly said. “Good for you.”
It was easy to imagine Veronica as a concert pianist. She had delicate features and slender hands, with perfectly groomed oval nails. Veronica looked like the kind of girl whose parents could afford piano lessons.
“So what do we think about competition?” Mr. Bahli asked the rest of the class.
“It’s all about winning. Second place is first loser,” Danny said. “Like on Wednesday. The pressure was on, and we kicked the Cougars’ butts. We rocked.”
“I don’t expect to win the talent competition,” Veronica said, louder than before. “A singer or dancer will win. I need to practice, and the competition will help me with my performances. I just want to play the piano the best I can.”
Molly didn’t care about winning. But she wasn’t calm like Veronica. When she thought about the competition, the butterflies in her stomach turned into swarms of bumblebees.
“So,” Mr. Bahli said, “everyone has their own reason for competing.”
Now that Molly had heard her voice out loud, she loved the way it sounded. And she loved the way she had felt when her dad was listening. Now all she wanted to do was sing. The competition would give her that chance, just like Veronica said.
At lunchtime, Molly charged out of the classroom alone and ran down the hall to the office. “Can I have a registration form, please?” she asked.
The secretary said, “Sure thing. What are you going to perform in the show, Molly?”
“Sing,” she said, surprising herself with her confidence. She didn’t notice Fi and Dede sitting in the hall.
The girls burst into laughter. “Sing?” Dede said.
Fi clasped her hands over her ears. “Will we have to listen?” she asked.
“No, you don’t have to listen. But you do have to be respectful, and that was rude,” the secretary said.
Fi whispered something in Dede’s ear, and the two of them burst into laughter again.
Molly took the form and shot out the door. Part of her wanted to tear it up and never think about the competition again. But part of her wanted to show the girls that she could sing. Still another part of her wanted to hear her voice in the huge auditorium at the community center. Then she thought about her mom and felt a twinge of guilt. Even though she had made another promise, Molly still worried about singing in front of a crowd before she sang for her mom. It didn’t feel right.
Molly was in such a muddle that she almost ran into Murphy in the hallway. She hid the form behind her back. “Where did you come from?” she asked.
“What do you mean? I’ve been looking for you.” He peered around her shoulder. “What are you hiding?”
“Nothing,” Molly said. “Just a form from the office.”
“What form?” he asked.
“I’ll tell you if you promise not to tell the other boys.”
Murphy looked confused.
Molly knew that having a boy as a best friend had its problems. Murphy didn’t understand secrets. He and the boys didn’t have any rules about what they said to each other.
“It’s a registration form for the talent contest,” she said.
“It’s a what?” Murphy asked.
“You heard me,” Molly said, holding the form in the air as Murphy grabbed for it.
“What are you going to do?” he asked.
“Never mind.” She stomped into the cafeteria.
Murphy followed her. He peered over her shoulder as she filled in her name, age and address. Under the heading Talent, she wrote, “SINGING.”
“Singing!” Murphy said. His eyes bulged like someone had pinched him. “You are going to get up onstage in front of a ton of people and sing?”
Molly turned her back so he couldn’t see what she was writing. “What’s wrong with that?” she asked.
“What’s wrong with that? You don’t know how to sing.”
“How do you know?”
“I know ’cause you’ve never said a word about singing. And you talk about everything.”
“I don’t know if I’m any good,” Molly said, “but I’ve been singing my whole life. I’ve just never let the sounds come out of my mouth.” She pulled out the twenty-five dollars, grabbed her completed form and stood up. “Come on. Let’s drop this in the office,” she said.
“I can’t believe it,” Murphy said. “I thought I was your best friend. And I thought girls told their best friends everything.”
“You don’t know anything about girls,” Molly said in a huff.
“Hold on a minute,” Murphy said. “Did you just say you sing but you never open your mouth?”
“Yeah,” she said, walking away. “That’s what I said.”
“How do you do that?” he asked.
“I listen to myself in my head,” she said.
“You listen to yourself sing, but you don’t make a sound?” He looked at her like she was out of her mind. “Why do you do that?”
“Because…” She paused. She knew she’d never be able to explain her secret promise. “Because that’s just what I do.”
“So because you sing in your head, silently, you think you can sing in a talent competition?” Murphy asked.
“Yeah. I mean, no. I mean, I’m not sure.”
Murphy said, “You are crazy, Moll.”
“Yeah. I know.”
Molly sat down on a bench in the hall. Murphy’s reaction was only half as bad as the other boys’ would be. She didn’t even want to think about what they would say.
“Okay,” he said as he dropped onto the bench beside her. “Fill me in. What are you talking about?”
Molly told him how she had sung for her dad and that it was the first time she had ever heard her own singing voice. She told him how her dad had been shocked and had left twenty-five dollars for her on the table the next morning.
“Have you been practicing with him?” Murphy asked.
“No,” Molly said. “He doesn’t like music.”
“How are you going to win a competition if you don’t practice?” Murphy asked. “If you have never sung for anyone? That doesn’t make sense. Music in your head doesn’t mean you can sing.”
“Yes, it does. You don’t understand.”
“You’re right,” Murphy said, folding his arms across his chest. “I don’t understand.”
“Then come over after school, and I’ll sing for you. If you think I suck, I won’t sing in the competition.”
“Murphy, my man.” Paige sauntered up the hall with her friends. She flipped her ponytail with her fingers and said, “Did you know your Molly girl is a singer? She thinks she’s the next Selena Gomez.”
Fi said, “Is she trying to recruit you to be her talent manager? As if she has any talent.” She sat herself down on Murphy’s knee and flirted. “I’d like you to be my talent manager.”
Murphy stood up, almost toppling Fi to the floor. He turned toward Paige and said, “Yeah. Molly’s a singer, and I’m her manager. Look out, Selena— Molly is about to arrive.”
Paige glared at Molly and then batted her eyes at Murphy.
“Well,” she said with a sappy smile. “Tell your friend she’s got some serious competition.” Her smile turned to a sneer. “She’s gonna be laughed off the stage.”
Murphy said, “No one will be laughing Molly off the stage. You heard that first from me.”
Paige’s face turned bright pink. She gave a fake giggle and then she and her friends moved on.
“Holy cow,” Murphy said. “You better know how to sing or I just buried myself.”
“Thanks, Murph,” Molly said.
“Come on,” he said. “We’ve got work to do. First of all, we better leave that form in the office. Then I better figure out how to be a talent manager.”
“Don’t worry about it, Murph,” Molly said, setting the paper on the counter. “You don’t have to do anything for me.”
“Yeah, I do,” he said. “This is a competition.”
The secretary said, “Good luck, Molly.”
“Thanks,” Molly and Murphy said together.
In the computer lab, Murphy Googled “talent manager.” He scanned website pages. “Okay, so I’m supposed to deal with promotions, photography, how much you get paid, performances. As well as the business of singing, lessons, practices and… your image.”
“You better quit now, Murph,” Molly laughed. “Now you’re the one acting crazy.”
“I’m serious. It says lots of talented people never get heard because they don’t have good management. It says good management is as important as good talent.” Then he paused and added, “Well, almost.”
Molly shrugged and said, “You don’t even know if I can sing.”