Nettie. Nettie, darling, it’s me. Can I come in?”
It’s Alec.
I get out of bed and plod to the door.
“Nettie, what happened? You were there one minute, and then when I came back, you’d gone.”
With a lurch, I remember the dress. I pick it up off the back of the chair and show Alec the stain. In a panic last night, remembering something about white wine being good for red wine stains, I threw an entire bottle of Echo Falls all over it. The result is…pink.
“Oh my God. You weren’t even drinking red wine.”
“Jade Upton threw it over me. Two massive glasses.”
“And you just ran off into the night, like Cinderella?”
Admittedly it seems dramatic now, in the hard October morning light, but yes. That is what I did.
“I panicked,” I say. “It was Mum’s.”
“Of course.” He turns me around and starts walking me toward the bathroom. “You need to get rid of these panda eyes and get dressed, and I’ll google a dry-cleaner who’s open on Sundays. Let’s get the kettle on.”
I stop to open a pack of wipes for my face.
“Nettie, darling, that’s not going to cut it. You look like Trixie Mattel after fourteen gins and a spin class. Plus you stink of booze. Pop yourself in the shower, love.”
I have a thirty-second shower, throw some clothes on, and blast my hair.
“Low maintenance,” says Alec approvingly. He watches me smooth my fringe down while downing the tea he’s made me. “Are you going to put some makeup on?”
“Should I?”
“Of course.”
“Sexist.”
“Not possible. I wear it.”
“You said you didn’t like wearing it because it spoils this.” I trace an emphatic circle around his face.
“Well, don’t tell Leon, but I never go anywhere without my Touche Éclat.”
We’re in St Martin’s Lane, in a little coffee house just by the Noël Coward Theatre. I’ve dragged Alec in there because it’s after twelve, I haven’t had caffeine yet, and I feel a bit shaky. I’ve got a strong black Americano in my hand, and Alec is sipping a macchiato. The dress has been delivered to the dry cleaner, with the promise of it returning pristine. Alec dealt with it, giving them the whole sorry tale and, of course, ending up with a huge discount. Turns out, my life’s a sob story. Still, if it gets the dress clean.
“So, what did you get up to at the party?” I say.
Alec gives me a well-honed pout-smile, like a drag queen saying “new shoes.”
“Oh, I got right up to Karl Townsend. He was loving his life last night with me on the dance floor.”
“Did you kiss?”
“Darling, we shagged each other’s brains out. I’m surprised you didn’t hear us. We were still at it at five this morning.”
“You don’t look bad, considering.”
“It’s called a post-coital glow.”
“Glad someone got some action last night.”
“You know that Jade Upton’s had a thing for Fletch for over a year now?” says Alec, completely out of the blue.
“Er, really?” I say, trying to sound uninterested. It comes out like someone trying to sound uninterested.
“Come on, Nettie. It’s me you’re talking to. I knew on the first day when I watched you talking to him on the stairs.”
“Are you literally always watching me? And how could you possibly know? I didn’t know then.”
“Some things are just written in the air. I’m good at spotting love at first sight.”
I do what is meant to be a disbelieving guffaw, but it sounds more like I’m choking on my coffee.
“It’s fine. We’re just friends.”
“For now.”
“If Jade wants him so much that she’s going to make my life hell, then she’s welcome to him,” I say. “I’d rather not have the hassle.”
“You don’t mean that,” he says, ready to fight me as always. “I can see how much you like him.”
“OK, fine. I do like him. But at the moment, I’ve got bigger stuff going on,” I say.
“Like what?”
“Er, like the fact that since I got here, I haven’t been able to sing a single note out of my face. Like the fact that Miss Duke has got me going to remedial lessons with Steph Andrews and I’ve only sung one note for her. The fact that Millicent Moore is determined to, like, ‘get’ me or something. Like…” I trail off.
“Like what?”
“Like, I miss my mum. I can’t get it together. I don’t know what the hell is wrong with me.”
“Just give yourself some time, Nettie.”
“That’s what I’m afraid of. I don’t have time.”
“Nettie! Wait.”
Fletch catches up with me as I come out of a particularly dynamic jazz class.
Yay. Bright red beetroot face with a sweaty top lip and a soaking wet fringe.
“What happened to you at the Freshers’ Ball?” he says. “I came back upstairs and you’d vanished.”
“Didn’t Jade tell you?” He looks blank.
“No, of course she didn’t,” I continue. “After you went to see Miss Duke, she threw red wine all over Mum’s dress, and I had to go home and try to get it out.”
“She threw it on you?” Fletch looks incredulous.
“Well, according to her, she tripped and ‘spilled’ it, but it’s not the first run-in I’ve had with her.”
“I’m sure she wouldn’t do something like that on purpose,” says Fletch.
I begin to feel irritated.
“Well, of course you wouldn’t see the bad side of her, because she’s always nice to you.”
“I’m not sure what you mean.”
“Oh, never mind. It’s done now,” I say. “Did you have a nice evening?”
“I spent most of it looking for you.” I look at him disbelievingly.
“Maybe if I had your number, I could call you next time, instead of wandering around college like a lost puppy,” he says, handing his phone to me for me to type in my number. “I can’t believe we’ve been working on that project for three weeks and we haven’t got each other’s numbers.”
“OK, fine.” I start putting in my number.
“I’m going to call you right now, so that you’ve got mine,” he says, watching me type.
“Just text me later.”
“No way,” he says. “You might have given me a fake number.” I roll my eyes and hand him back his phone. He calls me.
“See? Ringing.” I show him the display on my phone. “Answer it.”
I give him a Really? look, but answer it anyway. “Hello?”
“Hi,” he says, looking at me and grinning.
“Are we done?”
“I was just calling to see if you’d like to have coffee with me after class.”
“Oh, wait—the line’s breaking up… I’d…l…to…ha… becau—” I hang up.
“Very funny. So was that a yes?”
“Remember when you promised we could write and sing a song together?”
I swallow my vodka and Coke and take a breath. Coffee has turned into drinks, and the room’s a bit spinny.
“I remember.”
“Tomorrow at lunchtime work for you?”
“Sorry.” I pretend to look in my phone’s calendar. “I promised Alec I’d help him with something.”
“OK, the next day then.” He moves his chair next to me to see.
“Sorry.” I put my phone face down on the table and stare at it.
“Next week?” He waves his hand to get me to look him in the face.
“It’s just—”
“Nettie, what’s wrong? Have I done something to annoy you?” Oh God, those eyes.
“No. No, of course you haven’t.” I shift in my chair.
“Then what is it?”
“I just…I’m still finding it hard to sing at the moment.” He looks surprised. “Look, I’m trying to sort it out. God knows if I don’t, I’ll get kicked out of Duke’s. I promise I’ll sing. Just give me some time, OK?”
He looks at me for a few seconds, then nods. “Sure. But when you do sing, I want to be the first person to hear you.”
One day at the beginning of November, something weird happens. I go to the studio theatre after college hours, and the mystery pianist is there. They’re playing the intro to “Everlasting” from Tuck Everlasting.
Tentatively, I join in and manage to sing the entire thing without my voice faltering. It’s reassuring. I was beginning to doubt I could still do it. I leave quickly, but halfway to the station I realize I’ve forgotten my phone, so I double back.
When I reach the studio, the dividing doors have been pulled back to reveal the other half of the room, where Jade Upton is sitting at the piano, a book of sheet music in her hand. I stop dead.
“What are you doing here?” she says, emphasizing the word “you” like it’s something she trod in.
“I, er…” What am I doing here? Oh, yes. “I forgot my phone.”
“Well pick it up and get lost,” she says. “I’m trying to practice.”
She looks at me suspiciously as if about to say something else, but seems to think better of it.
“Right.” I grab my phone off the floor. As I go to leave the room, something occurs to me. “What are you practicing?”
“None of your business,” she says.
I wasn’t really expecting a useful answer, but it does give me time to catch a glimpse of the book she’s using. It’s The Best of Miller and Tysen.
I leave Duke’s as quickly as I can and speed across Soho Square, ignoring the crisp auburn leaves blustering about my face, focusing instead on how quickly I can google the songwriters, already filled with dread at what I’m going to find. Hands shaking, I type in their names.
Miller and Tysen are an American musical theatre songwriting team consisting of composer Chris Miller and lyricist Nathan Tysen. They started collaborating in 1999 at New York University’s Graduate Musical Theater Writing Program. Together they have written the scores to Fugitive Songs, The Burnt Part Boys, The Mysteries of Harris Burdick, and Tuck Everlasting.
Tuck Everlasting.
Shit. Jade.
“Jade Upton’s your mystery piano player?” says Kiki in disbelief.
We’re huddled in the dorm kitchen corner together while Kiki makes instant noodles.
“That’s just…so many levels of wrong. I thought we’d decided it was Michael St. John?”
“She had the sheet music for the song I’d just sung,” I say quietly, looking around to make sure no one’s listening. A second-year called Seb has got Neil Patrick Harris belting out “Angry Inch” over the speaker and is doing a complex and fairly sexually charged pas de deux with Alec, much to everyone else’s delight. “It’s got to be her.”
“OK—but three things,” says Kiki. “One, I very much doubt she can play the piano. For a start, she doesn’t look like she can. Two, if she could play as well as you say this person does, she’d be living her life boasting about it every five minutes.”
“What does a person who can play the piano look like?” I say.
“Not like Jade Upton.” She stirs a pouch of something brown into the noodles. “And three, she’s like the most self-centered person ever. There’s no way she’d be into any sort of collaboration, least of all with another female—you know, her competition. She’s a second-year on the MT course. She’s never giving another Duke’s girl the chance to practice. I still think it’s Michael St. John.”
That does make sense, I guess. But I can’t shake the look she gave me when I went back to get my phone. If anything, it’s put me off from going again.
The next few weeks pass without too much happening. Millicent Moore keeps the abuse to a minimum, and fortunately only delivers it in a whisper when no one else is listening, which saves me a lot of embarrassment. I keep out of Jade Upton’s way, and she leaves me alone.
I haven’t been back to the studio theatre to sing since I discovered her at the piano. I know it’s probably not her, but it makes me feel weird.
Miss Duke still never quite gets to my turn when she teaches the advanced singing class, and Michael never seems interested in picking me to sing alone in MT. After Kiki told me what the two of them said about me, I guess they’re just giving me a break, but it still feels like I’m sitting on a ticking time bomb. I manage to get a couple of notes out with Steph, nothing more. It’s frustrating because Fletch keeps asking me when we can start writing together, and I have to keep putting him off.
Then, a brilliant thing happens. I get laryngitis.
It’s so bad that I can’t speak. The doctor forbids me to sing and signs me out of all vocal lessons. I’m only allowed to watch and take notes. I hope it lasts until I sort my head out.
I go up to Steph’s room to tell her I can’t do her sessions for a while.
“Actually, Nettie,” she says, “I wasn’t going to do singing with you today.”
“What were you going to do?” I croak-whisper.
“I was going to ask you to tell me about your mum.”
“What about her?”
“Tell me one memory you have of her. Can you still do that with no voice?”
“Er, sure,” I rasp. “Like what?”
“Anything you like.”
“Um…” It’s hard to think of something when you’re put on the spot.
“Tell me what her favorite thing to do was,” says Steph.
That’s easy.
“She loved going shopping.”
Mainly in charity and vintage shops. We used to go to Brick Lane a lot. We were the same size, so we used to get a load of stuff and try it on together. Mum had a knack for spotting a neglected designer jacket and getting it for a bargain.
“She loved anything vintage. Our house was full of stuff she’d picked up,” I whisper.
Old gramophones, lamps made from weird things like petrol cans, and toys from the Fifties stuff that was completely useless and of no value any more. But Mum thought it would look cool.
“What happened to all that stuff?” says Steph gently.
“Most of it’s in boxes at my grandmother’s house,” I say.
“I’m sorry—are you OK talking about this?”
“Yes—it’s nice to talk about her. I don’t get to much. When she died, I went to stay with my grandmother. Left our house so it could be rented out. Helps pay for this place.”
“Who sorted all that out for you?”
“I did. There was no one else.”
“And your grandmother…”
“Hates me.”
Mum didn’t speak to her for nearly twenty years, although they seemed to reconcile in the days before she died. I don’t know what was said, but the upshot of it was that I had to go and live with her. It’s the only way I could’ve come to Duke’s. But it’s kind of torture living so close to my old house and knowing I can’t go there. I try not to think about it too often because it hurts so much.
I miss it. Mum puttering about in the kitchen, dancing to records while she made dinner.
Steph watches me.
“Are you having counseling, Nettie? There are groups you can go to; people you can see—”
“I went to one session, but it wasn’t for me.”
“I just think you need to talk about this with someone.” She folds her hands on her lap. She’s wearing a black jersey maxi-skirt and khaki sweater.
“I’m not going to counseling.” I pick a flake of lipstick off my top lip. I didn’t get time to reapply after hip-hop.
“It might be helpful.”
“I’m not going.”
“Well, listen,” says Steph. “I think you’ve got a lot of stuff to let out before you can release your voice. I’d like you to tell me one thing about your mum before we start every session. Just a memory. Good or bad, it doesn’t matter. Just something. Then at least you’re talking. Would you be up for that?”
“OK.” I guess I don’t mind talking to Steph.
With my new ready-made, get-out-of-jail-card laryngitis, I decide to ask Fletch when we can start writing the song. I broach the subject after MT one afternoon.
“You want to start now, when you’ve got no voice? I’ve been asking you for ages.”
“Well, I can still write lyrics,” I say in an enforced whisper. “And hopefully my voice will come back before the Duke’s Awards.” I mean that. Maybe my voice will just come back when the laryngitis clears up. It’ll all be like a bad dream, and I can start again from scratch.
“Do you like that?”
“Yeah, but it needs to go up more. Sort of…swirl upward.”
We’re working in the library after college. It’s just us there.
“Swirl—is that a technical term?” He grins at me.
“Yeah—haven’t you heard of it?” I throw my pen at him. “Call yourself a musician.”
He plays it again but this time it’s different. Swirlier. “Is that better?” He looks up from his guitar.
“Yes!” I don’t even bother hiding my amazement. “Totally. How do you do that?”
“Do what?”
“Just—just know what I mean.”
“Maybe you’re a good communicator.”
I roll my eyes. “Swirl?”
“OK—you’re not.” He thinks for a moment. “Maybe… we’re just good together.”
“Yeah.”
Neither of us speaks for a few seconds.
“You know, I’d love to hear what it sounds like with both of us singing,” he says. He notes the latest changes on his paper.
“As soon as it’s back, you’ll be the first to hear it.”
Despite my non-voice, we finish the song in a little under a week. Fletch is keen to write more. What I really should be concentrating on, I know, is getting my voice better. The thought of spending more time with him is just too much to resist.
The laryngitis starts to improve after a fortnight. I try to hide it, but it’s kind of impossible.
“Do you want to have a go at singing this together?” says Fletch one afternoon, after a particularly noisy explosion of laughter from me.
“I don’t think my voice is quite there yet,” I say, panicking.
“OK. Tomorrow. And I’m not letting you off.’
The next day, I randomly burst into tears halfway through a vocal exercise with Steph.
“Nettie, what’s wrong?” Steph stops playing. It’s not been a good lesson so far.
“I’m sorry, Steph, I hate myself for crying, it’s just that…having laryngitis has become a relief—an excuse for not being able to do it. Now I just can’t do it.”
“Nettie. Nettie. It’s OK. Just breathe.” She waits for me to calm down. “OK… Tell me a song your mum used to like.”
“I won’t be able to sing it, if that’s what you’re hoping.”
“Don’t get ahead of yourself. Didn’t you say she played you a lot of Sondheim when you were a kid? Were there any particular songs of his that she liked?”
“She loved ‘Being Alive’ from Company.” I can’t bring myself to mention “No One Is Alone.” It’s too raw.
“Great song. I’ve got it here somewhere.” She begins searching through the shelves and shelves of sheet music. “Ah, here it is. Right, I’ll play—you speak.”
“You want me to speak it?”
“Yup.”
“OK, fine.” I take a breath and begin. My brain seems to know it’s a song because it makes my voice suddenly very quiet.
“Perfect. Continue,” says Steph, as I speak the lyrics over the music.
“Now close your eyes,” she says. I shut them tight.
“Great—now sing!” shrieks Steph. She starts hammering the piano like it’s just admitted it’s been cheating on her. Pencils fly off it at an alarming rate.
My whole body starts shaking and my throat constricts. It’s pitiful. My voice is barely a whisper, no louder than when I had laryngitis. I shake my head at Steph and shrug, but she points at me ferociously and screams, “Don’t you dare stop! I don’t care how terrible it is!”
I finish singing (let’s call it that, but it was really more of a whimper). I crumple into a chair.
“Nettie,” says Steph softly, closing the lid of the piano. “It’s a start.”
“I can’t—”
“I’m not expecting miracles. I just needed you to commit. And you did.”
“I don’t normally sound like that,” I say for the umpteenth time this term.
“We’ll get there,” she says. She’s still kind, even when I must really be frustrating her. “Baby steps. That was huge for you. Well done, Nettie. We’re done for today. Keep practicing whenever you can be alone. The sound’s still coming out when you’re on your own, isn’t it?”
I nod, despite not having been to the studio for weeks. Thanks, Jade.
“Great. Then it’s just a matter of time. We’ve just got to unlock whatever it is that’s stopping you. I’m not giving up on you, Nettie.”
I meet Fletch in the library after college.
“Ready?” he says. He starts getting out stacks of our notes.
“Actually…can we just ride somewhere?” I can’t write songs today.
He nods and grabs his jacket.
Ten minutes later, we’re pulling out of the square. We ride the same way as usual, toward Green Note, our cafe in Camden, and I think he must be taking me there, but then he bears left at the top of Regent’s Park and rides along past the zoo.
He stops in Primrose Hill, on the edge of the park. “Shall we just sit and look at the view?” he says.
It’s exactly what I want to do. I love that he knows that.
We sit on the grass for about half an hour or so, watching the sun set over central London. All the usual suspects are there—the Shard, the London Eye, Centre Point—but to me they look novel because they’re all the wrong way around, with the Eye on the right of the picture.
“Best view of London,” says Fletch.
I look up at him. “Nope.”
“You know a better one?”
“Way better.”
“Come on, then.” He gets up and reaches for his helmet. “Where are we going?”
“Saarf London, naturally.”
“Cool. Where?”
In my opinion, the best view of London is that sneaky glimpse you get just beyond the top of my old road in Crystal Palace. You’re walking along past Crystal Nails minding your own business and suddenly the land falls away and you can see all the way to the Shard. But it’s a poky viewpoint, and not everyone gets it. So I take him to Greenwich.
We ride down past Russell Square, across Waterloo Bridge, down the Old Kent Road (actually quite fun when you’re on a bike and can beat the traffic), through New Cross, and up the hill to Blackheath. Fletch parks right outside the Royal Observatory, and we climb over the little barrier separating the parking lot from the grass.
“Wow.”
“Ever been here before?” I say.
“No. OK, you win.”
We sit at the top of the hill and look out over Greenwich and the city.
“Mum used to bring me up here with my friends on Sundays,” I say. “We used to roll down the hill.”
“Do you still see your friends?”
“I haven’t seen them since my Duke’s audition. It feels like too much time has passed now to get back in touch. I guess it might be weird. They’re busy with their own lives anyway.” I pull a piece of grass out of the ground and shred it with my fingers.
I think Fletch senses it’s a sore point. “Wanna roll down the hill?”
It’s almost dark. There’s probably about twelve minutes of fading light.
“Go on, then.”
It’s a colder experience at the end of October in the early evening than during August at midday, but the ground’s dry, and our bike-proof clothes offer some protection.
“Aaaaaagh!” I hear Fletch yell from behind my head as we gather speed, and I see land, sky, land, sky, quicker and quicker until my head nearly explodes. I roll to a stop near the bottom, giddy and laughing, and see Fletch a little further up the hill, having come to an early halt.
“I can’t believe how fast you went.” He’s out of breath.
“I’ve done that roll a hundred times,” I say. “Well practiced.”
“I’m going to plead lack of hills in my childhood for being so pathetic,” says Fletch. “That was fun.”
We climb back up the hill and lie down next to each other, our heads propped up against our bike helmets.
“Mum loved this view,” I say.
He holds my little finger in his. I put my head on his shoulder and he doesn’t move away.
After the sun has finally set, Fletch takes me back to the dorms and I invite him into the common room. Alec and Leon are in there, among others, and they beckon us over.
“Where’ve you been?” says Alec.
“Greenwich,” I say.
“Have fun?”
“We—we rolled down the hill.” I catch Fletch’s eye, and we both start laughing.
“Like that, is it?” says Alec.
I give him an imploring look that I hope Fletch doesn’t see.
Alec ignores it.
“Seriously, you guys are like always together these days,” he says. “Have I missed something?”
“We’re writing together,” I say quickly, looking at Fletch.
Alec comes between us and slings an arm around both our shoulders. “Well, that sounds divine. I’ll be first in line for your debut album.”
“Omigod, me too,” says Kiki. “The Songs of Nettie and Fletch.” She does a your-name-in-lights hand movement.
“The Songs of…Netch,” says Alec. The two of them burst into peals of laughter.
“Alec,” I say, kicking his shin with my heel, my face scarlet with embarrassment. I swear he’s got some sort of scary access to my brain sometimes.
Fletch laughs. “I like Netch. It’s got a ring to it.”
I’m glad Alec is still between us because the heat coming off my face is solar.
“Have you eaten?” Leon comes to the rescue. He’s always mopping up after Alec.
“No—we forgot,” I say gratefully.
“Will you be joining us, Fletch?” says Alec in a Mae West voice. He takes his arm away from my shoulder, fingers his own chest, and looks up at Fletch through his eyelashes. “We’re getting pizza, you know.”
“I’ve got to meet my roommate, actually.”
“Well, bring her along,” says Alec.
“Well, I—”
“Alec, it’s fine if Fletch has plans,” I say. Inside I’m praying he’ll stay.
“I could message him. He’s only around the corner,” says Fletch quickly.
“Ooh, him?” says Alec. “Even better.”
Fletch disappears down the hall (while I beg Alec not to embarrass me further), returning a few minutes later with a tall, incredibly good-looking second-year boy.
“Have you guys met Luca?” says Fletch. “He’s on the writers course with me.”
“Only briefly.” Alec’s now shamelessly eyeing Luca’s ripped body. “Sadly the writers don’t have to dance, so we’ve never shared a changing room.”
“Alec,” says Leon.
“What?”
“Don’t be a perv.”
“I was just expressing my regret that Luca and I have never had a chance to exchange ideas.”
“Yeah, well, every time you feel like saying something like that, imagine it coming out of Mr. Decker’s mouth in boys’ ballet,” says Leon. He’s referring to a creepy ballet teacher known for making the students uncomfortable with his pervy comments and unnecessary touching-when-making-corrections. It’s an inside Duke’s joke, but also quite gross if you think about it, which most of the boys try not to.
“I don’t want to imagine anything coming out of Handson Decker’s mouth, thanks,” retorts Alec. “Or going in, for that matter. Hieeee, Luca. Lovely to meet you.” He cocks his head to one side and extends his hand, which Luca takes, laughing.
“Hi, Alec. Good to see you again.”
“This is Leon, Kiki, and Nettie,” says Fletch. His eyes flicker back to Luca as he says my name, too quickly for anyone to notice. But I notice.
“Hi, guys. Nettie, I’m going to be joining a few first-and second-year MT sessions after Christmas. You’re in that class, aren’t you?”
“Yes,” I say.
Alec groans. “MT gets all the hotties these days,” he says.
“Aren’t you and Fletch working together on your MT history project, Nettie?” says Luca, clearly trying to steer the conversation somewhere else. “What are you studying again?”
“Ghost singers.”
“Good topic,” he says.
“Don’t you think it’s ironic that Debbie Reynolds had one for Singin’ in the Rain when she was playing the part of an actress dubbing for someone else?” says Leon.
“I hadn’t actually thought about that before,” says Luca.
“Of course you hadn’t,” says Kiki. “Because you’re not a massive geek.”
“Until you get him started on Bernstein,” says Fletch. “I thought I was a music nerd until I met Luca.”
“Are you writing anything at the moment, Luca?” says Kiki.
“I’m working on a revue—a collection of songs all linked by a common theme. Some of the third-year MTs are going to perform it next year, hopefully.”
“Wow. We’ll definitely come, won’t we, Nettie?” says Kiki. “OK, who wants tea?”
She takes orders and drags me over to the kitchen corner, which is fast becoming our place for secret chats.
“So?” she says, her eyebrows practically in her hairline.
“So what?” I say.
“Luca?”
“Oh. He’s cute, I guess?”
“Babe, that goes without saying.” She empties the fur out of the tatty common room kettle and refills it. “I meant do you think he could be the piano player?”
“No, he couldn’t be.”
“Nettie, think about it!” She grabs my cheeks and pulls my face close to hers. “He’s on the writers course, so he plays instruments. He’s a musical theatre geek—Fletch said so.”
“With logic like that, it could be half the college,” I say. “This place is full of musicians. Anyway, I’ve still got a suspicion it’s Jade.”
Kiki lets go of my face and starts fishing in the cupboard for tea bags. “But Luca’s so hot,” she says, ignoring my comment. “All that silky black hair and those massive arms.”
“What’s that got to do with anything?” I hand her a chipped mug with a faded Grease logo on it that looks about as old as me.
“It just makes this so much better!” She scrapes a bit of dried soup off the rim and pops a teabag in. “Nettie, don’t you want to find out for sure?”
I think for a second. “No. I could’ve looked through the doors any time, and I didn’t. Anyway, I’ve only been back once since I saw Jade in there.”
Thankfully, I was still able to sing, but it was all I could do not to conjure up images of Jade, sitting at the piano on the other side of the dividing doors, oblivious that she was playing for her worst enemy. (Logic tells me it’s not her, but I still feel weird about it.)
“You really think it’s Jade?”
“I don’t know. I think I’m done with it all now anyway.”
We make the drinks and take them back to the boys. Alec has found an old acoustic from somewhere and is making Fletch play Christmas songs in A Minor on a classical guitar while he improvises Flamenco. Luca’s bashing out intricate rhythms on the guitar case, and the entire common room is clapping in time and cheering. I smile, glad that Fletch gets on with my friends. Then I remember he’s not actually my boyfriend, and my heart gets a bit lower in my chest.
On the last day of term, I come in for registration, and Alec points out my name on the board in the foyer.
“Cecile Duke wants to see you at ten.” He puts a hand through his well-groomed hair.
“Omigod. What about?” My heart starts hammering violently.
“Either something very good or something very bad. Best hope it’s the first one.”
At ten o’clock I climb the stairs to Miss Duke’s office, feeling like I’m about to hear the verdict in the trial of my life.
Theatre paraphernalia lines the walls. I spot Elaine Paige, arms raised, smiling at me in her white ball gown as I pass an old poster for Evita. Is she willing me on or laughing at my fate? As I reach the door, the secretary pops her head out of the adjoining office.
“Antoinette? Miss Duke’s been delayed by a few minutes. She’s asked that you wait in her office for her.”
I nod and push the door open.
Cecile Duke’s office is everything I could have imagined, and would have imagined, if I hadn’t been too busy worrying about what she was going to say to me. It’s like the star dressing room, complete with ensuite bathroom, lounge area, and grand piano, as well as an ornate oak desk. The walls, like the stairs and landing, are almost completely covered with theatre and film posters, adorned with messages such as, “To Miss Duke, Thank you for everything. I wouldn’t be here without you,” and “Miss Duke, you have been an inspiration to me.” It’s a room filled with joy and success, not the fear and dread I’m currently feeling. There’s a paperweight on the desk that catches my eye. It’s a little glass dome with two ballerinas inside. I pick it up. It feels cool in my hand and somehow calming.
The door opens abruptly. I hastily put the paperweight back, but it’s all too obvious what I’ve been doing.
“Good morning, Miss Duke,” I say, my crimson face incriminating me further. Great. I’m now going to be chewed out for being light-fingered as well as whatever else I’m in here for.
But nothing can prepare me for what Cecile Duke says next. “Your mother gave me that.”
What?
“My mother?” I look down at it again.
“On our opening night of Oklahoma!—our first job together.” She walks around the huge oak desk and sits down. “So strange that you were drawn to it.”
“In Copenhagen?”
“Yes.” She seems surprised.
“I’m sorry—”
She holds up a hand to silence me. “You knew we were friends?”
“Only recently. I… I found an old photo of you together.”
“I didn’t think she would’ve told you. We were as close as you can be, until Ana…well, life gets busy as you get older. I had Duke’s, and she had you. Now, I imagine you know why you are here.”
“I—”
“Let’s not pretend it’s going well for you at Duke’s.” She leans forward and clasps her hands on the desk. “I’ve had reports from your singing and musical theatre teachers that you haven’t sung a note since you arrived. I know there’s a vocal issue, and I know you’re working with Miss Andrews to resolve it. But I need to see progress—quickly. I’ve got a list, as long as Ute Lemper’s legs, waiting for someone to drop out.”
“I know. I’m—” I want to concentrate on what she’s saying but all I can think about is Mum.
“Need I remind you that you are in a very privileged position?”
“No. I’m sorry, Miss Duke.”
“Don’t be sorry. Just get it together.”
“Yes, Miss Duke,” is all I say, when what I really want to do is ask her a million questions about Mum. But her manner prevents me.
“That will be all.”
“Thank you, Miss Duke.”
I close the door softly behind me. I know she was holding something back. What was it she said? We were as close as you can be, until Ana… Until Ana what? Miss Duke never finished her sentence. Did they have a falling out? It would explain why Mum never mentioned her. I guess I’ll never know now. I round the stairs slowly, my brain overflowing with questions.
The questions will have to wait. That meeting with Miss Duke was a warning. I have to sort myself out. There’s too much at stake now.