Saint Anything(69)
Author: Sarah Dessen

Wow, I thought. I’d been waiting so long for someone else to feel this way. I’d just never expected it to be Peyton. As I wondered how to reply, I heard a thump from beneath me in the studio. “I guess . . .” I began, then found myself hesitating. The line buzzed. “She’s just hanging on to anything she can make feel normal.”

“But this isn’t normal,” he replied. “I screwed up, I hurt someone, and I’m doing time for it. When she tries to make it anything else, it just . . . it makes me nuts. This needs to be different, you know? To be hard. Everyone else understands that. But she just doesn’t get it.”

Even with our recent talks, this was the most my brother had said to me in months, if not years. It was so unexpected, not to mention emotional, that I realized I was holding my breath. For so long, I’d seen him and my parents as one unit, sharing the same party line. But Peyton was his own person and carried his own weight. How could I not have understood that?

“I’m sorry,” I said. Two words, but they felt heavy, too.

“Yeah.” A pause. His voice sounded tight. I thought of him walking across that sinkhole: I saw bravery, him something else. “I’m, um . . . I’ll try her on her cell.”

“Okay. Take care, Peyton.”

“Bye, Syd.”

Another click, and he was gone. I hung up the phone, feeling a pang as I remembered my mom organizing her Big Club baked goods the previous morning, not to mention all the other work she’d done. She could tell us and everyone else it was for Peyton, and maybe she really believed that. I wasn’t so sure. I hadn’t thought I could feel more ashamed about the entire situation. Wrong again.

Chapter 18

“WAIT,” ERIC said. “I didn’t like that intro. Let’s try it again.”

Ford groaned, while Mac sat back behind the drum kit, rolling his eyes.

“Dude,” Irv said from beside me, “it’s a demo for a showcase, not your first album.”

“That doesn’t mean it has to suck,” Eric said.

“It’s not going to exist if you don’t ease up, though,” Irv replied. “We’ve been here for . . . how long, Sydney?”

“Hour and a half,” I told him.

“Hour and a half,” he repeated, emphasizing the words, “and you’ve got nothing down. It’s time to get serious.”

“I am being serious,” Eric said.

“Then get less serious,” Mac told him. “Let’s just get this done.”

Eric, his expression darkening, turned his back to the glass between us, adjusting something on his guitar. I looked at my watch: Ames would be showing up at ten, at which point they and all their equipment needed to be long gone. At the beginning of the evening, this had seemed entirely doable. Now I was beginning to have my doubts.

Eric’s perfectionism was one problem. Another was Spence, who, after arriving and immediately knocking over two amps (that was the thump I’d heard), had been told by Layla to sit on the couch, out of the way. There he proceeded to drink most of his bottle of vodka, providing a stream of not-helpful commentary (“Are you sure you’re in tune?” “More cowbell!”) as he did so. I had no idea why Layla had brought him.

“I didn’t,” she told me out in the workout room, where we’d slipped away during yet another complicated skirmish about verse transitions. “I told him I was coming here and that your parents were gone. All he heard was ‘party,’ so he grabbed a bottle and headed over. When Rosie dropped me off, he was in the driveway waiting.”

I thought of earlier, when I’d opened the door to see him standing on the porch, slumped against her. “Does he drink like this a lot?”

“No,” she said, her voice clipped. She added, “I mean, some, sure, but it’s not usually like this. Anyway, it’s not his fault they’re not recording. It’s Eric’s.”

I glanced back at the open studio door, where Irv was now sitting back in the chair by the control board, his hands over his face. I could relate.

“Lay-la,” Spence called out, then leaned forward on the couch, peering at us. “Come here. I miss you.”

“One sec,” she said, pulling her phone out of her pocket. She glanced at the screen. “Crap.”

“What is it?” I asked.

“My mom.” She turned, walking back into the studio, leaning over Irv to hit the intercom button. “Mac. Rosie just texted. She thinks Mom might need to go in.”

He was on his feet immediately, coming out the door. “What happened?”

“I don’t know; I’ll call right now.” She put her phone to her ear, walking over to lean against the wall. Spence, on the couch, offered her the now-almost-empty bottle, but she waved him off. “Hey, it’s me. What’s going on?”

As Rosie replied and she listened, we were all silent. I glanced at Mac, but he was watching Layla.

“Okay,” she said finally. “Yeah. Well, keep me posted. If you decide to take her, we’ll meet you there. What? We were planning ten thirty, but we can come now if she wants us to.”

Someone exhaled, frustrated. Eric, I assumed.

“All right. Yeah, do that. Thanks, Ro.” She hung up, then looked at Mac. “Just the usual. Dizzy, shortness of breath. She got super light-headed and Rosie panicked, but Mom says she’s fine now. She’s going to keep an eye on her.”

“Could be those new meds,” he said. It was like the rest of us weren’t there. “They said the side effects could be more pronounced, even with the smaller dosage.”

“Which sucks, because they’re working.” Layla slid her phone back in her pocket. “Whatever, let’s just try to get this done. I want to get home.”

“Seconded,” Mac said, turning back to the recording room. Once inside, he said to Eric, “This take is the last one for this song. Then we move on. Okay?”

Eric did not look happy about this. Still, he nodded, adjusting his guitar strap as Irv got everything on the board set up again. Mac counted them off and they began playing. I held my breath as they passed the intro into the first verse and then the chorus, the farthest they’d gotten so far.

“Sit down and relax. Have a drink,” Spence said to Layla, pulling her down beside him. She sighed, then, to my surprise, reached for the bottle and took a swig. “That’s my girl. Better, right?”