The sun sets around six, and unlike in the city, things actually get dark here. I almost find it charming—the soft rustling sound of the dried leaves being blown along the porch and driveway is strangely comforting.
I leave the front door open, the porch screen closed to let in the chilled air. It’s making the house cold, but I like the cold. It justifies pulling on my sweatpants and long-sleeved shirt. If I knew how to light the fire, I’d do that, too. Summer is leaving, making room for fall. I spend a few minutes dumping a pack of powdered cocoa into hot water, then stirring, and I blow on my cup as I walk to the piano. I take a sip too soon, and the liquid burns the tip of my tongue.
Once I set my cup down on the piano bench next to me, I pull out my sheet music from my boxes. There’s something that just isn’t right, and I’ve been dying to play through these lines—alone, without the critical ear of my father nearby to offer his opinion, or rather to point out that I should be perfecting my classics training instead of spending time doing the part I actually love.
My eyes closed, I let my fingers find their home. It’s natural. It always is, the way the polished slivers of black and white feel slick to my touch.
I crack an eyelid open and relent a smirk at my strange surroundings. This is not where I want to be, not where I want to play, so I close the eye again and pretend I am back in my practice room, my door closed and my sounds for nobody’s ears but mine. The rest just happens—fingers flying, pounding, stopping abruptly, and shifting from soft to quiet.
I like the change in music—to move from smooth to staccato, sometimes no transition at all. My father hates it, so I save these moments for nights like this. And before I know it, I fall into my routine, the blues rhythms coming through, taking over. My eyes open because this sound—the sound of my heart—has made me feel at home.
Without warning, though, my bliss is interrupted.
Thud.
Thud.
Thud.
The sound is constant, halted only by the loud clanking of a ball shanking off of the metal hoop outside. The shadows of the trees are sharp and dark against my curtains, and I can tell someone has turned the driveway floodlights on. My floodlights. The ones attached to my home. Where the basketball hoop is also located.
After what feels like a full minute of deep breathing, I find a fraction of my calmness from before and let my fingers glide back into their position. With my eyes closed, I do my best to tune out the continual barrage of noise taking over outside, and I almost get back into my groove, when the thud from before ricochets off of the side of my house.
“Oh, come on!” I shout, standing quickly from my bench and spilling the hot chocolate onto the floor. “Damn it!”
Changing direction, I head into the kitchen first and grab the towel folded over the cabinet under the sink and race back to the spilled drink, doing my best to soak it up from the wood floor.
Thud. Thud. Thud.
Maybe it’s the sound—the fact that it still continues—or maybe it’s the fact that I’m now on my knees cleaning up my spilled drink, my little night of happiness suddenly ruined.
Maybe it’s him.
Something pushes me, just enough, and I toss the towel back into the kitchen and pull my hoodie tight around my body, flinging the screen door open in front of me and leaping from the porch stairs. By the time I round the front of the house and start my way up the driveway along the side, I’m full of adrenaline, not even affected by the sting of the cold, and I ride the wave of bravery right into Owen Harper’s face.
“Uhhhhh, do you mind?” I say, grabbing the ball quickly and clutching it to my body, both arms wrapped around it tightly like I’m hugging a teddy bear.
Owen stares at the ground where the ball was bouncing just seconds before, his posture frozen and his face almost surprised. With a tiny jerk, he tilts his head up until his focus is on the ball in my arms, his gaze never quite making it all the way to my eyes.
“I never mind. Can I have my ball back now?” he says, the devil’s smirk creeping slowly on one side of his lips until the smallest dimple forms.
Asshole.
When he reaches his hand toward me, I shuffle backward quickly, squeezing the ball even tighter, and for a flash second, something happens to his eyes—they grow dark.
“Careful,” he says, his smirk curling slightly, like a fisherman’s hook waiting to catch me.
I’ve spent three years going to one of Chicago’s most elite private schools, which left me with some pretty solid experience when it came to navigating high school factions. I avoided the rich kids, and they avoided me right back, so that one was easy. I was friendly to the pot smokers, because those kids threw the best parties, but not friendly enough that I was ever guilty by association. I led among my circle—popular with the music students, crossing over to mingle with the drama crowd and the artists.