Playing Evelyn

Chapter 3

Chapter 3

Though I’d been there for four years it still felt like I was just visiting, that any day now this fairy tale life wouldn’t be here anymore and I would find myself back in the tiny apartment building with the cockroaches and leaking toilet.

In a way, the fairy tale had disappeared. Every day I watched as my mother became more and more a part of the society that George belonged to. I watched as she got involved with Crystal and Francine’s bake sales and car washes and whatever other fundraisers they could come up with. People would even comment on how much her daughters looked like her and she would just smile warmly at them.

I turned my key in the lock and walked into the house. Taking off my shoes, I headed towards the kitchen and saw my mom standing there with Chrystal and Francine. For a second I just watched as they cut up ingredients for a salad. Chrystal was a senior and Francine was a sophomore but they looked like twins. They both had long blond hair, Francine’s was a bit shorter but they both were five foot four and a half and they both had clear blue eyes. They were slim and athletic and their grades were decent. With my mother standing between them, they were the perfect family.

My mother caught sight of me and I watched as her eyes turned cold. I felt a familiar stab in my heart at the sight and mentally shook myself for feeling the pain. I knew exactly why she couldn’t act that way with me. She looked at me and all she saw was her past. Everything she’d tried to run from when she’d left the band had followed her and until I was gone, she could never escape that. She could never escape him.

I pasted a fake smile on my face and walked into the kitchen.

I was almost as silent at home as I was at school. The only person who ever tried to draw me into the conversation was George. I knew George pitied me. He’d bought me a car for my sixteenth birthday that I never drove. He gave me an allowance that I never used and often went out of his way to try to make me feel happy and comfortable here.

Truthfully, I was grateful that he was trying so hard for my sake, even if I couldn’t accept most of his extravagant gifts, I still appreciated the fact that he cared enough to try.

During dinner, I smiled as the four of them laughed at a story Francine was telling about a freshman on the cheerleading squad, not really paying attention. After dinner I did the dishes and then went to my room to do homework. After everyone was asleep, I went to the basement where an old piano sat. Francine and Chrystal had both taken lessons when they were young but neither of the girls had stuck with it very long. When I found it, the piano had been covered in dust and was badly in need of a tuning.

After learning how to tune a piano from one of Jonathan’s friends, I tuned it myself and started playing it. The piano was different from the guitar in so many ways but the music it produced was just as beautiful and freeing as the music from the guitar. For a while I focused on the sheet music in front of me but after some time I started playing the familiar melody of Break Even. I sang along.

 

I bet it all

On this unfamiliar thrill

You took my everything

Until you got your fill

But I got what I wanted too

Stop saying that you’re leavin’

I will never play the fool

There is no loss

There is no gain

This time I’ll break even.