They spent the rest of the night running songs and testing mixes. Jason had rearranged all their pieces for instrument-only, so it wasn't just a matter of Cass learning words and music. Every song she joined, the others had to relearn their parts as well.
"Can't do it," Evie said, when Reis suggested Cass sing everything. "I'm babysitting ten hours a day so I can get time off at the end of the week. There's no way I'll have time to work on every single piece. I can do three, maybe four, tops."
Then the argument turned to which pieces would benefit most from adding a vocalist. They worked their way through one song after another, stopping and starting to rework harmonies and transitions. Cass's skin felt flushed with singing and heat and Jason's presence. He kept finding excuses to lean against her, to touch her elbow.
"Guys," Reis said finally. "I have to go home or my mom will wig."
"But we're not ready yet," Cass protested.
Jason burst out laughing. "Do you have any idea what time it is?"
She shook her head.
Reis took a last swig of his soda and stomped the can flat. "Quarter after ten. I've got a 10:30 curfew and if I want to be allowed to go to the party at all, I'd better not be late tonight."
"Me too, and unlike Mr. Sticks, here," Evie kicked Reis's stool, "I have to be up early with the wonder-twins."
"Poor widdle Evie."
Evie paused only long enough to switch off the keyboard before grabbing Reis's drumsticks and aiming them at his head. Reis ducked for the door.
"Same time tomorrow," Jason yelled after them. "Don't be late!"
He turned as Cass stepped forward and they did that awkward you-go-first dance. Her hand brushed his side; every nerve flared as they both froze, their faces inches apart. The desire to close the distance was an ache in Cass's chest; the fear that he would pull back, a sharp pain.
She swayed backward. Jason stepped away, set his violin in its case with exaggerated care.
"You walked here?" he asked.
"Yes."
"We should practice riding again, or you'll spend all your time hiking back and forth." Latches clicked shut, startling in the quiet. "Let me grab a flashlight. I'll walk back with you."
"I'll be fine," she said quickly. "Besides, don't you have a curfew?"
"Sort of." His fingers brushed her arm again.
He touched so easily. It was delightful-and maddening, because clearly he had no idea how every contact jolted through her. She didn't think it meant anything to him. She'd seen him do the same with Evie and Reis.
"But Gramps won't mind," he went on. "I'll just explain to him about my new friend who's afraid of riding her bicycle-"
Cass expelled a breathy laugh.
"-and he'll be all over the damsel in distress thing."
"You don't have to-"
"It's settled. I'm coming whether you want me or not. Just a sec while I grab a light."
Cass searched for meaning-in his words, the way his eyes caught hers, the way he looked quickly away-but she couldn't read him. She couldn't tell if his offer stemmed from obligation or because he wanted to spend time with her. She couldn't tell if he was drawn to her or afraid of her. Or both.
But the truth was that she didn't want to leave him. Her skin prickled with energy, so that she didn't know how she would ever sleep; it still felt unreal that the sun had set. She wanted the night to go on and on. She wanted him to come with her. She wanted anything that would prolong their time together.
The night hung dark and moonless as they started back to town. Her feet felt light; a hum escaped her.
"What's that?" Jason asked.
She rewound the tune in her mind. "It's from Pirates of Penzance. I don't know what it's called. The heroine sings it." Their feet crunched on gravel. "It's kind of geeky, I guess. Jen bought me the DVD, because she said my mother used to love it."
The faint echo of waves whispered from beyond the trees; the sky opened vast with a million pinpricks of light punched through to heaven. Jason aimed the light at the ground, darkening it, and followed her gaze upward. "What's the matter, never see stars before?"
She drank in the sky, infinite and so beautiful it made her heart ache. It was the ocean's reflection, stretching into forever. "I was used to seeing them all the time before we came here. I can't see them in the harbor, though. Not like this. I miss being out where it's dark, really dark, where you can see the Milky Way and not just a few constellations."
She'd been moving forward without looking, trusting her feet to find the way, but her sandal toe snagged on a rock. She stumbled a step, catching herself just as Jason reached to help. They stood a hand's breadth apart. Her blood rushed in her ears, suddenly as loud as the ocean.
"Careful," he said.
She nodded. Crickets and stars and the smell of pine filled the night, filled the space between them like magic. A thought skittered through her mind: if she'd biked, Jason wouldn't be here with her.
"Do you think she was really there this morning?" he asked.
Cass thought back to the glimpse of movement on the hilltop, the rustling bushes. "I don't know. I saw something. It could have been a bird, I guess, but I didn't see a bird. And that wasn't my hair I found. I would've noticed losing that much."
He didn't move. She couldn't see his expression, only the light's faint reflection in his eyes.
"Has she...bothered you since then?" she asked.
"No, she doesn't come during the day."
Joe's words flashed through Cass's mind again. "Do you think she's a spirit?"
"No. No, I think she's real."
She scuffed her sandal toe in the gravel; questions were easier in the dark, so she asked, "Do you believe I'm not her, now?"
"Cass." The word came out a breath, a plea. "I always knew it wasn't you. Well, after the first time. It's just-I freak out-but that's not your fault."
She swallowed. "I wish I'd gotten to know you without all the weirdness."
He hesitated. "Me, too."
"You don't sound so sure," she said. It was an effort to keep her voice light.
"If it weren't for the weirdness, I don't think we would have spent so much time together so quickly. We wouldn't be so close already."
His words absorbed her so completely, she didn't realize that Jason had stepped nearer until his fingers brushed against her cheek. Then, suddenly, he bent even closer, the warm spicy smell of him flooding her senses. Before she could think of the answer, she'd forgotten the question.
Their lips touched.
Cass had never kissed a boy. Never been kissed by a boy. Her heart hammered stars in her ears, sparks in her veins. She felt frozen, speechless, as he drew away from her.
His head tilted, a silhouette against the spreading sky. "I...I'm sorry, I-"
She shook her head and rose to tiptoes again. All the world narrowed to his face, his near-invisible face, and the feel of it against hers.
Time slid.
She didn't know how much time passed before he pulled away again-a second? An hour?-but it was a different kind of pulling away than before. Jason placed his hands on her arms, maintaining that contact, that glorious electric connection where her arms and his broad-fingered hands melded into each other.
"We should go," he whispered.
"Oh. Right." She felt flustered. Upturned.
He didn't let go. "You are...amazing," he whispered. "I'm sorry...I mean, I hope that was okay. I should have asked. You must think-"
"I think...." What did she think? Her heart pounded with the need to put everything into words-to explain how his music, the fact that he believed her, the lingering heat of his lips-how it all tangled together into this amazing, impossible sense of rightness.
"Shh," he whispered, as if he could hear the whirlpool of thoughts in her head. "I know."
And somehow, incredible as it seemed, she believed him.
They walked without speaking after that, but everything had changed between them. They walked closer together, so that Cass could feel the heat of his arm swinging in sync with hers. The night's silence blossomed around them in a soft-footed symphony of rustling leaves, singing crickets, and the crunch of gravel beneath their feet; beneath everything ran the murmur of waves, out of sight beyond the trees.
None of her questions had been answered, but they'd all been chased away by the feel of Jason's hand in hers.
It was strange to think how the good and bad wove together. If her parents hadn't died, she probably would have grown up here. Maybe she would have been the one singing with Jason's group since forever. If Peter Stiegman hadn't fallen off his ladder and hit his head, she and Jen still wouldn't be there.
If stalker-girl wasn't tormenting Jason, he wouldn't have hated her on first sight-but they also wouldn't have gotten so close so quickly.
Maybe that was how life worked, good and bad always tangled together. Cass couldn't separate the happiness of Jason walking alongside her from the fear of the strange girl and the fear of what she might want from Jason and the question of why she looked like Cass, like her mother, on this island where her mother had been murdered-and her father blamed for it-twelve years before.
#
Jason walked her all the way to the dock.
"Thanks," she said. "I feel silly. I should have just biked."
"I'm glad you didn't. I'll see you tomorrow?"
Instead of answering, she rose to tiptoes and closed her eyes. For an endless time, she lost herself in the heat and sweetness of him.
When they finally pulled apart, she swayed. She was a hot air balloon and he had cut her mooring lines. She was afraid she'd float away.
She watched the glow of his flashlight blur and fade into night before turning down the dock. Even then her feet felt disconnected from the rest of her. She floated all the way to the Andiamo which-thankfully-was dark and silent. That meant Jen hadn't noticed she was missing.
But as she neared the boat, she realized that she'd been mistaken: the boat wasn't completely dark. One yellow light glowed in the main cabin. It flickered, like a candle. When she came up beside the boat, she heard something stranger still: voices. Jen's voice murmured something low and unintelligible and-her heart stopped-a girl's voice answered.
No, not just answered. Someone on the boat was singing.
--
A/N
So...what do you think she should do? Who does she hear? (Okay, maybe that's a little obvious :)!)
If you're enjoying please let me know-I LOVE reading all your comments and feedback. And definitely vote, which will help someone else find the story, too!
~Cheryl