Soria Girl

To sort of celebrate me coming back even further (as if them trespassing onto private property to hang a cheap banner wasn’t enough), that following Saturday, we had a bit of a welcome-back band practice to reunite.

And let me tell you, it felt freaking amazing to fall right back into that little groove I’d created back in seventh grade. To feel the strings cutting into my fingers again, playing songs that we perfected a long time ago. To hear them play along and bring that sweet sound back to my ears.

Those songs I introduced to them weren’t my best, but they picked up on them right away anyway. Along with “Time” and “Be Still,” I showed them “Alive,” which I wrote after Dad told me we were moving back. Out of the new batch, “Alive” was the strongest and they took to that one immediately.

The garage was filled with noise yet again after being quiet for six months. I didn’t even care if the neighbors were getting pissed from the sudden change. I was high on the music and nothing could get to me.

The hinges were a little rusty, though; I could tell Plaster Caster hadn’t really musically interacted when I left. Everybody played and sang pretty well on their own, but that chemistry was lacking at first. Every so often Brendan would tap out a beat that didn’t fit the bassline, or Ren would skip over a line or two. By the end of the practice, though, that was fixed. Mostly.

“Man,” Luke sighed, “I forgot how awesome this was.”

“I know,” Ren beamed. He had his dad’s guitar in his hand, and although he really still wasn’t any good at playing individual notes, he was a lot better at playing chords and bar chords.

At the moment, we were going over “Time” and I was telling them the lyrics and how they’d be sung. I always let them build their own parts themselves – things worked better that way.

“So it just rings out, misery loves its company, and then it ends?” Ren asked.

I said yes, nodding. Then I turned back to my guitar, trying to piece together a better bridge.

Last year during one of the first “band practices” we ever had where it wasn’t just me and Ren, Dad snuck in during it and listened in. That was the session that I told Luke and Ren about Travis since Dad said he was flying back to Santa Monica on leave, and it was the first of many times he’d listen to us play.

It was happening again that day. He slinked past the garage door and silently closed it, trying not to bring any attention to himself. When I caught a glimpse of him standing there, I saw him grinning real big. He even winked at me. Something was up.

So we finished up working on the bridge, saving the best part for last (I loved tweaking the last chorus and changing stuff around), and when that was done, Dad spoke up from his nonchalant silence.

“I know she missed playing with you guys,” he spilled.

“I missed playing, period,” Luke added. “It’s nice to get back to it.”

Dad ran a hand over the fuzzy layer of graying hair on his head, shoving another hand into his pocket. “I have news. Good news.”

“What about it?” I asked.

I could tell he wanted to tell us about it from the way he was beaming. “Well, you know how crappy the economy is, right? And how I’ve been digging around since I retired?”

I nodded slowly. I knew he was hunting around real hard, but I didn’t stick my nose into it since it didn’t seem like any of my business. Besides, he had the navy as a reference. How hard could it have been?

“I found a job being a construction worker down on Fleming Island. Pays great.” He was still smiling real wide, looking ten years younger. “I start on Monday. Isn’t that awesome?”

“Man, how come you can get a job and my brother can’t?” Brendan piped in, his arms spread wide in disbelief.

“Uh, congrats, Mr. Zach,” Ren sheepishly covered.

Dad tilted his head away from Brendan and instead said, “Thank you, Ren. It’s nice to know my daughter hangs around nice people.”

“And it’s nice to know her dad has job security,” Luke winked, pointing his fingers at my dad in a joking fashion.

God, kill me. It’s one thing to shamelessly suck up to my dad, but it’s another thing to not even try to hide a tone that might be misconstrued as sarcasm. Sometimes, things totally flew over my dad’s head, but he wasn’t completely witless. He picked up on some of it. Still, I smirked.

“No, but really. I think it’s pretty news-worthy,” Dad continued. “Just a little bit of info. Carry on.”

He turned on his heel, still beaming, and left the room, slamming the door shut quietly.

When he was gone, all eyes were on me.

Brendan had his eyebrows scrunched. “Your dad’s weird.”

“Yeah, but I don’t care anymore,” I sighed, gearing myself back into that music mindset.

Ren stared at me for a moment, but shrugged it off and instead focused back on the lyrics in his hands.

“He’s gonna be wolf-whistling at girls all day,” Luke laughed. “Can you imagine him doing that? Man.”

“My dad’s not a dirty old man, Luke,” I spat, rolling my eyes.

Brendan cocked his head, crookedly smirking again. “I dunno, sometimes he checks me out.”

“I don’t want to think about anything sexual involving my father,” I groaned, rubbing my eyes under my glasses. “Let’s just finish the song, okay? It’s going really good.”

Ren laughed along, even though he hadn’t contributed anything to the recent conversation bubbling between us. I don’t know what it was, but something about him seemed to be gleaming that day. I still don’t really know what caused him to be like that. All I do know about that day is that Dad was happy and I was happy. And that was awesome.