Touching Melody (A Forever First Novel) (33 page)

The cemetery is peaceful. A light breeze pushes the leaves. The sound reminds me of the ocean at sunrise, its waves rolling lazily to shore. The sky is clear and blue. No one else is here, just the chirping birds, the dead, and me.

I make my way through the gravestones. My parents are buried under a giant oak near the back. Their headstone is in the shade, away from the summer heat. In my hands are a bunch of daisies, my mom’s favorite flower. I’ve placed them in an empty bottle of beer—my dad’s favorite kind.

“Hi, Mom and Dad. Sorry it’s been so long. It was really hard to visit you here. Knowing I can’t see you. Wondering…” Tears build and roll down my cheeks. I don’t bother wiping them away. Crying is part of grieving, and I know it’s necessary. I sniffle. “But I’m trying. No, actually I’m doing better than trying. I’m living my life the best way I can.” I place the bouquet of flowers in front of their headstone and step back. “Kyle is in my life. He’s all grown up, and he’s amazing. Better than I ever imagined. With him on my side I know I’ll be okay.”

A breeze whips past my face and I imagine it’s my mom and dad, hugging me.
When it passes, I take another step back. “Aunt Eliza and Uncle John have been great to me. They aren’t the same as having real parents, but they’re close. Aunt Eliza is always telling me to live a little. Well I intend to do just that. Live each day with hope. With love. And without excuses.”

Afterword

Thank you so much for reading
Touching Melody
. Maddie and Kyle are fictional characters based in a fictional world. Their journey is a one of love—finding it and fighting for it—based on their life choices.

While many scenes in this story are based on reality, that doesn’t mean I condone recreational drug use, underage drinking, premarital sex (with or without protection), or excessive use of curse words. If anything in this novel bothered you, I would suggest talking to someone about it. Get the real facts
, based on your situation. I’m all for discussion with parents, parental caregivers, or a therapist. One in five women is sexually assaulted during her college years.

The National Network to End Domestic Violence (
NNEDV
)
is a great source to get answers to questions and/or information.

If you enjoyed
Touching Melody
, please do me a favor. Leave a review. It only takes a couple of minutes, but would mean a lot.

Thanks again!

Sincerely,

RaShelle Workman

If you enjoyed
Touching Melody
you might also enjoy
CROSSING
by Stacey Wallace Benefiel. Here’s the first chapter.

CROSSING

By

Stacey Wallace Benefiel

Chapter One

I pull my backpack straps away from the sweaty front of my Hello Kitty t-shirt as I run up the wide concrete steps of Villard Hall. In another month the seemingly never-ending Oregon drizzle will start and I can dress for style and cover instead of comfort.

Stopping in the entryway, I quickly peruse the black plastic signs stuck to the white walls and dial in on the one directing me to the Little Theatre, room 101. I hurry down the hall, my right hand leaving my backpack strap to swipe the moisture from my upper lip. Stupid sweat glands and stupid European Lit professor who went five minutes over on the first day, causing me to have to do my awkward straight-legged jog all the way from the other side of campus.

Sure, if I was an Accounting major I could clearly see how those buildings and my classes would be nowhere near each other, but Theatre and English, in a school with a significant Shakespearean program? It makes no fucking sense.

A guy speeds by me and nearly passes the double doors to the Little Theatre. He comes to a screeching halt and whips open the left door, disappearing inside, only to swing it out again and almost hit me in the face as I reach for it.

His brown eyes go wide. “Sorry,” he says, cringing. “I didn’t mean to be ungentlemanly and not hold the door open.”

He’s cute and not sweaty at all.
“So, you just thought you’d hit me in the face with it instead?” I ask, smirking as I breeze into the theatre.

I take a seat in the top row. The place reminds me of a cave. The walls, stairs, ceiling, and stage are painted flat black. For variation, the hard, plastic chairs, set in steep descending rows, are beige.

The guy slides in next to me. “Liam Garrett.” He holds his hand out.

“Danielle–
Dani.” I clap my clammy palm in his and face forward as our professor gets up from her seat down below in the front row and turns to address the class.

“Welcome to Acting I,” she says, smiling broadly before bowing at the class. She’s got short, spiky, purple-red hair and is wearing enormous white glasses. They coordinate nicely with her batik-patterned tunic and black leggings. “I’m Professor Barnes. You may call me
Maren.” She holds up a stack of white papers. “I’m going to set the syllabi by the door down here and you can grab one at any time during class. Acting I is all about scene work, so we’re going to begin with open scenes this week. After that, I’ll assign you scene partners and we’ll get into the nitty gritty of the Stanislavski method, my lovelies.” She waves us down toward the stage. “Let’s circle up and get to know each other. Then we’ll do some truly embarrassing warm-ups to get our bodies loose.”

I stand and wait for Liam to clear the aisle. I suppose I could’ve gone the other way, but following him down the stairs to the stage gives me a chance to check out his ass. And a fine ass it is. He’s wearing Levi’s and black Chucks and a short-sleeved royal blue Under
Armour shirt that hugs his biceps and shoulders. His short brown hair has wave to it, but he’s got it cut conservatively. None of that weirdness that looks like the guy’s had all of his hair sucked forward in a vacuum. Yep, he’s cute.

At the bottom of the stairs, I go around Liam and cut across the stage, opting not to sit next to him so I can check him out better from the front and size up the other people in class. This isn’t
Dani’s first rodeo. I was a mega theatre geek in high school and probably should’ve started taking Acting I my very first term at U of O, but my parents had suggested that with an English degree, at least I’d have a chance of getting a teaching job. There are no prospects in being a theatre major. I obeyed and suffered through four terms of English Lit hell before standing up to my parents over the summer and telling them that just because I could write a short story and liked to read, that didn’t mean I was cut out for life as an academic.

I couldn’t give a flying fuck about criticism or sentence structure or underlying theme.
But the characters? That’s what I loved about reading and writing…the drama, the character work, the becoming another person, getting inside someone else’s head. I told my parents I was grateful they’d shelled out the cash for me to attend college, but if I wasn’t going to be able to study what I wanted, they were better off saving their money and letting me drop out to get a job as a make-up artist at the MAC counter in the mall.

The class sits in a circle on the floor, everyone discreetly eying each other. Liam is by far the most conventionally attractive guy, but there are a couple other male specimens with potential. I let my gaze skip over the few boys that set my
gaydar off. I’d been down that road one too many times in high school. They could probably sense my hagability, anyway.

I am definitely the most conventionally plain girl in the class. Shoulder length brown hair, fair, freckled skin, sharp nose, weak chin,
tiny ears. Chubby, but not fat. Nice-sized boobs. Freakishly large feet. I’m not blond or tan or exotic or ethnic, or anything that would make me interesting. I’m a white Midwestern girl who looks like every other white Midwestern girl. Sometimes this seriously bums me out and sometimes I’m glad I’m not THE MOST BEAUTIFUL because it makes me try harder at being funny and charismatic and outgoing. Which is also pretty damn tiring. I’m conflicted, okay?

“Let’s go around and share a couple of things about ourselves,” says
Maren. “I’ll start. As I said, I’m Maren Barnes. I’m an adjunct and you guys are my last Acting I class before I move up to the big leagues and teach Acting II.” She smiles. “Essentially, if you continue on in the program, you’re stuck with me.” She giggles. “I’m originally from Baltimore and did my graduate work at UC Davis before farting around trying to get commercial gigs in L.A. for a few years. You’re looking at the face of Torrance Flooring World, I’ll have you know. So, that was depressing and I decided to move to the great Northwest, live in a condo with a mildew problem, and teach you lovelies.” She nods to the blond girl next to her, sporting a tiny silver nose ring and expensive outdoor clothes that look like they were actually used to go on actual hikes because her body is perfect and fit.

“I’m Sybil. I’m an
Enviro studies major and I’m taking this class as an elective. It seemed active and fun.” She gives us a megawatt smile. “I’ll probably suck, but that’s okay. I’m always up for an adventure. Oh, I’m from Whidbey Island up near Seattle.”

“Welcome Sybil.”

The next girl to go has long, glossy black hair and warm brown skin. “My name is India. I’m from the Bay area. I’m in the dance program, but thinking of doubling in Theatre.”

“Hey!” I pipe up. “You might know my roommate Elizabeth Danes? She’s a sophomore in the ballet program.”

India nods, but looks past me. “Yeah, cool, I recognize the name. I do mostly modern, but we collaborate with the ballerinas from time to time.”

After her, two more girls share - Evelyn and Cassandra. Both are pretty in an interesting way, Evelyn with her auburn hair and blue eyes, and Cassandra with her huge green eyes and long, long legs. They’re freshmen and roommates in the Creative Arts dorm that I lived in last year, both interested in becoming Theatre majors right out of the gate. I can tell they got all the leads in their high school plays.
They are
that
girl.

Liam is up next. “I’m Liam Garrett. I’m a senior Spanish major. I am also taking this class as an elective.”

“Getting it in under the wire, huh?” Maren teases.

He smiles and then licks his lips. “I don’t know why I waited so long. I, uh, worked crew on all the plays in high school and always really enjoyed it, so this should be fun. I’m from Boise. That’s about it.”

I notice the rest of the class is paying just as much attention to Liam as I am, which isn’t surprising. There are fourteen women in the class and six men: three are definitely gay, one is questionable, then Liam, and a weird older guy who has to be auditing.

We finish up the sharing. The old guy’s name is Steve and he’s taking the class for fun while he gets his doctorate in Iranian Studies. The three gays are Jake, Jacob, and Jackson, if you can fucking believe it, and I resist the urge to claim them as MY gays before India can get her hands on them.

“I’m Dani Walker. I hail from the great state of Illi-noise. DeKalb. Home of Corn Fest and barbed wire and Cindy Crawford? No? It’s a booming metropolis of farmland about an hour from Chicago.”

“NIU is there, right?”
Maren asks.

“Yup. And before you ask why I didn’t go to school in my hometown, you should probably look up DeKalb and see for yourself. I mentioned Corn Fest, right?”

Liam grins at me.

“Anyhoo, I’m a sophomore. I was an English major, but I’m switching to Theatre. You probably can’t tell just by looking at me because I’m off my fashion game when the sun is shining, but I got
alllll of the minor and supporting roles in my community and high school productions. I was the Cook in
Alice in Wonderland
, twice
.
Be not afraid, you won’t see any divaesque behavior from me. I’m more Tina Cohen Chang than Rachel Berry.” I shrug. “That’s me.”

Maren
gets on her feet. “I think this class is going to be awesome. Let’s get started on those warm-ups.”

We all stand while
Maren leads us through a series of stretches and yoga poses before moving on to the vocal exercises. Clearly, the embarrassing part.

“
Wheeeooooooooooo!”

“
Wheeeooooooooooo!” we echo.

“Blah, blah, blah.”
Maren opens her mouth wide and sticks her tongue out.

Liam catches my eye while we’re both mid-kabuki lion and cracks up when we shift into
squinchy lemon face.

“Now that we’re all introduced and warmed-up,”
Maren says, shaking out her arms, “please go take your seats for a moment and get out your textbook. Turn to the section with the open scenes.”

I follow Liam back up the stairs, admiring his Liam-
asstic assets again. He stops at the top of the stairs and gestures for me to pass, giving me another quick kabuki lion face. We sit and take out our textbooks. I scan the open scenes. They are literally five sentences with lines like, “No wait…” “What?” “Where have you been?” “I want…”