I watched in horror as Charlie abandoned me for the line at the bar and left me alone with his mentor—the man I was pretty sure was tallying up my acceptable qualities to see if I met his Charlie standard.
“How long have you played the bass?” I asked before he could spit out “So what are your intentions with Charlie?”
He leaned forward so he didn’t have to talk so loud. “Oh, since I was in middle school. My mom wanted me in the orchestra, but I had a thing for the girl who played piccolo in the school jazz band, so I followed her. But I fell in love with the music instead.”
“What happened to the girl?”
His grin ticked wider. “Been married forty-six years come August.”
My eyes bugged. I wasn’t expecting that answer.
He laughed. “I should have said, I fell in love with the music first. Martha still plays piccolo for us on occasion. Not as much as she used to.”
“That should be a T-shirt,” I told him. “Came for the girls. Stayed for the music. You can set up a merch table at your shows.”
“I like that,” he said, still laughing.
“What about you? What brings you to a jazz show on a Monday night?”
Here we go. I knew we’d circle back eventually. I nodded my chin toward the bar. “Charlie.”
His laser-like gaze intensified. “He’s a good one, that kid. One of the best.”
I glanced over my shoulder and saw him lean over the bar and tell the bartender what he wanted. The two of them talked for a minute, and Charlie started laughing, then the bartender started laughing.
“I think you’re right,” I finally said, turning back.
“We’ve spent a lot of time together over the past several years,” Steve continued. “I’ve seen him grow up, take responsibility, and become a man. Couldn’t be prouder of him if he were my own kid.”
“I’m glad to hear that,” I told him honestly. “He’s a special guy, but he hasn’t always made the best decisions.”
“Oh, I know that. But which one of us has? To err is human, Ada. Or hadn’t you heard?”
I smiled gently at his assessment. He was right of course, but didn’t he know what Charlie had done to me? I didn’t want to sweep it all under the rug and forget about it.
I also didn’t want to leave it in the sun to rot. I wanted somewhere in the middle where I could pull it out when it was convenient for me but wouldn’t openly get in the way unless I wanted it to.
That seemed reasonable to me. Ahem.
“I have heard that,” I told him. “Once or twice.”
His smile gentled. “He wants to do right by you. I don’t think I’ve ever seen him so determined, so set on something.”
“On me?” I asked, breathless and a little dizzy.
He nodded slowly. “There’s more to Charlie than the sum total of his mistakes, Ada. There’s a heart and soul there I think you would be hard-pressed to replicate. Does that mean our boy will be without mistakes or mess-ups going forward?” He barked a short laugh. “Of course not. He’s going to mess up. He’s not going to get it all right. But he is unmatched in how hard he will try and how often he will get back up and do it again.”
I was silent as I absorbed his endorsement of Charlie. Had Charlie set him up for this? Or was this something he’d decided to spearhead on his own?
Eventually, he said, “You know, he told me about you the second time we spent time together. I asked him what made him decide he needed to make a change. And he said, ‘There’s this girl. I want to be worthy of her.’ We’ve worked through a lot of shit in his past, and he’s gotten a lot of help making himself a whole person.” He held up a hand at my panicked expression and said, “Don’t worry, it very quickly became more about him than you. In fact, so much so, I’d nearly forgotten about that girl he was so worried about. But a couple of weeks back, he took me out for coffee and asked me if I thought he was ready to pursue the girl of his dreams.”
I choked on air and then died. Unfortunately, I never got to hear the rest of Steve’s story because of my untimely death. So I became a ghost and haunted Steve and Martha for the rest of their lives. Hoping they would just accidentally drop more details about Charlie wanting to pursue the girl of his dreams. The end.
Just kidding.
But I really did choke on air and had to gulp my water to keep from making a scene. I had never been anyone’s girl of their dreams. And I didn’t know what to make of it. Or what to make of Charlie. Or Steve. Or any of this.
Steve smirked at me, knowing he’d gotten my attention. “I told him yes, I thought he was ready. But I also told him that even if he wasn’t, the girl of his dreams should be willing to do that work with him. We shouldn’t always have to be perfect and worthy to pursue the things we care about. Someone worthy of him would be willing to work at it with him. And together, they’d meet in the middle instead of on some impossible mountain peak.”
