My mom covers Ari’s ears a second too late. No one bothers with Jackson or Lily because Garrett’s their dad, so they’ve probably heard it all whenever he’s working on one of his ongoing home reno projects. (Power tools are not his friends.)
Grandpa listens calmly like there’s nothing strange going on at all.
“Again, I’m not excusing myself,” Harmony says. “I misjudged Griffin. I hurt him. There’s nothing I can say that will undo that. But maybe I can explain in a way that at least helps you understand where my head was at.” She wrings her hands for a second, then goes to the back of the Bronco and removes a small black case shaped like a guitar. Atinyguitar.
“When did you pack that?” I ask.
My siblings exchange looks.
“I can sing it better than I can say it,” Harmony tells my family, as though this is an explanation to me as well. “Is it okay if we sit?”
My grandpa gestures to the chairs on the porch and we all take seats while Harmony unpacks the ukulele I didn’t know she had.
Has she even played that since herLucky Starsaudition?
She’s trembling when she positions her fingers on the tiny frets, pressing down the strings. Then she starts to strum a melancholy chord.
“‘Leave it open ended,’” she sings, “‘and I’ll fill in the blank, with something that you didn’t mean, although you far outrank the ones before, couldn’t ask for more, you’re everything they weren’t … but I’m a little burnt.’”
Harmony picks up the tempo for the chorus but it’s more emphatic than upbeat:
He walked all over me ‘cause I gave him an inch,
Well, I know this much is true:
If you get hurt enough, it’s hard not to flinch
When somebody touches you
Oh I’m sorry for making you pay
For somebody else’s mistake,
You’re picking up the pieces of
A heart you didn’t break
And it still aches …
But you make it better,
You make it better
Her voice is soft and breathy, grazing the high notes while she lays it all out. “‘I had a different set of rules, you didn’t know the score. My head said that it wasn’t fair, my heart prepared for war. But I caught myself, yeah I’ve taught myself to put away my blade … ‘cause I don’t have to be afraid.’”
She sings the chorus once more, then does another little strum pattern and finishes by plucking each string of the last chord until … silence.
The adults sit still, pensive, but the kids clap and so eventually the adults do too.
I embrace her, not knowing what to say. She planned this, prepared for it, and … totally killed it.
I love that she’s humble enough to have been nervous, but confident enough to stand up for herself, and she did it in a way that suits her, in a way only she could or would.
Rachel is visibly holding back tears.
Then my mother stands up and walks into the house.
Everyone gets quiet.
