“Nothing for me.” Lucas eyed one of the seats skeptically before grunting his way down the worn leather. He’d set his lips into a thin line. Henri couldn’t wait to wipe the disbelief off his face.
“Water, please.” Henri twisted the cap off the bottle Tessa handed him and took a seat next to Lucas. Tessa appeared a different person entirely in street clothes—smaller, less authoritative. Or maybe her chewing her bottom lip and rocking on her heels added to the illusion of youth. Then again, Henri hadn’t explained anything in advance, not wanting to put her on edge. She might blow Lucas away and still not agree to give up her meditation-therapy gig for the exciting world of rock and roll.
“I told my friend here about your playing, and we’d like to hear you.” Henri flapped his empty hand at the sheet-covered objects at the other end of the garage. “Go on. Whatever you want to play.” He relaxed as much as he could without knocking his seat over.
Tessa turned and folded back a sheet, revealing a plywood table filled with bronze-colored bowls. “Anything?”
“Whatever your heart desires.” He pulled out his phone and started recording.
She ducked beneath the plywood and emerged on the other side to fumble with the bowls and a bunch of sticklike objects with balls on the ends. Apparently satisfied, she took a deep breath, closed her eyes, and gently rolled a mallet along the rim of the largest bowl. With her other hand she countered with the smallest. Pure, clear notes rang out. Cold chills danced up Henri’s arms. A sharp intake of breath to his left voiced Lucas’s reaction.And he ain’t heard nothing yet.
Faster and faster she shifted from one bowl to the next. She never beat, she never pounded; she encouraged the bowls to sing. And sing they did, a melody of heartbreaking beauty.
Seb would love this! But Seb was gone, who knew where, and who knew when they’d see each other again?I’m doing this for you, Seb. You might not ever know, you might not care, but I aim to create something awesome, because you showed me how.
The tune ended on a long note, growing ever fainter until the bowls quieted. Lucas rose to his feet, smacking his hands together. “Amazing!” He shot Henri a cutting glare that said better than words,But what has this got to do with your band?
Henri couldn’t fight a grin. “Tessa?”
“Yes?”
“Would you mind playing the drums for us?” He operated on pure faith.
Another sheet wound up on the floor to reveal a drum kit unlike any Henri had seen before. There were the usual snares and a bass, but behind a set of Pearls another group of objects sat. One might have started life as a trash can lid—Henri couldn’t be sure.
“Anything?” Tessa traded her mallets for a set of more familiar drumsticks and twirled them in her fingers.
“Anything.”
“Okay. Remember, you asked for it.” She answered his grin with one of her own, appearing so much like an eager teenager.
“How old is she?” Lucas side-whispered.
“Twenty-eight. I’ll admit she seems a little offbeat, but trust me.”
Tessa tapped softly on the snare drum, finding her rhythm. Once more she closed her eyes and breathed deeply.
“Does she always play with her eyes closed?” Lucas probably didn’t even notice that he was patting his leg in time with Tessa’s tempo.
“She has every time I’ve seen her play in person.”
“And how many times is that?”
“Counting this one? Twice.”
Good thing no flies buzzed around the garage. Lucas might have caught one or two with his wide-open mouth. Whatever he planned to say never came out. Tessa launched in adoom-da-doom-doom,rendering thoughts of anything but her music futile. Again, she never banged, never pounded. Instead, she brought the instrument to life in a way Giles never had. Holy shit was she ever good. What she lacked in experience she more than made up with style. Henri’s mouth joined Lucas’s in hanging open. Just when he thought the impromptu concert couldn’t get any better, she spun around, tapping on the garbage can lid in a sweet calypso cadence. That part would fit right into a song Henri’d been working on.
After twenty minutes of the most stunning licks this side of the Rockies, the volume faded and died. Tessa’s chest rose and fell with her breathing, and her bangs stuck darkly to her forehead. No wonder she wore her hair in pigtails, to keep it out of the way.
Henri approached, handing over his nearly empty water bottle. “Play this.”
“How?”
“However you want.”
Tessa took the cap off and blew into the opening, controlling the tones by squeezing the sides. With a grin, she resealed the bottle and stood to place her newfound instrument on her stool.Rat-a-tat-a-tat,went her drumstick on the trashcan lid, followed by a clash of cymbals and two licks on the bottle.
Henri glanced back over his shoulder at Lucas, who seemed to have lost the ability to properly close his mouth. “Told you she could play anything.”
