Five Flavors of Dumb - Antony John [23]
I made him spell out the name for me, but it didn’t help. “Never heard of him. Was he any good?”
“Sure. Right up to the moment he rammed the staff on his toe, got gangrene, and died.”
I snorted. “Now I know you’re kidding.”
Ed bit the inside of his mouth, furrowed his brows. “Actually, I’m not kidding at all. But hey! It looks like your feet are doing just fine. Nice shoes by the way.”
He opened the door and climbed out before I could say good-bye. And it wasn’t until I started to pull away that I remembered I was wearing a new pair of Chucks.
CHAPTER 15
Determined to prove they were up to snuff, Dumb scheduled an extra rehearsal for Wednesday lunchtime. With Ed on board, we’d even gotten permission to use the large music classroom. Unfortunately, Josh had also scheduled an audience.
I should have realized immediately that Kallie’s appearance at the back of the room was no accident. The music block is on the far side of school, and doesn’t lead anywhere else. More significantly, Kallie was there to stay—she pulled up a chair and sat down, crossing her freshly waxed legs as though she was discouraging the boys from taking the closer look that her miniskirt seemed to demand.
I stared at her in a way that was meant to say What are you doing here? But Kallie just smiled right back, her lips parting by the smallest degree, revealing perfect white teeth.
I’d like to say that Kallie’s presence went unnoticed by the band, but nothing could be further from the truth. From the moment she showed up, Josh’s performance deteriorated. Within seconds his focus was on some acrobatic dance moves that seemed more suited to Disney than Dumb. Meanwhile, Tash gripped her guitar like it was an assault rifle. I estimated ten minutes before someone got hurt.
I tried to shut out the madness while I wrote an e-mail to Phil Kirchen c/o WSFT-FM, explaining that Dumb’s mentor, Baz Firkin, had made us aware of his call for bands (which was almost true since I’d seen the notice at Baz’s studio). A little web-based research revealed that budget cuts and a declining listenership threatened to bankrupt the station, so I added a line saying that if he promoted Dumb I could guarantee at least a thousand new listeners from our high school, where the band had a cult following (again, the sentiment was true even if my numbers were somewhat unscientific). True, the station’s tagline—“the softer side of Seattle”—had me a little worried, but I figured minor details like musical style and genre could be negotiated later.
As soon as I’d sent the e-mail, I noticed Josh standing in front of me, stamping the ground as if he were trying to put a hole in it. I peered over the top of the computer and realized all eyes were on me.
“Ed said that stamping my foot is a socially acceptable way of getting a deaf person’s attention,” explained Josh, confused that it took me so long to notice.
At the back of the room, Ed rolled his eyes. “But not during a band rehearsal, remember? I told you, there are too many other vibrations. Just wave your hand somewhere that Piper can see.”
Okay, I admit it—it kind of sucked to have all this explained in front of me, like it was part of a lesson on the care and feeding of the deaf girl. It especially sucked to have it play out in front of Kallie Sims, like we were a study in opposites, textbook definitions of “cool” and “uncool” with real live representations of each (for illustrative purposes only!). But at the same time, it was difficult to be too bummed since Ed had obviously told them all this stuff before, when I wasn’t around. And although Josh had forgotten, there was something quite comforting about knowing that he’d tried to take note, and that I had some behind-the-scenes help for whenever he (and everyone else) forgot.
Josh accepted Ed’s criticism with a curt nod, then looked back at me and grinned like we were sharing a joke that no one else could understand. His eyes twinkled, and I felt myself turn bright red. A moment later he stood beside me, clearing his throat to get everyone’s attention.
“Guys,” he