That included undoing the damage caused by her aunt. The first thing she’d done after retaining the legal services of William Small was have him assemble the best defense team that money could buy. She’d bankrolled Levi Greer’s bail, but neither Detective Clarke nor the Commonwealth of Virginia seemed inclined to drop the charges. Tomorrow, Con had to drive over to Richmond to discuss deposing her in the event she wasn’t physically able to testify at the trial. That would cost her most of the day.
“Couple more takes?” Con asked. “It’s still not there.”
“Are you crazy?” Dahlia cut in. The young girl had been helping out in the studio, even filling in when Stephie was busy in the store. She had the makings of a talented board operator. “That totally slings. What’s it called?”
“‘Dahlia Is a Badass.’ In D minor,” Con said with a grin. She’d never had a little sister but found it suited her. Dahlia made the devil’s horns with her fingers and stuck her tongue out.
“One more?” Con asked, compromising even though Stephie had already agreed. Her perfectionist streak would never not get the best of her, and Con felt guilty for dragging Stephie along on this tour of her obsessiveness.
“Do as many as you like, fool,” Stephie replied. “But are you still good to watch the store this afternoon? We’ve got parent-teacher conferences with this one.”
“No problem.”
“You sure? We can always close for a few hours. Really not a big deal,” Stephie said, hesitant to leave Con alone after the first of the seizures.
“Are you kidding? I will sell three guitars before dinner.”
“Three?” Dahlia said skeptically.
“Count it, girl.”
“Alright, then,” Stephie said. “Ready to lay it down again?”
Con gave her hand an encouraging squeeze. “Ready.”
The shop was a ghost town all afternoon. All she managed to sell was the sheet music for Joni Mitchell’s Blue and a ten-pack of guitar picks. The only way she was selling three guitars was if she bought them herself. She could certainly afford it now, but it felt like cheating. It was actually nice to have the time alone and gave her time to work on the lyrics to a new song. These days, they were coming almost faster than she could write them down. Sometimes new melodies came so easily that it felt as if she were transcribing notes that someone else was playing to her. She was hardly a spiritual person, but it had made her feel connected to Zhi and her old life.
Midafternoon, three teenagers came in out of the rain to check out the amplifiers. Con recognized them. Two of them were Stephie and Elena’s students and often hung around the shop after school. All semester, they’d been trying to start a band but couldn’t find a bassist, agree on their sound, or settle on a name. They’d spent the last few months rehearsing as a nameless trio. Con remembered forming her first band—the High Plains. They’d lasted nine whole days before breaking up over artistic differences, and also because they had nowhere to practice. Con smiled to herself at the memory. Rock and roll.
From behind the counter, she listened to the teens argue about who was the best pianist—capital-E ever. Names flew back and forth across the shop. One boy insisted it was Elton John or Ray Charles. The girl made an impassioned case for Stevie Wonder. The other boy said either Trent Reznor or Matt Bellamy would kick all their asses, sparking a fresh round of debate. It made Con nostalgic for those long hours in the back of the van, passed in pointless but passionate bull sessions about the greatest this or the all-time that.
She could think about Awaken the Ghosts, and the people in it, fondly again. Remembering had become an important ritual for her and Stephie—two old veterans of the wars memorializing their fallen brothers. After finishing in the studio, they’d sit up late into the night reminiscing and telling tall tales about those days. The time Tommy quit the band for a week because someone ate his oatmeal. Superserious and highbrow Hugh’s not so supersecret love of old-school Britney Spears. Zhi’s penchant for impassioned soliloquies and Tommy’s habit of derailing Zhi’s train of thought with seemingly innocent questions that Stephie suspected weren’t nearly as innocent as they seemed.
It felt good to have those stories back, to be able to speak their names without crying. Even Zhi, who she had loved and lost, found and then lost all over again. Before she died, she hoped his memory would bring her joy again. She didn’t know if she could get there, but it was important to try. That was, hopefully, what the new album would help her do—if she ever finished it.