Page 25 of Fostering Chemistry
“It wouldn’t fit through the door.”
My mouth gaped open. “Was that a joke?”
He cocked his head to the side, studying me. “I reportedly don’t have a sense of humor.”
There was no need to ask him who’d made those reports. All of us who grew up in the foster care system were well used to all kinds of assessments being made about us. I wondered if Cody’s had always felt as inaccurate to him as mine did to me.
After a moment had passed, I asked, “So instead of taking notes on the class, you were writing musical notes?”
“Yep.”
“Can I see?”
He hesitated. “It’s not finished.”
I grinned, nudging him with my elbow. “Which might be a problem if I could read music.” Cody was still hesitating. He was one of the most private people I’ve ever met. “Come on, I guarantee it'll be the best original composition I’ve even seen.”
“You mean the only one.” He pulled a pad of paper out of his backpack and tossed it on the table in front of me. “There. Opus No. 34.”
I had no idea what that meant, but I straightened out the pad, looking it over. There were five horizontal lines grouped together, which I was pretty sure was called a staff. And notes, lots of notes, moving up, moving down. Some were close together, some far apart. It looks like real music to me. “You wrote all this?”
“Yep.”
“In class?”
He nodded.
“No wonder you didn’t hear anything the teacher said.” I scanned the paper again. “Will you play it for me?”
“Nope.”
“Please?” I twisted my lips into a pout when he shook his head again. “I’ll back you up if you decide to move a drum set into your room. I’ll stand outside your door and guard you from anyone who comes up there wanting to smash a cymbal over your head.”
Maybe it was my imagination, but it looked like he was fighting a smile. “How about I just lend you a pair of drumsticks and you can hit that whiny one when he passes by.”
“Raymond?”
“Is that the blond one?”
“Yes.” I frowned. “How can you not know the name of someone who lives with you?”
He shrugged and took a sip of his coffee. “Same reason I don’t listen in class.”
“Because you’re in your head where the music lives?”
“Exactly. Trust me, it’s a far more pleasant place to be.”
I couldn’t deny that it sounded like it—or at least a lot more pleasant than talking to Raymond. And I’d bet that music had gotten Cody through a lot over the years.
I took a sip, too, glancing around to make sure no was waiting at the counter, but we were the only ones here. Working here was boring, but at least it gave me time to do my homework when I was caught up with my tasks.
Biting my lip, I tried to think of how to keep the conversation going. Cody’s shoulders weren’t tense anymore, but he still looked like he might take flight at any given moment. “When did you first start composing music?”
His blue eyes were unfocused as he seemed to be looking into the past. “I guess when I was six or seven? But I didn’t have any way to play or write any of the music down until GarageBand.”
“You were in a garage band?”
He shook his head. “It’s software that comes preinstalled on Macs. You could create music and hear it played back… it took me a while to figure out how it all worked, but once I did, it was like a whole new world was open to me.”
