Wild Awake - By Hilary T. Smith Page 0,82

a high-pitched strain to it like wind screaming in a chimney. I don’t care. I need to practice. The International Young Pianists’ Showcase requires my presence at 2:07 p.m. on Sunday, July 30. Now that I’ve scared off Lukas and abandoned Skunk, piano is all I have left. Triplets, triplets, left hand plays triplets. Right hand floats above.

Denny grabs my shoulders. Before I realize what’s happening, the piano bench topples like a kicked colt. My chin cracks against the floor. I am down. I have been downed. Kiri down. An ache springs up where my jaw hit the hardwood. My head floats dizzily from the surprise fall. I hear Denny stomp back up the stairs and slam the door.

For a moment, I lie there, stunned. I get up, lurch up the stairs, and pound on Denny’s door. “Denny—”

“Piss off.”

I talk at his door in a loud, fast, choppy gurgle.

“I’m sorry, Denny. I didn’t mean to wake you up. Maybe you could wear earplugs or something. The Showcase is in two weeks, and I basically need to practice nonstop until Mom and Dad get home.”

He crashes around his room. I hear him dial a number on the cordless phone. It’s sixteen digits long, which can only mean one thing.

The cruise ship.

“Mom? Hey. Kiri’s lost her mind.”

No.

I grab the doorknob, but it’s locked. Denny speaks nice and loud so I can hear.

“Yeah, she never sleeps, and she starts practicing piano at six in the morning, and I’m pretty sure she’s on drugs.”

No. No, no, no.

I jiggle the doorknob frantically and strain against the door with all my weight. “He’s lying!” I shout.

“What’s that?” says Denny, his voice dripping with responsible-older-brotherness like a switchblade dipped in honey. “Sure, you can talk to her. Hang on.”

The door pops open. Denny smirks as he hands me the phone. I snatch it and stalk down the hall to my room. By some miracle, I hear my own Responsible Voice spool out, calm and reassuring.

“Hi, Mom. I don’t think Denny understands. The Showcase is in two weeks.”

I sound so convincing it’s scary. I keep going, amazed at my own skill.

“I know, but he didn’t even try asking nicely. He can’t just come home out of the blue and expect me to work around his slacker schedule when I have so much to do.”

This is going well. This is going better than well. I press on. “I don’t know what he’s talking about. I told him I was sleeping over at Angela’s last night, but he doesn’t listen to a word I say. Ha-ha. Okay. I’ll tell him. Thanks, Mom. How’s the cruise going?”

Through my bedroom wall, I can hear Denny turn up his music to drown me out. I smile ferociously into the mouthpiece, hearing precisely nothing of my mother’s reply. “Ha-ha, sounds awesome. Say hi to Dad for me. Talk to you later. Bye.”

When I hang up, relief is coursing through my veins. I take the phone downstairs and drop it into its cradle.

“Mom says to let me practice!” I shout up the stairs.

I go to the piano, right the toppled bench, and start up where I left off without even getting ice for my chin.

Denny doesn’t come down again.

At one p.m. I take a quick lunch break, scarfing chips and salsa in front of the computer. There’s an email from my mom, saying it was nice talking to me on the phone this morning, but she just got a very worrisome email from Petra Malcywyck, who says that I seem to be having a rough time, and is there something going on that she should know about?

I reply to inform her that I have in fact been having a lovely time. I have been attending Hot Yoga classes at FitCity thrice a week, I have been learning the art of bicycle repair, I have been cooking organic macrobiotic three-course meals using the grocery money she left on top of the fridge, I have been practicing piano like a child of traditional Asian parents, I have been reading all the links to supposedly fascinating physics articles my friend Teagan has been emailing me from physics camp, and, oh yes, I have been watering the living crap out of the azaleas.

I write a similar email to Petra that is slightly more acerbic in tone.

A few minutes later, Lukas calls. I almost don’t answer. Then I do. I have a couple things to say to him. But instead of apologizing for being a treacherous narc, he says his