No Angels (Willow Creek Christmas)

9. Chapter Nine

Chapter Nine

Mike

Zane pulled me into his office this morning. “Mike, you need to buy her that piano. It’s the grand gesture that’ll get her to stay.”

“What piano are you taking about?”

“The one that was in the estate sale just up the road from you. No one bought it.”

“Why would I buy Bianca a piano?”

“Because she gave everyone there a concert on it.”

“When did this happen?” She never said a word.

“Saturday afternoon. Molly Monroe called me this morning. She told me in no uncertain terms I needed to convince Bianca to take over the theater because she played like an angel.” He shoots me a grin. “I told her I had my best guy working on it.”

I throw my head back and groan. Now the rumors will be unstoppable. “No you didn’t.”

“I did. So you need to work your magic.”

“We just had our first date.” I can’t hold back the smile.

He smirks. “Looks like it went pretty well.”

“Yeah. It went pretty well.”

He grins. Leans back in his chair and crosses his arms. “I knew it. Taren and I made a bet, She said Bianca wouldn’t give in so easily. But I said I knew there would be a sleepover. Looks like I was right.”

Taren and Zane’s bets against each other have become almost legendary in this town. Sometimes they bring their entire circle of friends into it too, or every single person in Willow Creek.

I roll my eyes and cross my arms as I lean back. “I should’ve known you’d make Bumble Bee and I one of your stupid bets.”

“Bumble Bee?” He guffaws. “That’s what you call her? What kind of a nickname is that?”

“It’s what I used to call her when we were kids.”

“You have to think of a sexier nickname than that. Even something as generic as sweetheart would be better.”

I shrug. “She doesn’t seem to mind.”

His eyes light up. “So you’ve called her that in bed?”

“Dude, I am not talking to you about what happens in my bedroom.”

He gives me a smug grin. “You don’t have to. Your face is telling me everything I need to know.”

“Whatever,” I tell him as I stand, because there’s such a thing as too much meddling. “I have to go supervise stringing the lights across Main Street. I’ll think about buying her the piano.” I give him a salute and his laughter trails in my wake.

I just finished hanging the lights and the wreathes on all the town lamp posts, and I should go home and take a shower. But I need to see her and make sure she isn’t freaking out about what’s happening between us.

When I enter the church vestibule, I hear her.

Her voice stops me in my tracks – just like it did all those years ago. I lean against the wall and close my eyes.

She’s right, she doesn’t have the range she did back then. But her singing voice has this husky contralto undertone I can’t get enough of. She’s singing Just You Wait from My Fair Lady and her Cockney accent and delivery make me smile.

When her voice trails off after the last note, I start clapping. She whirls around, and she looks nervous. “I didn’t mean for you to hear that. It was terrible.”

“You’re selling yourself short. It was magnificent.”

“No, it wasn’t. Broadway is like Shark Week and I already left a trail of blood in the water.”

“Your voice might be different, but you still sound incredible.” You’re still incredible, I want to tell her. You still stop the breath in my lungs and make me believe in things like fate and love and happily ever after.

“What’s phenomenal to your ears is mediocre to the ones that matter.”

“My ears don’t matter?”

She huffs in frustration. “That’s not what I meant. I meant that your ears are untrained and you probably don’t even notice the inconsistency.”

“Why do you want to go back if it’s so cutthroat? You have nothing to prove.”

“That’s not true. I have something to prove to myself. And to everyone who told me I’d never make my way back into the spotlight.”

“You shouldn’t care what they think.” I don’t know why it matters so much to her. It never did before. At least not when I knew her.

“If I can’t do this it means the last twenty years mean nothing. What if I fade into obscurity?”

I scoff. “Now you’re being ridiculous. Your voice is immortalized on dozens of cast recordings and solo albums. You have twenty-five million followers on the streaming app.”

“But what if that isn’t enough?”

“Not enough? You’ve built a career that’s its own legacy and you’re the most famous graduate of Willow Creek High School. Your not enough is more than most of us can even dream of.”

“I can’t just leave it all behind.”

I want to shake her for being so stubborn and oblivious. “You can. People do it all the time. If beating yourself up like this doesn’t bring you joy, you shouldn’t do it. Tell them you changed your mind about your big comeback and they can fuck off.”

She twists her hands in front of her. “Staging a comeback was all my idea. My agent said I should just retire gracefully.”

“So you don’t actually have to go back?”

“No. I don’t. But I want to.”

“You still want to?”

She tips her head and smiles sadly. “I do. You’re weakening my resolve, but I want to make sure the people that deserve to be brought down a peg get what’s coming to them.”

“It sounds like revenge is what’s motivating you, not the need to prove something.”

“Honestly, it’s a little of both. After I had my voice surgery, my understudy convinced my producer I couldn’t handle the part of Eliza.”

“ My Fair Lady was what you were cast in?” It’s the one part she’s always wanted.

“Yes, and you know what that role means to me.”

I nod. I do know. She sang those songs incessantly. I know all the words as well as she does. Even twenty years later.

I walk forward and tilt her face into the palm pf my hand. “If you go, I’m not letting you forget about me like you did the last time. I’ll come to you whenever I can and now there’s such a thing as cell phones and Facetime.”

She blinks up at me, her eyes full of unspoken promises. “Okay,” she agrees.