The Sweetest Sound

  Copyright

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

  Copyright © 2017 by Sherri Winston

  “Suspense.” Copyright © 2002 by Pat Mora. Originally published in This Big Sky (Scholastic Press, 1998). Reprinted by permission of Curtis Brown, Ltd.

  Cover art © 2017 by Erwin Madrid

  Cover design by Marcie Lawrence

  Cover © 2017 Hachette Book Group, Inc.

  All rights reserved. In accordance with the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, the scanning, uploading, and electronic sharing of any part of this book without the permission of the publisher is unlawful piracy and theft of the author’s intellectual property. If you would like to use material from the book (other than for review purposes), prior written permission must be obtained by contacting the publisher at permissions@hbgusa.com. Thank you for your support of the author’s rights.

  Little, Brown and Company

  Hachette Book Group

  1290 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10104

  lb-kids.com

  Little, Brown and Company is a division of Hachette Book Group, Inc.

  The Little, Brown name and logo are trademarks of Hachette Book Group, Inc.

  The publisher is not responsible for websites (or their content) that are not owned by the publisher.

  First ebook edition: January 2017

  ISBN 978-0-316-30292-0

  E3-20161118-JV-PC

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Prelude

  Chapter 1: Underneath the Stars

  Chapter 2: Emotions

  Chapter 3: Anytime You Need a Friend

  Chapter 4: Someday

  Chapter 5: It’s Like That

  Chapter 6: Make It Happen

  Chapter 7: I Don’t Wanna Cry

  Chapter 8: There’s Got to Be a Way

  Chapter 9: One Sweet Day

  Chapter 10: Heartbreaker

  Chapter 11: Fantasy

  Chapter 12: Don’t Forget About Us

  Chapter 13: Shake It Off

  Chapter 14: Vanishing

  Chapter 15: Hero

  Chapter 16: Butterfly

  Acknowledgments

  Thank you, George and Mariah!

  —S. W.

  Prelude

  Birthdays are a problem for me. It’s been that way for almost four years. My seventh birthday was the last time life felt normal. My party was amazing. We ate dinner at a Mexican restaurant, just family and a few friends—the way I like it. One of my friends, Faith, is from the Dominican Republic, so even though people assume she’s African American, she speaks Spanish quite well, thank you very much! She taught us some words. The band played “Happy Birthday to You!” the Spanish way, and we sang “Feliz cumpleaños a ti.” The music felt like sunshine on my skin, and Faith, Zara, and I did silly dances. My mother even sang with the band.

  It was the best night. Just the absolute best!

  The next morning I found a note on the coffeepot. It read:

  I love you all so much. But I have to pursue my passion. I can’t grow in Harmony, can’t be a star here. Jeremiah, you are a great man, wonderful husband, and terrific father. Cadence and Junior are lucky to have you. You deserve to be loved more than I can offer. Please don’t hate me. Cadence, my sweet little Mouse, so quiet and shy. Always remember, you are the high note of my life. I will always love you.

  Chantel Marie Jolly

  And then, she was gone.

  Birthdays have been tricky ever since.

  My name is Cadence Mariah Jolly.

  I live in western Pennsylvania in a small town called Harmony.

  I’m up in the middle of the night because I simply cannot sleep. Last year I stood outside my bedroom on this very balcony, staring past the dark mountaintops, pleading for a miracle. If God answered my prayers it would be a sign. No more sad, weird birthdays.

  That’s what I thought. Truly.

  Funny thing, though. God answered my prayers. I got exactly what I wanted.

  Now, four weeks away from my next birthday, that blessing feels more like a curse.

  I read a book over the summer called Holes. It was about this kid, Stanley Yelnats, who got sent away to an awful juvie place in the desert for something he didn’t even do. Talk about a curse! It was a great book, and I’ve reread it a few times. I plan to be a No. 1 Bestselling Author of Amazing Stories one day, so I like to study the works of other authors.

  I love reading, because authors have an amazing gift—they see problems and they find solutions. Have you ever wondered how an author would fix your life in a book? If the author of Holes, Louis Sachar, wrote a book about me, would he write about the fact that I’m really quiet? That at times I like being alone? Would he write about how I get this shaky, dry-mouthed feeling that makes my heart race whenever I’m around a lot of people? And if he did write a story about a girl like me, one who loves to read and plans to write great stories, a girl who is quiet yet tired of getting talked over and overlooked, tired of being pitied, how would Mr. Sachar fix her? (Me?)

  Trust me. I’ve got lots that need fixing.

  All I asked God for was one thing: for Daddy to find a way to get me a Takahashi 3000x keyboard and microphone. (It’s the kind used by all the best Internet sensations! At least, that’s what Faith says.)

  In my prayers, I promised I’d share my secret talent with the world, if only God made my dream come true. My aunt and lots of people at church were always warning us kids about our prayers. God ain’t no Santa Claus, they liked to say. When you talk to the Lord, be mindful of what you’re asking for. A prayer is a powerful thing.

  Honest, I believe in God, but truthfully, I wasn’t quite convinced He’d even care about my keyboard or my secret.

  Until it happened. God granted my wish. It was like some kind of miracle.

  Somehow Daddy got his hands on a busted-up Takahashi 3000x and fixed it without me finding out. Next thing you know, I get the keyboard for my birthday. A real dream come true.

  Now it’s time to keep my promise. But I don’t think I can.

  What happens if you make a promise to God, then try to take it back?

  1

  Underneath the Stars

  Some words feel so grown-up when you say them. Like scintillating. I whispered the word like it was part of a magic spell. One of many astronomy terms I learned from my mother. It means twinkling like stars. When she taught it to me, she would say it, then tell me to repeat it, and touch my lips as I did. Said to let it tumble from my mouth.

  My mother loved staring into the night sky. She loved pointing out groups of stars called constellations. She told me I loved it, too. Which was funny, because I could have sworn that staring into the sky at distant planets and glowing dust used to scare me. It made me feel so small, like I was vanishing. All I knew about the sky and the stars was what my big brother, Junior, had told me. Which was that slimy aliens and space monsters lived out there—he knew it because someone named Captain Kirk told him so. Like I knew the difference between Captain Kirk and Cap’n Crunch.

  I told her once, my mother, that looking into the deep vastness of the sky made me afraid. She surprised me, saying it used to do the same to her. She said she’d wondered as a kid about the universe with all of its mysteries, but she figured its mysteriousness was part of its beauty.

  She was so convinced that I loved it as much as she did that she ordered a telescope as a gift for my fifth birthday.

  Don’t get me wrong.
I did get quite a few things that I loved, too. Such as a tiny iPod and multiple pairs of candy-colored earbuds. I love music. My favorite singer was (and still is) Mariah Carey. She is like my fairy godmother. If fairy godmothers were real, which they aren’t. Except… maybe. I haven’t quite figured that out. Anyway, I had listened to my Mariah playlist for so long, it was as if her songs were made to explain all the chapters of my life.

  Later on, of course, my mother was gone, but the night sky no longer freaked me out. I gazed into the tiny lens of the telescope because seeing the stars up close made me feel closer to her. I knew that Captain Kirk was a make-believe character in Star Trek, and aliens and space monsters were make-believe, too. Probably.

  I also knew that most of the time, especially lately, I was the one who felt like an alien. Staring into the heavens, I imagined stories about the planets and the moon. Outer space didn’t make me feel invisible anymore; people did.

  Darkness wrapped around me. I pressed my eyes shut and remembered the touch of my mother’s fingertips on my skin.

  When I opened my eyes, her image appeared in the sparkling mass of constellations. The shape of her face was Cassiopeia; her eyes, Polaris; the curve of her neck, the handle on the Big Dipper. Just the way I remembered her, before she left us. Beautiful and distant. Scintillating.

  I used to get lost in the shadow of her shine. She was so beautiful and talented that it was like she cast this bright glow, you know? And the light from her amazingness reached way up into the heavens. I could never, ever come close.

  When she left, our world slipped into darkness. Would it be that way forever?

  Our house is three stories high. The top floor is like my apartment—I have it all to myself since my mother left and Daddy said he couldn’t face being up here alone. He and Junior carted all my things up from the first floor because Junior said he didn’t want to be up here, either.

  Now it’s just me and the last wonderful gift my mother ever gave me: my floppy-eared spaniel terrier, Lyra. She’d say hi, except it’s late. Really late. And Lyra loves her beauty sleep.

  Holding Lyra close, I leaned back on the chair and took in the night sky. My imagination conjured a familiar story. One that absolutely, positively made me sway. The way you might if you stood up too fast and got light-headed.

  The story came out of my soul, and now it rests in a journal. All good writers keep journals. When I grow up, I will write wonderful stories about girls who are brave and wise and fearless. Girls unafraid to stand out. Girls nothing like me.

  So, in the story I made up, my mother is no longer absent. She’s returned. She is in awe of my writing talent. She loves me so much and wishes she had not left me back when I was a little kid.

  We are being interviewed on TV. The host has tears in her eyes talking about my amazing new book. She says with a name like Cadence Mariah, it’s no wonder my words flow like a song, no wonder I grew up playing the piano and singing in my school and church choirs. The TV host understands. Cadence means “rhythm.” Middle name, Mariah, as in the famous singer, Mariah Carey. (See why I feel like she’s my fairy godmother?)

  Now, in my story, which flashes across the purplish mountainside like in a movie on a theater screen, I see the whole scene so clearly. I’m laughing with the interviewer, a quiet little laugh, and explaining how I used to be so shy that I hid in the back rows of the choirs.

  My mother, I reveal to the talk show lady, is known throughout our hometown for sounding like the famous singer Whitney Houston. When I was born, Daddy says, she couldn’t bear to share the perfection of Miss Houston with me. Instead, she made my middle name the same as her second-favorite singer, Miss Mariah Carey. But to me, Miss Mariah would always be No. 1!

  The TV show lady, tears glittering in her eyes, begs the two of us to sing a song together.

  My mother says, No, she couldn’t. She says, My baby won’t sing because she is so shy.

  And then the TV show lady looks at me. Eyes pleading.

  I walk over to my mother. I am very confident and sophisticated. The youngest bestselling author in the whole, entire world. She does not know how much I’ve changed since she left us. I am different now. Not the same Mouse.

  I say, Okay, Mother. I will sing with you. In a totally low-voiced, dramatic sort of way.

  And then we stand in the middle of the stage. My mother slips her hand into mine. Then the music begins. The orchestra knows exactly what song to play. The only song that makes sense:

  “When You Believe.”

  It is the only duet between the great Miss Houston and the amazing Miss Mariah.

  When we begin to sing, my mother stares in disbelief. She cannot believe how beautiful my voice is. She always wanted me to be a singer. Like her. But I don’t think she believed it would happen. I was always too shy. Was that why she left us?

  She did try to be happy as a wife and mother, working part-time at the Superstar Gas n’ Grocery Mart while taking classes at the community college.

  But that kind of life was making her die inside, Daddy said. He said somebody like my mother was born for bigger things. He said we did not wish her ill, but would, in fact, pray for her success and joy and happiness. Like my mother, Daddy seemed to think he knew what I was feeling without even asking. And even though my mother sent me a phone as a gift, she rarely called or left a number where I could reach her. Still, I told myself that was okay. I would hold no grudges; I told myself I forgave her. In my heart, I hoped it was true.

  So, in my story, my incredible, amazing, can’t-put-down, make-believe story, there we are. Reunited.

  And singing.

  It is the best feeling in the whole wide world.

  I stared into the sky.

  The stars were twinkling their applause. My heart danced in its cage. Lyra snuggled up to my ankles and let out a low doggie moan. I reached down and scruffed her neck. She was a small white dog with spots of golden and chocolate brown spattered over her face and ears. I named her after the constellation Lyra, which was itself named for an instrument played in Greek mythology.

  While my mother believed in all kinds of mythology, Daddy was a man who believed in keeping his feet firmly on the ground. When he wasn’t busy working for the sheriff’s department as a deputy or helping with the high school football team as an assistant coach, his real love was fixing old instruments. He actually had an instrument in his shop called a lyre. It made the coolest sounds. He had something else called a lute. Sort of like an old-fashioned guitar with a potbelly. I loved the lute and begged him to teach me how to play it, so he did. He refinished one and gave it to me as a gift.

  My fingers trailed across the strings of the lute now resting on my lap. A weird hollow feeling deep inside my chest made me shake inside out.

  Slumping beneath the quilt thrown across my shoulders, I sank into the creaky wooden chair. Lyra stirred, then she hopped onto my lap, pushing the lute aside. The warmth of her body, the scent of her doggie shampoo, made me draw a deep, calming breath. My fingers casually strummed the belly of the handmade instrument, the notes sad and sweet like tree boughs singing in the wind.

  I like to think that my mother gave me Lyra because she wanted someone here to watch over me—all of us—while she went out into the world to make her dreams come true. She was a singer, and a singer needed to sing.

  So I wished her the very best. Tried to, anyway.

  I breathed in air that was cold and tasted like winter, even though the calendar still said fall. It felt so peaceful. I inhaled the quiet back into my lungs.

  Then the peacefulness gave way to a knocking beat in my chest. My heart skipped a scratchy, snare drum rhythm. The lute’s music sounded melancholy. Another excellent grown-up word—melancholy. I was having trouble concentrating. Partly because of the secret I was hiding. And partly because of the promise I had yet to keep.

  Last year, sitting right here, I prayed and prayed for Daddy to find a way to buy me the keyboard. And I promised God I’d
stop being so boring and scared and start taking chances. No. 1 Bestselling Authors of Amazing Stories get their ideas from being bold, not by hiding from EVERYTHING.

  I was too shy and too scared. I did have to hand it to my mother about one thing, though—piano lessons. I started playing at three years old, and even though I still get butterflies sometimes, I know I’m pretty good.

  The music teacher at school and choir director at church knew about our family. Everyone did. Funny thing having a whole town pity you. Everyone bending over backwards to “help.” They tolerated my shyness. I hid behind other singers so I wouldn’t throw up on anybody’s shoe. But when the music teachers or directors needed me, I could play the piano or keyboard well enough to help. It worked out well for everybody.

  Replacing my dinky little keyboard with a Takahashi 3000x got me singing around the house all the time. Well, when I was alone, that is. I loved how singing touched my heart and made me feel light. Powerful. Strong. I wished I had the courage to sing in front of real people.

  Once I realized how good it felt, singing out loud with all my heart, mumble-singing in the back rows of the choir became more difficult. Still, I was determined not to draw attention to myself. I got enough attention for being the girl whose mother left. Everybody treated me like I was made of glass. Like I was broken.

  Am I broken? Would I know it if I were?

  One day Reverend Shepherd had given a sermon about blessings. He said God has anointed each of us with special gifts and talents. He said ignoring them was a sin. He said we should stand in our blessings, which I’d figured meant if God gave you a talent, you were supposed to use it. Kind of like a superpower.

  You know, church is like that. Sometimes the pastor is talking and all you can think about is eating pancakes when he is done. But sometimes he says something and, just like that, it feels like he’s talking absolutely, positively to YOU. I got chills as he talked about keeping our talents a secret.