‘Do you want them?’ August looks up at him. ‘We have a pear tree so it’s not like I need any. I can help you carry some, though.’
Picking food off the ground? She’ll know how desperate he is. Although convincing Joey they don’t need any would be impossible and the way she’s dancing around a pile of pears proves fresh fruit is more exciting than is usual for them.
‘Um,’ Beck says intelligently.
August pats his shoulder. ‘Stop thinking. It looks too painful for you.’ She holds her huge jumper out like a basket and piles in pears.
Beck peels off his own jumper and, after blasting Joey to get off the road, he gets a dozen less mangled pears. He feels self-conscious, but the two pear deliverers don’t seem to care because they’re too busy trying to coax their busted truck back to life.
August sniffs a pear. ‘Ooh, heavenly. These will make a delicious pie.’
Beck can think of a dozen ways to consume all these pears. First will be just gobbling them, skin and all. He can’t even remember the last time he had fresh fruit.
Hauling their spoils, they trudge the last block to the Keverich house. Joey keeps cackling like a deranged chicken and shrieking ‘Pears! Pears!’ at random intervals.
It’s only when they reach Beck’s driveway that he realises he has no idea if the Maestro is home yet.
‘Shall we put them in your kitchen?’ August asks.
‘Um, how about we just leave them out here and—’
‘Beck Keverich,’ August says. ‘I’ve been in your house before and it’s not a hellhole.’
‘It’s not that, it’s just – I …’ He tries desperately to remember when the Maestro said she’d be home. Late? Early? And if she is home, he’s already dead.
He can’t get deader.
‘Fine,’ he mumbles and slowly opens the front door.
Joey slips under his elbow and runs inside screaming about pears. Beck can’t see any signs of life, so he holds the door open for August. If she dumps the pears and runs then this might—
‘Oh, hi, Mummy!’ Joey says from the lounge. ‘We found pears! Can we have a pie? August says we should make pie.’
No.
His insides split apart. August is in his house, wiping her feet on the mat, oblivious to the fact he’s frozen. She strolls in like she’s been inside a hundred times, not just once when she was bleeding to death. He can’t let her go into the kitchen alone. He jumps forward, wanting to warn her, wanting to drag her out – wanting none of this to be happening.
The Maestro and August enter the kitchen at the same time.
Beck watches a chill fury wash across the Maestro’s face.
Joey chats on about pie, and August, oblivious, deposits her armful of pears on the kitchen bench. Then she wipes her hands on her shorts and, with a smile as bright as summer, she reaches out to shake hands with the Maestro.
‘Hi,’ she says. ‘I’m August. Beck’s friend.’
Beck wants to bury himself. It’s over. The Maestro will blame everything on August – this trip, the reason he’s started speaking up, even the lax way he’s been practising. And she’ll be right, of course. But this was his. He had something – he had something happy for once in his miserable life.
The Maestro shakes August’s hand and gives a tight smile. ‘How surprising,’ she says. ‘I didn’t know Beck had a new friend.’
He wants to slam his own head into a wall.
‘I’m assuming we’re friends by now,’ August says. ‘Scavenging pears seems a friend-sort-of-thing to do.’
‘Scavenging?’
Beck clears his throat, though he’d like to turn around and walk out the door and drown himself, basically. ‘Um, yeah. A truck dropped a bunch of them so we …’ He trails off. ‘Anyway, this is, yeah, um, August. She’s leaving now.’
August wrinkles her nose at him.
‘So can we have pie?’ Joey says, a pear in each hand. ‘Can we have nine pies?’
‘Hush, Sch?tzchen,’ the Maestro says, because Joey is a darling while Beck is a moron. She turns back to August, still cold – in Beck’s eyes – but acting disturbingly nice. ‘That’s very kind of you, August. How long have you been … friends?’
‘A month or so.’ August smooths her stretched jumper back against her belly. ‘We partnered for a paper in English. At first our relationship was War and Peace. Now it’s Sense and Sensibility.’
Beck looks at her like she’s grown horns.
‘I’m referring to the titles,’ August explains. ‘It’s sensible because when he sticks with me, I feed him cake and improve his grades.’
The Maestro gives a tiny laugh – how dare she – and nods. ‘Beck is not a hard worker.’ How dare she.
‘Not really,’ August confides. ‘But once you get past his serial killer vibe, he’s just an adorable puppy.’
Beck coughs. ‘Um, I’m standing right here.’
Joey has given up on being fed pie, so she drags a chair to the kitchen bench and attempts to reach the big knives. The Maestro plucks her off the chair with one strong hand and sets her down.
‘Did you arrange this afternoon’s picnic?’ the Maestro says.
Beck says, ‘No,’ at the same time August says, ‘Oh, we totally did.’
They look at each other. Beck’s eyes try desperately to convey the stop everything signal. August clearly is not used to such messages.
‘It’s come to my attention, Mrs Keverich—’ August begins.
‘Ms,’ the Maestro says.
‘Oh, sorry. Ms Keverich – that Beck is seriously gloomy and needs kicking out of his misery.’
Joey starts kissing the pears.
‘So,’ August says, ‘I was wondering, Ms Keverich, if Beck could come over for dinner some time?’
She’s dug his grave, blissfully unaware.
The Maestro looks at Beck, long and calculating. He feels the ice, but not the burn of fury – more puzzlement, or is that shock? That he would do something so defiant like make a friend.
‘Bee – Beck,’ the Maestro says, unused to his nickname, ‘is very busy studying.’
‘Oh?’ Thankfully August doesn’t scoff. She probably is on the inside.
‘He is a pianist,’ the Maestro says, the first time she’s admitted it. Usually it’s he is a worthless moron bashing my piano. ‘He has an important recital to prepare for.’
August’s eyes widen with delight. ‘Beck! You should’ve told me. This is incredibly exciting. I want to hear you play.’
‘No,’ says Beck.
‘I’ll take that enthusiastic response as a yes!’ August grins. ‘I’d only steal him for a few hours, Ms Keverich. I live just around the corner, and my dad could drop him home so he doesn’t walk in the dark.’ She pauses. ‘Are you allergic to dogs, Beck?’
‘No, but—’
‘Great. Because there are two or twelve inside at any given time. So what do you say, Ms Keverich?’
Would she say no? Would she yell? Would she show August who she really is?
The thing about the Maestro is her ability to be purely professional around other people. In a ball gown with jewels at her throat, you’d never know there is something … broken about this woman. She is tall and powerful and glorious.
The Maestro graciously says, ‘He’s facing a very taxing performance, as I said, so I will think on it.’
Beck grabs August’s elbow and drags her towards the front door.
August waves over her shoulder. ‘Nice meeting you, Ms Keverich.’
Beck gets her outside before he remembers how to breathe again. He wants to yell at her – he really, really does. But it’s not like he warned her. Sure, there have been bruises – but he always says he gets into fights, accidents. Maybe she thinks that’s the truth? Maybe August Frey is so full of sickening brightness that she can’t fathom a parent throwing their own kid into the wall.
Beck shuts the door behind him and digs his hands through his hair. He’s trying not to hyperventilate.
‘Wow, Beck,’ August says. ‘Meeting your mum wasn’t that traumatic for me. Do you want to sit down?’
He does want to sit down. Or lie down. And never get back up.
‘I’m sorry,’ he mumbles.
‘Why?’ August says. ‘Your mum seems, well, fierce but not too bad. I get that she’s strict though. Wow.’