Page 67 of Frog

“I’m sorry, when did you get your medical degree?”

“I live with a doctor.” I waggled my eyebrows at him. “You pick up a bit.”

Another chord was struck.

“Oh dear God,” Cy whimpered.

“It’s only for the first three songs,” I told him. “Then they switch to maracas.”

He was stunned.

I just made sure Micah saw me when he looked up, and saw me smile. The kid had to be supported, for crissakes.

Before New Year’s, Micah had asked Cy to please pass the mashed potatoes at the table. And Cy had. We made no event of it, and when we made the trip up to see his parents on the first day of the year, having seen them at Christmas a week before, they were shocked to hear him talking like it was no big deal, not speaking any louder or faster or even more, just him, just Micah. His life was settled. If he wasn’t at school or at an activity or with his mother, he was with me. I wasn’t going to die on him, and neither was his mother or his uncle. He had faith in all of us to stick around. His father was gone, but the man had been busy, in more ways than one it had turned out, and the sad part was that Micah didn’t miss what he hadn’t ever had. He didn’t miss the relationship with his father, didn’t mourn the man’s absence. None of the boys did. They didn’t even ask after him, which made me think even worse of the man. I did hope he was happy living in Vegas, though, and I, like Carolyn, wished he would just stay there and have a good life. Ours was perfect; we didn’t need to begrudge him.

The tap on my shoulder brought me from my thoughts. Turning, I looked over my shoulder at a very pained looking, beautifully turned out mother of one of Micah’s classmates.

“Ma’am?”

“I’m sorry to interrupt. Did you say only two songs like this, or two more and then the maracas?”

“Two more after this, then the maracas.”

“Thank you.” She winced. “Aren’t you Micah’s nanny?”

“Yes, ma’am, and you’re Kellie’s mom.”

“Yes.” She tried to smile at me.

“She plays a mean ukulele. I heard her practicing yesterday.”

“Oh, that’s right.” She was trying to hold onto her smile, her forced cheerfulness. “I forgot there’s that too. Thank you.”

I nodded and turned back around as a hand slipped into mine. Looking over at Cy, I found him smiling at me.

“What?”

“I love you.”

“I love you back.”

“I’m still going to kill you for not warning me about the xylophone,” he moaned as a wrong note was gonged. It was really loud, and his eyes got huge.

“That was cute there, doc.”

He growled under his breath.

Two hours and fifteen minutes later, after the last percussion and vocal interpretation, everyone wanted to know why the Easter program had xylophones, maracas, bongo drums, and ukuleles anyway.

“It’s about experiencing and appreciating different cultures and their musical interpretations and gifts.”

“It’s what?” Cy asked me as some of the other parents squinted at me.

“World music,” I explained to him. “You need to open your mind.”

He was looking at me like I’d grown another head.

“Oh, Mr. Yates.” Micah’s art teacher, who shared a classroom with the music teacher, was beaming at me. “Bravo, that’s it exactly. We must all expand our minds, breathe outside of our own cultural boxes.”