Aunt Leona was here.
She was never here except when she needed my parents’ assistance with family matters.
The heart-stopping oddity of this situation was that she was talking to my parents in the living room when I walked in the house. Usually, there would be the doorbell, the door itself opening, the sharp flowery scent of Chanel No. 5 perfume, the faintest glimpse of Leona’s lush eyelashes fluttering at me in a hello, then the murmurs that faded as Leona and my parents clacked down the hallway.
Then I would hear the door to my dad’s home office close. And the lock clicking into place.
But now she was perched on our couch, the mingle of cigarette smoke and my aunt’s perfume replacing sensory memories of my time over at my friend’s house.
“I just don’t know what to do about him,” her elfin soprano strummed at my ears. “I’d never really picked up on the fact….”
Her voice trailed off as she caught me in the doorway. Her lips twisted up in a crooked, almost sardonic smile.
“Hello, Justin,” she nodded at me between hits on the cigarette. “How are you?”
“Good. I…invited Kira over for dinner, if that’s okay.”
My mom nodded at me, murmured to Leona, “Maybe you’d better go.”
“Oh, yes. Yes. I need to make sure everything is right for Andres’s party tomorrow.” Aunt Leona stood up with a pack of Camels in her other hand. “See you tomorrow night at five.”
She breezed past me and out the door. My mom and dad were already walking towards the kitchen. When I offered to help with dinner, my parents refused. So I wound up in my room, lip-synching the words to a Rufus Wainwright song until Kira flew in.
“Good evening!” she trilled, hugging me and kissing me passionately. “I forgot to do my Daily Test today while you were at my house, so…”
“So, are you still a lesbian?” I asked her.
She nodded, sitting by me, “Either that or you’re a bad kisser.”
“Which isn’t exactly possible.” I winked.
Kira smiled at my stereo, “Is this Across the Universe? Rufus Wainwright?”
My nod confirmed it.
“Oh-Em-Gee! But after this, Britney? I need some ‘If U Seek Amy’ action.” Kira winked.
I rolled my eyes, grinning, “Whatever. What about Leona Lewis? That leaked song…?”
“And I keep telling you that damn voice is not Leona.”
“She’s using her lower register.”
“Oh, puh-leeze.”
“Kira, your falsetto makes you sound like you’re part of Alvin and the Chipmunks.”
“Which is a good thing,” Kira scowled at me.
“Admittedly, yes, but it makes you sound different.” I scowled back.
“But when I used the whistle register for the entire bridge in ‘Hope’, I still sounded like me. And remember that night I did it and I had a cold. I sounded different. Plus, that was the whistle register, which is way harder and higher than a falsetto, and thus a different texture than a simple falsetto.”
“That’s your opinion.”
“Which could be translated in hard, cold, smart-ass logic that is unbeatable. And I am telling you the damn voice is not Leona Lewis.”
I changed the subject, “My aunt came over today.”
“Uh-huh?” Kira started picking at a hole in her jeans.
“She wasn’t in the study.”
That coerced her in an eyebrow raise, “Uh-huh…”
“And she left when I came in.”
Kira’s lips pursed, “You think she was talking about you?”
“Or something related to me.”
Kira cocked a brow, “You really think so?”
“I don’t know.”
“Well, ask your parents!”
I scoffed, “Like they would actually answer.”
“You never know, Justin.”
I changed the subject, “Are you staying over tonight?”
“Duh. Unless you decided you were straight and wanted to fuck me, no thanks.”
“No, I’m still gay.”
Kira poked her tongue at me, grinning, “Good.”
--
Dinner was a silent affair, with Kira chattering away about this latest development with PFLAG or that “totally gay car I saw the other day.” My mom kept darting me glances, something shifting behind her eyes that was unreadable. Dad, however, was stuck on Kira, his face a comical combination of skeptics and fascination.
After dinner, she pulled me to the piano, saying, “I think I finally found a smooth melody for the lyrics you wrote last week.”
“Which one?” I replied as I sat beside her.
“You’ll see,” was all she said before she touched her fingers to the keys. A slow, luxuriant blues-tinged ballad wove its lazy way in my ears. Then Kira started singing.
Unlike almost all of the Celine Dion wannabes in the greater Seattle area, Kira Wise was trained and she had talent. Like unbeatable, amazing talent. Before she moved to Mercer Island, she said, she’d been trained at an excellent arts school in musical areas. She told me she’d been trained in opera before making the switch to rock, plus she’d gotten credibility for being a near-unbeatable composer. Her only weak spot was lyrics.
Hence where I’d come in. She’d enlisted in the creative writing class junior year and when she’d heard my prose, she’d asked me if I could write lyrics.
“Yeah, I love writing them.” I’d replied.
“Can you give me some?” she’d asked.
The next morning, she had pulled me in the music room and proceeded to knock me out with an amazing melody for the first actual song I’d written.
Now her voice was intense, with that playfully dramatic touch that could shed light on a death-metal song. Kira called it “the Wise signature.”
And she never ceased to amaze me, especially now when she stretched out the vibrato-laden note at the end of the bridge.
I smiled, “It’s perfect.”
Kira smiled back, “Any more for me?”
“Only a couple of half-finished drafts.”
“Well, finish them soon, or I’ll have to start writing my own lyrics.”
We continued to joke around until almost 11 PM. Mom instructed both of us to get ready for bed.
“Wait, hang on, Justin,” she stopped me in my tracks. “Can I talk to you?”
