We Are Inevitable by Gayle Forman (read aloud txt) 📕

melancholy.” She takes a breath. “Made me think of you.”

“Because I’m beautiful or melancholy?”

“Stop fishing.” She plays the song. The melody must seep out of the earbuds because as the music fills my head, Hannah dances her fingers through the air, as if she’s tracing the invisible arc of the notes.

When the track ends, she says, “That might be one of my perfect songs too.”

“How do you know when a song is perfect?”

“When it Beethoven’s Anvils you.”

“What’s Beethoven’s Anvil? Aside from your band’s name.”

“It’s the title of a book.”

“You named your band after a book?”

“Not the book so much as the phenomenon the book describes.”

“Which is?”

“Well, the book is written by a jazz musician. And it’s his attempt to understand why the brain reacts to music so powerfully, so primally. And it all boils down to how when we play or listen to music, we enter a communal experience. We vacate our ego and become, I dunno, part of the music. It sounds hokey, but to me, when I hear a perfect song, that’s exactly what happens. Everything else just disappears, all there is in the world is just me and the music.”

In the moment that follows, everything I hear—the slap of the tire treads against the pavement, the squeak of the speaker casters against the metal truck floor, the beat of my swelling heart—has a beat to it. I can’t find to a way to explain how I feel but words can’t contain it. Maybe only music can.

“Hannah,” Claudia calls. “We’re nearing the border. Better come up front.”

“Okay. I’ll leave you with this,” Hannah says, handing me her phone. “The songs will get you home.”

There must be a queue to cross the border because the van slows to a near stop. I listen to the next song, and the one after that. I can’t tell if they’re perfect or not. But they do help me quiet my doomsday worrywart.

The van lurches forward just as I hear a familiar fluty riff, the opening notes to a song I know so well. “This Must Be the Place,” by Talking Heads. The song Mom started every morning listening to. The song that was playing on Ira’s radio when Mom almost ran away from him. The song that made her stop and turn around.

It wasn’t just that Talking Heads were, still are, Mom’s favorite band. It wasn’t just that she was in fact hitching home from a musical festival they’d played at. It was the song itself. As David Byrne sang, Home is where I want to be, but I guess I’m already there, Mom felt like he was talking to her. Telling her this man would bring her home.

Hannah put this song on my perfect-song list. This is the song that’s playing as we cross the border. This is the song that brings me home.

After we are safely back in the United States, Hannah rushes back to me, pushing away the bass amp. Her face is flushed and hopeful and beautiful, and when I see her, it’s like my insides are turned out, like if she touches me, I will hemorrhage feelings.

I pull her toward me. The moment our lips touch, everything goes quiet, everything recedes. All there is in the world is just me and Hannah.

It is the Beethoven’s Anvil of kisses.

The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Starting and Running a Coffee Bar

I’m dreaming of Sandy. I’m in his room, amid his peeling band posters, his cork wall of ticket stubs from every show he went to, his corner workshop of turntables. His bed is unmade, as it was that morning. His boxer shorts are half in, half out of the hamper, as they were that morning. His face is blue, like it was that morning. Only unlike that morning, Sandy is alive. He’s playing records for me, in a way that he never did in real life. One track after the other. He’s bouncing to the beat, talking to me. But I can’t hear the music. No matter how hard I listen. And I can’t hear what Sandy is saying to me. No matter how I hard I listen.

I wake, utterly disoriented. In a short time I’ve become used to the whine of the table saw, the rifle pow of the nail gun, the Lumberjacks’ low-fi bickering. But today there’s none of that. It’s like the quiet of the dream has trailed me to the waking world.

Downstairs in the shop, Ira sips his tea while Chad quietly works on his laptop. They aren’t talking but there’s something about them, a warmth, as if they’ve known each other for years, not weeks.

“Good morning, sunshine!” Chad says when he sees me.

“Good morning,” I say.

“Afternoon is more accurate,” Ira notes. “It’s past noon.”

“It is?” I ask, rubbing my eyes. “Why didn’t you wake me?”

“Chad said you had a big night.” Ira closes the book in his lap. It’s not one of his West Indian novels but one of those Idiot’s Guides we used to sell so many copies of. This one is called The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Starting and Running a Coffee Bar. “Did you have fun?”

“I did,” I say, warming at the memory. I look around. “Where are the guys?”

“Off scavenging for parts for Lady Gaga,” Ira says.

“What are you two up to?” I ask.

“Chad’s working on the inventory,” Ira says. “And I’m getting ready to meet Bev for support group.”

“Tai chi,” Chad reminds him. “Support group is tomorrow.”

“Right. Tai chi.” Ira reaches for his coat.

“Did you take your Lexapro?” Chad asks.

Ira knuckles himself on the forehead. “I did not. Thanks for reminding me. Now, where did I leave the bottle?”

“In your pocket,” Chad says.

“Right,” Ira says. “Thank you, Chad.”

“Anytime, Mr. Stein.”

“Please call me Ira.”

“Sure thing, Mr. Stein.”

After Ira leaves, Chad turns to me. “Are your dad and Bev boning? Or whatever the old person version of boning is?”

“Thanks for the image, Chad.” I watch