Jane's Harmony (Jane's Melody #2) by Ryan Winfield Read Free Book Online Page A

behind them. It reminded Jane of livestock being moved at the fair. Next, they were corralled into a windowless room and asked to sit and wait again. Caleb leaned forward with his elbows resting on his knees and his chin resting on his hands, an unnatural pose for him. Jane sat beside him and gently rubbed his back. She wanted to encourage him somehow, if she could only find the right words, but she decided that maybe it was best to just let him feel whatever he was feeling.
    Jane looked around the room. You could tell the musicians from their families because the musicians were all nervous. Some had their heads bowed. Others were silently mouthing their lyrics, as if worried they might forget them. A few cocky ones were bouncing around and jabbering on about how they couldn’t wait to get to the live show. One nervous punk rock girl with a black lace dress and sparkly red shoes had a large plastic clock hanging around her neck, and she kept holding it up in front of her face and closing one eye and looking at it, as if she might be late for something.
    Everyone froze when the door opened.
    An energetic man entered and called for all the musicians to come with him. Caleb stood and picked up his guitar.
    Jane threw her arms around him. “I’m proud of you.”
    “But I haven’t done anything yet,” he replied, kissing the top of her head.
    She pulled back and looked into his green eyes. “Yes, you have.”
    Caleb smiled at her and she knew that he would be just fine. He glanced back before leaving, and Jane gave him two thumbs up. He grinned and walked through the door.
    Several minutes later, a woman came and took the family and friends out to an area not far from the soundstage marked off with yellow ropes. She ordered them to silence their cell phones and be quiet. Several LCD monitors showed what the stage looked like on camera, and Jane had to admit that it was a slick set—the panel of judges sitting in an elevated and ornate theater box looking down on the polished and gleaming stage backed by a wall of old-fashioned bulb lights that spelled out the show’s name. But when Jane looked away from the monitor, the perfectly framed camera shot disappeared and she saw it for the illusion that it was—the walls propped up by ugly metal stands, the flimsy false ceiling hung from wires, the makeup artists standing just off camera with their powder and brushes ready. So this was what you didn’t see on TV.
    “Everyone quiet on the set! Three, two, one, rolling.”
    Even though they could see the actual stage from where they were standing, Jane and everyone else turned to watch the screens. The young girl with the clock around her neck trotted out onto the stage first. Jane couldn’t believe it, but she was actually chewing bubble gum.
    “Well, hello,” one of the judges said. “What’s your name, young lady?”
    “Amanda,” she said meekly. “But people call me Panda.”
    “Okay, Panda,” the judge said. “You don’t happen to have the time, do you, dear?”
    She shook her head no, and all the judges laughed. Her cheeks turned as red as her shoes, and she looked down at her clock and then at the stage. She was obviously nervous.
    “Where are you from, Panda?”
    “Selma, Texas.”
    “And you’re going to sing a cappella for us today?”
    “Yes, sir.”
    “Well, you’ve got five pairs of ears here dying to hear it.”
    The girl was still looking down at the stage as she took the gum from her mouth and wedged it behind her ear. Then she began to quietly hum. When she finally looked up, her mouth opened wider than any mouth Jane had ever seen, and she let loose a note that shook the house. The song she sang was almost operatic, and Jane could hardly understand a word, but the emotion of it was unmistakably beautiful. While she was singing, her crazy clothes and her clock seemed to fade away with her shyness and she was transformed into something else entirely, as if she belonged to her voice rather than