Chapter 3 - The Ghost in the Melody
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The song swept into its chorus, the accordion and the upright bass weaving together in a slow, rolling rhythm that filled the high-ceilinged room.
Henry turned Rosie gently, keeping his steps short and measured. But inside his mind, he was no longer in the Willow Creek Elementary gymnasium.
He was twenty-four years old again, standing in a small frame house on the other side of the county, wearing a suit he had rented for thirty dollars. He was holding the hands of a young woman with dark hair and bright, laughing eyes—a woman named Sarah, who had loved this exact melody more than any other song in the world.
“If you ever lose me, Henry,” she had told him once, laughing as they spun around a rugless living room, “just listen for the clarinet. I’ll be right there.”
Sarah had been gone for twenty years. A sudden illness had taken her in the winter of 2004, leaving Henry with a half-built house, a stack of unpaid hospital bills, and a heart he had carefully encased in iron and concrete. He had never danced again. He had never listened to that song again.
Until tonight.
He looked down at Rosie. Her cheeks had regained their color, pink and warm under the gym’s fluorescent lights. The tears that had threatened to spill from her dark eyes were gone, replaced by a fierce, concentrated focus as she tried to keep her feet moving in time with his.
"You're doing very well," Henry said softly.
"I haven't stepped on your shoes once," she noted proudly.
"Even if you did, these boots wouldn't feel a thing," Henry replied.
At that moment, the heavy double doors at the back of the auditorium rattled against their wooden wedge and swung open. Cold air rushed into the warm room, sweeping across the floor and lifting the hem of Rosie’s faded blue dress.
A woman stood in the threshold.
May you like
She was breathless, her hair damp from the cold rain that had just started falling outside. She wore a stained green canvas jacket over a dark uniform, and her hands were raw and red from working outdoors.
Laura Parker stood in the doorway, her heart in her throat, searching the crowded floor for the small girl she had failed to reach on time.
