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100% written and illustrated by kids ages 6-13

Music


By

Let It Be

Nothing would ever be the same Kate had floated in and out of consciousness for days after the accident. She would occasionally wake to hear her parents conversing nervously with the hospital doctors. The voices were hushed, the tones grave. Kate dreamt of car crashes over and over again. She repeatedly saw the impact of the SUV smashing into her side of the car, and she remembered everything going black. Over and over she had the car dream, and she would scream, but no one could hear her. There was nothing she could do to keep from being hit. After days of drifting in and out of consciousness, Kate finally awoke. She strained her vocal chords, calling for someone, anyone. Her mother was right by her side, stroking her forehead, whispering kind words. “Mom,” Kate struggled to smile. “Oh, Kate, I knew you would make it, I knew you would!” Kate’s mother tenderly hugged her daughter. “Am I going to be OK, Mom? Is anything broken?” Kate’s mother, Denise, sniffled. “Honey, I… I have to call your dad. I’ll be right back.” “Mom, wait! You didn’t answer…” It was too late. Denise was gone. *          *          * Denise hurried outside and got in her car. She didn’t start it; she just sat there and stared at the rain rolling down the car’s windshield. Denise started to sob, and her hands shook as she dialed her home phone number. Her husband was probably asleep, since he had spent nearly the whole night at Kate’s bedside. Denise listened as the phone rang once, twice, three times— “Hello?” “Oh, David, thank God.” “Is everything all right? Denise? What’s the matter, honey?” “Kate woke up.” “Dear, that’s marvelous! I’ll be there right away. Why are you crying? Is something wrong?” “I can’t tell her, David. She’ll be crushed when she finds out her arm was amputated. Her life will never be the same. Kate asked me if she was all right, and I didn’t have the heart to tell her… especially after she had just woken up.” “I’ll be right there.” *          *          * Kate was horrified after she heard how upset her mother was. Was something wrong with her? Sure, she felt like she had just been crushed by a tractor-trailer, but that was to be expected. Kate tried to sit up so she could take stock of her surroundings and look at herself, but she didn’t have the strength to do it. Trying to hold back her tears of fear, Kate waited for her mother to return. Kate’s parents finally came in, accompanied by a nurse and a doctor. The adults looked somber, and Kate’s mom had obviously been crying. “Katelyn…” The doctor checked something on a clipboard he had with him. “Kate,” she corrected. Kate hated being called by her full name, as it sounded much too formal for a fun-loving girl like her. “Kate.” The doctor cleared his throat. “You were in quite an accident. You seem to be a fighter, but there was some permanent damage done.” Kate sucked in her breath nervously. “What’s wrong with me?” “Your left arm suffered some horrible damage during the crash. Glass penetrated your arm deeply, and you were bleeding badly. The only way to save you was to amputate your arm at the elbow.” Kate suddenly felt nauseated and dizzy. It couldn’t be true, could it? She’d never be able to do the simplest tasks like put on a shirt or pick up a large object. Kate would be an outcast, a weirdo, for the rest of her life. Nothing would ever be the same. *          *          * After an extended stay in the hospital, Kate was allowed to go home. Although she was glad to be home, Kate felt like she was drowning in a huge ocean with no way out. Nothing seemed fun anymore, and there was no reason to be happy. Some people said she was suffering from depression; others said she was just in shock and would eventually get over it. Kate felt like she couldn’t do anything for herself and that she was a baby again. Her mother had to help her dress, which humiliated poor Kate to tears. Fortunately, it was summer so Kate didn’t have to be seen by her peers. She rarely left the house for fear people would see her and stare. Kate felt like a freak, and she would have given anything to change what happened the night of the accident. One dull day much like the rest, Denise entered Kate’s room to find her trying to make a friendship bracelet from a collection of colorful strings. Kate was failing miserably at making the bracelet onehanded, and she was starting to become very agitated at finding that she couldn’t do something she enjoyed. “Why don’t you take a break, Kate?” Denise sat on the floor next to her daughter, brushing Kate’s hair away from her face. “Go for a walk, and get some fresh air. I don’t think being cooped up in this house is good for you.” “I don’t want to,” Kate mumbled sullenly. Her mother knew she didn’t like leaving the house, so why was she making her? “It’ll be good for you, Kate. Just walk around the block. It’ll calm you down. Please, honey? Do it for me.” Kate groaned when she realized she didn’t have a choice in the matter. She stood and said, “I’ll go around the block. Once. Then I’m coming in.” Kate left the house, turning left. Her sneakers crunched the gravel, and she realized she enjoyed the scent of the fresh air. Although dark rain clouds obscured the sky, Kate cherished the smell of the rain that was to come. Soon Kate found herself taking a long route around the neighborhood. She was about to turn around and come home when the heavens opened up and rain poured forth. The wind whipped the rain against Kate’s face, which she tried to shield with


By

Moonlight Waltz

Every note was a treasure, a gold flake making its way downstream “Kalie, have you practiced your flute yet?” My mother’s voice squeezed under my bedroom door and rang in my ears. “Not yet…” I answered. I knew what was coming next. “Well, do it now. Dinner’s in twenty minutes, and I know you want to watch TV before you go to bed, so you’d better get practicing or you’ll miss your program.” I let out an exasperated sigh and slammed my book shut. I didn’t argue with her, but I wasn’t going to practice willingly either. See, both my parents are musicians. My mom’s a singer and plays a little piano. She’s been singing since she was a little girl. She had her first performance on open mike night at the Candy Bowl downtown when she was nine. Everybody loved her, and she made her first record when she was twenty-six. She met my father at the recording studio, playing guitar and mandolin for her song, “Bridge to Nowhere.” I’ve heard the story of how they fell in love so many times, I’ve memorized it by now. It always ends in the studio, with my mom telling me, “It was love at first sight, naturally. Eight years later we got married, right there in that studio on the very day my second album was released.” Then she and my dad exchange loving looks, and then she says the last line, which is the one I dread the most: “And now, here you are, going to carry on in our footsteps!” But I think they got their hopes up a little too high. Because, to tell the truth, the one thing I hate most in the world is playing my flute. My parents decided that four was the appropriate age to get me started on an instrument, so they took me to a bunch of concerts with different instruments like guitars and pianos and violins and stuff. I think that the only reason I picked the flute was because that was the only concert I wasn’t napping through. It looked easy for the performers up there on stage. They just blew into their instrument and—voila!—out came a chorus of beautiful, soothing tones. Unfortunately, playing the flute really isn’t that easy. I couldn’t get my lips into the right position, and even when I could, when I tried to blow a note, it came out sounding like, well, someone was blowing air through a piece of metal. Which is to say, incorrect. My parents encouraged me throughout all my toil and tantrums. They never gave up hope in me, but sometimes I caught them exchanging worried glances back and forth. When I saw those glances I knew that I would never be good at the flute, no matter how hard I practiced. I would never perform on stage in front of an audience, and even if I got the chance, they would probably boo me off stage. Sorry, Mom, I thought sadly, sorry, Dad. I guess your daughter’s just not turning out what you want her to be. With a groan, I slouched off my bed and took my flute case down from the shelf. I opened it up, rubbed the red velvet lining for good luck like always, and then took out the shiny silver pieces of my flute and carefully assembled them. Then I went and stood in the corner of my room reserved for practicing, ignoring the numerous posters of famous musicians I barely knew the names of, all of them wearing weird-looking wigs, with slogans like, “Beethoven Would Have Applauded for You!” I snorted. Fat chance. I stood in front of my music stand and flipped through my book of tunes. I scanned the pages, reading the names off out loud. “Sweetwater Serenade,” “Angel Promenade,” “Fairy Ring,” “The Velvet Slipper Tune.” I had attempted to play them all, failing each one worse than the last. Finally, I decided on “The Velvet Slipper Tune,” just to get it over with and because it looked like it had the easiest notes. I raised the cold metal of the flute to my lips and tentatively blew the first note. It sounded too breathy and kind of high pitched. Whoops, I had gotten the fingering wrong. Frustrated, I positioned my fingers right and began to play the tune, greatly aware of the fact that I sounded a bit sharp. Who cared? Not me. Not bothering to fix the problem, I played on. The end of the piece was a little wobbly, but whatever. There. It was over with. And just in time, too. “Ka-lie! Din-ner!” my mom called up the stairs. She rapped on the ceiling below my bedroom with the broom handle, then fell silent. I hastily disassembled my flute and tucked it away in my case, rubbing the velvet as customary. Shoving the case back on the shelf, I clomped downstairs and into the kitchen, where my mom was just serving my dad chicken pot pie. I plopped down in my seat and spread out a napkin in my lap. I held out my plate expectantly, and my mom put a piece of pie on it. I stuffed my face and washed it down with milk, and had already finished my first piece by the time my parents were halfway through theirs. “How did practicing go?” my dad asked expectantly, as he always did during dinner. “Oh, fine, you know,” I said, serving myself another piece of pie. But it hadn’t been fine, and I had a feeling he knew it. “Would you like to give us a concert after dinner?” “Would you like to give us a concert after dinner?” my mom asked, daintily spearing a piece of chicken on her fork. It wasn’t just a question, that much I knew. It was my doom. Guiltily, I nodded. Just wait until they heard how awful I was, not that they didn’t already know. But every time I


By

Memories and Beginnings

“Maggie, this is Miss Tania, your new piano teacher” The doorbell’s ring still echoed in my head. I stood on the third step of the stairs that led up to the bedrooms and leaned my body all the way out. That way I could see the mirror that hung in the foyer next to the front door. I heard Mom wheel the rolling chair back from the computer and walk to the door. My older sister, Alexa Kate, ran from the den to join her, her sandy hair flying. Through the mirror, I saw Mom open the door and smile as a young lady stepped briskly in. From the open window in the kitchen, the fragrant scent of honeysuckle and lilac drifted across the house and tickled my nose. Memories came flooding back. Grandma’s sweet, laughing face creased with wrinkles, her wispy white hair framing her face perfectly. The way she threw back her head and laughed, as she, Alexa Kate, and I made cookies, or picked dandelions and sent our wishes to the wind. The way she would scold us, shaking her finger and looking stern, but the merry twinkle in her eyes always betrayed her. The way her body swayed as she sat on the piano bench and played her whole heart out. Beethoven, Brahms, Bach, she played them all. She had taught Alexa Kate and me to play, too. We would sit in the living room and laugh and play and laugh some more. Whenever we couldn’t get a piece right, she would always say, “Learn to like the music, and the music will learn to like you. Music only plays right for happy fingers. So have fun, and it will come!” But now Grandma was gone, and Mom had found another piano teacher to take her place. “Maggie!” Mom’s voice drew me reluctantly to the foyer, where I stood behind Alexa Kate, trying to hide. The lady smiled at me, her short brown hair bobbing. With her flowery skirt and blouse, she seemed right at home. Mom continued. “Maggie, this is Miss Tania, your new piano teacher.” She turned to Miss Tania. “Well, I guess I should let you get started? Which one of you girls wants to go first?” I did not raise my hand. Let Alexa Kate go first. She and I were only eighteen months apart, but we were completely different. She was not scared of anything. Why did I have to get the timid genes? The living room was just to the right of the front door, marked off by the couches. The old upright piano that Grandma had brought with her stood in the corner, crowned by an antique lamp and a photograph of Grandma, Alexa Kate, and me. Alexa Kate skipped over to the piano. Miss Tania followed, with a large, bulging bag. She dropped promptly onto the chair next to the bench. The chair that Grandma had always sat in. “Alexa Kate,” she said it with a lilting accent, “what have you been working on?” My sister picked up one of the faded yellow books that had been Grandma’s. “I just started practicing Heller’s ‘Study in A Minor, op. 47, no. 3.’” “Ah,” Miss Tania nodded knowingly. “Why don’t you play it for me?” Alexa Kate seated herself on the piano bench as comfortably as ever. Soon a lilting melody wafted through the house, Miss Tania humming along with a funny tone. I swallowed and raced upstairs to my room. Thirty minutes passed, and I lay on my bed, dreading my lesson. *          *          * “Maaa-ggie!” It was Alexa Kate. . “It’s your turn!” I forced my feet to tread down the stairs, into the living room. Alexa Kate breezily passed me, whispering, “She’s fun.” Even more fun than Grandma? I sat stiffly down on the piano bench and managed a lousy smile. Miss Tania smiled her sweetest grin. “Hello, Maggie. What are you playing?” I pulled out another music book that was falling apart. “Rameau, ‘Minuet in G minor.’” The teacher nodded in approval. I set the book up on the stand. My fingers found the keys. Slowly, I began to play, her eyes boring into me. Before I knew it, I was done. Miss Tania applauded me heartily. “Well done, Maggie! You are doing everything very well: the dynamics, the rhythm, the technique. Only the tempo needs to be faster. And—relax.” She reached over and gave my shoulders a little massage. It tickled. “You need to be completely comfortable. It doesn’t work if you can play the music perfectly; you have to have feeling, yet. Feel the music, Maggie.” I bit my lip. How could I enjoy myself when Grandma was gone and Miss Tania was watching me instead? Miss Tania reached down and retrieved a glossy new music book. “Here,” she said, flipping it open and giving it to me, “I want you to play this.” I stared at the swarming sea of black dots. Sharps, flats, cadenzas, trills: this piece was fraught with danger. I looked at the title of the piece. “Summer Memories, Part One.” More like Summer Horrors. “I’ve never played this kind of music before,” I stammered. “Only these.” I gestured to the pile of worn-out books on the table beside us. “Only classical? Well, it’s time you start trying other styles of music. Variety is good for you. This is modern music. It looks intimidating, I know, but once you get the hang of it, it will be fun! Come on, try it.” I set “Summer Memories” on the stand on top of Rameau. “Very slowly now, just to get a feel,” Miss Tania advised. Hesitantly, I placed my hands on the keyboard and dived into the world of unknown. It was a nightmare. I had to stop after almost every note, find the next one, make sure I had them all correct, then carefully press down the keys. Worst of all, the piece was six pages long! The longest I’ve