LITMIR.BIZ

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With that, she sashayed away, knowing he appreciated the view no matter what his church taught.

      “Inhuman bitch,” Earl called after her.

      Inside the ballroom, many kids were talking, some dancing to canned music, others mingling and joking around. Many were clustered around the table with soft drinks and the table with munchies. Jade Blossom spotted Cesar in the crowd, now wearing a black suit that was too small and tight, a white shirt, and a plain blue necktie that made him more nerdy than before.

      He was running his hand over the polished black surface of the grand piano. Most of his peers were casually dressed in teen styles she found silly but genuine. She decided Lara must have bought Cesar his ill-fitting suit.

      This time, the kids accepted her presence. Many of them watched her but no one interfered as she worked her way toward Cesar. She came up behind him as he looked at his slightly elongated reflection in the top of the piano.

      “Waiting for your date?” Jade Blossom asked, projecting her voice over the buzz of the crowd.

      Startled, Cesar whirled around. “Uh, hi.”

      “Why aren’t you hitting on girls?”

      “I suppose they’re avoiding me because of you.”

      “Okay, I’m your date. But what’s so fascinating about your own face?”

      “I want a human girlfriend! Someday, I mean.”

      “Someday!” Jade Blossom laughed. “Someday never comes, Cesar.”

      She looked out over the crowd. Rustbelt was across the room, his big jaw moving up and down as he talked to Rubberband in his signature slouch. Near one wall, she spotted a girl who fit the description of the joker piano player Cesar had mentioned. Her body looked like it was formed of large and small piano keys, hard and white in modular rectangles connected by hinges large and small. She had an exoskeleton, Jade Blossom had said to Cesar. In her case, this meant a chiseled white face with dark eyes, softened only by lush chestnut hair that reached her ivory-white shoulders. A green dress of modest length hung on her body, revealing more hard angles under the fabric.

      As Cesar eyed Jade Blossom, she nodded toward the keys of the grand piano. “Show me your stuff. You’re my date, damn it. Try to make a good impression on me.”

      “Why would I care what a diseased mutant thinks?”

      “You have any other girls begging to take my place?”

      He frowned but settled himself on the bench and started playing, even with the canned music coming through speakers and the growing buzz of conversation.

      She leaned down close. “Keep at it, dude, and I’ll be right back.” She ran her manicured nails along the back of his scalp for encouragement, but he flinched at the contact.

      When Jade Blossom reached Marissa she didn’t bother with niceties. “Don’t you want to play?”

      “I do play,” said Marissa, as her mouth made rigid vertical movements. “Pleased to meet you, Jade Blossom.”

      “I know you are.”

      Jade Blossom nodded toward Cesar. “Is that guy any good?”

      Marissa shrugged, her modular shoulders going up, slightly sideways, then moving in reverse. “I guess we’re all pretty good.”

      “Show us what you got,” said Jade Blossom.

      “What? You mean, now?”

      “Come on, joker girl. Have you got anything or not?”

      “Where the hell do you get off talking that way?” Marissa demanded. “Are you always a super-bitch?”

      “I’m a sweetheart.” Jade Blossom batted her eyes.

      Instead of responding, Marissa watched Cesar at the piano for a moment. Then she walked toward him, maneuvering awkwardly through the crowd.

      Jade Blossom followed.

      Cesar was toying with the keys, gazing out at the crowd in front of him.

      “Can you play or not?” Jade Blossom demanded, as she came up behind him. She began raising her density, sure that Cesar might try to walk away.

      “What?” When Cesar saw Marissa timidly sit down on one end of the bench, he rose to his feet. “Hey! I’m not playing with a joker!”

      Jade Blossom’s density had reached granite level. She placed her heavy hands gently on his shoulders and bent her knees slightly. Her weight slammed Cesar back down on the bench. “You’re my date, remember? Pretend you’re trying to get in my pants. Well, my thong.”

      Cesar glanced once more at Marissa, who pointedly looked down at her fingers on the keys in front of her. In a sitting position, her green dress clung even more to the sharp edges and angles of her body.

      Cesar suddenly started a fast, complex piece.

      Jade Blossom knew very little about classical music, but this had nothing to do with jazz. She believed it was a composition by Johann Sebastian Bach, but in any case, Cesar was showing off. Jade Blossom had challenged him and he was responding.

      The kids nearby turned to watch and listen.

      Marissa began playing. At first she watched Cesar’s hands, but quickly found what she wanted. Her hard, white, rectangular fingers matched the white piano keys.

      Jade Blossom listened and realized that Marissa was not just keeping up, but harmonizing.

      Cesar made an abrupt change. Suddenly he was playing a mid-tempo atonal piece, leaving Marissa behind.

      Jade Blossom finally got it—Cesar had no interest in impressing her. He was trying to embarrass Marissa. The little snot was angry about Marissa joining him, so he wanted her to look bad in front of all their fellow musicians. In return, Marissa was showing her stuff. Jade Blossom knew next to nothing about atonal music but she could see that their fast hand motions were precise.

      Against the far wall, the slender, very pretty six-footer was talking to the guy covered in peach fuzz. Others in the crowd drifted toward the piano, interested in the impromptu performance. A moment later, the canned music stopped.

      Marissa made the next move. She began a tune that Jade Blossom actually knew; her mother had listened to a lot of British-invasion-era rock music and this was “The House of the Rising Sun,” bluesy and wailing.

      Cesar hesitated, then followed her lead to the song.

      Jade Blossom heard him improvising and saw that Marissa responded in kind.

      The other kids were swaying, dancing, talking, and laughing. Many, though not all, were obviously tipsy, on drinks they must have smuggled into the event.

      Jade Blossom swept her skirt out of her way and planted one Jimmy Choo on the piano bench. Then she stepped up onto the deeply polished top of the piano. She danced alone, moving to the jazzy version of the song she had pretty much gotten sick of hearing when she was growing up.

      “Cool, bitch!” One of the boys held up a cell phone and starting taking video.

      “Proud to be both,” Jade Blossom shot back, and gave him a little hip move.

      Cesar settled into the line of music that was traditionally instrumental, down low, working the bass with his left hand and an A-minor chord arpeggio with his right. Marissa was playing the melody that represented the lyrics as the song was usually sung, slowly making it her own.

      Jade Blossom, still dancing and laughing as the kids crammed closer with their cell phones raised, realized that Cesar and Marissa seemed to have reached a musical accommodation.

      Because Jade Blossom wanted to keep the moment between them going, she swayed and waved, moving around a little on the grand piano. She spotted the solemn girl she had noticed earlier. The girl stood close to the piano, watching Jade Blossom without a cell phone, still

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