Finn tried to not let her disappointment show on her face. Her news would have to wait. “Uhh, sorry. I wasn’t feeling well.”
“So you ran… here?”
Finn shrugged. Nothing she could say would sufficiently explain her strange behavior, so she didn’t even try. Steve, mercifully, didn’t press her. “Want to head back to the party? I saved you girls each a piece of cake.”
“Sounds good.” Finn stood, swiped the dirt off her dress, then held out a hand to Zadie. As she helped her sister to her feet, Finn leaned in and whispered, “Let’s talk more tonight. Over Froyo?”
Her sister examined her curiously, then said, “Uhh… sure.”
“Meet me there at eight.”
As they wound their way through the man-made rainforest toward the exit, Finn began to hum. It was the song she recognized from her echo but couldn’t place at first. Then lyrics started coming to her one line at a time like brushstrokes:
Hush, darling, hush
It’s almost dawn
It was a ballad her mother used to sing to her.
The birds are singing
I must move on
“I can’t.”
“Just one song. Please?”
Zadie and Finn were seated across from each other at a clear acrylic table next to the karaoke stage where a man was clumsily detangling a microphone cord. The room was humid with hazy pinklight cast by neon letters that spelled words likedanceandstar. The Fro-Yodel was a little on the seedy side for a frozen yogurt place, partly because of its location right next to the railroad tracks. It was in the girls’ old neighborhood, twenty minutes north of San Antonio, where they’d lived with their mother. Every Friday night, the three of them used to walk the four blocks to listen to terrible karaoke and take turns pulling the dispenser levers, marveling as frozen yogurt coiled like snakes in their bowls.
After loading up on toppings, Nora would sometimes embarrass them by hopping up onstage and belting out one of Janis Joplin’s greatest hits. Her voice would crack like the strip of sunbaked earth that was the girls’ driveway, but that just made it sound more rock ’n’ roll. Finn remembered men sometimes leaning their elbows on the edge of the stage as she sang. As soon as she was finished, they’d ask to buy her a beer at the bar across the street. Nora refused most of them, but to a select few, she’d write her phone number on the back of a napkin and say, “Rain check.” Then she’d return to their table, to her girls, because that’s why she was there, to be with them, to hear about their days and laugh at their jokes and play Psychic Karaoke.
The game was simple: Zadie would use her gift to try to predict the next song in the karaoke lineup. If she got three correct in a row, Nora would reward her daughter with another trip to the soft-serve machine or extra toppings.
“I don’t play that anymore,” Zadie said matter-of-factly, licking yogurt off the back of her spoon.
Finn sighed. “What’s the point in having an awesome talent if you never use it? I’d trade mine for yours any day.”
“Yeah, well, if I could give it to you, I would.”
“Speaking of giving things away, are you gonna finish that?” Finn pointed to Zadie’s half-eaten frozen yogurt.
“Nope. Go for it.” Zadie pushed the bowl to her sister, who received it with a little happy dance, then asked, “Will you tell me what mine sounds like?”
Psychic Karaoke wasn’t the only game the girls used to play at the Fro-Yodel. The other relied on Finn’s skills. “Gimme a minute.” She spooned Zadie’s yogurt into her mouth but did not swallow. Instead, she let it turn to fruity liquid on her tongue and waited.
Finn remembered the first time her mom had taken her to the Fro-Yodel. She was sloppily eating chocolate yogurt with gummy worms when a song got so viciously stuck in her head that she dropped her spoon on the floor. “The yogurt tastes like music!” she gasped. As a kid, Finn was prone to silly outbursts, so her mom probably thought nothing of it, but over the next few months, her proclamations became more and more specific:
“This one tastes like jazz!”
“This one tastes like a banjo!”
“This one tastes like the drum solo from ‘In the Air Tonight’!”
Each Friday, Finn would eagerly anticipate what music she’d “taste” later that night. She wasn’t sure why the Fro-Yodel triggered so many musical memories. Her best guess was that they were linked to whoever had made it that day. However, it was more fun to pretend that the yogurt itself was singing to her.
“Well?” Zadie had been waiting on Finn for almost a minute.
Finn silently asked for more time by holding up an index finger. A few more seconds passed; then a song began playing in her head. It was in another language—French, maybe—with an accordion and what she thought was a washboard.