The Touch - Rewrite

Choir had started to feel different by the end of the week.

Not in a big, noticeable way, but in the small things. I didn’t pause in the doorway anymore. I didn’t scan the room before stepping inside. I just walked in, like I already knew where I was supposed to be.

Most of the Varsity group was already there, voices overlapping in quiet conversation as people settled into place. Chairs shifted against the floor, sheet music rustled, and someone laughed near the back of the room. It wasn’t overwhelming anymore. It was just noise.

I moved toward my usual spot without thinking about it, setting my bag down near the wall before stepping into line. Chad was already there, leaning slightly against the riser as he talked to Samantha. He glanced over when I stepped in and nudged my shoulder as I came up beside him.

“Look who decided to show up,” he said.

“I’m always here,” I replied quietly.

“Yeah,” he said with a small grin. “Now you are.”

I didn’t have a response to that, but I didn’t look away either.

Mrs. Grant clapped her hands once at the front of the room, pulling everyone’s attention toward her. The conversations died down quickly as people shifted into position.

“Alright, let’s get started,” she said. “We’ve only got a few weeks left, and I’d like to not embarrass ourselves at the final performance.”

A few people laughed, but most of us straightened automatically.

“Warm-ups.”

The piano keys sounded clear and steady as she played the first notes, and the room followed almost immediately. Voices rose together, blending in a way that still caught me off guard sometimes. I found my place without thinking, letting my voice fall in line with the others.

It came easier now.

I didn’t have to force it, didn’t have to focus on every breath just to keep going. I stayed with it, steady, letting the sound build around me instead of getting lost in it.

Chad shifted slightly beside me during one of the scales, just enough that his voice lined up more clearly with mine.

“Don’t disappear,” he muttered under his breath.

“I’m not,” I said, quieter but certain.

He didn’t respond, but I saw the corner of his mouth lift slightly.

Mrs. Grant moved them into one of the songs for the end-of-year performance. The music started slower, controlled, each section building into the next. I kept my eyes on the sheet at first, tracking the notes and timing, following the cues I already knew.

But I didn’t stay there.

Somewhere in the middle of the piece, I stopped staring at the paper and listened instead. The voices around me blended together, each part fitting into the next. I could hear Chad just off to my right, steady and consistent, and I adjusted without thinking, letting my voice fall into place with his.

It didn’t feel like guessing anymore.

Mrs. Grant cut us off partway through the final measure, lifting her hand slightly. The sound dropped immediately, leaving the room quiet again.

“Better,” she said, scanning across the group. “Much better.”

Her gaze passed over me briefly before moving on, not lingering, not calling anything out.

We started again.

This time, I didn’t hesitate at all. I followed the rise and fall of the music without second-guessing it, letting my voice carry through the parts I used to hold back on. The sound filled the room, layered and controlled, and I stayed with it all the way through.

By the time rehearsal ended, my voice felt strained in that familiar way, the kind that came from actually using it instead of holding it back. Conversations picked up again almost immediately as people started packing up, the room filling with noise again.

Chad bumped his shoulder into mine as he grabbed his bag. “You didn’t drop out once.”

“I told you I wouldn’t,” I said.

“Yeah,” he replied, glancing at me briefly before looking away. “You’re getting it.”

I picked up my bag and followed him toward the door with the rest of the group, the hallway noise already spilling in as the next period started to take over. Someone near the front mentioned rehearsal schedules and performance dates, voices overlapping as they talked about how close everything was getting.

I caught part of it without really meaning to.

A few weeks.

That was all.

I adjusted my grip on my bag and stepped into the hallway with everyone else, letting the noise carry forward as the next part of the day took over.

Chad was already in his seat when I got to Biology a few days later, his notebook open, pencil spinning lazily between his fingers as he leaned back slightly, talking to someone across the aisle. The moment he noticed me, he straightened just enough to nudge his stuff over, clearing space without saying anything.

I slid into the seat beside him, setting my bag down carefully before pulling out my notebook.

“Cutting it close,” he said, glancing at me.

“I wasn’t late,” I replied.

“Didn’t say you were,” he said with a grin. “Just saying you looked like you were thinking about it.”

I shook my head slightly, but there wasn’t much of a response to that. Mr. Jackson started class a few seconds later, going over cell structures that I had already seen before. Chad followed along easily, writing things down in that same neat handwriting I had noticed the first time we worked together.

About halfway through the period, Mr. Jackson clapped his hands once.

“Alright, partners,” he said. “Same as before. Work through the next section and label everything correctly. I want it clean this time.”

Chad nudged his book toward the middle of the table between us. “Guess that’s us.”

I pulled out my sketchpad without thinking, flipping past a few pages until I found a blank one. Chad noticed immediately.

“You always do that,” he said.

“What?” I asked, glancing up briefly.

“Just pull that out like it’s nothing,” he replied, tapping the edge of the sketchpad lightly. “Most people would be freaking out trying to draw this stuff.”

I shrugged slightly. “It’s easier than writing it.”

“That’s not normal,” he said, though there wasn’t any judgment in it.

We fell into the assignment quickly after that. Chad worked through the descriptions, writing everything out in clean, organized lines while I focused on the drawing itself. The outer membrane came first, then the internal structures, each part layered carefully into place. I adjusted spacing without thinking, leaving room for labels and connections so nothing overlapped in a way that would make it harder to read.

It didn’t take long before I was ahead, but I slowed down anyway. Chad leaned over slightly, comparing what I had drawn to the diagram in the textbook.

“You’re doing it again,” he muttered.

“Doing what?”

“Going overboard,” he said, though he didn’t sound annoyed about it. “This is way more detailed than it needs to be.”

I glanced down at the page, then back at him. “It looks better this way.”

“I’m not arguing that,” he replied quickly. “I’m just saying you’re making the rest of us look bad.”

I let out a quiet breath that almost turned into a laugh before going back to what I was doing.

We worked like that for a while, passing information back and forth without needing to say much. Chad would finish a section, slide his notes toward me, and I’d adjust the diagram to match. I added finer details to the structures—textures, slight variations in shape—just enough to make each part distinct without cluttering the page.

“You ever think about doing something with that?” Chad asked after a few minutes, his voice quieter this time.

I didn’t look up right away. “With what?”

“The art,” he said. “Or the music. Either one. You’re kind of… unfairly good at both.”

My pencil paused just slightly over the page before continuing. “I don’t know.”

“You should,” he said, not pushing it any further than that. “I mean it.”

I nodded faintly, though I wasn’t sure what to do with that.

He didn’t bring it up again. Instead, he shifted the paper slightly and started labeling the parts I had already drawn, his handwriting lining up cleanly with the edges of the diagram. I followed along, connecting each structure with precise lines, making sure everything matched his notes.

By the time we finished, the page looked cleaner than anything else on the tables around us.

Chad leaned back slightly, looking it over. “Yeah… we’re not failing anything this year.”

I glanced at it again before closing the sketchpad halfway.

Mr. Jackson made his way around the room, stopping at each table long enough to look over the work. When he reached ours, he paused a little longer than he had with the others.

“Well,” he said, leaning in slightly. “That is impressive.”

Chad straightened a bit at that, and I looked up.

“This level of detail is exactly what I was hoping to see,” Mr. Jackson continued, tapping lightly near the center of the page. “You didn’t just copy the diagram—you improved it. The separation between these internal structures makes it far easier to follow than the version in the textbook, and the proportions you’ve used actually make the relationships between each part clearer.”

He moved his finger along one of the labeled sections. “You’ve taken something fairly abstract and turned it into a clean, readable representation. That’s not something most students manage at this level.”

Chad glanced over at me briefly before looking back at the page.

“Excellent work, gentlemen,” Mr. Jackson added with a nod. “Keep this up.”

He moved on to the next table, leaving the paper where it was.

Chad let out a small breath. “Okay, yeah… that was more than just ‘looks good.’”

I didn’t say anything right away, just looked back down at the page.

“Told you,” he added, nudging my shoulder lightly.

The bell rang a few minutes later, cutting through the room as everyone started packing up. Chairs scraped against the floor, voices picked back up, and the usual rush toward the door began.

Chad slid his notebook into his bag before glancing over at me. “You heading to Choir next?”

“Yeah,” I said.

“Good,” he replied with a small grin. “Don’t disappear on me in there.”

“I won’t,” I said.

He nodded once, like that settled it, before slinging his bag over his shoulder. We stepped out into the hallway with the rest of the class, the noise rising around us as everyone moved toward their next period, the flow of students carrying us forward without much effort.

Deedra and Sheldon were already at the house by the time I got home.

I had barely made it through the front door before I heard her voice from the living room, loud and animated like she had been there for hours instead of minutes. Sheldon’s quieter responses followed underneath it, steady and patient in a way that somehow kept up with her without trying to match it.

“There he is!” Deedra called the second I stepped into the room. She was stretched out across the couch like she owned it, one arm hanging over the side while she looked at me. “You took forever.”

“I just got out of school,” I said.

“Exactly,” she replied, like that proved her point.

Sheldon glanced over from where he was sitting on the floor near the coffee table, giving me a small nod. “We just got here.”

“That’s not the point,” Deedra said, waving him off before sitting up a little. “We’ve been talking about summer, and you weren’t here, which is a problem.”

I set my bag down near the wall and moved a little further into the room. “Why is that a problem?”

“Because you’re part of this,” she said, like it was obvious. “You don’t just get left out of plans.”

I paused for a second at that, not really sure what to say.

“She’s been planning your life for the next three months,” Sheldon added, not looking up from the notebook in front of him.

“I have not,” Deedra shot back. “I’ve been suggesting things.”

“You told him he’s going to Paris.”

“I said he should come to Paris,” she corrected, turning back to me. “My parents are taking me in July. Like, the actual Paris. Not the fake one.”

“There isn’t a fake one,” Sheldon muttered.

“You know what I mean,” she said, rolling her eyes before looking back at me. “You’d love it. We could go shopping, see all the landmarks, eat real food—”

“I eat real food now,” I said quietly.

She paused for half a second before grinning. “You know what I mean.”

“She’s not wrong about the trip,” Sheldon added, finally looking up. “But I’m not going anywhere. I’ve got soccer camp most of the summer.”

“You love it,” Deedra said.

“That’s not the point,” he replied, though there wasn’t much argument behind it.

I moved over and sat down near the edge of the couch, listening as they went back and forth. Deedra talked about flights, hotels, places she wanted to go like it was already decided. Sheldon cut in occasionally, pointing out things that didn’t make sense or reminding her that not everyone could just leave the country on a whim.

Neither of them seemed to notice how easily they included me in it.

Not like it was a question.

Just… assumed.

“What about you?” Sheldon asked after a minute, glancing over at me. “You got anything planned?”

I hesitated slightly. “Not really.”

“That’s because nobody’s helped you plan anything yet,” Deedra said immediately. “Which is clearly a mistake.”

“I think he’ll survive,” Sheldon said.

“Barely,” she replied.

I let out a small breath that almost turned into a laugh, leaning back slightly as I listened to them keep going. It didn’t feel like something I had to keep up with. I didn’t have to jump in or say the right thing to stay part of it.

I was already part of it.

“Okay, but seriously,” Deedra said after a moment, shifting so she was sitting up properly now. “If you could go anywhere this summer, where would you go?”

The question caught me off guard.

I thought about it for a second longer than I expected to.

“I don’t know,” I said finally.

“That’s not an answer,” she replied.

“It is,” I said.

She narrowed her eyes at me slightly before huffing. “We’re fixing that.”

Sheldon shook his head, but there was a faint smile there. “Good luck with that.”

Deedra ignored him, already launching into another explanation about why traveling was important and how I was apparently missing out on everything by not having plans.

I let her talk.

Sheldon added comments here and there, keeping her grounded just enough that she didn’t completely take over the conversation. The two of them balanced each other in a way that made the room feel full without being overwhelming.

I reached down and pulled my backpack a little closer, unzipping it as they kept going. Homework would come eventually, but for now, I just listened, letting their voices fill the space while the afternoon settled around us.

A few days later, the house was quieter when I got home.

Deedra and Sheldon hadn’t come over that afternoon, and the difference was noticeable the second I stepped inside. The noise was gone, replaced by something softer that made the house feel a little bigger than it had the day before.

Toby was already at the kitchen table, his worksheet spread out in front of him and a pencil clutched tightly in his hand. His brow was scrunched in concentration, his tongue just barely peeking out at the corner of his mouth as he stared down at the problem like it had personally offended him.

I set my bag down on the chair beside him and slid into the seat without saying anything at first.

“You’re doing it wrong,” I said after a second.

“I am not,” Toby shot back immediately, not even looking up.

“You are,” I replied, leaning over slightly to point at the numbers. “You skipped a step.”

He frowned harder at the paper, then finally glanced up at me. “I did not skip a step.”

“Watch,” I said, pulling the paper a little closer.

He leaned in as I worked through the problem slowly, writing each step out so he could follow it. His expression shifted as I went, the frustration easing into something more focused.

“Oh,” he said after a moment. “That makes more sense.”

I handed the pencil back to him. “Try the next one.”

He nodded and went back to the worksheet, his movements slower now, more careful as he worked through it the right way. I stayed where I was for a second before reaching into my bag and pulling out my own homework.

The house stayed quiet for a while, just the sound of pencils moving across paper and the occasional small sigh from Toby when something didn’t click right away.

“Zach?” he said after a few minutes.

“Yeah?”

“When’s your birthday?”

The question caught me off guard.

My pencil hovered over the page for just a second longer than it should have, my grip tightening slightly before I forced it to move again.

“It’s… later,” I said quietly, keeping my eyes on my work.

“When?” Toby asked, looking up at me now.

I shrugged lightly. “Soon.”

He seemed to accept that without thinking too much about it. “Mine’s June twenty-eighth,” he said, sounding a little proud. “I hope I get to have a party.”

I glanced at him. “Yeah?”

He nodded, a small smile forming. “I want to invite my friends from school. And Gavin. And you. And Greg. And Natalie. Everybody.”

“That sounds like a lot of people,” I said.

“It’s supposed to be,” he replied, like that was obvious.

I nodded slightly. “Yeah. It is.”

He grinned and went back to his worksheet like the conversation didn’t matter.

I stared at my paper for a second longer than I should have, the numbers in front of me not quite lining up the way they had before. I pushed the thought away before it could settle, shifting my focus back to the table.

“Hey,” I said, tapping his paper lightly. “You’re doing that one wrong again.”

“I am not,” he argued, though he leaned closer anyway.

“You are,” I said, pointing at the line. “Right there.”

He groaned, but he fixed it.

A knock at the door broke through the quiet a few minutes later.

Toby glanced up but didn’t move. “Someone’s here.”

“I got it,” Natalie called from down the hall.

Her footsteps crossed the house, and a moment later the door opened.

“Hi, Karen,” Natalie said, her tone warm but a little more formal than usual.

“Hi, Natalie,” Karen replied.

I turned slightly in my seat as they stepped into view. Karen gave Natalie a small nod before her attention shifted toward the kitchen.

“Hey, Zachary,” she said when she saw me.

“Hi, Miss Stevens,” I replied.

Toby twisted in his chair the second he heard her voice. “Miss Karen!”

He hopped down and hurried over, stopping just short of her.

Karen smiled softly. “Hey there, Toby.”

“I’m doing homework,” he said quickly.

“I can see that,” she replied.

“I’m helping him,” I added.

Karen’s eyes moved between us briefly. “I can tell.”

Natalie stepped aside, letting Karen come further into the kitchen. “Just a quick check-in?” she asked.

Karen nodded. “Just making sure everything’s settling in the way it should.”

Toby grabbed her hand and pulled her toward the table. “Look, I fixed it,” he said, pointing at his worksheet.

Karen leaned down slightly to look it over, nodding as she followed along. “That’s a big improvement.”

“He’s teaching me,” Toby added with a grin, glancing back at me.

Karen smiled faintly before straightening, her attention shifting back to me for a moment.

“How are you doing, Zachary?” she asked.

“I’m okay,” I said.

She held my gaze just long enough that I knew she was looking for more, but she didn’t push.

“And everything’s going alright here?” she asked, glancing briefly toward Natalie.

“Yes,” Natalie answered calmly. “Everything’s been going really well.”

Karen nodded slowly, like she expected that answer.

She stayed for a few more minutes, letting Toby talk through his homework and asking a few light questions along the way. The visit didn’t feel heavy or tense, just part of a routine that had already started to settle into place.

After a bit, she stepped back toward the front of the house.

“I’ll check in again soon,” she said.

“Okay,” Toby replied.

“Take care of each other,” she added, her eyes moving briefly between all of us before she turned to leave.

Natalie walked her to the door, and a moment later it closed behind her.

The house settled back into quiet.

Toby didn’t hesitate. He went right back to the table, climbing into his chair and grabbing his pencil like nothing had interrupted him at all.

“Okay,” he said, pointing at the next problem. “This one.”

I pulled the worksheet closer again and leaned in to look at it.

“Alright,” I said. “Let’s see what you did.”

The afternoon moved forward around us, quiet and steady as we worked through the rest of his homework together.

Later that week, the keyboard stopped feeling like something new and started feeling like something familiar.

Greg had set it up in the living room, taking his time with it like it mattered, adjusting the stand, checking the connections, making sure everything worked before stepping back and letting me figure it out from there. At first, I had only played when the house was quiet, more out of habit than anything else.

That didn’t last long.

It didn’t take much for my hands to remember what to do. The keys felt the same, the spacing, the weight of them under my fingers. I didn’t have to think about where to go next most of the time. It just came back.

By the end of the week, I wasn’t playing pieces I already knew anymore.

I was playing something else.

The house was quiet that afternoon, sunlight stretching across the floor as I sat at the keyboard, leaning forward slightly. My fingers moved without hesitation, following a pattern that had been stuck in my head for the past couple of days. It wasn’t a full song yet, not something I could name, but it kept coming back no matter what I tried to replace it with.

So I stopped trying to replace it.

I played it instead.

The melody shifted as I went, changing slightly each time I came back to it. Some parts repeated, others didn’t. My hands adjusted without thinking, filling in spaces that hadn’t been there before, smoothing out transitions that had sounded off the first time.

I didn’t notice Natalie until I caught movement out of the corner of my eye.

She was sitting in her recliner, a book resting in her lap, though she wasn’t reading it. She didn’t say anything, didn’t move, just listened.

I paused for half a second.

Then I kept playing.

The sound filled the room, steady and controlled, not hesitant, not searching. It felt like something that had already been there, just waiting for me to sit down and let it out.

A few minutes later, I heard footsteps behind me.

Greg.

He didn’t interrupt right away. I could feel him there, leaning somewhere just out of view, listening the same way Natalie was.

I finished the phrase I was working through before letting my hands rest lightly on the keys.

“That’s new,” Greg said.

I glanced back at him slightly. “Yeah.”

He nodded once. “Didn’t sound like something you were practicing.”

“It’s not,” I said, looking back at the keyboard. “It’s just… stuck in my head.”

Greg pushed off the wall and stepped a little closer. “Like a song?”

“I don’t know,” I admitted. “It keeps changing.”

“That’s usually how it starts,” he said.

I shifted slightly on the bench. “I can’t get it out.”

“Then don’t,” Greg replied simply. “Keep playing it.”

I hesitated for a second before pressing a few keys again, letting the melody pick back up where it had left off. It wasn’t exactly the same as before. It never was.

Greg watched for a moment before reaching over the side of the keyboard.

“You know this thing records, right?” he asked.

I paused again. “What?”

He leaned down slightly, pointing to a small section near the controls. “Right here. You hit this, it’ll save whatever you’re playing.”

I looked at it, then back at him. “Why?”

“So you don’t lose it,” he said. “If it keeps changing, you’re going to forget parts of it. This way you don’t have to.”

I stared at the button for a second longer before nodding slightly.

Greg stepped back, giving me space again. “Try it.”

I pressed the button, watching the small indicator light up before I placed my hands back on the keys.

Then I started playing again.

This time, I didn’t stop when something shifted. I let it happen, letting the notes move the way they wanted to instead of trying to hold them in place. The melody stretched out further than it had before, filling more space, connecting in ways that felt more complete.

I didn’t look up.

I didn’t think about anything else.

Just the sound.

After a while, I slowed, letting the last few notes fade out naturally before lifting my hands from the keys.

The room was quiet again.

Greg gave a small nod. “There you go.”

I glanced down at the keyboard, then at the recording light before pressing the button again to stop it.

“It’s still not finished,” I said.

“It doesn’t have to be,” he replied. “You’ve got it now.”

I nodded slightly, letting my hands rest in my lap for a moment before pushing back from the bench.

The keyboard stayed where it was, quiet again, but it didn’t feel like something I had to come back to later.

It felt like something that wasn’t going anywhere.

A couple of days later, I was in my room working on homework when my phone buzzed beside me. I glanced down at it, then reached over and picked it up when I saw Gavin’s name on the screen.

“Hey,” I said as I answered.

“Zach, tell me you’re not busy,” Gavin said immediately.

“I mean… I’m doing homework,” I replied, shifting slightly against the side of my bed. “What’s up?”

“That’s fine, you can do both. I’ve been thinking about something.”

“That’s never a good start.”

“Oh, shut up,” he shot back, though I could hear the grin in his voice. “I’m serious. You should come to New York this summer.”

I didn’t answer right away, just stared at the wall for a second while I let that settle.

“You’re still on that?” I asked.

“Yeah, because it’s a good idea,” he said. “First week of summer. You stay here, we hang out, I show you around. It’s not that complicated.”

“I don’t know,” I said quietly.

“Why not?” he asked, not aggressively, just confused. “Do you already have plans or something?”

“No,” I admitted. “Not really.”

“Then what’s the problem?” he pressed. “Just ask. My dad already said it’s fine if you come.”

That part didn’t surprise me.

I shifted my phone slightly against my ear, thinking about it for a second longer than I probably needed to.

“I’ll think about it,” I said.

“You always say that,” he replied.

“I know. I mean it, though.”

“I know you do,” he said after a second, his tone easing a little. “Just… don’t overthink it. It’d be fun, Zach.”

“Yeah,” I said quietly.

There was a short pause, not awkward, just a break in the conversation while we both let it sit.

“So what’ve you been doing?” he asked.

“School. Homework. Choir stuff,” I said. “Toby’s been making me help him with his homework, too.”

“Making you?” Gavin said. “Or you just do it anyway?”

I shrugged even though he couldn’t see it. “He messes it up if I don’t.”

“Sounds about right,” Gavin said. “Kid’s chaos.”

“He’s getting better,” I said. “A little.”

“Wow,” he replied. “You’re really turning him around, huh?”

I huffed a quiet breath that almost turned into a laugh. “I wouldn’t go that far.”

We talked for a few more minutes after that, mostly about random things. Games, stuff he’d been working on, things at school. It wasn’t anything important, but it didn’t feel forced either. The conversation just moved on its own without either of us trying too hard to keep it going.

Eventually, it started to wind down.

“Alright, I’ll let you get back to your homework,” Gavin said. “But seriously—ask about New York.”

“I will,” I said.

“I’m holding you to that.”

“Yeah, okay.”

“Alright. Later, Zach.”

“Later.”

The call ended, and I let the phone rest in my hand for a second before setting it down beside me. The room felt quiet again, but not in a way that bothered me.

A soft knock came at my door a moment later, and before I could say anything, it cracked open just enough for Toby to slip through.

“What are you doing?” he asked as he climbed onto the bed like he belonged there.

“Homework,” I said.

He looked down at the papers, then back at me. “That’s boring.”

“Yeah,” I replied.

He didn’t leave. Instead, he shifted closer, leaning lightly against my side. I adjusted without thinking, making room for him while I picked my pencil back up.

“Did you finish yours?” I asked.

“Yeah,” he said. “I didn’t mess it up.”

“That’s good.”

He nodded and went quiet, watching me for a few seconds before settling in more comfortably.

The house was calm around us. I could hear movement downstairs—Natalie in the kitchen, Greg talking about something I couldn’t quite make out—but it all blended together into something steady.

I glanced toward the window for a moment, the fading light stretching across the room, then looked back down at my homework before the thought could stick.

“Hey, Zach?” Toby said after a minute.

“Yeah?”

“You’re coming to my birthday, right?”

I paused for just a second.

“Yeah,” I said. “I’ll be there.”

“Okay,” he said, satisfied.

He shifted slightly against me, and I went back to my homework while the evening settled in around us.