Free Connection (Le Garde) by Emily Ann Ward

glass in her curly hair, and she stared back at me.
    “ We did it,” I said.
    Anna nodded, looking down at her hands. “We should get back.”
    We walked back to the steps. I looked up at the lights that we broke. The school might have a hard time explaining that. At the top of the steps, a group of men and women, including Mr. Boyd, were huddled around the fuse box, talking quietly. They didn’t notice us.
    All of the lights were back on, even the ones in the auditorium. I’d felt those, too, in the hallway, and I hadn’t even realized what I was feeling.
    We joined the band quietly, looking at the other students. “Are we going to keep playing?” Anna asked.
    “ I don’t know,” Jenna said. “They don’t want another outage.”
    I stared at my hands, then at Anna. I got the feeling someone was looking at me, and turned to looked out in the audience. My dad stared at me, his lips pursed into a straight line.
     
    Anna
    The band waited while the staff spoke by the fuse box. I watched, wondering if I could go over there and ask what was wrong. The audience murmured to themselves. I surveyed the lights. None of these seemed to be broken, like the ones on the steps and in the hallway. I felt Aaron’s gaze on me, but I didn’t want to look at him. I wanted this concert to be over, and I wanted to work this all out in my head.
    Finally, Mr. Boyd came back onto the stage and told the audience that everything was fine. The fuse box was fine; the electricity wouldn’t be going out again. Still, in the interest of everyone’s safety, they’d cut the concert short. He said this in a tight voice, but everyone applauded him and the band.
    Afterwards as the band cleaned up, we heard Mr. Boyd complaining to Ms. West, the principal, to reconsider and let them finish the concert. At least mine and Aaron’s breach of Boyd Protocol wouldn’t seem so bad compared to the principal forcing him to end the night early. Good thing he didn’t know Aaron and I were responsible for the outage.
    I put my clarinet in my case and turned to Aaron with a deep breath. “Good job. We sounded really good.”
    “ Yeah,” Aaron said. “You were great.”
    I forgot my anxiety for a moment to remember how smoothly I played. I smiled at him. “I couldn’t have done it without you.”
    He picked up his saxophone case, smiling back. “You would have managed.”
    I chuckled. If only. We walked with the others toward the front of the auditorium. Everyone stopped to stare up at the broken lights, and I tried to look just as concerned as everyone else. I didn’t know how well it worked.
    At the end of the hallway, we met up with people leaving the auditorium, and the crowd moved slowly toward the doors that would take us to the rest of the school. Everyone was chattering about the unexplained power outage. A few people complimented us and other band members as we went by.
    Once we’d emerged into the large hallway outside of the auditorium entrance, I saw my mom and sisters near the bathrooms. I looked at Aaron, who was a few people away. “Nice job, Aaron. See you tomorrow.”
    He met my eyes. “Bye, Anna.”
    I held his eyes for a moment, replaying my mini-mental breakdown in the hallway. Where had I even been running to? I took a deep breath and walked over to my family.
    “ Anna, you two were great!” Allie squealed, hugging me. “You sounded so, so, so good!”
    “ Thanks,” I said with a tight smile.
    “ Good job, honey,” Mom said as she patted my shoulder. She stilled when Aaron and his parents came near.
    “ Anna!” Aaron’s mom called, beaming. She pulled me into a hug. She’d been like an aunt when Aaron and I were still friends. Were we friends again? That was up to me, wasn’t it? Because I knew he wanted to be friends again. She squeezed my shoulders. “Great job! You sounded so great together. I remember when you picked that clarinet just so you could play with Aaron.”
    I smiled as Aaron gave me an embarrassed