Suzie’s House 193: The Lips of an Angel

Gene couldn’t get rid of the grin on his face. He went down the pull-down attic steps into the upstairs hall with a choke hold on the guitar. Maybe he didn’t get to keep it forever, but right now it was all his.

“This is great, Mrs. H.! Thanks!”

“You’re welcome. Just keep up with your chores and you’ll be able to trade it in for an electric bass in a couple of months.” She smiled like she was proud or something.

Tracy grinned too. She looked at the old acoustic guitar, pressed her lips together, and nodded. “That’s a nice one,” she said.

“It was just collecting dust. Well, I’ve got something to deal with. If you’ll excuse me.”

“Sure thing Mrs. H. And thanks. Really, thanks.”

She waved, then headed down stairs. Gene and Tracy went into his room where he sat down on the bed, careful to keep the guitar from hitting anything.

“Ever play guitar before? I’d be glad to give you lessons,” Tracy said.

“Yeah, right. Like you know how to play one.”

“Sure I do. Let me show you.” She reached out for it, but Gene didn’t let her have it.

“No way. I want to play it first.”

He tried tuning it up, which was kind of hard because he didn’t have one of those things that makes a sound that you’re supposed to match, like on the computer at school. Still, he thought he got it about right.

“It’s a little off,” she said.

“You just want me to hand it over.” Gene gave her look.

He strummed a few notes, tried a cord. It sounded pretty good. “I don’t really play guitar.” He glanced at her, letting the hair that liked to fall into his face cover his eyes.

He didn’t do bangs, so it wasn’t like bangs, just the hair that would have been bangs hanging kind of across his face. He thought maybe he looked kind of cool, especially when Tracy looked at him like that, like she wanted to touch him or something.

“I really want to play bass, but I guess this is close enough for now.”

“Is that a song you’re playing? It sounds kind of familiar.”

“Yeah, it’s Lips of an Angel by Hinder.”

“Oh, I thought it was! I did.” She nodded and smiled like they’d both accomplished something.

“But,” he got through the first part and into the chorus and stopped, “I don’t know the whole thing.”

“That’s all right. It’s not like you’ve been taking lessons for a long time or anything, right? I’ll bet when Ben gets his computer we can look up tabs and then you can really learn to play.”

“Yeah,” he said like he knew what she was talking about. He wondered if “tabs” was a real word, or one of her mistakes. “Yeah, I’ll get better if I practice.”

Now she was looking at the guitar like she wanted to touch it. How could he be jealous of a guitar? It didn’t make sense. But he’d really like to kiss her again some day, and right now it looked like the guitar stood a better chance of it.

“All right,” he grumbled, holding the guitar out by the neck. “Fine. Show me what you can do.”

To his disappointment, she got this huge grin, and took it.

If you enjoy Suzie’s House and would like to see more, please leave a comment. Suzie’s House is powered by its readers.