Charlie's Arc

Chapter 3 of 3

Charlie slid two fingers into the crack in the old viola. The wood was rough inside. He pinched the folded paper and pulled it free. Everyone leaned close as he opened it. Inside was a drawing of the viola, but with a symbol he didn't know, and one word: Orchestra. Bridgette frowned. "Grandma wrote this." She turned the paper over. "She wanted this fixed and played again. In an orchestra." Charlie looked around the crowded room. He knew his sister played the viola. He heard her practice through the wall at night. But their school had no orchestra. No band. Nothing. "There's no orchestra anywhere," Charlie said. His voice was small. Bridgette set the viola down. "There's one place. St. Thomas Moore. The Catholic school." She said the name like a locked door. "They have an orchestra. But we don't go there. We don't know anyone there." Charlie thought about the note. Grandma wanted the viola played. Bridgette wanted to fix it. Both meant nothing without a place to play it. He wanted to help. He wanted to prove again that he saw things the others missed. He studied the drawing. The strange symbol sat in the corner, small and neat. Two crossed keys. He had seen it before. On the green door downstairs. On the mat where he wiped his shoes every day. "Bridgette," he said. "Come look." He led them all down the three floors of the storybook house. He stopped at the front door and pointed. There, carved into the wood near the handle, was the same mark. Two crossed keys. Faded, but real. Bridgette touched it. "That's the school's symbol," she whispered. "How is it on our house?" Jojo pushed forward. She was two years older than Charlie, and she still looked at him like he was a joke. But she wasn't laughing now. "Grandma taught music," Jojo said slowly. "At St. Thomas Moore. Before we were born." She stared at Charlie. "Nobody told him that either." Charlie's chest went warm. He had found the way in. "If Grandma taught there," he said, "maybe they'd let her viola play there again. Maybe they'd let us bring it." Bridgette held the note tight. Her eyes were bright. "That's it. That's how we fix it right. We take it to the school and we ask." She looked at Charlie, then at Jojo. "All three of us." Jojo crossed her arms, but this time she nodded. Bridgette pushed open the green door. The night air came in cold. "We go tomorrow," she said. "But St. Thomas Moore won't just hand us anything. We have to prove the viola was Grandma's. And I don't know how yet." Charlie looked down at the folded paper in his sister's hand. One problem was solved. Now they had a school to face, and no proof at all.