Amen, L.A. Page 3

  “Nice,” I echoed politely. This room looked like it belonged in the design wing of a modern-art museum in New York City. If you put your feet up on those couches, it was probably a Class C felony.

  The mansion went on and on. Formal dining room with a table that sat twenty. Enormous state-of-the-art kitchen, which I knew my father, who did a lot of the cooking, would go crazy over. The kitchen opened to a patio of white and grass green marble, with comfy outdoor furniture and a massive fire pit. Off the patio were a hot tub and a swimmer’s continuous-action wave pool that would make Chad drool.

  We went back inside and explored the rest of the downstairs. There were two bedrooms, one of which was my parents’ master suite. One whole wall was a window, and a gigantic bed faced the view. I’ve heard that California has a mattress named after it, the California king, which looks like two regular king-size beds put together. This was a king-size king. Their bedroom had a black and white theme; the bed was draped with a luxurious damask patterned comforter that went down to the floor. There were a tall black armoire and two white leather button-tufted lounge chairs that sat in front of a fireplace. Above the fireplace was a gigantic flat-screen TV. Their bathroom was all white marble and had a Jacuzzi tub that could hold half of Mankato. Off the bathroom were two enormous walk-in closets, one for my mom, one for my dad. My parents’ clothes were already unpacked into just one of the closets. Maybe they’d rent out the other one.

  “Your bedrooms are upstairs,” Sandra told me. “Come on, I’ll show you.”

  We mounted a spectacular spiral staircase and found ourselves deposited in a sitting area with a dove gray suede couch and matching low-slung chairs, a wall-mounted TV, silver metallic cushions on the floor, and even a small refrigerator and wet bar. I felt my sandals sink into the plush white rug. All I could think was, what if I wanted to eat chips and a bowl of salsa while watching TV? What if I dropped a big-ass chunk of salsa on that rug? I was pretty sure an alarm would go off and the interior design police would cart me away.

  “Your bedroom’s the one on the left,” Sandra said eagerly as she opened yet another mahogany door. “You’re going to love it.”

  I stepped inside. Whoa. Back in Mankato, Gemma and I had shared a room forever. We’d had bunk beds, a couple of desks from Ikea in Minneapolis, ditto Ikea dressers, and very little floor space. There were two small windows and a bulletin board covered haphazardly with photos and souvenirs from Gemma’s life. She was in almost every photo—no shocker there. Over my bed was a framed poster from the movie Once, about a guy and a girl who come together to make the most moving music ever without doing something cliché like falling in love. I’ve seen that film at least a dozen times.

  My new bedroom looked like a penthouse suite at the nicest hotel in the world, with a view of the Hollywood Hills through a picture window. There was a four-poster bed with an airy canopy of sheer textured ivory cotton gauze across the top and a billowy hand-knotted white comforter that fell in graceful pleated folds to the gleaming, polished hardwood floor, which was dotted with intricately woven rugs. The closet—okay, I admit I was psyched about this one—was practically the size of my high school’s football stadium. There was an amazing closet-organizing system, which included a center rack that rotated at the push of a button. The movers had already unpacked my stuff and hung it up. It took up, oh, say, a hundredth of the space. Less, actually.

  “I kinda poked around a little before you got here,” Sandra admitted. “You can cover the window like this. The glass on your windows adjusts to the light, but you can also adjust it yourself.” She pointed to a discreet button on the wall near the window, then sat on the edge of the—my—bed. “I have to tell you, Nat—can I call you Nat?”

  “Sure,” I said, feeling a bit overwhelmed.

  “The whole church has been so excited about your family. And when my friends and I found out that you were our age, we were so psyched.” She grinned at me and looped some wheat-colored hair behind one ear. “I guess what I’m trying to say is, we’re just really glad you’re here.”

  I couldn’t help smiling back. It’s always nice to feel wanted. Still, I couldn’t get over my Alice-through-the-looking-glass feeling. I mean, yes, Sandra was being really nice. And my new bedroom was amazing. But like the living room—and the entire house, for that matter—it just didn’t feel like me. The only things that made me feel better were that my bed had been made with my Minnesota sheets, blankets, and pillows and that my guitar—I’d forgotten all about it, maybe Xan had brought it up—was leaning against the wall to the left of a hand-painted nightstand. I moved to it, looking for something that would connect the “me” of here to the “me” of there—back home in Minnesota, where I belonged.

  “You play guitar,” Sandra observed.

  I sat on a white chaise lounge near the picture window. “A little.” I opened the case. It smelled of my room in Mankato. I felt a lump swell in my throat.

  “There are a lot of places to play here in L.A.,” Sandra said. “Do you perform?”

  “Once in a while.” I strummed idly. An E-minor chord. A G. And then the chord progression of one of my favorite songs of all time, Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah.” I closed my eyes and started to sing the first verse, about how King David wrote music that pleased God so much.

  To my surprise, Sandra joined in. Even more surprising, she had a lovely voice—an alto to my soprano. I kept my eyes closed, but we sang the whole song. She knew the lyrics as well as I did. We even did some impromptu harmonizing on the chorus.

  When it was over, I strummed one last chord, let it dissipate, and finally opened my eyes. We shared a smile. “That was beautiful. Where did you learn to sing like that? Are you in the choir?” I asked.

  She grinned. “You know Nona?”

  “Sure.” Nona was one of the truly groundbreaking female singers of the 1980s and 1990s. These days, she’d shifted her focus from rock to musical theater, having written and starred in a Christian rock opera about Joseph and Mary.

  “She belongs to our church,” Sandra explained. “Which means you’ll meet her. Actually, she’s my mother.”

  Whoa baby. Sandra was Nona’s daughter? No wonder she had such a good voice.

  “If you want to meet her, come over later,” Sandra offered. “I know she’d love to get to know you. We know what it’s like to move to L.A. from another place. I moved here, too.”

  I’d had no idea. “From where?”

  “Manhattan.” Sandra brushed some of her flaxen hair off her face. “We had a townhouse on the Upper East Side. I lived there my whole life, and it broke my heart to move away. That was after sixth grade. But my dad died—he was a lot older than my mom—and she couldn’t deal with going to the same restaurants and the same church, walking on the same streets she used to with him.” She shrugged. “We came out here for a new start.”

  I put my guitar down, thinking that I would never have guessed that about Sandra. Huh. Maybe she really could be my friend.

  We went into the upstairs den, cracked open a couple of Cokes that were already cooling in the fridge—the welcoming committee must have stocked the place, which was amazingly thoughtful—and talked some more. We would both be going to Beverly Hills High School in the fall. We both liked Will Ferrell, hated Gossip Girl, and had started the Twilight series in ninth grade. We didn’t drink, smoke, or do drugs, though Sandra warned me that 90 percent of the kids out here were happy to do all three, and often at the same time.

  “It’s easy to get sucked into the whole teen party scene,” she said. “I mean, girls out here? If they haven’t had sex by the time they’re fourteen, they lie and say they have, to be cool. It’s just so easy to get corrupted.”

  “It won’t happen with me,” I assured her. “That’s not my style.”

  Oh yeah? a little voice inside me piped up. Having sex with Sean last night wasn’t your style, either.

  That was different, I told the voice.

  Yeah, the v
oice shot back. That was worse.

  Fortunately, right then I heard a squeal followed by laughter. Gemma and Lisa seemed to be getting along like they’d grown up together in the same designer playpen. Lisa was giving my sister a rundown of who was hot and who was not at our church. Trevor and Chad came in and raided the cupboards. They left with armfuls of junk food, babbling about the Xbox 360 in Chad’s new room. Evidently, it had enough games to make any thirteen-year-old boy think the Rapture was upon us. By the looks of it, they were anticipating a long stay post-tribulation.

  Before I knew it, an hour had passed. Remarkably, without any planning, I’d made my first friend in L.A. Even better, it looked like Gemma and Chad had made friends, too. Hey, once a big sister, always a big sister. You look out for your siblings whether you want to or not. It just comes naturally.

  Sandra was talking about the church youth group—she was incoming president—and an upcoming volunteer project later in the summer when her iPhone rang. I recognized the melody. “Manhattan Morning.” By her mother.

  “My mom,” she explained as she glanced at her iPhone.

  I nodded.

  She sprang up. “Whoa. I’m super-late. We’re going to this screening later. It’s the new Spielberg. The one that comes out in August?” She frowned. “I’d invite you, but we had to RSVP ahead of time. But next time?”

  “I’d like that.”

  A screening of a new Steven Spielberg movie? That didn’t happen in Mankato. Ever. I really would like that.

  Then she smacked herself in the head. “I am such an idiot! I almost forgot.”

  “Forgot what?”

  “Follow me.” She led me back into my room, knelt down, and reached under my bed.

  “We knew you played guitar,” she admitted. “So the church youth group got you a present.”

  There, before my disbelieving eyes, she extracted a guitar case that looked a lot like Eric Clapton’s crocodile model, except this one was zebra-striped. It was obviously leather—unlike my own—and it was obviously expensive.

  Then she opened the case. Slack-jaw time, again.

  “We asked your mom if you had a twelve string,” Sandra explained. “She said no.” She smiled and handed me the guitar.

  Unbelievable. I was holding in my hand a Breedlove Classic XII acoustic that I knew had to have cost more than three thousand dollars. It made my gorgeous Takamine look cheap by comparison.

  I shook my head. “I can’t accept this.”

  “You already did,” Sandra said breezily. “It’s a present from the youth group. And you don’t want us to hate you, do you?” She grinned again. “So, go for it.”

  What could I do? I played a tune I’d written for Sean called “This Guy.” I didn’t sing; I just played the melody. It sounded like it was being played on a three-thousand-dollar guitar. Because it was.

  Sandra applauded when I was done. “I know who’s entertaining on our next retreat.”

  “Yeah,” I said, laughing. “You.” I carefully put the guitar back in its case. “I know you have to go, but come downstairs first. I want you to meet my parents.”

  I felt pretty good as I led Sandra to the lower level, but the house was so big that I had to text my dad to find out where they were. It turned out they were on the back patio, with a dozen other church members Connie had invited for a meet-and-greet barbecue, conducted by a very tall African American chef looking even taller in an enormous chef’s hat.

  Sandra greeted my parents warmly and thanked my mom for being a coconspirator in the purchase of my new guitar.

  “Happy to help.” Mom looped a slender arm around my shoulders. “Now, make sure you guys do three thousand dollars’ worth of charity work together.”

  “We will,” Sandra promised. “We’ve got an interfaith soup kitchen project in the Valley in a couple of weeks.”

  “I’m in,” I declared.

  “Sweet,” Sandra replied. “Come on. Walk me to my car.”

  I did; we hugged each other goodbye, then Sandra got in her gray Prius and drove down the majestic brick driveway. I watched until her car was out of sight.

  So far so good, I thought. I was psyched that I had made my first friend. I headed back to the house, trying to decide what I wanted to do. Did I want to hang out on the patio? Work on “The Shape I’m In,” my latest song? Or call Sean? There was so much to talk about, if he was willing to talk.

  I tried Sean. No answer, got his voice mail, which was a letdown. I left a brief message, telling him I was okay and asking him to call me later. But not too late, since I was sure I’d be crashing early. Non-call out of the way, I knew what I wanted to do. Play my really incredible twelve string and see if I could come up with a melody for the new tune.

  I practically ran through the house and up the stairs to my room.

  I opened the door and screamed.

  Sitting on my bed, with my new guitar in his hands, was a very hot—and did I mention buff?—guy.

  He was also very naked, except for a heavy chain wrapped around his right ankle.

  “Hey.” He greeted me as if we were long-lost naked friends. He strummed a few chords expertly. “Insane guitar.” He strummed another chord. “I’m Shepard. What’s your name?”

  Chapter Three

  “Get out of my room!” I shrieked, trying hard to look everywhere except at a certain part of his anatomy.

  “Don’t be like that,” he chided gently. “I’m really good.”

  I could feel my face turn the color of marinara sauce. “I don’t care how good you are! I just, just …, ” I blustered.

  “I meant on the guitar, babe. Watch.” He played an amazing lick.

  I was pretty sure that if I ever wrote a memoir, finding Buff Naked Guy in my bedroom, on my bed, playing my guitar like a rock god, would be right up there in the chapter of memorable experiences. However, Buff Naked Guy Who Sounded Like a Rock God was clearly insane. Which meant, just as clearly, I had to hustle downstairs to tell my parents. But as I pivoted to make my getaway, he ripped another smoking riff out of my guitar, using one finger instead of a guitar pick, the notes rolling and building and filling my room. It was as intricate as a Bach fugue but with the driving intensity of Metallica. I don’t know a lot of things, but I do know music. I couldn’t help it: that riff stopped me in my tracks.

  I turned back and saw him tilt his head toward the ceiling as he played and shout at the heavens above. “Randy Rhoads? You listening, dude? You suck!”

  Randy Rhoads. Used to play with Ozzy Osbourne. Dead. Possibly in the heavens above. In fact, probably, since he died in a plane crash and didn’t use a lot of drugs or alcohol. It meant Buff Naked Guy Etc., even if he was certifiable, was shouting in the right direction.

  Enough was enough. I left and headed down to the backyard barbecue and my parents. There’s a naked guy playing lead on my bed, I practiced mentally. Yeah, that ought to get their attention.

  The barbecue area was empty. Crap. Why did this place have to be so huge? I found my folks at the front door, waving as the last of their guests departed, my dad’s arms around my mom.

  “Nice welcome,” he said to her.

  She nodded her agreement. “I always say, you can find good people everywhere.”

  “I totally agree,” I chimed in. “For example, at this very moment, there’s a nice guy in my bedroom playing my guitar. Did I mention that he’s naked?”

  Up went my dad’s eyebrows. “A naked guy,” he repeated. “And he’s playing your guitar. That’s all?” My father obviously wanted more confirmation.

  “So far,” I said. I folded my arms in what I hoped was a definitive gesture.

  “Charlie, maybe you’d better go see what’s going on,” my mother advised him. “Perhaps one of our guests had one too many beers.”

  “Perhaps,” my dad agreed.

  I couldn’t believe how calm they were. “He’s too young to be your guest and too old to be mine,” I said.

  Funny how I wasn’
t totally freaking out, either. Maybe it was because the guy was so hot—forgive me my moment of shallowness, God, thank you. Maybe it was because the guy was so talented. Or maybe it was because in his current state of undress, there was zero chance that he was carrying a concealed weapon.

  “Nat, wait here,” my dad instructed, and he and my mom headed upstairs. Just as I was contemplating following them, our doorbell sounded. Huh. No one had buzzed from the gate down the hill. Probably one of the guests had forgotten something.

  I opened the heavy door. A girl my age stood there. She had lush mahogany hair that fell in artfully tousled waves to her shoulders. Her eyes were the color of the sky at thirty thousand feet, and she had Angelina-worthy pouty lips. She was both curvy and skinny, in a white ribbed tank top, tiny cutoff jeans, and flip-flops. She had some kind of super PDA in her hands, and a shoulder bag.

  “Hi,” she said, her voice worried. “You just moved in, right? I saw the moving truck this morning. I’m Alexis Samuels. We live back there.” She gestured vaguely toward the canyon.

  “Natalie Shelton.” I held out a hand and she shook it. “Call me Nat,” I added.

  “And call me Alex. So listen, I think my brother, Shep, is here.” She held up the PDA. “At least, that’s what my tracker says.”

  Suddenly, it all made sense. The ankle bracelet on Buff Naked Guy Etc.’s right ankle. If what the girl was holding was a GPS tracking device, that ankle bracelet had to be a transmitter. I saw no reason to doubt her.

  “He’s in my room playing my guitar,” I said. “I just saw him.”

  She winced. “And he’s wearing …?”

  I leaned against the wall. “Adam? Eve? The garden before the whole apple thing?”

  “Playing guitar and getting naked are two of his favorite things to do,” Alex said. “All the others are illegal.” She sighed and raked a hand through her glorious hair. “I’m really sorry. He’s allegedly under house arrest. Drug charges. If it makes you feel any better, he’s totally harmless. He’s never hurt anyone except himself.”