” I said in a sweet tone. “Chloe claimed first dibs each night and my hands get sore after the first one.” I said.I wasn’t lying. My hands alw...ys get sore after rubbing Annie. But I was years away from that. At this point in time, Annie would be only 9 years old. So it would be 9 more years before I could see her again, with Guri’s rules.“Mom, I’ve been thinking as Josh and I were talking,” Chloe started, “I think you should give him new birthday money. It wasn’t fair that you pulled that. . we had George ... don’t need another bass player.Sitting down.“Impossible!” said the lead player from the Royal Toads ... it can’t be done. There’s a tape machine in there.” He was in to see why we were more popular than his band ... we weren’t British. I invited him on stage.“Here, you play ... I’m going to get fancy and I need both hands.”He took my guitar ... I shouted the chord progression twice.And then I started singing. I came to the instrumental and said, “Take it.”The crowd went wild. I was convinced that he didn’t love me enough to hug me. Slowly, very slowly, I realized that it wasn’t about me. What Dad had written more or less confirmed that.It was weird to read Dad’s description of me. It made me feel strange in my head. The little Bec in my brain that always stays back and watches had been nodding and saying “That’s what I see.” I felt bad about making Dad uncomfortable because I sometimes understand what he’s thinking. Sometimes I guess and my guesses turn out right.. Sam and Judy were down at the other end of the pool but he was sure that someone else was just surfacing at his end. Strange, he thought to himself.But, wanting to confuse the girls, he ducked under water again and swam to one of the corners at the shallow end. That was his undoing. Less than a second after he slowly surfaced, Judy, who must have been tagged by Sam, was now Marco and said the word.Even before he was able to say the response, he heard Judy say, "Gotcha" and Sam said, "Not again..