Chapter 39

“N-not h-happening. I’ll l-leave th-this one up for the time b-being, though. N-now go s-s-sit down.”

The brothers had to huddle around Atticus one more time first, huddle and clinch all at once, nearly smooshing him in the middle.

The stage was decked with twelve Christmas trees, each one lit to coordinate with a drummer’s shirt, red, yellowish green, lavender, teal, pink, yellow, purple, true green, light blue, orange, a darker blue, and maroon. A huge nutcracker with a rainbow scarf at his neck stood guard down left. His twin was posted down right. The silhouette of a drummer boy with the North Star overhead was projected onto the back wall, and a huge wooden sleigh with eight not so tiny reindeer stretched across the floor in front of the entire setup. AC wondered if every show featured such fancy set design. Was it the venue’s doing or the band’s? If it all belonged to the 12 Drummers Drumming, if they had to ship it all ahead, no wonder they were broke.