The studio lights flash over a lake of hopping, flailing silhouettes.
A great pool of undefined shadows.
Screaming her name. Some, just screaming.
She can barely hear the music in her headset, let alone the speakers directed at the audience. It hushes the cacophony to a whisper.
Have you ever seen such a beautiful night
I could almost kiss the stars for shining so bright
Then I see you smiling as I go
Oh oh oh
"Now?! You can't be serious."
Miley doesn't respond. She watches the city lights pass the window by. Reflecting off the glass.
The glare reminds her of the stage and she tenses and feels a chill down her spine.
I would never want to miss this
'Cause in my heart I know what this is
"Ladies and gentlemen - please," she says, raising her hands to signify that she has something to say. "I'm glad ya'll enjoyed the show but, I got something I'd like to say."
Hey now
Hey now
This is what dreams are made of
"First your mother runs out on me and - hey, are you listening to me? Miley!"
"Yes, daddy," she says, quickly snapping out of her daze. She's both scared and saddened by his tone and she isn't quite sure how to react to make it stop.
"First your mother runs out on me and now you're quitting the music industry? I aint got a job, Miley. I got lumbago. Yer leavin' me helpless."
"I don't care about the money, daddy, I just-" Miley starts to say before she's cut off. She realizes her mistake as it's happening. She's trying too hard to be honest, to level with her father. The only thing he'll listen to is what he wants to hear.
"You two must be conspirin' against me, aintcha? Conspirin' to tear my whole world apart." He scoffs, disgusted.
"That ain't funny, daddy."
"I aint laughin'."
Hey now
Hey now
This is what dreams are made of
"I just want you all to know that it's been a wonderful journey getting here to be with all of you tonight. Every show, every fan. You all just mean so much to me and I... I wanted you to know that this is my last show as Hannah Montana."
The crowd goes into an uproar. Not a good one.
"We're calling that agent of yours first thing in the morning and we're gonna figure out how to clean up this mess you've made. And that's the end of it. You hear me?"
"I just wanted to play ya'll one last song," she says, her voice trying its hardest to break. But she won't let it. She's practiced the smile and the voice too hard, and too many times. "This one's called, Wherever I Go."
Maillou
It didn't take Miley long at all to realize she couldn't stay with her father. And it didn't take her mom long to extend the olive branch of a place to stay after she'd heard Miley was quitting the business.
She knew Robby Ray loved her. He'd be fit enough a father as long as he was happy. But any inkling of that money drying up and well, there'd be hell to pay with a pocket full of lent and a checkbook springier than a hopfrog. Ka-toink!
Miley's momma smiles at the thought of that onomatopoeia. But it was all too brief, she notes, as the look on her baby's face reflected in the window brings her back down to reality.
"You aint done nothin' but look out that window, honey," she says, leaning against the door frame between the kitchen and the living area. "Why don't you watch Tv or somethin'?"
"Aint nothin' on."
"That so?" She asks, putting her hands on her hips. "Someone done painted a Tv guide on the neighborhood now did they?"
Miley looks back at her and smiles weakly, but genuine. "You caught me. I just aint in the mood to do nothing, momma."
"I don't mean to pry," she says, making her way to the chair adjacent to the couch Miley's laid up on, "but you have been here two weeks, and I am your momma."
"I know, momma."
"I just want you to know you can talk to me," she says, leaning over and flicking her on the shoulder. Miley gives her a look and she retreats, hands inoffensive like. "You don't have to, you know. You just. Can." She offers a smile.
Miley smiles too. But it quickly fades. "I just feel bad. Leaving him all alone like that. Like I abandoned him."
Her mom sucks her teeth in disappointment - not at Miley, but at Robbie Ray for making her feel like that. "Honey, you didn't abandon him. He abandoned us."
"How do you figure?" she asks, biting her lip in apprehension.
"Honey -" she stops for a moment to clear her throat and rearrange her thoughts. "Your father aint well. Now, I woulda stayed with him and took care of him myself but.."
Miley looks up, curious as to where her own thought process is taking her. "But what?"
"Your daddy don't want help. He don't wanna be better, he don't wanna get better. You can't give that man nothin' but his way and as far as he's concerned, that's the end of the story."
Miley sniffs and carefully wipes her eyes before the tears get a chance to come. She isn't wearing make up right now, but instinct prevents her from messing it up if she was. Her head kind of drops, but she nods.
She understands.
"Miley, I know that's a hard truth to know, but," she licks her lips and stops just long enough to truly appreciate an understood pain between the two of them before she goes on. "It's better you know that than it is for you to guilt yourself. Because nothin' that man does to himself is your fault."
Miley stands almost abruptly, panicking inside. Unable to process this information in the presence of someone else. "I'm going for a walk, momma."
Her mom looks disappointed, but she nods in understanding. "Alright, sweetie. I'm here if you need me, okay?"
"Thanks." Miley turns to leave but stops and turns back. "Can I have a hug?"
She smiles, somewhat relieved. Feeling like she hasn't been completely shut out.
"Of course you can."
They hug, and Miley walks out the door. She sits where she was sat and watches Miley walk on through the window.
A sharp breeze kicks up and Miley hugs at herself like she's wrestling off the weather, and her emotions.
The wind calms and the leaves dance in it ever so gracefully on each side. It's sundown, and the sun's kissing the houses on the horizon.
Houses and green as far as the eye can see. Having grown up in the city, it's not a sight Miley was used to, but she figured she could get that way.
It was quiet out here. She liked that.
But it was just as she had begun to appreciate all that quiet that the whizzing of a playing card through the spokes of a bicycle wheel caught her attention - and just as she looked, she noticed a small child wobbling around for balance on a bike that was at least two sizes too big for him. Before she can say or do anything, the whole mess flips and tumbled onto the pavement. The kid, similarly too surprised to react as she was, merely lets out an "Oof!" as he bounces off the concrete and into an irregular pile of flesh and clothes a couple feet away from the turned over bike.
Her eyes widen and she hugs herself harder than she ever hugged herself before. "Oh my gosh! Are you okay, kid?!"
Snapping herself out of her own daze with her own words, she rushes over to him. She is perplexed by what she sees.
Miley's never seen someone quite so contorted that wasn't a professional, and still, somehow it snapps up straight into a hop and lands on its feet.
Nothing about the boy looks natural. Nothing about him looks... right.
His head's the wrong size for his body. His eyes are small and beady. Almost entirely black, except for that gleam the sun always manage to catch, no matter which way he was facing.
His movements, quick... animated.
The kid doesn't say anything. He just looks up at Miley and smiles.
"Are... you okay?" she eaks out before an abrupt response.
"Ahyup! I'm fine! Just didn't see that coming is all!"
"Is this your first time without training wheels?"
"It's my first time on a bike!" He hiccups, and a perfect droplet of snot nestles in at the corner of his nose. It seems to dangle. "I aint never been on a bike afore and this is my first time! Haha! I guess everyone makes mistakes! You see, I asked my MOMMA and my POPPA for a bike and they said! You can ride this!" he gestures wildly at the bike on the ground, "And if you learn to ride it we will BUY YOU ONE."
Miley flinches when he yells at the end there. She doesn't particularly think that was necessary, but she doesn't say anything about that.
"Why would they give you a bike twice your size?" she asks, blinking.
"I guess I don't know why's that, haha," he says rubbing his hands and arms all over his face enthusiastically. "Maybe! I guess! They forgot how big I was is all!"
"What?"
"My sides, yes," he says, settling down. "They forgot about those..."
He seems to shut down as his eyes lock onto a nearby yard. Maybe it was the grass or maybe it was something in it, but it had his attention fixated definitively.
Miley struggles, as her head is swimming with thoughts and emotions. "I-it's uh. Getting dark. Shouldn't you be getting home?"
"Huhuh! Ahyup! Good call, lady! I should prolly be getting home because it's dark out, huh? Wouldn't want them gators to get me! Ahyuck!"
Miley knows that he's doing a southern accent at her, he'd made that totally obvious as he drifted in and out of it carelessly. But she isn't sure why.
Was he making fun of her? No way. This kid was what, three? Four?
It was more weird than anything. Maybe he was doing some kind of impression but she never knew anyone who'd drifted in an out of it quite so often.
"Yeah kid, you should get home. It's getting late." She looks around the area for any sign of his parents, or a face that might be familiar to him. "Who are you, anyway?"
"I'm just a kid who's four!"
She blinks again and his response registers. "Ah, four. Climbing up in the world, aint ya?"
"Ahyup! Less like a rocketship, more like a balloon!" He inhales into his cheeks and puffs out his face way into uncanny valley territory.
Miley would be lying if you asked her if she was creeped out right now and she said no. But she figured this kid couldn't help being weird and she knew he needed an adult. And so did she.
He pretends to pop into a dispersal of laughter. "But I guess you'd know all about that huh!"
"Haha, I guess," she says laughing awkwardly, forced, not really having understood exactly what he had said or what he meant by what he had said. Which she hadn't necessarily understood, as previously stated. "Where do you live?"
"Due west," he says, smiling at her. Suddenly, he blinks, his face expressionless, and sits down and looks at his knee. He swipes the blood off a gnarly scrape with his index finger and then tastes it. "Hey lady, I'm bleeding. Could you help me stop bleeding?"
Miley's horrified. She has to say something. "Hey kid you shouldn't be doing that."
"Doing what?" His head cocks to the side in confusion.
"Tasting blood. You shouldn't be uh. Putting that in your mouth. Blood."
"Huhuh!" He talks like he doesn't have teeth sometimes. "It tastes like pennies! Like lots of pennies!"
"You shouldn't be putting either of those things anywhere near your face, kid."
"Do I LOOK like a goat?!" He thinks about that for a second, him being a goat. Then he makes the most ungodly shriek, trying to make a goat sound. "WH-YEH-YEH-YEH-YEHHH!"
Miley's surprised into laughter. She covers her mouth and giggles through her words. "Why would I think you looked like a goat!"
"Because you keep calling me kid!" He wipes the snot out of his nose with his naked forearm and extends the hand to shake while smiling up at her with those beady little eyes. "My name's Caillou! What's your name?"
"Miley," she says with a hesitant, noncommittal grasp. "I live just down the street."
"Great!" Caillou exclaims. "I live due west!"
"I uh," she says patting herself down for something she realizes she doesn't have as soon as she understands what she's looking for. "I don't know where that is. Could you show me?"
"Nope!"
"But... how did you plan on getting home..?"
"I know! You could take me to your house!"
"Look, kid, I-"
"Caillou."
"Caillou," she sighs into a forced smile. "Yes, I-"
"You could carry me on your back and walk the bike and take me to your house! And! I could call my parents! And they could come get me!" He sits down and smiles up at her.
She sighs, losing the smile this time. She didn't sign up for this.
"Please?"
"Do I really need to *carry* you?"
"My knee is bleeding," he says, chewing on the corner of his mouth.
She knows. Dear god, she knows and she's repulsed by it.
She looks up at the stars as if to say, if you're watchin', you'd better remember this.
"Stand over here," he says, pointing near the bike.
She walks over and holds her hands on her, blowing a raspberry. She leans over to pick up the bike, and as she does, his position has changed.
Like a ninja or something, he's basically a blur of color darting from one point in space and time to another.
Her vision hones in on his foot hooking the frame of the bike she just picked up. His weight pushes the bike against her, pressing it tightly as he kicks his way up onto her shoulders.
"Ow! - Jeez, kid! Watch the feet!"
"Sorry! I'm set!"
"You sure?" she asks, rolling her eyes. "You don't need a juicebox or something?"
"Yeah, okay!" he says, kicking her clavicles and hugging the crown of her head. "I like Apply Ever After! Haha!"
"Sorry, kid," she sighs, walking the bike towards her garage with a strange toddler sitting on her shoulders. "Fresh out."
"What kind do you have?"
"Kid, I- we're almost there, I think we have some apple juice or something okay?"
"That's not Apply Ever After," he says, chewing on his cheek. "That's not even a juicebox! What a rip."
"We take what we can get in this world."
"Hey!" he says kicking both her clavicles again. "Hey I just thought of something!"
"Tssss! Please stop that!"
"Stop what?"
"Kicking! You're sitting on a human, not on furniture."
"Oh! Okay, sorry."
"It's alright, haha," she says, very awkwardly laughing it off. "Just stop, okay?"
"Okay!" He says, bouncing. "You wanna know what I just thought?"
"Sure, Caillou," she says, trying to ease through the irritation.
"You're Miley!" he says.
"I'm Miley," she says.
"I'm Caillou!" he says.
"Mhm," she grunts, trying to balance him as she leaves the bike by her garage. "You certainly are Caillou."
"You know what that makes us? Like this?"
"Caillou sitting on Miley?"
"MAILLOU! Miley! Caillou! Maillou! HuhHA!"
She smiles through her disbelief. "I think you're really onto something there, kiddo."
"Maillou! HuhHA!"
"Rather," she scoffs. "Alright, hold still."
She jams her key into the lock and the door swings open and her mother is standing there and she is shocked and confused.
"Seems like you made a friend, Miley."
"I was-"
"WHO IS THIS MILEY YOU SPEAK OF?!" Caillou shrieks in his deepest voice. "WE. ARE! MAILLOU!"
Miley feels like dying from embarrassment but she's also tired. She does her best to offer a facial shrug as this kid sits on her shoulders and she just says - "haha, yeah, we're Maillou. He needs to use our phone."
Caillou consumes the entirety of the cup of apple juice in one long sip. All while maintaining eye contact.
Still staring at her, he sets the empty glass down and lets out a long burp. He smiles at her.
Miley stands for for a moment, bewildered by this behavior, as is custom. Then she grabs the portable kitchen phone off her wall and hands it to him.
"You need to call your parents, right?"
"Ahyup!" he says, hiccupping again. And again, that same snot. "I should call them alright! Too bad I never used a phone afores! Hahaha! HuhHA!"
Her eyebrows raise and she tries to reassess her facial expression in the process. Her eye twitches.
"Do you know the numbers?"
"I know all the numbers!" he says, delighted. "I know how to count to ten! Are you ready?!"
"No, wait, I-"
"CAILLOU CAN COUNT FROM ONE TO TEN! ONE TO TEN! ONE TO TEN!"
"Wait," Miley says, panicking. "Caillou, st-"
"CAILLOU CAN COUNT FROM ONE TO TEN! ONE TO TEN! ONE TO TEN! LET'S ALL SING ALONG!"
"Caillou!~"
"ONE TWO THREE FOUR FIVE SIX SEVEN! EIGHT NINE TEN! EIGHT NINE TEN! ONE TWO THREE FOUR FIVE SIX SEVEN! EIGHT NINE AND TEN!"
"CAILLOU." Everyone iss surprised at the authority in her voice. Most especially Miley. "C-Caillou. I'm sorry. Do you know your parents' telephone number?"
"Nope! HuhHA!"
Miley is so distracted by her anxiety and wringing the handle of the kitchen phone like some kind of squashgremlin that she doesn't even notice her mom in the room.
"Honey, what is your last name?" her mom chimes in, trying to help the situation.
"Caillou," he says, smiling.
"Okay," she says, flipping through the phonebook. "Your last name is Caillou? What's your first name?"
She nods at her daughter, and then at Caillou.
"Caillou," he says, smiling at both of them.
"You're full name is Caillou Caillou?"
"HuhHA! I dunno!" He says, smiling.
Just when both girls begin to lose all hope, light shines through curtains, casting shadows across the living area.
Miley and her mom freeze and Caillou smiles wider and hops off his chair.
"That's probably them! That's probably them! I'll go look and see!"
Caillou waddles towards the living area window as doors shut outside. He peers outside and there's two knocks at once. Neither of them seem to acknowledge each other.
Caillou keeps peering and the knuckles keep knocking.
Her mother seems too confused, with her mouth open and the kitchen phone cradled between her shoulder and her head.
Miley steps forward to answer the door and when she does she feels like she's met with a circus act.
"I'm Doris!" she says.
"I'm Boris!" he says.
"And we're!" they say in unison. "BORIS AND DORIS!"
"Uh, hi," she says. "I'm Miley."
"Hiley Miley hiley Miley HILEY MILEY! HAHA!" they both say, dancing in unison.
Miley is confused, as she is one to be. Especially given the circumstances.
But that's when Caillou brushes past her knees.
"Parents!" he says, delighted.
"CHILD!" they both say, just as delighted.
"You guys know each other?" Miley jokes into a raspy throat.
"Heck YES we do!" Boris says.
"Like ever!" Doris says.
"Momma! Papa!" Caillou says leaping hisself up into their magnetic invitation of a gesture. "Thank you Miley! You helped me find my parents!"
"I-"
"We won't hear nothing of it!" Boris says.
"And we won't think nothing of it!" Doris says.
"WE WILL PAY YOU BACK IN KIND!"
And the door slams and Miley and her mother blink at the darkness. But Miley opens the door and the light splashes across the canvas of their living area again.
They're already leaving. Miley shuts the door.
The shadows suck up the light through the curtains and she looks at her mom. Who looks at her back.
"I'm making some tea, you want some?"
"What kind?" Miley asks, watching the lights barrel down the street. "Nothing with caffeine. I have enough troubles sleeping as it is."
"I was cookin' up some tension tamer. Don't worry, honey, I'll help you sleep as soon as you can."
Here we are now
Everything is about to change
We face tomorrow as we say goodbye to yesterday
A chapter ending but the story's only just begun
A page is turning for everyone
"I can't forget that crowd getting so sore at me," she says, gently dabbing the tears from her eyes.
So I'm moving on
Letting go
Holding on to tomorrow
I've always got the memories while I'm finding out who I'm gonna be
We might be apart but I hope you always know
You'll be with me wherever I go
Wherever I go
"And daddy, so disappointed in me," she says, letting a sob escape her for the first time since she was just a girl.
So excited I can barely even catch my breath
We have each other to lean on for the road ahead
This happy ending is the start of all our dreams
And I know your heart is with me
Miley's mother feels helpless for the first time she can remember since a time where she just needed to figure out how to handle a baby, and that was all.
And she feels tired. Tired of every time she had to tell that no good sack of dirt he was just sucking them dry of their energy.
Every pointless fight she ever had with the rotten son of a gun.
So I'm moving on
Letting go
Holding on to tomorrow
I've always got the memories while I'm finding out who I'm gonna be
We might be apart but I hope you always know
You'll be with me wherever I go
"Mom?" Miley asks, her lips parting, her eyes widening. Wondering when that anger in her mother's eyes had gotten there, and why. "Did he ever hit you?"
Its time to show the world we've got something to say
A song to sing out loud we'll never fade away
I know I'll miss you but we'll meet again someday
We'll never fade away
"He hit me once," her mother says, more serious than she's ever been. "Back when he was a drunk. He didn't hurt me, but he gave me this look like he wanted to. He apologized. And I told him to either get rid of that look or quit drinking and hope it never came back again. So he quit drinking. But I left him. I left him because he gave me that look again."
So I'm moving on
Letting go
Holding on to tomorrow
I've always got the memories while I'm finding out who I'm gonna be
We might be apart but I hope you always know
You'll be with me
"You left because you thought he would hit you?"
"I didn't want to give him the chance. I knew he wouldn't hit you, long as you gave him what he wanted. So I gave you a place to go and let you understand him for yerself."
Miley doesn't say anything.
So I'm moving on
Letting go
Holding on to tomorrow
I've always got the memories while I'm finding out who I'm gonna be
We might be apart but I hope you always know
You'll be with me wherever I go
Miley's in her childhood bed, trying not to think about anything. And that's when someone or something starts slamming on the front door.
Wherever I, wherever I go
The shutters smashing against their frames is what woke her up.
Without thinking, she throws the covers off her and she stands straight up. She leaves her old bedroom.
The slamming sound against the front door pulls her forward. She hears her father's muffled screams on the other side of it.
It's something calling at her, hooking her soul that she doesn't understand. She tries ever so desperately to quietly make her way down the steps but every step she makes creeaaaaks and the SLAM! never comes at the right time.
She just steps forwards, downwards.
Miley knows her father is on the other side of that door. She knows he is broken, more broken than she could ever be.
The world resets itself and she is static. Feeling everything about the world around her, but through pins and needles, and more intense than she could ever imagine. Every particle within her snaps and goes different directions at the very thought.
When Miley opened the door she saw her father, and that hurt her more than she could ever express.