speaking tambourine

from chris adrian’s new story in the new yorker:

At first, it seemed no one had noticed that she’d missed a beat [on her tambourine]—Chris was the only one who usually cared, anyway—until Peabo did the same thing, just one beat off, but didn’t look at her. He did it again: another missed beat.

She missed one back, and then threw in an extra one at the end of the next verse, and then for the rest of the song they were trading omissions and additions, having a conversation above and below and around the song that no one else, not even the snarky voice in her, could understand, and it occurred to her, just before the song ended, that they were speaking tambourine.