“I hate that I’m lying to my parents,” I say, my throat constricting. “But this thing with Drew, I can’t walk away from it either. You know what I mean?”
“Yeah.” Shane’s eyes shift to the expensive-looking Persian rug beneath the drum set. The bass bears his initials. Shane drew the cartoonish font himself and had the letters silkscreened on the front. His eyes flick back to me as he wipes his palms on his gray track pants. “I mean … I can imagine what that feeling is like … you know … not being able to walk away.”
Shane blows out a heavy breath of air and I hate that he’s part of my lie. I hate that stress settles in his eyes and that he grows increasingly flustered each time we talk about Drew. But I can’t figure out a way to unravel it all. So for now I tread water, hands and feet moving in fast, desperate circles. But I know it’s only a matter of time before I gasp for air and my head disappears beneath the surface.
“Anyway, audition’s in two months,” Shane says, and I’m grateful for the change in topic. He grabs a drumstick from a metal bin next to his set. I swear there are probably a hundred wooden sticks in there.
“I break ’em a lot,” Shane said the first time I came over, my jaw dropping at the sight of all the equipment. When Shane started playing drums, Drew’s dad worked out the design for the studio and Shane’s dad built it for him, just like that. Like having a recording studio in your house is no big deal. But that was before Shane’s dad got sick. He told me about him the first time I came over, his eyes igniting at the mere mention of his father. I wonder if he feels his dad’s presence in here, if he thinks about him every time he turns on the mixing board.
“Can we play back the part I worked on last week?” I ask and Shane presses play on the Mac. My rendition of “Born to Run” spills out of floor-to-ceiling speakers and I cringe at the missed notes. Shane rewinds it and plays it again, nodding at the computer.
“There,” he says. “You hear that?”
It starts off okay, the notes all where they should be and the tempo increasing, but then it’s like I can’t keep up with the song.
“It sucks.”
“It doesn’t suck. It just needs work.”
“What about you?” I ask, hoping to shift Shane’s focus. He hasn’t rehearsed at all, at least not when I’m here. “Are you going to try out again this year?”
“Definitely,” Shane says, effortlessly twirling the drumstick between two fingers. “Problem is, I can’t play the Zeppelin song again, the one that got me in last year. And I’m having trouble picking something else.”
“Can you make something up?” I ask. Shane cocks his head at me, a smile curling the ends of his mouth.
“I don’t see why not. Do you think I could pull that off?”
“Absolutely,” I say. “Make it into whatever you want.”
Shane sits on a stool in front of the drum set, grabbing his hat from the cymbal and chucking it on the mixing board. A kick at the bass drum pierces through the air, one lone beat that shouts listen up. Then, all at once, Shane launches into it. The intense rhythm is so loud and contained in the room, hammering at my ears, escalating. Shane drums fast and precise, almost like the drumsticks are extensions of his hands. Every muscle flexes in his arms and his hair becomes messier as he goes. I can’t see his feet, but the kick of the bass drum vibrates through my chest. He closes out the beat and grabs hold of the cymbal, silencing the crash. Shane isn’t good. He’s exceptional.
“Think that’ll work?” he asks.
“Absolutely. A hundred percent in the bag.”
“Your turn,” he smiles and moves from the stool to the chair behind the mixing board.
“No way am I following that.” I rub my eyes, Shane turning blurry. Fatigue grabs hold of my body, squeezing out every last ounce of energy. “I don’t have it in me today.”
“Stevie?” Shane scoots closer to me and examines my tired eyes. “You’re not okay, are you?”
“Not really.” It’s a relief to admit that to someone. Sarah barely texts me back, and when we do finally connect, it’s mostly about which new bands we’re listening to or tough teachers we have. It’s never about anything real. Each time I try to tell her about something that matters we get cut off. It’s either the time difference or a bad FaceTime connection, and after a while I stopped trying. I guess she stopped trying too. She has no clue what happened with Dad or that my insomnia has gotten worse or that I’m falling for Drew. She has no clue I’m worried it might all disappear. She doesn’t even know I’m trying out for All-State, or that I’m using these practice sessions as an excuse to sneak out. The physical space between us created this awkward rift in our friendship that neither of us wants to admit. “I can’t sleep.”
“You’re talking to the right guy.” Shane stands and zips his navy hoodie. “I can help. What’s the one thing you love to think about?”
“Music,” I say without hesitation, not sure where Shane’s going with this.
“Favorite band?”
“Pearl Jam.” This conversation is like one of Shane’s rhythms and I don’t miss a beat.
“Should’ve guessed that,” Shane says. “Okay, get up.”
He leads me into a soundproof booth with a microphone hanging from the ceiling. This room is a vacuum. No air conditioner clicking on, or hum of a lawnmower outside, or his mom’s footsteps upstairs. Shane holds his finger to his lips and smiles.
“This is what your mind should feel like, right before you fall asleep,” he says, his voice cutting through the silence. “This quiet in here, this stillness, it’s the only way to turn everything off. And you can’t do that if your mind is dialed up to eleven.”
“Okay, so how do I dial my mind down?”
“Top five Pearl Jam songs on Ten,” he says, his eyes sparking. “Go.”
“In no particular order,” I say, playing along. “That would be too hard.”
“Of course,” he says, nodding at me.
“‘Porch.’”
“Good call,” Shane interjects.
“‘Black.’”
“Obviously.”
“‘Jeremy.’”
Shane groans loudly and I laugh.
“I was hoping you weren’t going to say that. So commercial.”
“I’m kidding,” I say. Only posers would rank “Jeremy” in their top five. “‘Even Flow,’ ‘Why Go.’”
“Phew.” Shane exhales.
“‘Release,’” I say. “Best song on the album, in my opinion.”
Shane smiles but his mouth is tinged with sadness, the kind of smile that breaks your heart. And without asking him I know why, the lyrics of the song running through my head.
“I listened to that one on repeat when my dad died,” Shane says. “You know he wrote it about his own dad, about missing him after he was gone?”
I nod and step closer to Shane.
“Did it help?”
“Yeah, more than anything else at the time,” Shane says, and I know exactly what he means—the songs we need to make sense of what we don’t understand.
“You would think ‘Release’ would be my favorite on the album,” Shane says quietly. “But if you’re gonna pick a slow one, I’d go with ‘Oceans.’ Great lyrics. Hold on to the thread. The currents will shift. Glide me towards you.”
“Great song,” I say, a soft flutter beating in my chest, a sensation so slight that I almost miss it. “How do you know these lists will help?”
“I like to think a lot at night too,” he says. “For me, it’s usually if Brent gets in my face at school. I replay it over and over changing how I reacted, making up a different script in my head.”
“Is that really what keeps you up?” I ask because Shane’s not looking at me. He’s messing with the zipper on his sweatshirt.
“It’s not only that,” he says, meeting my eyes. “I think about my dad, almost every night. Some nights I swear I can hear his key in the door coming home from a late night at the office. He was an a
rchitect. Did I tell you that?”
I nod. He told me last week, but I let him tell me again.
“He didn’t just build this studio. He built my house and most of the houses in this town.” Shane shifts his eyes back to his zipper. “Am I talking about him too much?”
“Of course not,” I say, and before I realize I’m doing it, I reach out and touch his arm. Shane flinches ever so slightly, then clears his throat and steps back. The warmth of his arm stays with me, fusing with the palm of my hand.
“Anyway, it was a long time ago,” he says, even though it’s only been a few years. “What keeps you up?”
“I’m scared everything’s going to get taken from me. I’ve had to leave behind every friend I’ve ever made. I want one thing to last, to be forever.”
“It doesn’t work that way,” Shane says, leaning against the foam wall, his eyes tethered to mine. “Nothing lasts. It’s about living it all while it’s happening, not stressing about when it’s going to end. And trust me, the right people will stick with you, no matter what.”
It’s so quiet in the recording booth, the air listening to our breathing. Two people locked together in a moment, Shane’s words resonating. Maybe it’s time to stop thinking about endings. My heart palpitates from inside my chest, alive and ready. Shane’s dimple appears and it dawns on me that I did make my first Millbrook friend. And he’s nothing like Sarah, Krystal, Emily, or Nicole. He might be the kind of friend who stays even after I leave.
Through the glass walls of the recording booth, I catch the time on a digital clock displayed on the mixing board. All at once my stomach jumps and I’m jolted from this conversation.
“I should probably get going,” I say quietly, my eyes fixed on the floor, my heart clenching.
“You’re meeting him now, aren’t you?” Shane says.
“Yeah.” My answer sounds louder than I intended, magnified by the still air of the recording booth.
But this time Shane doesn’t urge me to fess up to my parents. He doesn’t lecture me.
“If you ever need to talk…”
He offers me a half smile and it feels so good to have someone on my side. I throw my arms around Shane’s neck, hugging him and saying, “Thank you,” in his ear. When I step away, for a split second his eyes are different, like they’re hugging me back.
* * *
The moon is low and full, casting a bright halo into the dark night sky. An acorn drops from a branch landing in a pile of red and yellow leaves. I pull my bubble vest in close as Drew’s Jeep swerves into his driveway, a beat thumping from his stereo, stopping me in my tracks. The music goes quiet and Drew hops out of the car, wearing a leather jacket slung over a gray hoodie. A smile takes over his face as he jogs to me, wrapping his arms around my waist.
“Hey, you,” he says, kissing me, my body relaxing into him. “Just got done with band practice. How’s the Springsteen piece coming?”
“I can’t get it right,” I say. “I don’t know if this All-State thing is happening this year.”
“You’ll get in,” he says, tugging at the bottom of my hair. “So listen, there’s a homecoming party Saturday night at Tom’s. I was hoping we could bump into each other there. For once you don’t have to lie to your parents. I wish you didn’t have to lie,” he says, his eyes apologetic. At first Drew wanted to come back over, to try again with Dad. But I thought it would only make things worse. Lying seemed like the easier option, but now guilt creeps in every time I’m with my parents.
“I heard the whole school goes to Tom’s party,” I say, thinking that Drew’s right. If I meet him there, I won’t have to lie about where I’m headed, and that part would be a relief. But the mention of homecoming makes me think of Ray and the cardboard signs plastered all over school covered in little yellow suns and bubble letters—Catch Some Rays. Vote for Ray for Homecoming Queen. The other day she handed me a flyer, the first time she’d spoken to me since I told her about Drew.
“Hey, Stevie,” she said, as I looked at the piece of paper in my hand. She fished through a shopping bag and pulled out a small cellophane pouch filled with multicolored Starburst, handing it to me. “Vote for me?”
“Sure,” I said, missing a friendship that never was. As much as I love hanging out with Shane and Drew, I need girlfriends. “Are you around after practice today? Maybe we could meet up?”
“Can’t,” she said, her eyes darting around the hallway. She waved to a group of girls walking past us. “Super busy with this homecoming stuff. And doing both football and soccer is kicking my ass.”
“Oh,” I said, not entirely believing her. The bell for first period rang and she said a quick goodbye, disappearing into the crowded hallway.
And now I need to know what happened between Drew and Ray, to know if lying to my entire family has been worth it. If giving up a friendship with Ray has been worth it. I need to be able to trust that this thing with Drew is real and not going to disappear.
“I heard Ray’s nominated,” I say carefully, searching Drew’s face for a clue to his past. “Is she going?”
“I don’t know. Probably.” He scratches the back of his head and stares out into the night sky. It’s obvious he doesn’t want to talk about her, but I need to know.
“What happened with her?” I ask, hating the sound of my voice, small and desperate. “I mean, I heard you guys used to…”
“We were a thing, and then we weren’t,” Drew says, his dark eyes taking hold of mine. “I cared about her, of course. But it’s over. It’s been over for a while.”
We stand there for a beat, Drew fidgeting with the sleeve of his jacket and me picking at my cuticle. In a year from now, will Drew say the same thing about me? That I was a girl who moved away. A random girl he used to know.
“Why are you with me?”
“What do you mean?” His hand reaches for me, his fingers lacing with mine. My first instinct is to pull away, shield myself from getting too close. But his brown eyes are vulnerable, not cocky. I curl my fingers around his, and take a deep breath, about to spill all the insecurities that keep me up at night.
“You could be with any girl in Millbrook. Why me? Why a girl who has to sneak around her parents to see you? Why a girl who could pack up and leave at any moment?”
He gives my hand a little squeeze, pulling me closer, touching the tip of my nose with his finger.
“There’s a million reasons.” He rakes the hair out of his midnight eyes and smiles. “Like when I talk to you, I know you’re listening, not pretending to listen. And when you sing along to the radio, it’s like you’re up on a stage. And you don’t want anything from me but me.” He brushes the hair out of my face and looks at me, really looks at me. “And I don’t care about you maybe leaving. You need to let all that go and realize that what we have going on right now is what matters.”
My chest pounds, like a typewriter permanently imprinting each one of Drew’s words on my heart. I squeeze his hand and decide in this moment that I’m going to forget about it all, my parents’ rules and Ray and leaving, always leaving. Because Drew’s right, I’m not leaving right now, and if I don’t start living the moments I have, I’m going to miss it all.
“Why me?” he asks, his voice soft, like he’s unsure of my answer, which is so simple and true it should be obvious.
“Because you feel like freedom.”
“Freedom?”
“It’s a feeling I have, when I’m with you. Like everything else disappears.”
Drew kisses me, slowly pushing me against the Jeep, the metal cold on my back. The leather from his jacket brushes against my face as he tucks my hair behind my ear. I pull him to me, but for the first time it’s not enough. My hand reaches for the door handle and I yank it open, guiding Drew into the back seat. I scoot back, and he lingers at the door, his eyes roaming my body, his mouth parting like that night at the beach.
“C’mon,” I say, laughing. Drew slides over me, the scent of his lemon shampoo fil
ling the back seat as his hair grazes my face. I pull his hips to me, feeling him beneath his jeans, my heart racing. He kisses me over and over as his hand slides under my shirt, undoing the top button of my jeans.
“You’re shaking,” he says in my ear. “Are you okay?”
He pulls away from me and gazes right into my eyes, kissing the tip of my nose.
“It’s just…” I stammer, my whole body in flames. “I’ve never…”
Drew kisses the tip of my nose again and says, “It’s okay. We can go as slow as you want.”
“Can we just stay where we are?”
“Absolutely,” Drew says kissing me again, his nose touching mine and his hair tickling my cheeks. He speaks softly between kisses.
“I love…” His thumb traces the bottom of my chin. “… where…” His deep eyes connect with mine, holding me tight, assuring me. “… we are.”
CHAPTER 10
Drew
Shane lies on my living room couch, throwing a Nerf football at the ceiling. He’s in track pants and his dad’s worn Princeton sweatshirt. When Shane’s dad died, he wore that sweatshirt for a week straight. And now Shane wants to go there too. But he hates the idea of the whole legacy thing. If you ask me, he doesn’t need his dad’s clout. I’ll bet when the time comes he’ll have his choice of any school that would be lucky enough to have him. The ball hits the ceiling and plummets into Shane’s hands. He chucks it up again, his eyes fixed on the ball, not saying a word. I wonder if Brent got in his way this week, but I don’t ask. Shane prefers to work that shit out on his own.
Mom’s out with that finance guy again. When he came to the door earlier, my stomach turned at the sight of his Sperry loafers and blazer. He’s nice enough, opening the door for Mom, asking me about my day—trying. And Mom seems to be doing a little better, even hugging me on the way out. Or maybe it’s me. Stevie and I laid in the back seat of my Jeep for a while the other night, Stevie nuzzling into my shoulder as I stroked her hair. Even though right now my family is complete shit, being with Stevie makes me feel the way I did when I was little, tucked in tight beneath a cozy blanket.
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