Fireworks

by Katie Cotugno

  “I know,” I said, sitting up on my bed. “I’m being an infant. There’s nothing to be upset about, this is the opportunity of a lifetime, I could have gotten sent home like Ash and Kristin, so who cares if my best friend hates me and everyone here is full of shit?” I glared at her. “Does that about cover it?”

  I was expecting blowback, but Charla just looked at me calmly for a moment. “No, actually. That’s not what I was going to say at all.”

  I raised my eyebrows. “No?”

  “No.” Charla stuck her hands into her back pockets, put one knee up on the edge of the empty bed. “Look,” she said, “I know you’re upset with me. I know I have to earn your trust back. And I know that whatever is happening between you and Olivia is mostly our fault, and I’m sorry for that. But already this is working better as a solo project, don’t you think so? Don’t you feel that at rehearsal?”

  I hadn’t been feeling much of anything at rehearsal besides numb, actually. I shrugged. “Maybe,” I said, unconvinced.

  Charla pushed forward. “Guy knows what he’s doing, Dana. If you don’t believe anything else I say, believe that. If you work with him, and Juliet, and Lucas, and me—this could be bigger than anything you ever thought.”

  “Maybe,” I said again, watching an empty bag of chips skitter across the concrete below us. Then I looked up at her. “But what’s it going to cost?”

  I was expecting some bullshit answer, but Charla held my gaze. “Well, that’s up to you, isn’t it?”

  I nodded. “Yeah,” I said slowly. “I guess it is.”

  “You want some ice cream?” she asked then, holding her hand out to pull me off the bed and to my feet. “Would that cheer you up?”

  I knew she was trying to distract me or buy me back again, on top of which it was probably fat-free frozen yogurt as opposed to anything I actually wanted to eat. But I was tired, and I didn’t want to fight anymore. I just wanted someone to tell me what to do. “What flavor?” I asked eventually, raising my eyebrows.

  Charla grinned.

  TWENTY-FIVE

  Sitting on the kitchen counter in the apartment and clutching the receiver in my sweaty hand, I finally scraped together the courage to call Ashley at home in her ritzy Chicago suburb. I don’t know why exactly I felt compelled to do it—it wasn’t exactly like we’d been friends while she was here—but it bothered me, the way she and Kristin had gotten dropped so quick and so dirty. I felt like it had been partly my fault.

  I was expecting an attitude, but instead Ash sounded happily surprised to hear from me. “It’s fine,” she said when I was finished apologizing. “It is what it is, you know? I wanted it, but it’s my senior year. Everybody’s really happy I’m back. I’m probably going to be homecoming queen come fall.”

  I laughed at that. “You definitely will be,” I said, picturing her waving from the top of a crepe-paper float. “Take pictures, okay?”

  “You too,” Ashley instructed. “How is it there?”

  I hesitated. “It’s okay,” I said carefully. I didn’t feel like I could tell her how much I missed Olivia, how weird and lonely this new setup felt. “It’s good.”

  “Good,” Ash said, and it sounded like she meant it. “I’ll listen for you on the radio,” she promised as we were saying good-bye, and I swallowed something that felt bizarrely like tears at the back of my throat.

  “Bye, Ash,” I said.

  After that I called Kristin, who hung up on me so hard I could actually feel it in my eardrum. I put the receiver back in its cradle, leaning my head against the wall.

  “No rehearsal today,” Charla said two mornings later, when I came out into the living room; Olivia was already sitting at the table, a bowl of oatmeal pushed to the side. “The two of you have got media training this morning.”

  I frowned. “What’s media training?” I asked.

  Media training, as it turned out, was Olivia and I sitting side by side in Guy’s office while a middle-aged blond woman named Gayle taught us how to answer interview questions without embarrassing ourselves or our coaches. Gayle rubbed me the wrong way immediately, her red lipstick and carefully shellacked hair like the women who worked at the fancy department stores in Atlanta, her mouth drawn up tight like a square knot in the middle of her face.

  I only half listened as she droned on through her list of dos and don’ts, looking over at Olivia out of the corner of my eye. Her attention was rapt, of course, head tilted slightly to the side as she took in everything Gayle was saying; she’d be great on TV, I knew, same as she was great in performance: poised and disciplined and confident, nothing ugly ever seeping through the cracks. I frowned and looked away, picking at a loose thread on my shorts. I kept waiting for the moment when sitting near her or hearing her talk didn’t make me want to scream or punch her or burst into tears, but it hadn’t happened yet. We’re a team, I wanted to shout; I wanted to shake her. What the hell happened to the two of us being a team?

  “People will know what you tell them,” Gayle explained. “Be pleasant, but not boring. Stay on message. And for Pete’s sake, smile. We’re building a brand here. We’re selling a product,” she continued, “and the product is you.”

  There was that word again. I got an unpleasant creeping feeling every time anyone said it, like Olivia and I were a pair of dolls in boxes on a shelf. I crossed my arms and leaned back in my chair, frowning. Gayle glanced at me with open disapproval.

  “Now,” she said, “a word about body language . . .”

  We had our first live performances that weekend, opening for Hurricane State at a festival at a big public park in Orlando. We were scheduled to go on right after the pie-eating contest, which is about the only way we convinced Mikey not to enter. “I could take this!” he protested, looking longingly over his shoulder at the racks of blueberry and rhubarb. “You’re keeping me from my true calling!”

  It was even hotter than usual; volunteers were handing out little bottles of water, and spritzing stations were set up so that people wouldn’t pass out from heat exhaustion. Juliet sprayed our faces with Aqua Net to keep our makeup from melting down our cheeks. “You’re up first,” she told me, reaching up and tucking a stray piece of my hair back. I glanced at Olivia, who was looking away.

  I’d spent the whole morning anxious out of my brain, reliving the disaster of our rehearsals in front of Guy on a never-ending loop. Why had I thought I wanted this again? As I watched the crowd gather in front of the makeshift stage, red-faced and restless, it was hard to remember.

  The DJ from a local radio station introduced us over the microphone, feedback squealing out into the throng. The crowd clapped politely down in the grass. The recording Lucas and the other backup musicians had made of our tracks blared from the speakers and out across the park, and then it was just . . . happening.

  “Hi, guys!” I heard myself say, my voice as clear and steady as if it belonged to somebody else entirely. “I’m Dana Cartwright!”

  I’d spent the last few days steeling myself for the possibility of disaster, expecting my nerves to swallow me like some kind of tsunami, but instead I felt calmer than I ever had. I felt . . . ready. Right away I felt muscle memory take over, like all these weeks of practicing had actually meant something. Like every once in a while, hard work paid off. I remembered every lyric, knew every step and combination. And when I hit my most difficult note, it took every ounce of self-restraint I had not to stop in the middle of the song and fist-pump. Suck it, Lucas, I thought.

  Take that, Liv.

  The best part, though—the absolute best, most surprising, most unbelievable part—was how much the crowd was enjoying it. They were dancing and clapping and singing along with me, and when I got to the part in “Heat Wave” where I asked everybody to throw their arms in the air, everybody did. I spotted Alex off to the side just then, watching, and the proud, happy grin on his face told me everything I needed to know.

  I felt like I was magic, like I could bend the entire universe
to my will as long as I was up there. I felt confident and powerful and true. I could love this, I realized as I headed into my last song, building to the finale. More than that: I kind of already did.

  “Oh my God,” I said when it was over, still smiling and waving at the slowly dispersing crowd. “Oh my God, that was awesome.” I felt light-headed with adrenaline as I jumped down the last two steps off the stage, my legs going a little rubbery as I landed and a dazed, fizzy buzzing at the back of my brain. I could have turned around and done it again, ten more times.

  I reached out to high-five Charla, who was waiting on the grass off to the side, but she grabbed my hand and pulled me back to her, wrapping me in a tight hug even though I was hugely, grossly sweaty. “Do you see?” she said in my ear, quiet enough so Olivia couldn’t hear. “Do you see what you can do when you really try?”

  “I do,” I promised, and for the first time I actually meant it. “I see.”

  Afterward, Alex and I walked the fairgrounds for a little while, watching the rickety Ferris wheel complete its revolutions and little kids shoot down the giant yellow plastic slide on burlap sacks. I was getting my change from the fried-dough vendor when someone tapped me on the shoulder; I turned to face a rail-thin girl with long, straight blond hair who couldn’t have been more than nine or ten, a hot pink marker in her skinny hand.

  “Can I have your autograph?” she asked, blue eyes wide.

  I laughed out loud, surprised and cackling. Somehow I hadn’t imagined this. I definitely hadn’t imagined how crazy and exciting and unbelievable it would feel, the idea that I meant enough to a total stranger for her to want a piece of paper with my name on it. For that to be something that was valuable to her. My face actually ached from smiling. “Of course,” I said, signing with a flourish and drawing a heart next to it, grinning at Alex as I passed the pen back. “Anytime.”

  “Check you out,” Alex said once the girl was gone, her ponytail bouncing as she joined her group of giggling friends next to the Fun Slide.

  “Okay, I liked that,” I admitted as we brought the fried dough over to a picnic table, kicking up clouds of hot, sandy dust as we walked. My fingers were sticky with melting powdered sugar. “That felt awesome.”

  “I can tell.” Alex grinned. “You’re gonna be doing a lot more of it, I can tell that, too.”

  “Oh, you can, huh?” I laughed.

  “I can. All over the place.” Alex raised his eyebrows and tore off a piece of fried dough. “They’re talking about Europe after the national tour, did you hear that? Maybe even Asia.”

  “What?” I gaped at him. “Seriously? And you guys would get to go?”

  “So would you,” Alex pointed out.

  “Or Olivia,” I said.

  “Or you,” he said again.

  I let myself imagine it for a moment: the notion was glittering and white hot, like it would burn my hand if I reached for it. Europe and Asia, a fall and winter spent globetrotting with Alex. The whole world—suddenly, literally—within my reach. “Have you ever been?” I asked instead. “Out of the country?”

  “Just to Mexico,” he said around a bite of dough. “It sounds amazing, though, doesn’t it? I’d love to see that stuff with you. Eat croissants in Paris, that kind of thing.”

  That kind of thing. I couldn’t keep myself from smiling. Two months ago, if anyone had told me there was a chance in hell I’d see Europe in my lifetime, I would have laughed out loud. It was dangerous, I knew, to let myself picture it. It could mean I was setting myself up for a disappointment that would grind my bones to dust. But when I looked at Alex, I could tell he believed I could get there. And just for a moment, I believed I could, too.

  “Come on,” I said, finishing the last of the fried dough and licking my sticky fingers, nodding my head at the spinning Ferris wheel. “Let’s go get stuck at the top.”

  TWENTY-SIX

  The thrill of performing live struck some magical match inside me. I rehearsed in the shower, in the car on the way to the studio, before I went to bed every night. Once I woke up in the dark with the sheets tangled all around my ankles, and I realized I’d been practicing my routines in my sleep. I gulped every gross green smoothie Charla handed me. I worked harder than I ever had. I wanted to be the best. More than that: I wanted everyone to see me be the best.

  Especially Olivia.

  It was stupid, maybe, but hers was the face I saw every time I missed a dance step in rehearsal; hers was the voice I heard taunting me in my head. I wanted to get up earlier than she did, to hit notes that were higher and get crowds to scream louder. I wanted her to admit that she’d been wrong. I wanted Olivia to know she’d misjudged and betrayed me, but the more I tried to get her attention, the more indifferent she seemed. As hard as I was working, it was like she was working even harder not to notice me at all.

  Guy noticed, though. “Come in here,” he said one day after rehearsal, motioning me into his office. I felt myself tense as he shut the door behind me, but all he did was thump me on the back, dad-like. “Nice job, kid,” he said, sitting down in his big leather chair across from me. “You’re really showing up now, huh?”

  “Thanks,” I said, feeling surprisingly proud, my face flushing with the unexpected pleasure of it. It was nice to feel like everything was paying off.

  I expected that to be the end of it, and I took a step toward the door, but Guy held a hand to stop me. “You doing all right?” he asked.

  “Me?” I said. “Yeah, I’m great.”

  “You sure?” he asked, looking at me closely. “You happy?”

  I stopped, surprised. Guy was the last person I ever expected to care about something like that. “Of course,” I assured him now, which was a lie. I wasn’t happy, not exactly; I missed Olivia, and I felt unsure more often than not. But the longer I did this, the more there was a charge in it for me, something about it that made me want to get better; I liked being special, liked the different way Lucas and the other coaches looked at me when I came into the studio. And more than I’d ever thought I would or was capable of, I liked the feeling of working toward a goal. “I am.”

  It felt good to do what you were good at, I realized. And I was getting really good.

  Guy nodded. “Not everybody has what it takes to do this,” he told me. “Lot of girls flame out, crack under the pressure. But you’re not like that, I can tell. We’re gonna go all the way.”

  I found myself grinning at him. “Yeah,” I promised, nodding in agreement. “We are.”

  We had another performance with the boys later that week in New Orleans; it was the first time we’d gone anywhere far enough from Orlando that we needed to fly there, and I gripped the armrests like I could hold myself up in the sky. “This your first time on a plane?” Alex asked, sitting down beside me—Mikey had been assigned to the seat, but Austin had dared him to go up to the flight attendant and ask for one of those little plastic pins shaped like wings.

  “Nope,” I lied.

  “Really?” he asked, raising his eyebrows. “It’s my first time.”

  “Really?”

  “No.” Alex grinned when I scowled at him. “Relax, though,” he said, peeling my fingers off the armrest and taking my hand. “Planes hardly ever crash in real life. You’re, like, a hundred times more likely to die in a car wreck.”

  “Gee, thanks,” I said, but I was laughing now, distracted. It occurred to me that that might have been the point all along.

  That night’s performance was a good one, bright lights and my first time with a full backup band, an electric kind of energy in the audience. I took my bow and waved and came offstage looking for Alex—I’d tried something different in “Only for You,” a little run of notes toward the end of the bridge, and I wanted to hear what he’d thought about it. I was expecting him to be waiting in the wings, like I had for Hurricane State’s performance earlier, but I didn’t spot him in the crowd of assistants and techs. “Have you seen the boys?” I asked Juliet, who was deep in co
nversation on a cell phone, the long antenna poking up into the air.

  “Follow the food,” she suggested, putting her hand over the mouthpiece. “Try the green room.”

  The green room was actually a large white tent set up behind the stage, air-conditioned by a huge whirring generator and outfitted with food tables and plenty of booze, no one checking if we were of age. I saw Alex almost immediately, along with the rest of Hurricane State, an R&B trio called Star Signs who were headlining the festival—and half a dozen girls with radio station contest winner badges around their necks. One of them, a leggy brunette in artfully tattered denim shorts, had her fingers curled around his upper arm as she leaned in and said something close to his ear.

  Alex stood up as soon as he saw me, trotted over, and took both my hands. “You’re back,” he said, sounding surprised and happy and then worried. “Did I miss it?”

  “You missed it,” I said, and Alex frowned.

  “Shoot,” he said, “I’m sorry. How was it, how did it go?”

  “It was good,” I said, squirming away as he moved to put an arm around me. I wasn’t a jealous person, generally, but seeing him with those girls unsettled me. Our connection felt tenuous all of a sudden, a thread that could easily be snapped.

  “What’s wrong?” Alex asked. Then, following my gaze to the brunette, who was currently giving me stink-eye: “Oh,” he said, looking at me sheepishly. “That wasn’t—they didn’t mean anything by it.”

  “I don’t blame them,” I said pointedly.

  Alex nodded like, message received. “I didn’t mean anything by it, either,” he promised, leading me over to a quiet corner near a long buffet of food. “Really. I know that looked questionable. Guy likes us to do that kind of thing, you know? Talk to the contest winners and stuff. He thinks it’s good for sales.”

  “Flirting with girls is good for your sales?” I asked skeptically.

  “No,” Alex said immediately. Then: “Well—”