Here I Go Again: A Novel

by Jen Lancaster

  Deva shrugs. “Can you do it in the next couple of weeks?”

  “Probably not. The squad’s got to learn three new routines before homecoming, and I have an English midterm.”

  Deva pats my shoulder. “That’s unfortunate. By the way, I saw your squad practice the SuperLiss. Derivative, but I like it. Reminds me of a Zulu dance I saw in sub-Saharan Africa. Here’s a thought—what if the girls bared their breasts like the tribeswomen? That would feel more authentic for me. Maybe go with a beaded skirt? Oh, you’ve not lived until you see Zulu beadwork! So intricate! So colorful! So—”

  I stand up and begin to pace. “Are you planning on explaining what happened or should we keep making small talk? ‘Nice weather today! And how ’bout them LT Lions? Think we’ll beat Hinsdale Central at the homecoming game?’”

  Deva shakes a large finger at me. “You’re still funny, Lissy Ryder.”

  “And you’re still freaking me out. Can we discuss all of this”—I sweep my arms around the ladies’ room—“before I have a panic attack and then find out Ativan’s not yet been invented?”

  It takes a good half an hour of tangents, diversions, and exotic travelogues until I finally wrestle the whole story out of Deva. Basically, the fluid she gave me has the ability to alter time. Each drop of the tonic is equal to one hour in the past. With the amount I ingested, I should be here in 1991 for two more weeks, as I’ve already been here a week. When the potion wears off, I’ll wake up exactly when and where I was when I drank it.

  “How could you know I’d drink half the bottle? You told me to use it sparingly,” I protest.

  “Lissy Ryder, you’re as predictable as the tides. Since when do you listen to what anyone tells you?” Deva gives me a playful chuck on the arm.

  Touché.

  “But what am I supposed to do for the next two weeks?” I ask. “If I’m just going back to my miserable life, what was the whole point of this exercise? To show me how awesome everything used to be? To make sure I don’t have enough time to invent Facebook?”

  Deva seems a little disappointed in my question. “How many times do I have to tell you, Lissy Ryder? The point is to achieve clarity, purpose, and inner peace.” She narrows her eyes. “You do realize your journey’s not about ripping off that nice Mark Zuckerberg, right?”

  I shrug. “I was still kind of hoping I could make it work.”

  This succeeds in finally rattling her. “Do you need me to spell this out? Lissy Ryder, we’re here—you’re here—because you’re soul-sick. There’s a dark cloud around you. I went out on a limb for you because I’ve never seen anyone who generates worse karma.”

  Likely because she’s never met Mamma.

  “Well, what am I supposed to do about it?”

  “You’re meant to take a long, hard look at your past. What do you notice? What might you change about yourself? What works? What doesn’t? What’s the source of why you are the way you are? Right now, it’s not too late to make a difference. Consider this, Lissy Ryder: A spaceship can go one degree off course and that’s nothing, right? Just one small tilt of the space steering wheel and you’re right back on track. But the farther the ship travels from where it veered off course, the harder it is to recover the original orbital trajectory. At thirty-seven, righting all your old wrongs is an almost insurmountable obstacle. But at seventeen? That’s nothing. Bear in mind, though, that the nature of time is fluid, Lissy Ryder. Place one finger in the water and the ripples impact the whole lake. Aim for subtle, not grand gestures, okay? Please don’t try to assassinate any presidents or anything.”

  I feel like Keanu Reeves learning about the Matrix. My brain is throbbing and I still may or may not revisit the Cheerios I had for breakfast. “Let me get this straight—what you’re saying is, if I want to have a good life in the future, I have to make small changes to what I screwed up in the past?”

  “Bingo.”

  “Bingo?” What is it with her and “bingo”?

  “Bingo. It’s exactly that easy.”

  “Whoa.”

  Deva begins to walk to the door. “Any more questions? Because I should probably get to calculus now. No matter how many times I return, I never can quite master antiderivatives. Very embarrassing in my line of work.”

  I catch up to her. “The tonic—how’d you know how to make it? The shaman taught you?”

  Deva has to nod with her whole body to compensate for the brace. “Right. Bob at Machu Picchu is highly skilled with ancient Incan potions. He’s a real mixologist. You should try his lime rickeys! He says the secret is using fresh juice, but I—”

  “The shaman’s name is Bob?”

  “It may be a nickname. I’ll ask him next time.”

  Then I remember some boring History Channel show that Duke/Martin insisted we watch right before he dumped me. “I thought the Incans vanished entirely in the fifteen hundreds. They all died out or something.”

  Deva pats me on the shoulder. “The Incans aren’t dead; they just went home.”

  “Hey!” I bark. My voice echoes off the tile. “You swiped that line from Tommy Lee—not the hot one—in Men in Black. That movie’s not out for another six years! I thought we weren’t supposed to steal stuff from the future.”

  Deva chuckles. “No, Lissy Ryder. I’m allowed to steal stuff from the future. You’re not.”

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Turn and Face the Strange Changes

  “Lissy? Are you okay?”

  “Huh?

  I snap out of my reverie and glance up into the concerned face of Brian Murphy. He’s standing next to my car, yet I didn’t even notice him walking up to me. My heart inadvertently speeds up for a second until my head reminds me that dorks are not sexy-in-a-bookish-sort-of-way.

  “I asked if you were okay. You’ve been idling in the driveway for a while. Saw you from my bedroom window and couldn’t figure out what you were doing out here.” When he smiles, I notice how white and straight his teeth are. I guess all those years of wearing his Nerdzilla headgear finally paid off.

  “Oh, I was . . .” I’ve been in a complete fog since my conversation with Deva. Honestly, I don’t even recall the drive home. Last I knew, I was ditching seventh period and heading to my car. I got in, popped the top, cranked the tunes, and then just drove for a very long time.

  Brian’s all attentive and expectant, so I have no choice but to answer. “I was just listening to some . . .” I stop myself before I finish the sentence.

  Brian nods appreciatively. “Slip of the Tongue? Not bad, but not Whitesnake’s best. They lost something vital when Vivian Campbell left the band in ’eighty-seven.”

  I don’t respond, so he takes that as an invitation to continue. “Is Whitesnake still a rock powerhouse? Yes, of course, but Vivian? He brought such an interesting element to the guitar riffs, a complexity. Real layered sound, you know? Here, listen to this.” Brian leans across the open passenger side and fast-forwards to “Kitten’s Got Claws.” “Lacks the nuance of previous work, right? It’s missing that certain something that makes them quintessentially Whitesnake.”

  I sit up straight in my seat. I instantly forget to be distracted about what Deva told me and I disregard the fact that I’m too cool to admit to loving this music. “I know, right? Steve Vai’s talented, but he’s no Vivian Campbell.”

  Glancing over both shoulders, he crouches down and I catch a hint of the sweet tang of his Ralph Lauren aftershave. If the nineties had a scent, it would be the woody, mossy whiff of Polo, applied liberally, and then applied again for good measure. “I hear he’s been talking to Def Leppard. Rumor has it he may join.”

  “Shut up.”

  Holy crap, Vivian’s been with Lep now for so many years that I forgot there was ever a point he wasn’t with them.

  Brian leans against the passenger side, all chatty and casual-like. Other than Deva, he seems to be the one person I don’t intimidate. Hmm. “My uncle works for Geffen and he’s in on all the dirt. Total insider. Speaking
of, I have some news that’ll blow your mind. Ready for this? David Coverdale and Jimmy Page are secretly working on a collaboration. My cousin just got back from the Abbey Road studio in London and he brought me a track.”

  I throw off my safety belt and fly out of the front seat. Coverdale/Page! I love that album! It’s one of my favorites and it doesn’t even come out until 1993! “Then what are we waiting for? Let’s go give it a listen.”

  Brian seems taken aback, but pleasantly. “Er . . . sure! Let’s go.”

  In my dream future, which I guess is my actual future, this is the time of year when Brian and I had our little fling, only the circumstances were slightly different. Originally, last weekend was when Duke/Martin was sick in my car and he came over that Sunday and got kind of shouty and aggressive. Which made me like him all the more, according to my diary. (I’m really starting to question my teenage value system, FYI.)

  Brian came out to calm everyone down and then he made Duke/Martin leave, politely but firmly. I was so impressed with Brian’s fearlessness and command of the situation that we ended up hanging out for a couple of weeks, until I realized being with him would send me to social no-man’s-land.

  But I didn’t even see Duke/Martin over this last weekend, because I’m still kind of mad at him for his behavior in my dream future, which is actually my real future. Regardless, that means that he never actually threw up in my car.

  Ergo . . . I didn’t saddle him with “Duke,” so he’s not going to resent my giving him a nickname for the next twenty-plus years.

  Which means I’ve already made strides to fixing my future!

  Yes!

  Maybe this whole time-travel dealie really is a blessing and not some cruel joke perpetrated by a meddling hippie with large paws and an unhealthy amount of nudie art in her apartment. (I’m still probably going to call him Duke in my head, though, because every time someone says “Martin” I assume they’re talking about Martin Lawrence.)

  We cross the street to Brian’s house. His place is decorated so differently from my house, even though they’re laid out pretty similarly . . . which I discovered the last time, when I’d routinely sneak up to his room in the dark to make out with him. (But that’s not happening this time because I’m all Team Duke.)

  Whereas our central-stair Colonial is all about big vases of silk flowers and fussy couches and oil paintings, his central-stair Colonial looks like a Toys “R” Us on Black Friday. There are balls and army men and Barbie dolls on almost every surface. Crumbling LEGO kingdoms top each coffee table, and scattered bits of puzzles poke out beneath the tall pile of the living room shag rug. It’s not dirty, but it is total chaos.

  We step into his cheerful kitchen and I spot Brian’s mom outside with a couple of the smaller kids. Their backyard is overrun with swing sets and sandboxes. I watch her shoo Snowball away from the sand, shouting, “No! That’s not for you! Bad kitty!”

  Brian grabs a couple of Cokes out of a fridge that appears to be constructed entirely of shitty finger paintings.

  Looking back, I recall him living in a houseful of siblings. And I recall being superannoyed by them, particularly when they’d run through the sprinklers and squeal. Like nails on a chalkboard, that sound.

  “How many brothers and sisters do you have again?” I ask.

  He’s puzzled for a second, but I play it off like Lissy Ryder can’t be bothered to know the comings and goings of this sleepy little burg, even though we’ve lived across the street from each other since third grade, rather than the truth that Lissy Ryder just got here from the future and struggles to remember anything that wasn’t explicitly posted in her diary, so please don’t call the authorities. Brian replies, “Four. I’m the oldest. The first set of twins—Diana and Holly—are nine, and the younger set—Paul and Greg—are six.”

  I shudder inadvertently. “Your poor mother.”

  Brian cocks his head and when he does, his eyes catch a swath of afternoon sun. I thought they were brown, but with the light on them, I see they’re more of a lake-water green with tiny speckles of gold. Did I ever notice this before? I suspect I may have. “How do you figure?”

  “She’s got to deal with all those brats! My God, what a nightmare! I mean, they’re sticky and loud and they ask a million questions. Ugh. Who wants that?” My skin crawls at the notion of being saddled with so many progeny.

  Brian grins again. “I’m pretty sure my parents like their kids. They’re a little worried about paying for five sets of college tuition, so they’re careful how they spend, but otherwise, we have no plans to sell ’em on the black market.”

  “That’s a damn shame,” I reply. “Healthy Caucasian kids like that would fetch enough to fund an Ivy League education.”

  Aw, crap, what’d I just say? I’m supposed to make small changes and be nice, and the first thing I do is suggest he sell his siblings into white slavery. Smooth, Lissy. Real smooth.

  But Brian just laughs and the moment passes. While he fills a couple of glasses with ice, his two brothers run screeching through the kitchen to the family room like a thundering herd of asshole buffalos, LEGOs toppling in their wake. I clamp my hands over my ears but Brian is completely unaffected. “We call that ‘joyful noise’ around here. You learn to tune it out.” I smile and nod, hands still firmly in place over my ears. He peels a hand back. “But you’re clearly not into it, so let’s head upstairs.”

  We gather up our drinks and a bowl of butter pretzels and exit the kitchen. We arrive at the landing in front of his door on the third floor and he opens it with a flourish. “Welcome to the jungle.”

  Brian’s room is still exactly the way I’d described it in my diary—organized and meticulous without being sterile or lacking in personality. It’s kind of cozy in here, with slanted ceilings, and it’s refreshingly clean for a boy’s room. Unlike Duke’s room, which smells like sweat socks and is plastered with bikini sluts lounging on Lamborghinis, this place is populated by neatly aligned books and model airplanes and Star Wars memorabilia. (I’m glad he has a solid eight years of bliss before the whole enterprise is ruined by Jar Jar Binks in The Phantom Menace.)

  There’s a hilariously boxy Macintosh computer on his desk and he seems very proud of it. Oh, honey. Wait until you see the iPad. For a moment I consider asking him how one might go about building a complex social networking site but I’m not sure how to describe it except that it involves “likes” and “dislikes” and something called Farmville.

  His desk overlooks the street, and now that the leaves are falling off the (huge, pre–Dutch elm disease) elm tree, I notice he has a view right into my bedroom. I’m not sure how I feel about that.

  Half of Brian’s room is devoted to high fidelity—he’s got a turntable, a CD player, a dual cassette deck, and, what really impresses me, a reel-to-reel, all wired through a stereo receiver and cabled to a pricey pair of Bose speakers with a subwoofer. “That’s some setup you have here,” I tell him. Duke has only a Walkman, a boom box, and an unfortunate boy band fixation. (Color Me Sadd.)

  “I’m really lucky,” he tells me. “I could never afford all of this on my allowance. My uncle gives me all his castoffs and the swag he gets from vendors. Even used, his equipment is better than most consumers could buy in a store right now.”

  “Lemme check out your collection,” I say, brushing past him. The whole wall by the desk is filled with music on various mediums, too, including lots of genres outside of metal. “Elvis Presley? Lame!”

  Brian arches his brow. “You are so wrong.”

  Well, that’s refreshing. No one tells me I’m wrong. Ever.

  He points to various albums, explaining. “You can thank Elvis for being the grandfather of rock and roll and for blurring the color lines in popular music. Without Elvis, you wouldn’t have had blues go mainstream, which led to R and B and eventually hip-hop. More important, without Elvis, there’d be no Beatles. Without the Beatles, no Rolling Stones; no Stones, no Zeppelin; no Zeppelin, no Aerosmith; no
Aerosmith, no Van Halen; no Van Halen, no grunge. Shall I continue?”

  “Only if you want to bore me to death.” But I say it kind of nicely and he seems amused. Brian launches into a whole genealogy of popular music, demonstrating which sounds spurred new music, and when he’s done, he’s mapped out an entire tree with most of the limbs stemming from Elvis. I grudgingly give the King of Rock and Roll some props.

  (But not for the teddy bear song. Tell me that wasn’t beyond creepy.)

  We listen to his uncle’s bootleg and it’s everything I remember, too. We spend the afternoon waxing poetic about music, with me sprawled in his beanbag chair and him at his desk so he can access his neatly categorized wall of sound. His deep and abiding love for Elvis/his pelvis aside, I’m surprised at how similar our tastes and opinions are, like how we both prefer the Scorpions to Ratt (despite Ratt’s glam-metal facade), and how Mutt Lange’s vision is why Def Leppard’s Hysteria sold as many copies as it has. We’re both passionately in love with the movie Spinal Tap, too, and in the middle of entirely different thoughts, we keep shouting, “No, we’re not going to fucking do Stonehenge!”

  After Brian plays a retrospective of all my favorites, he starts sampling clips from the “second wave” phenomenon out of Norway that his uncle sent him. Scandinavia’s having a real hard-rock resurgence here in 1991. The music’s more thrash/speed punk, and way, way darker than the candy-coated, sexy hair metal that I prefer. While I’m not a huge fan of the beat, I’m charmed listening to Brian gush about the Viking-black-death rock ten feet away from where he sleeps on sheets patterned with Wookies and droids.

  Our tastes truly diverge only when we broach the subject of Nirvana. And, trust? In 1991, everyone’s talking about Nirvana.

  “How are you not enthralled by them?” he argues. “The lyrics, the raw emotion, the power behind the guitar licks, the way they’re so stripped down—they’re the very essence of rock and roll without having to rely on theatrics.”

  I counter, “Pfft, I’m all about the theatrics. Plus, how are you able to get past that each one of them is in desperate need of a shower? Or if that’s not anarchy or punk rock enough for them, maybe they could jump in a fountain or something.”