Then Amanda came racing around the corner like she was in the ocean and someone had shouted “Shark!”
“Are you Okay?” she panted. “Adrian, are you okay?”
“I don’t know. I’m not in yet.” Adrian rattled at the door. “Come on!” Then he was inside and turning frantic circles. “Where is it?”
“What?”
“The fire. There’s a fire in the shop. The shop is on fire.”
“No it isn’t,” said Amanda. “But look, I need to get you to a hospital, all right?”
“Not even any smoke,” said Adrian.
“Just come with me, and everything will be all right,” said Amanda.
“What…Why?”
“I had a text from Katie saying you’d tried to throw yourself into the river.”
“I haven’t tried to throw myself into the river.”
Amanda stood back and looked at him. “Are you sure? Not even a little?”
“I’m sure. Really. I’m not the happiest guy in the world right now, but I’m not that bad.”
“That is the last time I give my phone to Jaz,” I said.
“Amanda!” Mom’s car screeched onto the pavement, and she was out of it before the engine even stopped running. “Don’t you even think about it.”
“About what?”
“It’s been a difficult few days,” said Mom, “and we’re all very tense, but I promise, getting a tattoo will not help. Especially not of a dragon. Especially not on your face.”
“I’m not getting a tattoo,” said Amanda. “Er, Katie, would you mind telling us what’s going on?”
We went into the shop, everyone still a little shaken, to be honest, and then they looked at me.
“I’m sorry about…all…that,” I said. “I just needed to get you here, and I knew you wouldn’t want to come.”
Mom and Adrian exchanged a glance—a glance that could have been the complete definition of the word “awkward.”
“Why?” said Amanda.
This was so embarrassing. “Because,” I said, my cheeks hotter than the sun, “I sort of have some stuff I’d like to play for you.”
“Really?” said Mom. “You really think that—”
“I know,” I said. “But look. You’re here now. It’ll only take a few minutes. Promise me you’ll stay and listen, just for a little while? And then we can all go home and pretend this never happened, if that’s what you want.”
Mom looked like she was ready to start pretending now, but Adrian pulled back the record racks and unfolded a few chairs while Manda switched on the fairy lights and made everyone some coffee. And said again and again and again that there really was no way she’d ever get a tattoo. Which wasn’t entirely true. I knew she actually had a teensy little dolphin on her back that she’d gotten when she went to Ibiza after university entrance exams.
So while that was happening, I tuned my guitar, probably taking a little longer than was really necessary, then shuffled my chair into every possible position you can have a chair on a small wooden platform.
Mom and Adrian and Amanda were sitting, waiting.
“Okay,” I said. “I’m ready now.”
Was I ready? Was it about to be Savannah’s party all over again? At least there weren’t any cakes for me to destroy.
I cleared my throat.
“Okay,” I said. “I’ve been doing a lot of thinking lately. And a lot of writing. And I figure that the best way to show you what I’ve come up with is to sing. This first one’s called ‘Sorry.’ And I really, really mean it.”
I let the first chord trickle out from beneath my fingertips.
“I was wrong. So wrong.
Wrong about my life,
Wrong about my song.”
As I sang, Jaz slipped through the door of the shop and gave me a big thumbs-up.
“Wrong about you,
Wrong about me.
All I can say
Is sorry”
That first song went by in a complete blur. I don’t know where I looked or whether anyone was even listening. All I know is that I’d never meant anything more. I didn’t even notice that I’d finished until they started to clap.
“Um, so that’s the first one. The next one is…oh. Hey, Sofie.”
Sofie, Paige, and Savannah had come in and were sitting down on the floor. And Dominic Preston, who was managing to be more good-looking than ever.
Aaaaaargh!
I glanced over at Jaz, who just grinned.
“The next one is…?” said Mom. I was pretty sure that meant she wasn’t about to leave. At least not for another song, anyway.
I swallowed. “The next one’s called ‘Autocorrect,’” I said.
And maybe I wasn’t going to crash and burn, even when the door opened again, and Devi Lester came in and then Finlay, both of them holding up their phones and swaying the screens in time with the beat.
So I sang. I sang to them all. I sang all the stuff that I’d only ever admitted to my lyric book, stuff that I’d have thought would make them laugh and hate me. And perhaps it would later, or tomorrow.
But while I kept singing, they kept listening and clapping, and more people came: some sixth-graders from the bus, my guitar teacher Jill, Cindy from Cindy’s, the weird boy Jaz had brought to the party. Even—oh Lord—even McAllister was there, and the principal, crowding in at the back, both wearing jeans. I don’t know what was more surprising—that they’d turned up or that they knew how to dress casual.
Finally, when the shop was full to bursting, I said, “Why did you come?”
A silence. Then someone shouted, “Jaz!” and there was a lot of giggling.
“Oh no. What terrible, awful, hideous thing did she say to get you here?”
“She said that you’d be spilling your guts live in concert,” said Sofie. “And that we had to tell everyone we knew.”
Ah. Yes, that would do it.
Then, from Jaz, right at the front, “Why are you here, Katie?”
All those faces, open and waiting, lit in smudges from the fairy lights and phones.
“To say…to say that I was an idiot. This guy from Top Music, Tony, he told me he would release ‘Just Me’ as a single. He said I’d be going on tour. That I’d have everything I wanted—everything I thought I wanted. And I believed him…which was stupid. Because I’ve got everything I want here.” I cleared my throat. “There isn’t going to be a single. He lied. But that’s a good thing. I think I just want to keep writing music. That’s all.” My voice went sort of funny. “Do you mind if I take a quick break? Is that Okay?”
Everyone said that it was, and so I stopped and staggered into the stockroom on legs of jelly.
Mom and Adrian followed, as Amanda called, “Is it all right if I open up the register? People seem to want to buy things.”
And as she said it, I heard someone out front saying, “I never knew this place existed!”
I sank down onto a box as Mom said, “Katie, that song, ‘Autocorrect.’”
“Er.” My eyes slid away. “Sorry. I…”
“Is that really how you’ve been feeling?”
“No!” Then I remembered why I was here. “I mean, yes.”
Mom’s face did something quite complicated, and then, completely unexpectedly, she pulled me into a hug.
“It’s Okay,” I told her shoulder.
“It isn’t,” said Mom. “But we’ll work on it.”
We pulled apart, and I saw her eyes focus in on something behind me.
“Adrian, have you been sleeping in here?”
“Just a few nights,” said Adrian.
“On this?” She pointed at the sleeping bag.
“Yeah,” said Adrian.
“I thought you’d be in a hotel.” As she said it, Mom leaned o
n the stack that was Adrian’s drum set. Which fell down, made exactly as much noise as you’d expect.
“Kind of expensive,” said Adrian quietly.
“So why didn’t you go stay with Neil? Or your mom? Someone in the pub must have a spare room.”
He rubbed at his cheek. “Wasn’t really thinking straight.”
We might have gone on like this for a while, since Mom hadn’t even gotten as far as finding out where Adrian was brushing his teeth, only Jaz came shoving in.
“It’s gone crazy out there.”
“I know. McAllister? At my private gig? What were you thinking? And how did you even know her number?”
“You haven’t noticed?” said Jaz, then, to the world at large, “She hasn’t noticed!”
“Noticed what?! Jaz, you are making me crazy!”
In answer, Jaz took my hand and dragged me back into the shop, where Amanda appeared to be selling every record she had.
“Look,” she said.
“What? What am I supposed to be seeing?”
“Outside,” said Jaz.
I focused on what was behind the glass. Then I saw.
People. People pressed up against the window with their phones held high—not just a few, but rows and rows and rows so that every inch of the glass was filled, like we were in a zombie movie, only scarier. They saw me and began to wave and shout.
“Who are they?” I whispered.
“There’s more of them,” said Jaz. “I just looked down the street. They’re everywhere.”
I darted back into the stockroom and sat down on the floor until the world stopped spinning, only it wouldn’t stop but just went faster and faster.
“How do they know you’re here?” said Adrian. “I don’t know how news can travel so quickly.”
I knew.
Oh yes, I knew all too well. I don’t know why I hadn’t thought of it sooner.
“Um, Jaz. The people holding up their phones. Were they…putting this online?”
She nodded.
“And…” I said, slightly not wanting to know the answer, “are there people…out there…on the Internet…watching?”
Jaz nodded again. And as she did so, I heard a chant begin.
“KA-TIE. KA-TIE. KA-TIE.”
“Better go do the second half,” said Adrian.
“But…I can’t,” I said. “This was supposed to be just us. Now it’s everyone. Everyone except…”
“Except who?” said Mom.
“Except Lacey,” I whispered.
“I did try to get her here,” said Jaz, looking surprisingly defensive. “Even though she’s an annoying drip with stupid hair. I did try.”
Which gave me an idea. “I’ve got one more chance,” I said. “Give me my phone.” And then I texted:
Hey Lace.
We’re not friends anymore and I get it. I don’t deserve u.
But look, can u get to Vox Vinyl ASAP?
This is the last thing Ill eva ask, I promise.
I need u 2 cut me bangs
“That’ll do it?” said Jaz, looking over my shoulder.
“KA-TIE. KA-TIE. KA-TIE.”
“I don’t know,” I said. “Come on. I’d better finish this.”
She didn’t come. I sang “Cake Boyfriend” and “Respect Your Waist” and “London Yeah” and “Mobility Scooting On the Pavement.” Then there was just one song left.
“‘Just Me’!” shouted Devi. And then they were all at it. “‘JUST ME’! ‘JUST ME’!”
And I raised my eyes and looked into the audience to see that—
Adrian and Amanda had gone from the front row.
Walked out.
Abandoned me.
Mom was looking at her feet.
And Lacey still wasn’t there.
It was just me.
And I thought, some things you just can’t forgive.
And they shouldn’t forgive me. Because I’d been stupid to show off like this. Stupid to think that getting up in front of everyone would help.
My guitar began to slip from my arms.
“’Scuse me.”
It was Adrian, emerging from the stockroom with an armful of the drum set.
Amanda was clambering onto the teeny piece of stage that was left, slinging on one of Adrian’s bass guitars. Jaz was coming up past me, drumsticks in her hands, and now—now it was just like my bedroom, only without…without…
It was at that moment that we all heard this rumble, like a wave, far away at first, then gathering into a roar. Outside, the people jumped apart, as something, someone came hurtling through the crowd, scattering phones this way and that like glowing Lego tiles.
And then I saw what it was…and it was like…it was like…It wasn’t like anything I have ever seen or heard or imagined.
It was Lacey, being carried along above the mass of bodies, half surfing, half flying, while something—someone—charged through, ramming a path to the door.
Finally, as they broke through the front, I saw.
Bleeding from a scratch above the eye, hair crazy, eyes basically feral…
Lacey was riding Nicole, the sophomore.
And it was magnificent.
Adrian was holding a tambourine.
And as Lacey reached out her hand, I knew it was going to be all right.
“Yikes,” said Lacey, staring down at her phone. “Have you seen this? You have to see this.”
COX IN CONCERT
She shot to fame with her homemade video of the gloriously cheeky “Just Me,” then vanished from view. But last night, Katie Cox made a return to our computer screens with an intimate, live-streamed, one-off concert.
Cox seemed nervous at first, her hands visibly shaking. But after a few stumbles, she got into her stride with a set so electrifying, so well-crafted, and so heartfelt that the early jitters were quickly forgotten. Family matters came up again and again, perhaps most memorably in plaintively lovely “Autocorrect.” And then there was a somewhat strange song titled “Cake Boyfriend,” much appreciated by the audience but somewhat lost on this critic.
Explaining the recent disappearance of the video that made her name, Cox said that she’d recorded “Just Me” as a single with the über label Top Music (home to the likes of Karamel and Crystal Skye) but that her track had inexplicably been held from release.
Indeed, it was the teen anthem “Just Me” that finished the set, with the backing of the same ragtag group that had featured on that bedroom recording. Was it as good as the video watched by two million people?
No. If they’d rehearsed even once since making the original, then it didn’t show. Endearingly, this did not seem to matter to Cox, whose smile lit up the room even as her song was abandoned before the second verse.
And perhaps it’s that smile that so appeals to her fans. A number of different recordings of the concert exist, of varying quality, but a rough tally of their views thus far shows that from an initial audience of a few hundred, the show has already been downloaded more than nine hundred thousand times.
Amid a frenzy of press interest, CEO of Top Music Tony Topper vehemently denied that the single “Just Me” had been shelved, saying, “There must have been some kind of miscommunication. I adore Katie. We had a terrific time in the studio, and she’s back in soon to talk about her album. We couldn’t be more excited.”
So basically, it was the next day and we were at school, sitting around the back of the classroom, sharing a bar of chocolate that Jaz said she’d swiped from Aldi. Only I found a receipt in the bottom of the bag, so, you know. Jaz says she’s an anarchist who doesn’t live by the rules, but someone paid for that candy with exact change.
“The best part was when that girl got arrested for trying to kick the door down,” said Jaz.
“The best part was when you said nice stuff about me,” said Lacey.
They were both good, although I have to say the girl trying to whack through the back door with steel-toed boots while screaming my name was a little worrying until the police got it straightened out.
Anyway, though, they were wrong. The best part was when I was putting my guitar away and I saw Adrian slip his arm around Mom’s waist, and she didn’t shrug him off or anything.
There were lots of great parts that night, and I hope it doesn’t sound like showing off or anything, but I do want to say them because they are important.
The first was that I barely saw Amanda for the rest of the evening because they kept the shop open after I’d finished, and everyone was asking her where they could get my songs, but obviously they couldn’t. Only Amanda didn’t let that worry her at all and was getting people to sign up for her mailing list and promising another concert at the same time next week and recommending albums here, there, and everywhere, and best of all, people were actually buying them. I even heard one guy saying that he was happy that Harltree had finally opened up a music store because he’d been waiting long enough.
All while Amanda was rushing around in this happy blur, Mom and Adrian were off talking in the stockroom, and when I put my head around the door to see about maybe going to McDonald’s or something, I found them kissing. I screamed, obviously, and said it was the most disgusting thing I’d ever seen, to which Mom made a rude gesture. While still mid-lip-lock.
Mom rocks.
After all that, the rest of the night was kind of anticlimactic, to be honest, as we waited around for the street to empty out and Lacey remembered about the bangs cutting and ended up with the stockroom scissors.
Eventually, it rained and everyone went off and we got in the car and drove home, where we found that a big new leak had appeared in the roof and part of the hall ceiling was now on the hall floor.
Weirdly, though, after all that craziness, and the fact that the house really did seem to be doing its best to fall down around our ears, I slept incredibly well that night. And even though I was woken up early by Adrian banging on my bedroom door, meaning he must have stayed over to finish what he and Mom had started in the stockroom, which is revolting, I felt this amazing sense of peace.
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