by Jamie Shaw
When the lights come back on, his eyes have already locked on me again, his smile making my cheeks blush. I escape back to the kitchen to grab plastic plates and a serving knife, and Rowan watches me with that annoying smirk on her face.
“Shut up,” I say as I pass her.
“I didn’t say anything.”
“You thought something,” I argue.
“Yeah . . . I tend to do that. I’m pretty sure normal people think things.”
She chuckles, and I ignore her. “Grab the napkins.”
“Okay, Miss Bossy.”
As I leave the kitchen, I flick her off with the hand I’m using to hold the cake server, and she calls after me, “I’m thinking thingsss!”
“You’re stupiddd,” I sing back, and her giggle follows me to the living room.
I cut Joel a whopping slice of ice-cream cake before cutting tiny slivers for everyone else who wants one. By the time I’m done cutting, there’s no cake left and I realize I haven’t left any for myself, but then Joel is abruptly tugging me onto his lap and offering me some of his.
After cake, most of the party follows Adam outside for a smoke break, and I decide to make myself a margarita. I’m pouring ingredients into a mixing cup when Jenny, a girl who showed up with one of the guys Joel went to high school with, joins me in the kitchen to dump her plate and fork in the trash. She stands next to me, staring over the breakfast bar at Rowan and Mike playing on the hand-me-down Xbox Mike gave us as a housewarming present. They’re surrounded by a group of guys drooling over their kill counts.
“I never thought I’d see the day when Adam Everest and Joel Gibbon got serious girlfriends,” Jenny muses, and even though I’m not Joel’s girlfriend, I don’t correct her.
“Did you go to high school with them too?” I ask, putting the cap on my mixing cup. I begin shaking the margarita, and she nods.
“Yeah. I went to that school my whole life.”
“What were they like?” I pour a glass for Jenny after pouring one for myself.
“Adam was a heartbreaker even in elementary school.” She takes the glass I offer and laughs to herself. “We had class together in third grade, and I remember that his Valentine box was crammed full of cards on Valentine’s Day. He picked the girl who gave him the most candy with her card, and she became his little girlfriend for the week. I think that was the only girlfriend he ever had until she came along.” She nods toward Rowan, and a little smile sneaks onto my face.
“Shawn and Adam were almost always together, but they were so different. Adam spent most of his lunches in detention for skipping class or fooling around under the bleachers, but Shawn was always at the top of our class.”
“Really?” I say, curious even though I don’t find it hard to believe.
“Yeah. He was like this weird mix between a good boy and a bad boy. He always looked the part of a bad boy, but the teachers always loved him because he always pulled straight As.” She chuckles and says, “I had a friend back then who had such a crush on him. I mean, a lot of girls had crushes on him, but she reeeally liked him. I think she’s in a band now too.”
She trails off, thinking about her friend, and I say, “What about Mike?”
“I don’t remember Mike before middle school, but even then, he just kind of kept to himself. I played clarinet, and I remember he joined band for like . . . a month. Then he just walked out one practice and never came back.”
“It was too easy!” Mike shouts from the couch, surprising us with his superhuman hearing.
Jenny laughs. “I think he started the band with Adam and Shawn shortly after that. He dated a girl for most of high school,” she lowers her voice to a whisper, “but she was a total bitch.”
“What about Joel?” I ask.
“I think he moved to town halfway through our freshman year. Back then he didn’t have the mohawk. He just had a head full of messy blond hair, and the girls loved it. He had like this grunge bad-boy look.”
I wonder if she knows about Joel’s mom, that he probably didn’t look grungy by choice, but I don’t ask.
“He always spent classes doodling in a notebook instead of paying attention. A few teachers really got on his case because they said he was wasting his potential, but I think he always knew what he wanted to do with his life, you know? All those study halls he spent in the music room ended up being worth it.”
Last Tuesday night, Joel came over with an acoustic guitar since he said he was working on a song but wanted to see me. We spent the evening sitting together in my living room, him strumming his guitar and working out the notes, and me working on a paper for English class while trying not to jump his bones. There was just something about seeing him play that guitar, so deep in concentration, that made me squirm in my seat. When he finally put it down, I was on his lap in a matter of seconds, tugging his shirt over his head and kissing him senseless.
I’m lost in the memory when Joel walks back inside, and I take a big gulp of my margarita to try to get my head straight.
“You two are really cute together,” Jenny says. She pats my arm and walks away.
“What were you girls talking about?” Joel asks when he takes her spot.
“You,” I taunt.
A tipsy smile consumes his face, and he says, “About how hot I am?”
I laugh and say, “Nope. About what a nerd you were in high school.”
He follows me out to the living room, protesting the whole way. “I was not a nerd. If anything, Shawn was the nerd.”
“Hey!” Shawn says, and a bunch of us laugh. “I was not a nerd.”
“You were kind of a nerd,” Mike says, and Shawn glares at him.
“Didn’t you used to let Adam copy all of your assignments?” Jenny’s boyfriend asks, and Shawn scoffs.
“What else was I supposed to do? Let him fail?”
Patting Shawn on the back, Adam says, “You’re a good friend.”
Shawn scoffs and knocks Adam’s hand away. “Whatever. You still owe me thirty bucks for doing that history paper for you for Mr. Veit’s class.”
“Joel still owes me thirty bucks for when I took the fall for him denting my mom’s car with that skateboard,” Adam counters.
The boys start squabbling over who owes who what, and I break it up by bringing Joel one of his presents from the gift table. “This one is from Blake and Jenny.”
He opens gift after gift, getting T-shirts and albums and gift cards and expensive liquor. Rowan got him personalized guitar picks, Leti got him a kickass pair of shades, and the guys all chipped in to get him a special kind of Fender guitar that everyone oohs and aahs over. I give him my gifts last, trying not to fidget as he opens them.
When he pulls back shiny green wrapping paper to reveal a graphite pencil set, he smiles down at the box.
“I didn’t want you to be able to back out of our deal,” I say, only half joking.
“What deal?” Rowan asks.
“He’s going to draw me something for my birthday.”
“You draw?” she asks Joel, and he finally turns his smile up to me.
“Used to.”
“He was really good,” Adam offers, and I hand Joel my next present before anyone can ask any more questions he might not want to answer.
“Another one?” he asks, setting his pencil set carefully aside before taking the box I hand him and shaking it next to his ear.
“Just open it.”
Joel peels the wrapping paper away from the front of the box in one clean swipe, revealing the Hot Wheels Dragon race track that he got for his birthday when he was a kid—before his mom sold it to fund her alcohol addiction.
Adam and Shawn start gushing about the track, reminiscing in their own childhoods, but it’s all just white noise surrounding Joel’s blank expression. My heart plummets as he stares down at the set, unmoving and unsmiling.
I open my mouth to say something. To apologize. But then he looks up at me, and his eyes are bright and glassy. I barely h
ave time to register the tears in his eyes before he sets the gift aside and walks right toward me, lifting me off the floor without breaking stride. He carries me all the way down the hall to my room, closing the door behind us, and then we’re just standing there, me with my feet off the floor and him with his face buried in my neck.
“Joel,” I say, prepared to apologize, but his body begins trembling with little sobs and I no longer know what to say. I wrap my arms tighter around him and press my cheek against his temple. “Hey,” I whisper, rubbing my hand over the buzzed hair next to his mohawk. I plant a kiss against his head and let him hold me.
Joel shakes his head, and I ask him what’s wrong. He just shakes it again, and then he takes me to the bed and sits down with his arms still around me. I stand in front of him, and he holds me close. His cheek presses against my stomach and his body shakes with barely audible sobs that have tears spilling over my cheeks and dripping onto his back.
“Hey,” I say again, rubbing my hand over his broad shoulders. “Come on, stop that. You’re going to mess up my makeup.”
Joel chuckles against my stomach, and I smile and lift a hand to wipe my eyes.
He takes a deep, shuddering breath and stands up to take my face in his hands. He holds my teary-eyed gaze for a moment before giving me a soft kiss. “Thank you,” he whispers.
I want to tell him it’s just a toy, that there’s nothing to thank me for. But I know it meant more to him than that, so instead of saying anything, I dry his tears. And when his thumbs wipe over my cheeks, I let him dry mine too.
Chapter Sixteen
“DON’T ANSWER IT,” Joel groans the morning after his birthday party, but I wiggle away from the warmth of his body to grab my ringing phone off the nightstand.
“Hello?”
My dad chuckles into the line. “Morning, sleepyhead.”
I collapse back against my mattress and groan. “What time is it?”
“Almost noon. Late night clubbing?”
An amused chuckle answers him. “Dad, what do you know about clubbing?”
“What do you think I’ve been doing with all my time since you moved out?”
I laugh hard, waking Joel back up. He turns his face toward me and mumbles, “Who is it?”
“Is that a boy?” my dad asks.
“My gay friend, Dad,” I quickly answer, emphasizing the last word for Joel’s benefit. “We had a sleepover last night after a birthday party.”
“Gay friend?” my dad asks.
“Gay friend?” Joel mouths.
“Leti, remember?”
“Oh, yeah. Whose birthday was it?”
“My friend Joel’s,” I answer, and Joel’s eyebrow lifts.
“A boy friend?”
“Yeah, a boy, space, friend,” I say, rolling away from Joel so that I’m facing the edge of the bed. He brushes my hair away from my neck, and then his warm breath is on my neck and I’m struggling to listen to my dad.
“—just wanted to see when you’re coming home for Easter,” he says, and Joel’s satin tongue curls behind the tender lobe of my ear. My eyes flutter closed, and I bite my lip between my teeth. “Dee?” my dad says, and I roll out of bed, padding out of Joel’s reach.
“Yeah. I’m coming home the Wednesday before Easter,” I say, watching Joel stretch out on my bed. His arms lift over his head, pulling his stomach muscles tight. When he catches me staring, he winks at me, and I spin toward the wall.
“I was thinking chicken cacciatore over garganelli pasta this year. Think we can figure out how to make it?”
The first Easter after my mom left, my dad attempted to cook Easter dinner, but the ham was burnt, the mashed potatoes were runny, and the green-bean casserole was charred to a crisp. We were both sitting at the table staring at our food, thinking of my mom, when he abruptly stood up and dragged me to the kitchen.
“Alright, we’re going to make a linguini ala pomodoro caprese,” he said, and at eleven years old, I had no idea he was just making shit up. We ended up boiling a bunch of miscellaneous pasta, cutting up fresh tomatoes and peppers, and mixing everything with a store-bought tomato sauce. My dad and I ate every last bit, swearing it was the best meal we had ever eaten, and in truth, it was. It was also the best Easter I’d ever had.
Every year since, we’ve attempted to make something especially complicated, and even on the years we’ve failed miserably, we’ve laughed our asses off and have eaten the scraps.
I smile at my lavender wall. “Yeah, I think we can manage. That sounds amazing.”
I wrap up the conversation with my dad and turn back toward Joel, glaring at him. I point a finger at his smirking face and say, “You are evil.”
“And gay apparently,” he says, and I can’t help laughing. “Are you really leaving next Wednesday?” he asks, suddenly more serious.
“Yeah. Heading home for Easter.” I walk back to the edge of the bed and smirk at him. “Why, are you going to miss me?”
“Nope,” he teases, tugging me back onto the covers, “I plan on being tired of you by then.”
For the next few days, he makes it his mission to spend so much time with me that we’re sick of each other by the time I have to leave. He sleeps at my apartment, he cooks me breakfast, we spend evenings on the couch watching movies. I watch him play guitar, he complains while I struggle over homework, and we spend more time in my bed than anywhere else in my apartment. Even the shower is no longer a safe zone, which is why we’re late to auditions on Saturday. By the time we get to Mayhem, the first guitarist is about to start without us and Rowan scolds me with her eyes but encourages me with her smile.
“If I can’t stay in bed,” Adam gripes, tripping Joel as Joel walks to his seat, “neither can you.”
“We weren’t in the bed,” Joel says with a smug voice and an even smugger smile. I muss his precious mohawk before taking the seat beside him. He glares at me, I blow him a kiss, and Shawn clears his throat.
“Can we get started now?”
We all quiet down, and after being patient with four guitarists who looked much better on paper than they sounded in person, Adam goes outside for a smoke break. The rest of the guys follow, and I slide into a seat next to Rowan.
“Listen to this,” I say, playing her a song on my phone.
Her head nods to the beat. “I like it. Who’s it by?”
“The next auditioner.” My grin is downright giddy, and Rowan catches my good mood, her blue eyes lighting up. “His name is Kit. I have a good feeling about this one.”
I got the email from Kit on Wednesday while I was walking back to my car from class. By the time I got home, I was overflowing with excitement and practically tackled Joel to get him to listen. He agreed that the song was awesome, and I immediately sent an email to Kit to give him an audition time.
“I think Shawn’s head might explode pretty soon if we don’t find somebody,” Rowan says, and I laugh. The last guy couldn’t even figure out how to plug in his guitar. Shawn plugged him in, patted his back, and then immediately sent him on his way, shaking his head when the guy tried to talk his way back onto the stage.
“If this next guy doesn’t work out, I’m just going to learn to play the guitar myself.”
Rowan chuckles, and then she grins at me and says, “Sooo, you and Joel . . .”
When a knock sounds at the door, I seize the opportunity to bound out of my seat, not bothering to respond to my meddling best friend. Rowan thinks Joel and I are more than what we are, and no amount of arguing is going to convince her otherwise. My heels echo off the floor as I escape to the front door, and I swing it open wide to find Queen of the freaking Groupies.
Long black hair highlighted with dark blue highlights cascades down to a loose black tank top—low cut and showing copious amounts of lacy black bra. The girl’s black jeans—which are more ripped up than any pair I’ve ever seen Adam, Shawn, or Joel wear—are practically painted to her legs. She’s built like a freaking runway model with boobs.
Complete with stacked bracelets, a tiny diamond nose ring, and combat boots, she’s the definition of rocker chic.
I resist the urge to slam the door in her face.
“The band isn’t here to sign shit or take pictures,” I say, wondering how the hell she heard they would be here today.
“Okay?” she asks, a perfectly shaped eyebrow lifting to emphasize her confusion. “I’m not here for autographs or pictures . . .”
“Great.” I begin closing the door, but she slaps her hand against it.
“Are you Dee?” When I just stand there staring daggers at her, she wedges her combat boot against the door and holds out her hand. “I’m Kit. We spoke over email?”
“You’re Kit?” Rowan asks from behind me as I dazedly shake Kit’s hand.
Kit’s eyes light with realization, and she laughs. “Oh, sorry. Yeah. I have four older brothers who thought Katrina was too girly of a name.”
“And you’re here to audition?” Rowan asks.
Kit pulls a guitar case from where she’d propped it outside against the wall. She shoots us a smile and says, “I hope so. It is okay that I’m a girl, right?”
“Yeah,” Rowan rushes to say, but I’m skeptical. The song I listened to sounded amazing, but it’s hard for me to reconcile the expectation I had in my head with the girl standing before me.
“That depends,” I answer. “Are you a girl that can play the guitar?”
“I think so,” Kit says with a perfectly straight face. “I mean, it’s difficult since my vagina is constantly getting in the way, but I’ve learned to manage it just like any other handicap.” Her brows pull down in a frown, and she says, “Sadly, I don’t get special parking.”
A long moment of silence passes between us, but then I can’t help laughing. Kit’s lips turn up at the corners and I lead her inside.
It isn’t until we enter Mayhem that the first glimpses of her nervousness begin to show. With her guitar propped against the stage, she rubs her hands over her back pockets and stares around the room. “So it’s just going to be us?”