My parents stared at me. Finally my mom said, “You write songs?”
“I do now, I guess,” I said. On the word guess I heard a sudden fumbling on the other end of the line, a familiar voice yelling, “Not if I can help it!” at someone, and then a huge, quick laugh.
It was definitely her—Jane, of Plain Jane.
On the phone.
Calling me.
If only life were recorded, I would play that moment over and over and over again.
“Hey, Flattery Girl, what’s going on?”
“Um … Well, I can’t believe you’re calling me.”
Another loud, rock-and-roll laugh. “Yeah, well, here I am!”
I tried to laugh too, but I think I was hyperventilating, so I’m not sure any noise came out.
“Katie, I have a question for you. Did you really write those lyrics Pops Ramdal sent me?”
I nodded, but then realized you can’t hear a nod over the phone, so I said, “Yeah.”
“Well, they’re good,” said my favorite songwriter ever. “They’re really good.” Then she yelled off the phone, “Right, Kit?” Then back to me: “Kit thinks so, too.”
“This is unbelievable,” I said.
Jane laughed again, and said, “Yup, it is kind of unbelievable. I was reading this song, and I was thinking about this girl in middle school, feeling these intense feelings, feeling a little trapped by them, and not quite knowing what to do with them, and then finally realizing that writing is the way out. Writing is freedom.”
I was shocked that she could get inside my head so accurately. “Wow,” I said. “That’s amazing. You totally know exactly how I was feeling.”
Jane laughed softly. “I wasn’t talking about you,” she said. “I was talking about me.”
Neither of us spoke for a few seconds after that.
“Well, I was feeling sad,” I said, finally. “When I wrote it, I mean.”
“Ah. Well, sometimes it takes a little sadness to let the art out.”
I nodded again, but this time I felt she knew I was nodding, so I didn’t say anything.
“So listen, sweetie,” Jane continued. “We’re taking a break from the road, and I’ve got a little time on my hands. So how would you like to come down to my studio tomorrow afternoon and have a look around? We’ll talk about these lyrics of yours, figure out how to turn it into a real song. You game?”
You know how you have the moment when you say to yourself, “My life is changing forever, right now,” but you don’t really believe it, or you don’t really trust it, even though you’re hearing it with your own two ears?
I was having that moment.
“I would absolutely love to come to your studio,” I somehow managed to say into the phone. I glanced at my parents, whose eyes were going wide. “I would be totally honored.”
“Great! I gotta run, so I’m going to put Kit back on the phone. She’ll talk it over with your folks, work everything out. Sound like a plan?”
“Absolutely,” I said. “Thank you so, so much!”
Jane laughed again. “No, thank you,” she said. “The world needs people who can write. Turns out you’re one of ’em. It’s a gift, and I’m here to make sure you don’t waste it. See you tomorrow.”
“See you tomorrow,” I said, but she was already gone.
I handed the phone to my mom and sat down at the kitchen table, trying to get a handle on the most amazing five minutes of my life. One thing kept running through my head: This fantastic thing that was happening to me was all because of a boy whose heart I had just broken.
Life is really weird sometimes.
16
TWO PELICANS
I knew I was in a different world when we drove through the gates at Jane’s house and the first thing I saw was a huge marble statue of two pelicans playing guitar.
“What on earth is that?” said my mom.
“Two pelicans playing guitar,” I answered.
She looked at me. “Thanks for clearing that up.”
We were met at the door by some guy who introduced himself as Nigel. He had an English accent and hair down to his butt.
“Jane’s in the Plastic Room,” Nigel said.
My mom and I looked at each other.
“It’s a room with a lot of plastic in it,” Nigel explained.
“Oh,” we said.
And off we went to the Plastic Room, which was filled with giant plastic chairs, couches, and tables. They were all brightly colored and incredibly shiny. It felt like what a room might look like in a four-year-old’s dream.
Jane was on an orange couch, with her eyes closed, wearing a pair of headphones the size of a small country. She was swaying slightly back and forth, moving to the beat of something. She had no idea we were standing two feet in front of her.
My mom and I looked at Nigel. “Give her a minute,” he said.
Approximately eight minutes later, the song ended and Jane opened her eyes. She saw us standing there and broke into a big smile.
“Yo!” she hollered, whipping off her headphones and leaping up from the orange plastic couch. She hugged me, then hugged my mom. “Welcome to Two Pelicans!”
“Thank you,” said my mom. “Now, about the pelican thing—”
“I love pelicans,” Jane said. “Always have. Was obsessed with them as a kid. They are the most awesome-looking creatures. I would have pet pelicans but this environment is just all wrong.” Jane gestured around the room. “You like the Plastic Room?”
“I’ve been meaning to ask you about that, too,” said my mom.
Jane knocked her hand against the table. “Plastic! Ugh! The hardest material to get rid of. Doesn’t decompose. Just sits there taking up valuable earth space. So I decided to start collecting plastic and making good use of it. I got a whole company now dedicated to collecting plastic and making furniture. It’s actually doing really well.”
“That is so amazing,” I said. “You are so amazing.”
Jane laughed her big laugh. “Cut it out, Flattery Girl! I just got lucky. But you know something? I got lucky because I worked hard. And I believed in myself. So, yeah. How’s that for a segue?”
“What’s a seg-way?” I asked.
“A segue,” Jane explained, “is a way to go smoothly from one song to another. Or one topic to another. And I want to go from the topic of me to the topic of you.” She looked at Nigel. “Is the Black Room ready?”
“Ready,” Nigel confirmed.
Jane turned back to us. “Let’s go.”
We followed her down a long hall, around a corner, out a door, across a stone path, through a cottage filled with manufactured pelicans of all shapes and sizes, and finally, into a giant barn that was completely dark except for one red light blinking on the far wall.
“Hold on a sec.” Jane disappeared into the darkness. Suddenly there was a sharp click, and dim light filled the room. Everything was black—the walls, the couches, the carpeting, even the huge refrigerator in the corner.
“Can I ask why you call it the Black Room?” my mom asked.
Jane roared with laughter. “Holy smokes, Katie, your mom is a funny girl!”
But I wasn’t paying attention. I was staring. Because the room was filled with more instruments and musical equipment than I thought existed in the world. Guitars, basses, keyboards, amps, mikes, a beautiful grand piano. All completely black.
“Wow,” I whispered.
“Help yourself,” Jane said. I looked at her, confused, so she clarified. “Play anything you want.”
I think that was the moment my eyes bugged out of my head.
“I can’t.”
Jane walked over to a completely gorgeous pitch-black Gibson Les Paul guitar, picked it up, and put it in my hand. “Can’t isn’t an option,” she said.
I didn’t know what to say, so I just stared down at the guitar. Then I played one chord—E major. It sounded like the most perfect chord ever.
“Jane, you are being so in
credibly kind to my daughter,” my mom said, sitting down on one of the black couches. “Do you mind if I ask you one question?”
“Shoot,” said Jane.
My mom thought for a second, then said, simply, “Why?”
“Jane’s from Eastport,” I reminded my mom, as if that answered the question.
Jane plopped down onto the rolling chair behind the massive soundboard. She started rolling back and forth, playing with knobs.
“Katie, did you show your parents the lyrics you sent me?” asked Jane.
“No,” I said quickly.
“Why not?”
“I don’t know.”
“Do you mind if I show it to her?”
I glanced at my mom. “I guess not.”
Jane pushed a button and my lyrics came up on a huge screen hanging from the ceiling (which was black, btw).
I looked at them and suddenly felt terribly embarrassed.
How do you
Speak the words
That you never thought would be spoken?
How do you
Break the heart
That never has been broken?
I watched my mom as she read the lyrics. Her face looked like a combination of shock, concern, and pride.
Afterward, she looked at me. “Now I get it,” she said. “Now it makes sense.”
Jane’s eyes went back and forth between my mom and me. “What does?”
I jumped in. “My parents have been telling me that I text too much, that I IM too much, Instagram, Snapchat, all that stuff,” I said.
“Sounds familiar,” Jane said, smiling.
“Yeah,” I said. “We fight about it a lot. I always told them they were crazy. But then something really bad happened.”
I stopped for a second and looked up at the screen again.
How do you
Look someone in the eye
When you’re not sure what you want to see?
How do you
Say the words
There is no more you and me?
“Mr. Ramdal’s son, Nareem, has been my boyfriend for almost a year,” I continued, “even though I’d been thinking about breaking up with him for a while. But I was never able to do it. Then I thought about doing it on text. Because you can say a lot of things on text that you’re too scared to say in person.”
“That’s for dang sure,” Jane said.
“So I had decided to do it, but then he invited me to your concert, and to meet you and everything, and so of course I couldn’t do it. But the night after the concert, I was texting with a bunch of people, my friend Becca who’s in my band, and my friend Charlie Joe, and Nareem. And Charlie Joe knew I didn’t really like Nareem anymore, and we were joking around about it on text. And I sent a text that said something like ‘Well, yeah, I don’t like Nareem anymore, but of course I can’t break up with him now that he helped me meet Jane,’ or something like that.”
I paused to take a deep breath. The only sound in the room was the buzzing of all the equipment.
“Only, I sent it to Nareem instead of Charlie Joe.”
Jane whistled. “Holy—.” Thankfully she remembered she was with a girl and her mother, and she stopped.
Nigel popped his head in.
“Can I get anyone a juice or a coffee?”
“Mango soy juice all around,” Jane said. Ew, I thought to myself. Nigel nodded and disappeared.
Jane got up and went to the piano. She casually played a few of the most beautiful chords I’d ever heard. Then she stopped and looked at me.
“Your mom asked why I’m being so nice to you,” Jane said. “It’s because you’re me. You’re me! Don’t you get it?”
“Not really,” I said.
“I was just like you!” Jane said. “I wanted to write, but I was too shy, too insecure, too nervous. But I made myself do it! I made myself!” Then she pointed at the guitar in my hands. “I want you to finish the song.”
“Now?”
Jane hooted. “No, not now, silly.”
I stared down at the guitar. “You mean write the music?”
Jane nodded. “I mean, write the song. Make it a complete thing. Finish what you started.”
I tried to imagine coming up with chords and a melody to the words I’d written.
“I don’t know if I can.”
“Of course you can,” Jane said.
For some reason, her being so confident in me made me way less confident in myself. “I’m really busy,” I said, lamely.
“Oh, please. Doing what? Sending texts and photos to your friends? That’s another reason why that stuff is so dangerous—it’s killing creativity! If I had Facebook and Twitter and texting and all that stuff to distract me, I don’t know if I ever would have written even one song.”
Nigel knocked and brought in a big tray of snacks and drinks.
“I would love to give up all that stuff,” I heard myself say. “It would make life so much easier.”
Jane directed her blazing eyes right at me. “So why don’t you?”
I wasn’t sure I understood what she meant. “Why don’t I what?”
“Give up your phone,” Jane said. She got up and started pacing around the room. She looked like she was getting more and more excited about the possibility. “Just try it! See how it feels!”
Yikes. Was she serious?
“Um, I don’t know,” I mumbled. “That’s kind of impossible. I need my phone just to deal with everyday life, with everything going on.”
“You don’t! Trust me, you don’t.”
I looked up at her. “I don’t?”
“I don’t text,” Jane said. “I don’t IM. I don’t do Facebook or Twitter. Now it’s true, I do have an online profile, which Kit keeps up for me, but it’s just business. But personally, I refuse to be defined by that stuff, because it’s no way to live. It makes us mean, and it wastes our time, and it prevents us from being real people.” She pointed at the screen. “It stops us from doing the writing that really matters.”
I tried to process everything Jane was saying. No texting? No Facebook?
Holy moly.
“You can do this,” she continued, really getting into the idea. “Give up your phone, texting, all that stuff. It would be so awesome. Your friends could to it, too.” Suddenly she clapped her hands together. “How about this? I’ll make a deal with you!”
“What kind of deal?”
“You and ten of your friends give up your phones for one week.”
I sighed and laughed at the same time. “That will never happen.”
“Why not?”
“You haven’t met my friends.”
Jane picked up a different guitar and started tuning it. “Okay, I’ll sweeten the pot,” she said. “If you give up your phone for a week, and get ten friends to give up theirs, too, I will get all of you backstage passes to a show. And I’ll bring you guys up on stage.”
Then she pointed up at my lyrics.
“And we’ll play your song,” Jane said.
My eyes bugged out of my head. Play my song?!
“In front of everybody?” I asked.
Jane’s eyes twinkled. “In front of everybody. If you finish it, that is.”
I felt my jaw drop open. For about the fiftieth time in the last couple of days, I was too shocked to speak.
“But here’s the thing,” Jane added. “You can’t tell your friends that you came here today. They can’t know about our deal, or anything about my playing your song or inviting them on stage. I don’t want them eating the Cracker Jacks just because there’s a prize in the box.”
I didn’t know what that meant, but I was too hyped up to care. Instead I asked, “So how am I going to get them to give up their phones?”
“That’s for you to figure out,” Jane said.
I looked over at my mom. She was talking to Nigel and had missed this whole part of the conversation, which was fine by me.
“How are you going to know that we real
ly did it?” I asked Jane. “I could just tell you we did, even if we don’t.”
“I trust you,” Jane said.
“Why would you trust me?”
Jane laughed. “I have keen powers of observation. I guess that’s what makes me a decent songwriter.”
And that was it. I was all out of questions.
Jane stuck out her hand. “What do you say?” she said. “Do we have a deal?
We had a deal.
After we shook hands on it, Jane turned around and grabbed another guitar and handed it to me. “Now let’s make some music.”
For the next half hour, we jammed. That’s right, I jammed with Jane Plantero. We played three Beatles songs, a Stones song, a Joan Jett song, and a Patti Smith song. No Plain Jane songs, though: “That’s the last thing I want to hear right now,” Jane said.
We didn’t stop until Nigel stuck his head in and said two words: “Satellite interview.” Jane put down her guitar, hugged me, and said, “One week. No phones. You can do it. Can’t wait to hear the song.”
Then she was gone.
As my mom and I drove back out through the gates and headed home, I stared at the huge statue of the guitar-playing pelicans.
Jane was right, I thought—they really are amazing-looking creatures.
Part 2
THE SAME, ONLY DIFFERENT
17
A NOT-SO-BUSY MORNING
Here’s what happened before breakfast on Monday, April 30:
I woke up, showered, brushed my teeth, and got dressed.
* * *
Here’s what happened during breakfast on Monday, April 30:
I ate cereal and talked with my parents.
In the middle of our conversation, my mom suddenly realized something. “Where’s your phone?” she asked. “Why aren’t you texting your friends?”
“Don’t feel like it,” I answered, shrugging.
* * *
Here’s what happened on the bus ride to school on Monday, April 30:
I read a book.
18
CHARLIE JOE JACKSON’S GUIDE TO WHY TEXTING IS AWESOME
Charlie Joe was the first one to notice. He cornered me at school, just before lunch.
Katie Friedman Gives Up Texting! Page 4