When It Happens

  “E, I already have a flyer,” I tell him.

  "No, man. This one’s revised. Check out who’s playing last.”

  I take a look at the list. I see Marco’s name last.

  “How did he even get past the audition?”

  "You got me,” Eddie says. "Laters.”

  Marco is this Nas-wannabe rapper who always says his vocab is scorching. I guess no one’s told him that overusing the dictionary can be a bad thing.The other bands are your standard assortment of genres: Fred and Zack are in Jade Elephant and play indie house punk, then there’s Julian’s band called Zeitgeist who all worship Coldplay, another alternative-type band, a techno group, one band that does all unplugged stuff, a heavy metal band, us, and Marco. And Overlord, with this kid George who’s a genius on about five different instruments. There’s usually ten bands selected to play, but the tenth had to drop out because the lead singer has mono. MindFlame is listed to go on fourth.

  Mike’s already tuned up. Now he’s outside trying to convince his latest conquest that her life will be incomplete unless she agrees to dance with him tonight. Before the bands play, there’s dancing for an hour. This night will rock. Dancing with Sara, then making the crowd go crazy, then winning when the applause for us is way louder than for any of the other bands.

  Josh arrives during sound check. "What’s good?”

  “Same old. Fred and Zack think they’re wiping the floor with us.”

  We look over at them, sitting on the side of the stage. They both have these glazed looks of boredom. Like they’re doing everyone a favor by being here. Just because they’ve gotten gigs at the under-21 club in Stirling doesn’t mean they’re better than us. The club owner is, like, Zack’s uncle or something.

  “Whatever,” Josh says. "That’ll just make it more fun to watch how crushed they are after we finish stomping all over them.”

  We grab a spot to the side of the stage. Music plays. A few kids start dancing, but most of them sit in groups on the bleachers. People filter in. They reek of self-consciousness. Nervous excitement is in the air. And there’s that charge of hope I always feel at these things when I have a girl watching who’s into me. But now I have a girl I actually want to be with.

  “Whassup?”

  I snap out of my trance and there’s Marco.

  “What’s good?” I say.

  “What’s real good, fam?” Marco mumbles. Then he gives Josh and me pounds. He’s such a wigga it’s hard to take him seriously sometimes.

  “How’s Eddie gonna be dissin’ me like that, yo?” Marco’s medallion slaps against his chest. His jeans are so low and baggy I don’t know how he keeps them on.

  “Like how?”

  “He’s tellin’ everybody how I’m some kinda lame-ass rapper. That’s some cold shit!” Marco looks around like he wants to snuff Eddie.

  “Yo,” Josh warns. “Be easy.”

  “Nah, yo, he’s gettin’ me tight.”

  “Dude,” I say. “He’s just jealous of your skills.”

  Marco considers this. "Ya think?”

  “Absolutely.”

  Marco smirks. "Peace out, homes.” He shuffles off.

  When Sara comes in, I forget how to act like a normal human being.

  Josh notices where I’m looking. “She’s gorgeous, isn’t she?”

  “Yeah. Most definitely.”

  “I might ask her to dance,” he says.

  Not like I own Sara or anything, but what the fuck? “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

  “You don’t think she’d dance with me?”

  “She’s taken, okay?”

  “Since when?” Josh looks confused.

  “Uh . . . since me?”

  Josh looks back at the girls. “Dude! I’m talking about Maggie, not Sara! Give me some credit here. I’d never horn in on your girl.”

  My brain starts to work again.

  “Oh. I knew that.”

  “Do you think she’d dance with me?”

  I’m so happy he’s not talking about Sara that I say, “Absolutely.What girl would be crazy enough not to dance with you?”

  “Yeah, right? Listen, I’m getting a drink. You want anything? ”

  “No, I’m good.”

  Then Mike comes back in. I watch him work the crowd. He eventually finds me.

  “Hey, man,” he says. "Why are you over here and she’s over there?”

  “I’m watching.”

  “God, you are so weird. Let’s try me watching while you go over and ask her to dance.”

  Josh comes back.

  I say, "Let’s go.”

  “Go where?”

  “Didn’t you want to ask Maggie to dance?”

  “Yeah, but I can do it myself, Dad.”

  “I’m asking Sara to dance, so I’m going over anyway. Come on.”

  Walking over, Josh says,“How’s my hair?”

  “Horrific. It’ll give me nightmares for weeks.”

  “No, seriously.”

  “Chill, you’re fine.”

  Sara sees me walking toward her. She says something to Maggie. Maggie looks over. She doesn’t look too happy to see me. I wonder what that’s about.

  “Hey,” I say.

  “Hey,” Sara says.

  “Hey, Maggie,” I say.

  Maggie steps away from us a little. "Hey.”

  Sara hugs me.

  “Hey, guys! Great music, huh?” Josh thumps me on the back and looks back and forth between Sara and me. “What’s up?”

  “Nothing now.You guys know Josh, right?”

  Maggie looks like she just swallowed sour milk. "Unfortunately. ” She is so obviously way out of Josh’s league. Then again, look what happened to me.

  I look around. A lot more kids are dancing now.

  “Do you feel like dancing?” I ask Sara.

  “Yeah.”

  We walk into the crowd a little. She puts her arms around me. I rest my chin on the top of her head. I breathe in her familiar smell, those flowers.

  We dance like that for a couple more songs even though they’re both fast ones. Then Eddie blows into the microphone.

  “Testing . . . testing . . . Let’s do this! First four bands, you’re wanted backstage.”

  Sara gives me a big hug. “Good luck,” she whispers in my ear.

  “Thanks.”

  “Not that you need it.”

  Fred and Zack are first up. They have everyone slamming by the third chord. I start to feel intimidated on top of nervous. Mike watches the crowd’s reaction with me.

  “Don’t sweat it,” he says. “We’re better than those fools.”

  The next two bands aren’t all that. It seems like we have a real chance of winning this thing.

  Then I hear Eddie announcing us. “Give it up for MindFlame!” he yells. There’s loud applause.

  I’m psyched.

  When Josh clicks his drumsticks together for the beat, I look for Sara in the crowd. Her eyes lock into mine. Sweet.

  The song starts out okay. Mike and I are totally on key with vocals. Josh is slamming on the drums like a professional. I scan the crowd for reactions. Most people seem to be in a trance. But not in a good way. Kind of like they’re watching commercials. A bad feeling creeps over me that no one gets what we’re doing. But I’m sure I’m just being paranoid. We clearly rock. Everything’s perfect so far.

  I look back at Sara. She’s watching me and moving to the beat. This encourages me near the end with the heavy drum-and-guitar jam session. I pour everything I’m feeling into it. Josh is crazy on the drums. I’ve never heard him sound so hard. I answer back with even more force. The power of it is almost better than sex.

  Everything builds to this enormous crescendo.You can see the sweat flying off of Josh’s face. Mike’s bass shakes the stage. When it’s time for the last chord, I nail it.

  The last chord reverberates through the gym. I can almost hear it splat against the floor. It dies out.

  No one moves. No on
e claps. No one does anything.

  It’s completely quiet.

  What are we supposed to do now? Stand here looking like morons? Play it off like it was supposed to go down like that? Or get the hell off the stage as quickly as possible?

  I vote for the last one.

  Then I hear some clapping. And other people join in. And soon there’s official applause happening. But it feels kind of forced.

  We get our stuff together without talking. Backstage, Josh grabs a towel and mops his face off. He throws the towel on the floor.

  “We are so underappreciated.” Josh kicks the towel. “I was working my ass off out there!”

  “I told you we should have done ‘Heaven’ instead,” Mike says.

  “But that is so standard,” I say. “Anyone could pull it off.”

  “That’s the point. At least we’d have a chance with something people recognize.”

  “Bad Company rules,” Josh says.“Just because kids nowadays have no appreciation for where it all came from . . .”

  “We rocked,” I say. "Everything was perfect.That jam?”

  But Josh just shakes his head. He looks at his towel on the floor.

  “Nah.” Mike wipes sweat off his forehead. “It was our one chance to show them who we are. And we royally fucked it up.”

  Josh glares at him. "No we didn’t.”

  “Whatever.”

  “Remember when Wild Mood Swings came out?” I say. “And all the bad reviews it got? But The Cure was still The Cure. We can’t let a bunch of ignorant meatheads decide who we are.”

  Mike looks unconvinced. “Like we’re anywhere near The Cure.”

  We hang out backstage, listening to the other bands. Zeitgeist is good, but someone needs to let Julian know that ripping off Coldplay can only get you so far in life. Marco is hideous. His lyrics don’t make sense, and his flow gives me motion sickness. At the very least, we should come in third.

  “Okay, peoples!” Eddie announces. “It’s voting time!”

  Now the audience votes by applause. The two bands that get the most applause will do encores for the title.

  “Jade Elephant!” Eddie yells.

  The crowd goes wild. I see Fred and Zack high-five each other in the corner.

  Eddie announces the other band names in order. Maybe I’m paranoid, but it sounds like we hardly get any applause.

  Then Eddie consults with some kids in the front row. He announces the results.

  We come in last. Even after Marco.

  “Well,” I say to Sara. “We officially suck.”

  “You do not,” she says.

  We’re sitting on the wall outside the front entrance.

  “You guys were great.” She holds my hand in her lap.

  “Yeah?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Then what was up with the applause?”

  “Everyone was just . . . shocked by your talent. They had no idea what hit them. It was like . . . like a delayed reaction.”

  I look over at Sara to see if she’s serious. I expect her to start laughing at me any second now. But she’s not making fun of me at all.

  “Thanks.”

  “Anytime.”

  “Sara!” Maggie yells from the parking lot. “Let’s go!”

  “Oh. I better go.”

  “You’re still sleeping over at Maggie’s?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Okay . . . well . . .” I put my hands on the sides of Sara’s face and kiss her.

  Sara sighs. She slides down off the wall. Then she does this crooked walk like she’s dizzy from the kiss. I laugh. She’s the only one who could make me feel good right now.

  Mike drove Josh and the equipment home already. I stick around for a while. I wonder where I’ll be at exactly this time next year. What if the band bites? What if we break up? It’s kind of inevitable, anyway. I mean, Mike and I might be in New York, but Josh is probably going around here somewhere. Then what?

  I walk to the parking lot. And think about Sara.The way she looked at me, even after we bombed . . . she makes me feel like I can do anything.

  So I got the girl. If that’s not proof that anything can happen, I don’t know what is.

  CHAPTER 31

  the little things

  november 21, 7:00 p.m.

  So of course Laila’s not allowed to go to Battle of the Bands. Her father is seriously deranged. But at least she’s allowed to sleep over at Maggie’s later.

  Maggie has been getting ready for over an hour. I barge into the bathroom again.

  I go, “Are you ready yet?”

  Her makeup is spread all over the counter, and she’s putting on a fifteenth coat of mascara.

  “In, like, two seconds.”

  I go back to my room and put away my sketchbook stuff. Hopefully she’s being accurate this time.

  When Maggie’s finally ready, I get my coat and key and look into Mom’s room. She’s watching TV.

  “Bye,” I say.

  “Bye! Have fun,” Mom says. She’s been in an unusually good mood for the past few days. I overheard her talking to my gram on the phone about how she can’t believe I’m going away to college already. Maybe if she’d paid more attention to me this whole time, she wouldn’t feel like it’s “already.”

  But I don’t want to think about her now. Soon I’ll be with Tobey. And he gives me all the affection I need.

  Walking to the gym doors, I notice the windows are covered with black construction paper, so we can’t see in yet. We giggle about nothing.

  The gym has swirling, bubbly lights in all different colors spinning around on the walls. There are black lights right when you come in, so my white sweater glows with that weird purple hue. A lot of kids are here already. “Going Under” is playing. Evanescence rocks.

  “What is Caitlin wearing?” Maggie asks. “Don’t look.”

  I look.

  “I said don’t look!”

  I pretend to look for someone else and see that Caitlin is wearing a dress. No one wears dresses to these things. The dress has one shoulder, then cuts diagonally across her chest and goes under her other armpit.

  “Maybe she didn’t get the memo about this not being a nightclub,” I say.

  “Like, where does she think she is?” Maggie goes. “Nineteen seventy-eight?”

  I wonder how everyone’s going to react to Tobey’s band. I’ve gone to a couple of their practices, so I’ve heard the song they’re doing. Josh had to explain the history of it and the band that wrote it, and I don’t think anyone here is going to know it. But so what? They’re really good, and that’s what matters.

  Most of the guys are on one side of the gym, and the girls are on the other. We walk over to the girls’ side. I look around for Tobey. I see him standing near the stage with Josh. I get the same butterflies I get every time I see him.

  “Fabulous,” Maggie says.

  “What?”

  “Your Something Real and Mr. Maturity are coming over.”

  “Just be nice to Josh, okay?”

  “I’ll try, but if he stares at my boobs, I’m out.”

  “Hey,” Tobey says.

  “Hey,” I say.

  “Hey, Maggie.”

  “Hey.”

  “You guys know Josh, right?”

  “Unfortunately,” Maggie mutters behind me. I jab her in the ribs.

  “Hi, Maggie.” It’s obvious that Josh is totally infatuated with her.

  “Hi.”

  Then nobody says anything.

  “Harder to Breathe” comes on, but it’s not the standard Maroon 5 version. It sounds acoustic. I’m loving that the music doesn’t suck.

  “Do you feel like dancing?” Tobey holds his hand out for mine. I’m someone who gets highly affected by the little things. And this little thing is huge.

  I put my hand in Tobey’s. We walk to where some other couples are dancing. He puts his arms around me and makes me feel safe. I rest my head on his shoulder and blend into him.
r />   As we slowly turn, I watch all of the unlucky kids standing on the sides with no one to dance with. Maybe they’re watching me, wishing they could have someone to dance with, too. The way I used to at so many dances. I’m so relieved to be on the other side.

  Everything is perfect. Until I see Dave dancing with some sophomore. I don’t even know her name, but I’ve heard she’s easy. Which is the primary quality Dave looks for in a girl now.

  A fast song comes on, but I don’t let go of Tobey. I wish I could dance like this with him all night.

  Feedback from the microphone snaps me back to reality.

  “Testing! Testing!” Eddie yells. “Let’s do this! First four bands, you’re wanted backstage!”

  I’m so excited and nervous for Tobey. MindFlame has to win.

  I practically strangle him with a hug. I put my lips against his ear. “Good luck,” I whisper.

  “Thanks.” He looks like his usual confident self as he walks to the stage. I feel like such a rock star’s girlfriend.

  Maggie comes running over to me. “Oh my god!” She grabs my arm. “Chad is snorting Kool-Aid through a straw. You gotta come see!”

  “I think I’ll pass on that one.”

  Everyone starts cramming in front of the stage. I pull Maggie to the front. I want Tobey to be able to see me.

  When Fred and Zack start playing, the bass is so strong I feel every beat of it shake my bones. The crowd moves like we’re all one big entity. It’s a total blast. I’ve never wanted to come to Battle of the Bands before. Now I’m stoked that I’m here.

  But while MindFlame is tuning up, Dave starts a commotion with his people in back of us. I glare at him. He doesn’t see me.

  “What?” Maggie says.

  I point at Dave. He’s got the rest of the beautiful people all around him. They’re obviously planning something.

  “He’s such an ass,” Maggie says.

  And he’s going to feel like even more of an ass when MindFlame wins. He just better not throw anything at them.

  “Give it up for MindFlame!” Eddie yells. I’m relieved when there’s a decent amount of applause.

  Josh clicks his drumsticks together. Tobey sees me and smiles. I smile back. They sound great. They sound even better than they did in practice this week. I love how Tobey’s arm muscles look when he plays. And how he gets this really serious expression, like he’s concentrating so hard.