by Emily Lowry
No, I couldn’t think like that.
If you thought about something too hard, you were more likely to mess it up. To play the wrong chord. To knock over the microphone. To lose your voice.
A hundred thousand things could go wrong, but you needed to ignore each possibility.
The door to Prohibition opened, mercifully pulling me from my anxiety.
There were certain experiences in life that would always give you goosebumps. Sunrise on a crisp summer morning. The opening note of your favorite song coming through the static of the radio. The way the world went still the first time snow fell in the fall.
Seeing Hailey Danielson was one of those things. No matter how much time I spent with her, no matter whether she was glammed up with a little black dress or in sweatpants and a pajama top, the girl’s glow stole my breath.
“Hey,” I said. My voice felt small in the emptiness of Prohibition.
“Hey yourself,” Hailey said. As she got closer to the stage, I saw that she was wearing tight, dark jeans, high-heeled boots and a form-fitting black t-shirt. She didn’t look like a rockstar’s girlfriend, she looked like a rockstar herself.
But it wasn’t just how she looked that struck me — it was the way she walked. When we first met, she walked like a straight-A student delivering a report to the principal’s office.
But the Hailey Danielson walking through Prohibition now? She looked like she could chomp cigars, shoot dice, and leave a trail of broken hearts in her wake.
She had swagger.
When the thought sprung into my head, it shook me like a small tremor in a beach town. I blinked and steadied myself. Hailey Danielson, Evermore’s golden girl, was cool.
When did that happen?
I extended my hand and helped her onto the stage.
“Hey,” I whispered, a goofy smile spreading over my face. I hadn’t been giving her anything close to enough of my time or attention lately.
She stood beside me and faced the imaginary crowd. “Wow,” she said. “It’s so different from the last time we were up here. It’s more…”
“Real,” I said. Before, our nights out at Prohibition were a game. Just for fun. But next time, I would be on stage. There would be real consequences if something went wrong. My shoulders felt heavy, my world starting to settle on them. “What do you think?”
“I don’t know,” she said softly. “What do you think?”
“I don’t know, either.” Of the thousands of thoughts running through my head, I couldn’t grab a single one. How do you put the biggest night of your life into words? How do you deal with the idea that everything you’ve worked for will come down to a single 45-minute set? And how do you live with yourself if it goes horribly wrong?
“I have an idea,” I said. Yes, an idea. This was the reason I’d told Hailey to come to Prohibition. I’d spent the past week figuring out how to word it properly, but now those same words felt slippery, a snake in the water. “Every band needs supporting characters.”
Hailey looked at me oddly.
Heat rose to my cheeks. Was it the spotlight? I shook my head and tried again. “Like, a band needs instruments. And a singer needs music.”
This was not going well.
“And there’s Batman and Robin.”
Oh good, Trey, now she probably thinks you’re having a stroke.
She cocked her head, but didn’t speak.
I took a deep breath and tried again. “What I’m trying to say is that I want you on stage during the performance.”
She didn’t reply.
Of course she didn’t reply. I had pressed her too hard. She wasn’t part of the band, and she knew that. She wasn’t in our rehearsal sessions. She’d been on stage before, but not as a feature act. And now I was scaring her off. Me asking her to perform was like her asking me to be the top of the pyramid at the next cheer competition. I needed to salvage something before I scared her away completely.
“Not like an official band member,” I said. “But for a song or two. Like you’re not the hero. But you can do backup vocals. You can be my sidekick.”
There. That made sense, didn’t it?
Her face was blank.
What was she thinking?
46
Hailey
Sidekick.
Trey had called me his sidekick. I stood on stage next to him, staring out into the imaginary audience, the spotlight burning a yellow hole in my vision.
Sidekick. Maybe that was all I was to Trey.
I rubbed my hands on my pants, increasingly aware that Trey was waiting for a response. At least being a sidekick was better than what Adam thought of me. He treated me like a trophy, a video game accomplishment to be checked off. Trey wasn’t treating me like a trophy, but… was I just his latest accomplishment? The sidekick to help bring him his success?
“Hailey? What do you think?” Trey asked.
Sidekick. The word stuck in my mind, caught in my throat. Hearing that someone thought of you as their sidekick was like taking a drink of curdled milk when you were hoping for ice cream. My face grew hot. A sidekick. “I’m not a singer,” I said.
He sighed. “You can sing. Don’t tell me that you can’t.”
I pressed my lips together tightly and stared into the darkness, practically catatonic. If anyone was watching they would’ve assumed I was having a stroke. There was one question I wanted to ask, but there was no way I would let the words escape my mouth. If Trey thought of me as a sidekick, was it because of something he did, or something I did? I’d spent my entire life transforming into what other people told me I should be.
Prohibition swirled around me, a mix of reds and blacks under a yellow glare. I’d thought of Prohibition as home. But… it wasn’t home. It was just another place where I could disappear. Another place where I could become someone else.
Trey tried to take my hand.
I pulled away. “Don’t, please.”
“Hailey—”
I stepped off stage, hurrying towards the exit. Where would I go? I wasn’t sure. All I knew was that I didn’t want to be here anymore.
“You don’t have to sing,” Trey shouted. He was still on stage, still under the spotlight. From his vantage point, I was just another member of the audience. Every musician needed an audience, right?
I stopped, my hand resting on the door. “This isn’t me.”
“What’s not you?”
“This,” I said, gesturing towards the whole of Prohibition. “An underground night club. A midnight affair. All of this. I didn’t come here for me, I came here for you.”
Trey looked as confused as I felt. “Hailey, you’re my girlfriend. Couples do things for each other, right? What’s the problem?”
One of my first nights at Prohibition, I had stepped on stage and sung in front of strangers. But I didn’t get on stage because I wanted to sing. I got on stage because Trey grabbed my hand, pulled me up, and told me I needed to trust him more than I trusted myself. Since that night, had I ever trusted myself?
“This isn’t your problem, Trey,” I said. “This is me.”
He shrugged and rolled his eyes, exasperated. “Are you seriously trying to say it’s not you, it’s me?”
The classic break-up line. Was that what I was trying to say? I wasn’t sure. “I just need to know who I am outside of all of this. I don’t know if I’m the kind of girl that’s supposed to be here.”
Before he responded, I left.
I was right, wasn’t I?
I wasn’t the kind of girl that’s supposed to go to places like Prohibition.
But where was I supposed to be?
47
Trey
Hailey’s words echoed, the last chord of a fading song. She wasn’t the type of girl that was supposed to be here. The way I saw it, there was only one thing that could possibly mean: the rich cheerleader didn’t belong in a grubby place like Prohibition.
And she didn’t belong with a guy like me.
&nb
sp; I slowly climbed off the stage. I bumped into a chair, then went for the bar, waiting for my eyes to adjust to the darkness. Shadowy bottles of alcohol lined the mirrored shelf behind the bar. I ran my fingers through my hair. I thought we had built a connection — a real connection. Being with Hailey had turned my world upside down. She had challenged me, called me out, made me laugh. And I had fallen for her, hard.
But hadn’t this always been a fever dream? Imagining that it could work out between us even though we came from different worlds?
No.
This wasn’t over.
I needed to talk to her.
I rushed for the door, but just as I reached it, it swung open.
Leo jumped. “Dude. You scared me.”
“Move,” I said.
“Easy, dude. First Hailey, now you?”
I stopped. “Did she say anything?”
“She looked upset. Wiping her eyes and stuff. Did you two—”
“I don’t know,” I said quickly, not wanting to hear the end of Leo’s sentence. “It’s complicated.”
“Is it because of the Click blast?”
“What blast?” I hated that stupid app with a passion. It only sent messages at the exact wrong time, and it only ever sent them with one purpose — to destroy whoever was on the receiving end. “What did it say?”
Leo hesitated. “You don’t want to see it.”
“Show me.”
“Your funeral.” Leo pulled up Click and handed me his phone. “Just press play.”
I did.
There was a vignette, several short clips of Hailey stitched together. She ate chips in the cafeteria, miserable. She went through the motions at cheer practice, miserable. More of the same. Then a caption.
When you spend too much time in the slums, it’s hard to keep your head above water.
It felt like a punch to the gut. I had to brace myself against the wall to keep from falling over. Had Click finally got to her? Is that why she came to Prohibition this afternoon, not to see me, but to break up?
My eyes stung.
And the worst part?
The worst part was that I understood. If she was as miserable as Click made her out to be, that meant she didn’t want to be with me. I understood. Evermore’s gossip mill was savage. It set out to ruin lives. And Hailey had been Click’s prime target lately.
Relationships — even friendships — with people like me and people like her never worked out. I didn’t want to drag her down with me.
48
Hailey
It was official: I was a hot mess.
The last time I saw Trey was burned into my mind. Him, on stage, under the spotlight, alone. I felt guilty for turning down his request. I sent Trey multiple texts, but they were all ignored — even the ones about Wuthering Heights. I walked around Evermore High with a lump in my throat, my stomach uneasy. I ate because I knew it was necessary, but I could barely taste the food.
The world felt fragile, a pane of thin glass already spider-webbed with cracks. It would only take the slightest of taps for everything to shatter.
My classes blurred together. Even English class, which I normally looked forward to, was a dud because Trey hadn’t shown up for the past three days. All I could do was bury my head in my binder and wait for the bell to mark the end of the day.
But even that brought little relief, because after school came cheer practice.
I changed into my uniform and sat on the bench in the center of the locker room, phone in hand. The other girls were waiting for me — they wouldn’t start practice without their captain — but I couldn’t muster the energy to leave. Instead, I kept scrolling through meaningless websites, hoping, praying, that a text from Trey would arrive.
Could I call him? If I called him, he might think it was serious. But what if he didn’t answer? Or worse — what if the line rang once, then he sent me immediately to voicemail? I wasn’t stupid. I knew he was avoiding me, but there was a difference between knowing something and KNOWING something. If I didn’t call, at least I could bury my head in the sand.
I sent a text.
Hailey: Can you at least let me know you’re okay?
I shoved my phone in my locker.
Cheer practice was a blunder of mistakes. May Madness was on the horizon and we were not ready. A group of bases almost dropped their flyer during a simple basket toss, Becca slipped while landing her tumbling sequence, falling on her butt, and multiple girls took a wrong turn during the dance routine. What was happening?
“Smile, Hailey!” Coach Garcia yelled. Her face was like thunder. How long had I been gritting my teeth for?
I held my breath when it was time for our pyramid. Surely nothing else could go wrong. I kept my body rigid as my bases threw me up and I found my balance on their hands. I threw one leg up into a split while my arm instinctively reached to interlock grip with the flyer next to me. Madison. Her arm was outstretched, and I reached to grip her — we were almost there — when suddenly, she made the slightest movement, pulling her arm backwards just a fraction. It threw me off. I wobbled wildly and grasped for Madi, but it was too late. I overbalanced, crashing down onto the bases below me, causing a domino effect as the rest of the pyramid fell into a heap on the floor.
I was on my feet the second I hit the ground. “What’s your problem, Madison?”
She jumped up to face me, hands on hips. “Are you kidding me? You were the one who lost your balance.”
“You moved your arm!”
“No, I didn’t. Maybe if you were awake for this practice, you’d know that.”
Had I imagined it? I stood, red-faced, flustered and glaring at my frenemy, not sure what to say next.
Luckily, Coach Garcia got there first. “Ladies! Break it up! It was a mistake. We’re lucky nobody got hurt.”
I whirled around to see the Coach’s pretty face crumpled in disapproval. I wasn’t acting like a captain. And to add insult to injury, she did not look mad. She looked genuinely disappointed.
In me.
It was the perfect punctuation mark to another terrible day. Coach Garcia, who could usually find some positives, just shook her head in disgust and dismissed us early.
Back in the locker room, Madison cornered me.
“Get your head in the game, Hails,” she snapped, close enough that I could smell her lunch on her breath. The smell turned my stomach. “Maybe spend less time fooling around with losers and more time being the cheer captain you’re supposed to be.”
I brushed past her. “We’re not doing this.”
The other cheerleaders were watching. There were no teachers around.
“I know we’re not as important as your pretty boy-toy, but honestly, if you won’t be a leader, you shouldn’t be captain.” Madison put her hand on her hip. “And this is why Evermore should never have a junior captain again. They don’t know what’s important.”
None of the other girls said anything. Trisha, one of our best tumblers and a senior, crossed her arms and stared at me. I had gotten the position she had wanted so badly. And I wasn’t delivering.
The words stung.
Worse, they stung because I knew they were true. When I was out on the mats, my mind wasn’t on cheer practice. It was on Trey and how much I missed him. It was desperately trying to piece together who I was supposed to be. Maybe Madison was right. Maybe the cheer team would be better off without me.
Maybe Trey would be better off without me.
“I’ll get it together,” I said, offering a curt nod. My voice projected no confidence, no security. No one would follow me into the fire — I’d be lucky if I could get them to follow me to Peak’s Frozen Yogurt.
No one talked as we changed.
I moved at a slow pace. My phone sat at the back of my locker, beckoning me. It was face down, so I couldn’t see if I had received a reply.
Don’t get your hopes up, Hailey. You already know he didn’t reply.
But maybe this time—
<
br /> No.
Two sides of me went to war. The pragmatic side that knew Trey didn’t text back, and the painful optimist that wanted to feel better momentarily, even if it meant feeling worse later.
I waited until everyone left.
My heart quickened.
I grabbed my phone.
Unlocked it.
There was a new text message.
A smile burst across my face, only to quickly fade when I realized the text was not from Trey.
Mom: Going out for supper. Order something on the card when you get home. Something healthy this time, pls.
I sat on the bench and buried my face in my hands.
Instead of heading back to my empty house after practice, I walked across the Evermore campus with my head bowed and dipped into the Fine Arts building. The light was still on — I guess we were lucky that cheerleading practice had been so miserable that we called it early.
The office for the school newspaper was at the back of the building. I knocked on the door, someone shuffled inside, and the door opened.
It was Abby. “Hailey?”
It was strange to see her without Chase by her side. But I supposed that they had a life outside of each other — even if Jordyn wouldn’t admit it.
“Is Mr. Adebayo in?” My English teacher was also the staff lead for our school newspaper, The Pinnacle.
“In the back,” Abby said. She gestured for me to come inside, then closed the door. She rested her fingers lightly on my shoulder. “Are you okay?”
I forced a smile, something I’d been doing a lot of lately. How many people saw through my little charade but were just too polite to call me on it? “It’s all good.”
Ugh. Now I even sounded like Trey.
Mr. Adebayo was in his office in the back of the room, scrolling through photos on his laptop. Payton Clarence, the coach’s daughter, had been responsible for editing all the photos, but she’d transferred at the end of last semester.
