by Erin Hahn
The crowds start to filter in, and Phil and I cover the bar in equal parts. I watch him interact. Even though I’m available, most people wait to catch Phil’s eye. He’s the legend. They came for him as much as they came for the beer and Big Ten basketball.
And I can see why. He’s easy like his bar. Comfortable. Genuine as fuck. It’s the most unsettling-slash-settling thing I’ve ever encountered.
I wonder what the footage he has of my dad performing will look like. I honestly can’t imagine it. My dad stopped being a punk rocker long before we came along. The Charlie Greenly I know wears his seat belt and goes to wine tastings and plays Mario Kart. I’ve heard some of his music, and it’s good. Really good. Raw and edgy and heartfelt.
I inherited more than my blond hair from him. The pressure of what could be weighs on my chest so heavily, I feel short of breath. It’s not that I don’t want to create music. I do. I just can’t perform it live. It’s too personal. Cullen interrupting my songwriting the other night felt like a straight-up violation.
No. I couldn’t do it. Play my own words in front of an audience? I can’t think of anything I’d hate more.
16
VADA
It’s unseasonably warm when Phil shoos me out of work early Saturday night. I’m not on the schedule anyway, and I suspect he’s feeling extra generous after I hooked him up with Luke. Luke’s so diligent, he’s putting the rest of us to shame. The first time they worked together, Luke kept calling Phil “Mr. Josephs” to all our great amusement. Phil let him for a good hour and a half before I intervened.
“Go.” Phil swats in my direction. “Get into trouble. Be a kid.”
I wipe my hands on a clean rag. “Really?” I ask even as I’m untying my apron strings.
“Really. But don’t get arrested. Mary would definitely blame me.”
I reach for the tip jar and dump it out behind the bar, counting out my share and shoving it in my back pocket before I reach for my phone and tap out a text to Meg.
VADA
Off early. Where are you?
MEG
Around the corner. Fly Fishing doc at Michigan Theater. *eyeroll*
Yikes. Meg’s social life is even worse than mine.
VADA
Can you escape?
MEG
Be there in five.
“Night, Phil!”
“Text your mom!” he shouts back, and in response, I wave over my head and shove through the back door, nearly smacking Luke in the face.
“Gah! Sorry!”
He laughs, surprised. “My fault. I wasn’t watching.”
He’s wearing a jean jacket, and the denim does ridiculous things to his gray-blue eyes, making them pop, even behind his frames. “Are you working?”
He shakes his head. “Nah, I’m picking up my check. And tips from last night. I forgot to grab my share, and Phil saved it from Kazi.”
“Ah,” I say, leaning a hip against the door. “Yeah, you gotta watch him. His dreads hide secrets.” I turn to see Cullen and Zack standing behind Luke. “Coming in for a job, too? I’m on a roll for recruitment these days.”
Cullen shakes his head. “I don’t do manual labor. Germs make me nervous.”
Zack rolls his eyes and reaches out his hand. “I don’t think we’ve officially met. Zack Granger.”
I shake his giant hand and tilt my head, looking up at him. “You’re even more enormous in real life.” Zack is handsome in a classic way. Tall, tanned skin, prominent Adam’s apple, well built. And yeah, really tall. Zack appears stretched out and about three years older than the rest of us.
“I get that a lot.”
“It’s a compliment. You carry it well.”
“He does, doesn’t he? Not an inch wasted,” Cullen says, looking his boyfriend up and down. Zack beams at the attention. It’s adorable. I don’t know when Zack came out as gay. It’s like one day he was there, holding Cullen’s hand in the hallway and kissing him after school and it just looked right. What he was wasn’t definitive. He was just Cullen’s, and Cullen was his.
“Anyway,” Luke says, clearing his throat. “D’you just get off? I mean, did you finish? With work? Are you done with your shift?”
Cullen mutters something under his breath, and Luke turns red, shoving him away.
I decide not to comment on the slipup, even as my own face grows hot. “Yeah. Phil let me off early. I was actually just meeting—”
“Me! She was meeting me!” Meg says in a harried voice, stripping off her jacket as she jogs up. “Lord, it’s warm out.”
“Well, it is fly-fishing season,” I say glibly. She snorts, and I turn to everyone else. “This is Meg. Meg, this is Zack, Cullen, and Luke. Luke Greenly,” I say and bite the inside of my cheek when I see her eyes light up. “Luke and Cullen Greenly, I mean. They’re twins.” Jesus, Vada, just stop.
She immediately holds out a hand to Luke, who’s staring at her rainbow fairy wings with interest. “Pleasure to meet you.”
“I’m Luke,” he says.
“And I’m Cullen,” his brother interjects. “Love your wings.”
Meg curtsies. “Thank you. I feel they add a bit of whimsy, don’t you?”
“Absolutely,” says Zack, straight-faced. “Not just anyone can pull off wings.”
I press my lips together, watching Luke take in my best friend. Because this is sort of a deal breaker for me. Meg’s important, and we’re a package deal. Not that anything is, like, happening with Luke. But just in case. Best to know ahead of time.
“Do you listen to Lorde at all?” Luke asks after a beat.
Meg’s smile is megawatt. “Heck yeah, I do.”
Luke squints. “You remind me of the ‘Green Light’ video. Have you seen it?”
“Oh my gosh, yes!” I agree excitedly. “Oh my god, Meg. Totally. Lorde dances down the street alone in her dress and sneakers, and it’s so adorable and whimsical as fuck. It’s perfectly you.”
Meg is already pulling up the video on her phone as we move off to the side to allow people into the club. A few seconds later, she’s twirling under Zack’s arm and singing along. For a giant basketball star, Zack is remarkably graceful.
I glance at Luke, and out of the corner of my mouth, I whisper, “You got all that from fairy wings?”
His eyes brighten. “It’s a gift. Sort of like that whole genre-aesthetic thing you do. She feels like Lorde dancing down the boulevard in the middle of the night to me.”
“Incredible,” I say. I’m tempted to ask what song makes him think of me, but I squash the thought quickly.
His full lips lift in a small smile as if he can read my mind, and he shakes his head. “I’m still working on you. Some people jump right out at you. Meg and Cullen, for instance. Cull’s clearly Panic! at the Disco—”
I hold up a hand. “Wait! Let me think.” I watch Cullen with Zack and Meg. All three are dancing, Meg the pixie belle of the ball. Zack, stalwart and warm, steady as they come. But Cullen? He’s like this brilliant technicolor. I think of every Panic! at the Disco song I’ve ever heard. So many come to mind, but … “‘Dancing’s Not a Crime,’” I say.
Luke raises his brows under his blond waves. “Are you sure?”
“One hundred percent.”
He nods, looking at his twin. “It’s like it was written for him. Even Zack agrees.”
“It could be his life’s motto.”
“I’m pretty sure he’s been advocating to make it the prom theme.”
“If anyone could do it…”
Luke agrees. “If he could channel just an ounce of that superpower into philanthropy, he’d be able to fix global warming.”
Lorde wraps up, and we’re starting to get stares from people walking into the bar. “Where’re you three headed?” Meg asks, tucking her phone in her back pocket.
Cullen points across the street. “Only the best place in the universe. Pinball Pete’s.”
“The arcade?” I ask. “I’ve never been.”
>
Zack blinks. “You work across the street.”
“But I always enter and leave out the back. It’s not really on my radar.”
“Well, today is your lucky day,” Cullen says, taking my arm. “Inside those Day-Glo doors is a mood ring with your name on it.”
* * *
“Cullen. We would need to pool all our tickets for a mood ring! It’s like seven hundred tickets for something that will inevitably turn my finger green. It’s not even real science.”
“Hush,” he says over the loud tinkling and chiming of the zillions of games.
This place is like a fever dream. Blinking strobe lights, loud music echoing from the row of driving games, and the clatter of change machines spewing more chances.
Also, super fun. Way more fun than I’d expected when we first descended the stairs into this dungeon of an arcade. Turns out, we all suck at pinball, despite my lifelong assumption I would be great at it. But we’ve found our hot spots. Zack is murdering Luke in Skee-Ball, and Meg won’t leave the moving shelf game. She’s got a stack of quarters, and she’s determined to win the jackpot.
“How many do you have so far?” I ask Cullen, nodding at the stash of paper tickets dangling from his back pocket.
“Plenty,” he says. “And I’ve come prepared with a secret weapon.”
“Which is?”
“My winning smile.”
I roll my eyes with a groan. “We’re doomed. I’m just gonna cash in for some Dubble Bubble.”
“Stop!” he says, jumping in front of me and grabbing my hands in his. “We can’t give up! There are certain machines that give out more tickets. Meg’s on quarters. She’s bound to strike it rich. And Zack is a Skee-Ball prodigy. It’s his hands,” he offers with a sly smile, leaning close. “Magic hands.”
I remove my hands from his grip, smacking his shoulder with a grin and glancing around for something to spend my last four quarters on. “Are those Dance Dance Revolution?” Before Cullen can say anything else about Zack’s magic anything, I make a beeline for the vacant machines.
I squat down, looking for the amount needed, and it’s a dollar. Perfect.
“Dance off?” Luke suggests, holding his last dollar out. He must have gotten tired of losing to Zack.
“‘99 Luftballons’?”
“Done,” he says.
“Have you done this before?”
His lips quirk. “Maybe. Are you scared?”
I straighten. “Not a chance. If I win, I get all your tickets. There’s a mood ring with my name on it.”
He shakes my hand. “Your funeral.”
I bend down to retie my Chucks and remove my long-sleeved work T-shirt, passing it to Zack to hold. Luke pretends to stretch his lats, and when he does, I notice he’s removed his jean jacket and is wearing a solid white T-shirt. A fitted one that stretches taut across his chest.
So, that’s not fair.
I shake off my thoughts and spit on my palms, rubbing at the soles of my shoes.
“Ew, Vada.” Meg snickers. I ignore her. This is serious.
We hit Start and step onto the arrows. At first, it’s slow. Step forward, step back. Together, apart. Luke’s with me step-by-step, and I can’t help but mouth along with the singer. I love this song.
About a minute in, it starts to pick up, but I’m here for it. I don’t glance at Luke, but I can feel him keeping time beside me. I slip into the beat, and I’m in the zone. Getting a little cocky, I take my hands off the bars. I can hear voices behind us but won’t let myself concentrate on anything but the beat blaring around our heads. My calves are burning, and my face feels warm. I swipe at sweat on my upper lip, but I’m smiling so hard, my cheeks hurt. This is the most fun I’ve had probably ever.
“Getting tired yet, Carsewell?” Luke asks, not sounding at all tired.
I don’t respond. I just keep dancing on this ancient machine. Step touch. Step touch. Jump apart, jump together. Jump diagonal. The song is clearly winding down because it shifts into hyper speed, and I gulp. I can do this. I put my hands back on the bars, but that throws me. Damn it.
I get off beat, and my screen lights up with misses. I try to catch up, but I can’t. Before I can recuperate, the song clicks off, and Luke’s victorious. I can’t be mad, though. He looks so damn cute with his hair sticking up off his forehead, slicked with sweat, and his T-shirt clinging to his abs.
Nope. I’m not even a little mad.
I pass over my tickets. “Fair and square,” I say, giving a fake bow. “I’m not worthy.”
He shoves my tickets into his pocket. “It’s okay. How could you possibly know I was the seventh-grade DDR champion back in London?”
“No!” I say, choking on my laugh.
“Hell yes. I’m not too proud. I beat out Cullen for the title.”
“He did?” I confirm.
Cullen shrugs easily. “I’m heavy on my feet.”
I follow Meg back to her quarter shelf. “I’ve been thinking about this,” I say. “What if you put in more than one at a time?”
She holds out the three she has left. “Worth a shot.” One by one, they plop in, and the entire continent of change shoves off the shelf, the winning chime ringing out.
“Holy smokes!” she cheers, collecting the still-streaming tickets and winding them around her fist.
“Yikes,” I say with a grin a minute later as she feeds tickets into the redemption machine. “Your parents will never forgive me for starting your gambling habit.”
“It’s true,” she says happily, her wings bouncing. “There’s no coming back from this den of iniquities.” She pulls her receipt out and reads the total with a squeal. “I’m full-on corrupt.”
I follow her to the counter, and she decides to cash in all five hundred of her tickets for a plastic pirate sword. All those quarters. For a prop. Which she’s using to stab Luke in the back, making him laugh in the best way as we head back up into the early-spring sunset. The air feels fresher up here, and the sounds are muted. I thought working in a bar was an assault on my eardrums, but that was something else. Another hour and I’d have gained an eye twitch, for sure.
I glance at my watch. “It’s late, Meg. I should take you home.”
“We need to go, too,” Zack says. “My sister wanted the car tonight.”
“Actually, looks like my mom and dad are leaving the theater,” Meg says, glancing ahead and waving her sword above her head. “I’ll head home with them.”
I give her a quick hug, and she dances off. Zack and Cullen cross the street ahead of Luke and me to where a red Jeep is parked in front of the Loud Lizard.
“You headed back in?” he asks.
“Nah. But my car is out back.”
Luke and I linger. I don’t know why we don’t cross the street except that when we do, this is over.
He reaches in his pocket. “I got you something.”
“More quarters?” I guess. He holds out his hand, his fingers wrapped around something small.
I hold out my hand under his, the heat from his skin infusing mine. He presses something sharp in my palm.
“A mood ring! This must have cost all your tickets!”
“All our tickets,” he says. “Sadly, it’s too small for my fingers.”
“It’s adjustable, you nerd.”
His face is innocent. “Ah well.”
“Thank you,” I say. Feeling weirdly touched. It’s a cheap toy, for crying out loud. It’s totally gonna turn my finger green. (Because I’ll never take it off.) We cross the street, and Cullen and Zack are already in the car. Watching us. So, I wave, flashing my mood ring, and cut through the alley to the back of the building. I’m glancing at my ring again when I hear a groan, and my stomach sinks.
Asshole Marcus is slumped against my car.
I curse under my breath and glance at the back door to the bar. “Does Phil know you’re still here?” I hold out a hand. “Never mind. Don’t answer.” I hesitate half a second before the image of m
y poor stepmom having to load up the sleeping babies to come and get Marcus has me unlocking my door with a beep. “Get in the car. I’ll drive you home.”
I get him buckled in and pass him a plastic bag that I find after a cursory search of the back seat. “Don’t you dare puke in Mom’s car.”
He crumples the bag in his fist and looks at me, irritable. “Watch the tone.”
I stab at the radio and turn it loud, ignoring that stupid statement.
Before I’ve had the chance to back all the way out of my spot, he’s turning down the music. “Who is it?”
I bite the inside of my cheek. We’ve been playing the radio game since I was born. My dad slaps his hand over the lit display. “No cheating.”
I huff, desperately wanting to ignore him and knowing I won’t. “The local college station doesn’t have names anyway, Marcus.” I listen for a second before I say, “Too easy. Social Distortion.”
“Song?” he quizzes.
That takes me longer, but I know it as soon as the first lyric comes on. “‘Ball and Chain.’”
“Lead singer? And at least two facts.”
I recite blandly, “Mike Ness. Social D was often called the punk version of the Rolling Stones, though I disagree. And Mike had a heroin addiction.”
“Probably not the only one,” he concedes. “Why don’t you think the Rolling Stones comparison is accurate?”
He’s not curious. He’s quizzing me still. Marcus doesn’t want to talk. He wants to teach.
“Because he’s not fucking Mick Jagger, that’s why.”
“Mick Jagger is overrated,” he says predictably. Marcus hates the Rolling Stones. For a long time, I thought I did, too. Until I realized I only hated them because I never gave them a chance. I’d inherited my dad’s opinion like it was canon. “And watch your language,” he continues. I scowl into the darkness.
When I get to the next light, I turn in my seat to face him. In the shadows, his face looks haggard. He’s still in his suit jacket from work, which means he hit up Phil the second he got off. Probably right after Phil kicked me out. Did Phil guess he would show? Has my dad been coming in a lot lately? I need to have another talk with my boss. He’s protecting me again.
