Katie Cox vs. the Boy Band

by Marianne Levy

  Fly home, bird

  To me

  The final note held, then broke, and then, before I could even catch my breath: “Now for our first ever number one. Get ready…for an all night part-aaaay!”

  I tried to imagine I was somewhere else, listening to something halfway good, not this terrible garbage that was making me sway and then pulling me onto my very tiptoes.

  In fact, if I really concentrated, I could forget about Karamel altogether. Forget about the way that their music came at me like a sky full of doves, swooping and soaring, racing across fields, skimming the sea before hurtling up, up into the blue…

  No, not birds, something rich and lovely, a chocolate cake with a million layers…

  Forget the way Kurt’s fingers slid across his guitar like it was a part of him, like he was running fast downhill with the wind behind him…

  Oh my God.

  “Sing with me, O2!”

  My hands were in the air, and my vision began to cloud with bursts of gold. The lights maybe, or it could have been the chords themselves, bursting out of the air, filling my eyes with the same fire that flowed from Kurt’s fingers.

  “Are you okay?” shouted Dad. “Katie, you’re shaking. Katie? Katie?”

  “Help me,” I murmured, but my words were lost in the wonderful, awful, wonderful music.

  Minutes, or maybe hours later, there was a tap on my shoulder.

  “Katie, are you ready to go?”

  “Whu…?”

  “Great!”

  I just had time to realize the person talking was Chris, and there was a TV camera pointing right into my face, when…

  “So, Katie, tell me, what is it that you so dislike about Karamel?”

  A few meters away, Kurt was bent over the microphone, eyes half closed.

  “I, um, I don’t like their music.”

  “Yes, but why?”

  “Because…” Wow, how had he just jumped to this topic? How? “It’s very…I don’t…it’s not…very…good.”

  “Twenty thousand people out there seem to disagree.”

  “Yes. But. Yes.”

  Chris gave me a funny look, then turned to talk into the lens. “While Katie Cox never actually names the subject of her new single ‘Can’t Stand the Boy Band,’ clearly, Karamel, the world’s number one boy band, must be who you’re talking about?”

  “Um, maybe.”

  “You’ve been extremely vocal in your dislike of manufactured bands, of Auto-Tuning, even their expensive merchandise came in for criticism. As you said when we first spoke, who has fifty dollars to spend on a T-shirt?”

  “The T-shirts? Oh yeah. They’re exploiting their fans,” I said, wondering vaguely whether Dad would lend me fifty dollars.

  “So to conclude, Katie, why should viewers buy your single and not theirs?”

  Something about his rather snarky tone pulled me out of my daze, and I managed to look into the camera and say, “Because they are fake, and I am the real deal. I’m Katie Cox, and my music is true. That’s why.”

  “With the two singles now out and battling for the top spot on the charts, only time will tell. Handing back to the studio now for the news.”

  • • •

  The craziest thing is that I can’t even remember the end of their set. I must have been sick or something. Certainly my head was sort of burning, although in another way I think I experienced every single moment more vividly than anything that had ever happened to me before.

  The last notes died away, and the three of them ran from the stage.

  Dad was looking around. “Come on. Let’s go find this party, okay?”

  “I don’t know,” I said. And I didn’t. I didn’t know anything about anything.

  “You need something to eat,” said Dad. “They always have food at these things.”

  He led me down some steps, me stumbling like I had just gotten over the flu, and then through an open door, and I could hear music and laughter, and I stood, my head resting against the wall, my eyes half closed, trying to make some kind of sense of what was happening to me…

  “Well? Still think we’re plastic?”

  I opened my eyes, and there he was.

  “Yes, actually,” I said. “You totally had a wind machine. That part where you all walked forward, with your shirts flapping around? That is exactly what I was talking about.”

  “Ha! Yeah, all right. But—”

  “And you all sat on barstools. Er, cliché much?”

  “They were not barstools! They were…just…high stools that we…all right, they were barstools.”

  “And that video, the one they projected while you did the song about the party. With you all jumping around. You were in a camper van. And then you all walked off into the sea at the end!”

  He was really laughing now. “You know why we had our backs to the camera? It was so cold when we were filming that Kristian was crying.”

  “Really? Ha!”

  “Anyway. Thanks for coming. I’m sorry you didn’t like it. I’ve never played like that before. I wanted you to… I’m just sorry that I couldn’t convince you that we’re not what you think we are.”

  I could sort of feel my heart hammering in my chest, the blood pulsing in the very tips of my fingers, as I said, “There were a few moments that I didn’t completely hate.”

  He looked up. “Wow. The praise is too much for me to take.”

  “I liked that riff you did on the beginning of the one about your mom.”

  “Huh. I was trying to be the Edge.”

  “Well, you weren’t. But it still sounded good. And that first song, the bird one, was…kind of…amazing.” There was a silence. My breathing felt far too loud. To cover it up, I said, “Plus, you have an okay voice.”

  “Just okay?” He laughed that lovely laugh. “Katie, admit it. I saw you cheering.”

  “I was not.”

  “You started out just standing there. By ‘Big Love,’ you were jumping up and down. And at the end there, I could see you singing along.”

  “Stalker!” I had to stop myself from the thrilling idea that even while he had all of the O2 to sing to, he’d noticed me.

  “Should’ve brought you onstage.”

  “In front of that many people? I don’t understand how you can do it.”

  “I wasn’t confident to begin with,” said Kurt, like he was telling me this great secret. Maybe he was. He was talking fast, his cheeks all flushed. “But…I love being onstage, making music. It’s the only time I ever feel like I’m really being me.”

  “I feel that too,” I mumbled. “Like, I can’t say stuff well at all, I’m totally failing English, and half the time I can’t even have an actual conversation. Lacey—she’s my best friend—she thinks I have verbal dyslexia, which I don’t think is a thing, but if it is, I absolutely have it. Only, when I’m singing…”

  “You’re being your true self,” said Kurt.

  “Yes.”

  I had to make a conscious effort to remember that I didn’t like him.

  “It’s funny,” Kurt was saying. “I saw your video of ‘Just Me,’ and it was like, like a bomb going off in my head. I thought—I understand her. I get where she’s coming from. That sound, pure, spontaneous—we need to get back to that.”

  “Really?”

  “Yeah,” said Kurt. “And then, when I heard ‘Can’t Stand the Boy Band’…it hurt.”

  My phone was buzzing in my pocket. Mom. Many, many missed calls. “Look, I have to get home. Where’s my dad?”

  We looked across the room to see him laughing in the middle of a big group of people.

  “Your dad’s pretty fun. I loved that song you did about him.”

  “Thanks,” I said. “Everyone else hated it.”

  “It’s nice that you�
��re close. Mine left when I was seven. Came back when the band got big, of course.” He dropped his eyes. “Anyway. Doesn’t matter.”

  “I’m lucky,” I said.

  “You are.”

  There was this moment.

  “About this stupid chart battle…” he began.

  “Oh. That.”

  “May the best man—”

  “Or woman,” I said quickly.

  “May the best man or woman win.”

  Then he turned and went into his party.

  “So to conclude, Katie, why should viewers buy your single and not theirs?”

  “Because they are fake, and I am the real deal. I’m Katie Cox, and my music is true. That’s why.”

  “With the two singles now out and battling for the top spot in the charts, only time will tell.”

  I looked up from Paige’s iPad and across our classroom to see Savannah’s top lip curl in a way that, on anyone else, would not have been pretty. Since it was on Savannah, it was still very pretty.

  “Babes, what happened?”

  “Were you nervous?” asked Paige.

  “Um, I guess so.”

  “Because that was”—Savannah searched for a word, then not finding one, went with two—“car crashy.”

  “It wasn’t that bad,” said Lacey.

  “My boyfriend Kolin is seriously upset about it all,” said Savannah. “I mean, he’s totally rising above it because that’s what he’s like, but he is upset.”

  “I’m sorry I upset Kolin,” I murmured.

  “I think Kolin can take care of himself,” said Lacey.

  “But you were so weird,” said Sofie. “It’s like you forgot how to speak or something.”

  “Like she was sick. Or crazy. Like she was having a breakdown!”

  And I was starting to think that maybe I was when Lacey spoke up.

  “Come on, Katie. Let’s go.”

  We went down the main stairs, past the drama bulletin board, which was crowded with drama types all looking at some drama thing, and then the sports bulletin board, crowded by sports types all looking at some sports thing.

  “Sorry about Savannah,” said Lacey.

  “Hey, that’s okay,” I said. “It’s not like you’re in charge of her.”

  Lacey scrunched up her face. A face that, I noticed, was lightly coated in some kind of moisturizer that made her look sort of damp.

  “What?” said Lacey, her hand going to her cheek.

  “Just, your skin…?”

  “Oh. Yeah. It’s supposed to be ‘dewy.’”

  “You want your face to look like wet grass?”

  “I did when Sofie got us all sample bottles. Is it awful?”

  “No. Just a little shiny.”

  She smushed it around with her palms, leaving two patches of pink. “Better?”

  “Kind of. But, Lace, don’t let me stop you from looking dewy.”

  “I won’t,” said Lacey, slowing down to give the vending machine a longing stare. “I’m stopping myself. Anyway, if I wanted to buy a jar, it’d cost a fortune. So it was never going to be a long-term thing.”

  I wanted to ask her whether she actually liked hanging out with Savannah and co., but maybe that was my answer. Reaching into my pocket, I found some change and popped it in. “Whaddya want?”

  “Ooh. Kit Kat?”

  There’s always a worry with vending machines that the candy will get stuck, and then I’ll shake the thing to try to get it out, and the whole thing will tip over and crush me to death, which apparently happens more often than you’d think. I once said this to Amanda, who replied that I worry too much, and told me that people get killed by everything, from bee stings to their own bedsheets, which gave me even more to worry about. Luckily, on this occasion at least, the Kit Kat came tumbling straight down into the bottom.

  “Here.” I offered Lacey half, and she took it. “Um, you know…in the interview…on the TV last night…was I really that bad?”

  “You were fan-freaking-tastic,” said Lacey. Which meant that yes, I was.

  “I wish you’d been at the concert with me,” I said, and I did wish it too. “You keep me sane.”

  “I wish I’d been there. You watched Karamel from the side of the stage. What a waste.”

  “Lacey,” I began, “what I told you. About…them. Karamel. I think maybe I said some stuff I didn’t mean. Well, that I did mean, at the time, but now…”

  Lacey was now into her second stick of Kit Kat, peeling away the last few flecks of silver foil. “Katie, it’s okay. I understand.”

  “You do? Thank goodness! So here’s the thing. I’d heard them before, of course I had. But I’d never heard them until last night. And—”

  “And now you’re lying about how you feel about Karamel so you can be my friend again.” I was about to set her straight, when she went on. “Which is really nice of you and everything. But I don’t want you to tell me that you like them.”

  “You don’t?”

  “You’re you, Katie, and you hate Karamel. You don’t like their music or their fashion or their high production values or even that they’re popular. You hate the mainstream. And that’s not something we agree on, honestly, but it’s who you are, and you are my friend, and your life is difficult enough right now without me abandoning you too.”

  “Um.”

  “Friends forever!” said Lacey.

  “Er, yes.”

  “It’s like you said. You’re real, and you’re true. And sometimes we’re going to disagree. But you need to be able to be yourself. Or what’s the point of us being friends?”

  “Mmm.”

  She took a bite, then grinned at me, a tiny blob of chocolate on her front tooth. “So what was the worst thing about last night? The most annoying thing they did? You’re going to tell me anyway, so I might as well ask and get it out the way.”

  I was feeling extremely uncomfortable, and not only because Amanda had shrunk the skirt I was wearing in the washing machine.

  “I don’t know that I could pick a specific moment. There was a chord sequence that went into this song about a sunset beach. It was actually technically incredibly accomplished…and also very, very bad. In a technically accomplished way.”

  Lacey threw a handful of wrapper in the trash. “What else? Go on. You know you want to.”

  “Er. Okay. I didn’t like the way Kurt—that’s his name, right?—Kurt looked out into the audience like he was about to kiss them all. He did this thing with his eyes. And his hands. It made me feel weird.” That, at least, was true.

  “I know what you mean,” said Lacey. “It does seem a little like they want all their fans to be in love with them so they can sell them music. And I dunno. I’ve been thinking. And I do love them. But—”

  “Because I’ve been thinking too,” I said quickly, “and I don’t mind if you want to talk about them a little. Like, not a lot, because you’re right—it’s way boring. But if you, say, wanted to lend me a couple of their albums or something then we could play them and discuss them, maybe after school tomorrow if you want? Bring everything you have.”

  “I don’t want to do that,” said Lacey. “Because I know you wouldn’t like it.”

  “I’m just saying, if you did, then I’d be totally up for it. As a favor to you. Tomorrow. Or tonight. Or the day after tomorrow if you’d like. Whenever, basically.”

  “Katie, it’s fine.”

  “No,” I said. “It’s not. I know you’re pretending you don’t care about them as much as you did, but secretly deep down, I think that you do. And so I am willing to put my, er…prejudices aside, for one night only, or a few nights, and do a complete Karamelathon, completely immerse myself in their work, in order to save our friendship.”

  “That’s very generous of you, Katie. But hon
estly, our friendship doesn’t need saving.”

  “Doesn’t it? Because, I dunno, recently, I’ve been getting the feeling that—”

  I stopped because Lacey wasn’t looking at me. She was looking at her phone.

  And I did think, if this girl is about to tell me we are BFFs while simultaneously texting Savannah, then I will…

  “Look, K.”

  She held it out. There, in her iTunes library, was “Can’t Stand the Boy Band.” Artist, Katie Cox.

  “I bought it.”

  “But you already have it. I sent it to you. Way back. That’s how all this started.”

  “Yeah, but, Katie, this is a chart battle. And if there’s going to be a battle, of course I’m fighting for you.”

  “Oh, Lace.”

  Sensing that I was about to do something incredibly embarrassing like cry in the hallway, she brought out a pair of headphones. “Want to?”

  We looped them in one ear each and sat on the dining hall steps, very close.

  Can’t stand the boy band

  “It’s you!” Lacey squeezed my hand. “Your new single.”

  “Yes.”

  “You were so worried, and now, here it is. I’m proud of you, BF.”

  “Thank you,” I said in my smallest voice. We listened as well as we could over the noise of a bunch of sixth graders walking by. Even with that, and with the fact that I could hear it through only my right ear, I caught a scratch in my voice as I went into:

  On the skin that’s perma-tanned

  Plus, the guitar seemed thin, all on its own, without even a bass line to shore it up. My brain reminded me of the lushness that was Karamel, and I found myself saying: “You don’t think it sounds kind of, er, underproduced?”

  “To me it does,” said Lacey. “But then, we know I like my music overproduced. So I don’t think my opinion counts.”

  “It does!” For the second time in ten minutes, I found myself wanting to cry. “Your opinion totally counts!”

  “It doesn’t,” insisted Lacey, “because I don’t know about music like you do.”

  “Maybe I don’t know about music. Maybe I’ve been mouthing off about something without taking the trouble to really understand it.”