Anyway whatever you believe the reason was, the tide started to turn on us the night before Catch a RI-Zing Star. In retrospect we probably should of cancelled that last Bruno’s show since it was so close to the big day. Plus all of us were already way tired. Being in a band was a lot more work than I’d ever imagined. But Fridays were always big nights for Bruno and we’d already made the commitment to him.
Even before we started playing I had an uneasy feeling. While we set up our instruments, Ray Beech and Dean Eagler strolled in. They’d come to our 1st show of course but they’d kept quiet and stony-faced at the back. Tonight they wore tight, suspicious grins while they sauntered over to shoot the breeze with Bruno. Bruno was a middle-aged guy with beefy arms and Elvis sideburns and a loud laugh. I already knew he was friendly with Dean and Ray from the times Mudslide Crush played the restaurant. Still, it made me nervous to see him yucking it up with them.
And then just as we began our 1st song, Dean and Ray parked themselves at a table right by the stage. It wasn’t like they were doing anything wrong exactly but the way they were smirking made me uncomfortable. I tried not to let them bother me too much though. To be honest, by the middle of our set I was kind of distracted anyway. Something was wrong with Mo. She kept slipping up. Which was way weird for her.
“You OK?” I whispered at the end of “Back Among the Walls.” She’d missed the start of her solo by 2 whole beats which was a mistake she’d never made before her eyes looked kind of droopy too. “You don’t look so great are you sick?”
“It’s just allergies” she whispered back. And then almost more to herself than to me she said “I can’t afford to be sick.” Then she sneezed for about the 3rd time in maybe 30 seconds.
For a brief moment the red rims around her eyes made her look like she’d been crying it reminded me of that awful telephone conversation we’d had the night before the Bash. Even after all this time her comment that I didn’t fit into her stupid grand plan still bothered me. I felt a sudden flash of frustration. With her and with myself.
Right then and there I decided that as soon as the show was over I would flip a coin. Heads I’d ignore everything inside me that said I should keep my stupid mouth shut and let her know how I really felt. That I thought about her all the time and cared about her in a way I’d never cared about anybody else before. Tails I wouldn’t.
Stella started the opening chords for “Everyday Monsters.” All over the big room kids in bizarre outfits sprang from their UFO tables and began dancing and jumping around. But Ray and Dean still looked like Cheshire Cats—you know, like in that Disney cartoon. All smiles. By the end of the song while everybody else was applauding I heard Ray say “Losers!” He was pretending to cough but his table was close enough that I distinctly heard the word. It made Dean laugh so Ray did it again and again. “Losers! Freaks! Losers!”
I looked over at Wen. He shrugged and mouthed the words “Ignore them.” He started playing the opening riff to “I’m Singing a New Song.”
But Ray and Dean didn’t stop. By the end of the song they were both coughing out words and giggling like idiots. Unfortunately that’s when a flock of new arrivals like Patty Norris and Beth Blanchard and a bunch of the other Mudslide Crushers wandered in from the cold. Dean and Ray called out to them and everybody greeted each other.
That’s when Mo started up “Anywhere But Here.” That song had an extended moody beginning with no words. As the bass moaned and Wen’s trumpet came in I couldn’t help watching Ray and Dean whispering and smirking they were definitely up to something. Stella and I exchanged glances but what could we do?
After that, everything happened pretty quickly. About a minute into the music Ray stood up, grinned at his friends and then stepped casually onto the stage.
“Good evening ladies and gentlemen” he said grabbing the mike “and welcome to our freak show!”
I couldn’t see Olivia because she was standing behind us waiting for the vocals to begin but Mo and Wen and I nearly jumped out of our skins. Stella glanced over at me obviously unsure what to do but when I almost stopped drumming she shot me a look and her mouth formed silent words. “Keep playing!”
I did as she said.
My eyes searched the crowd for Bruno but I couldn’t see him. He must of gone into his Office or something.
Dean gave Ray the thumbs-up sign. Ray leered back at his friends. Some of them were still standing and others had taken seats at the last empty booth at the back. At 1st they seemed surprised to see Ray onstage but now they sat up and started clapping and hooting.
“I’d like to take this moment to introduce the band” Ray said like some twisted Master of Ceremonies. “Over here with the green hair, biker duds and toy guitar we have that bright bulb known as Stella Penn. Don’t get too close she bites!”
Dean and the kids at the back laughed. Most of the others just looked confused but some of them joined in the clapping. I guess a lot of them probably weren’t sure if this was supposed to be part of the show or not. After all, it wasn’t the 1st time other people had joined us onstage.
By then Stella had moved in closer. Her face had reddened a little but she kept her cool I heard her say “Come on, Ray, knock it off.”
But Ray ignored her. “And on my left are Charlie ‘Buffalo Boy’ Hirsh—a kid with a personality so electrifying that he’s been known to fall asleep in the middle of his own sentences—and Wendel Gifford aka the one, the only . . . Woody the Horndog!”
There was more hooting and laughter. Wen glared at Ray like he could of socked him a part of me wanted to throw down my sticks and lunge at him too. But neither of us stopped playing. I guess we all had the crazy idea we could still salvage this somehow.
“Ray” Stella said a little louder “you’re making a complete ass out of yourself.”
“And finally” he said, gesturing with a sneer toward the other side of the stage “let’s not forget that psycho of song, fresh from the insane asylum, Miss Olivia Whitehead . . . or of course my very own buddy’s Hindu-honey ex, his former dark-skinned delight . . . Mo ‘Hot Curry’ Banerjee!”
I couldn’t believe he actually said that. The ass! When I looked, Olivia was shrinking against the wall and Mo was leveling a glare at him like I’d never seen. I searched for Bruno again. Still nowhere in sight.
Back in the audience some of the kids started to sense what was going on. A few of them began calling out “Off the stage! Get him off!” Others banged on the tables or stomped on the floor.
Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!
Ray spread his arms. “Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you . . . Loser Mouth!”
Dean and his other friends howled with laughter. Other people shouted or shook their fists.
And then Ray started singing.
“Eeeeat, Freaky Freshmen, eeeeat . . . before your tiiiiiime is done . . .” He was using a fake raspy voice that I guess was supposed to sound like Olivia but just sounded ridiculous. “You are pathetic looooosers, you weeeeigh a tonnnnn . . . enjoy this buuuurger, have anooooother one . . . Eeeeat, Freaky Freshmen, eeeeat!”
The muscles in my jaw went tight. By the end of his chorus all of us had finally stopped playing. Ray kept going, though, following the rhythm of the table-pounding and foot-stomping. Finally a couple guys stepped onto the stage and tried to pull him away. And then Ray took a swing at them.
That’s when everything went crazy.
Even more crazy I mean.
In all the Chaos it was impossible for me to see everything or to tell exactly what happened when. Dean jumped into the mess then the next thing I knew a bigger fight broke out. The crowd pushed forward. I finally saw Bruno his face was all flushed and he was pressing his way through the mess but he was too far away to stop it. Pretty soon the entire place was going nuts with kids grabbing each other and knocking over tables and others screaming and shouting somebody stepped toward Olivia but Stella shoved him away. I tried to call out for everyone to calm down but it was no use there w
as nothing I could do but stand back. I looked desperately around at Mo and the others but they looked as stunned as I felt. I don’t think any of us could believe what was happening.
Before our eyes our peaceful night of music had morphed into anarchy.
MOHINI:
Death Warmed Over
“You sure you’re well enough to do this, Mo?” my dad asks tentatively. “You look a little pallid.”
It’s the next morning and I’m slouching quietly in the passenger seat of my dad’s Subaru. Finally we pull to a stop at the corner near the medical clinic. The world outside looks bitter and gray, with fat, dime-sized flakes of snow just starting to drift onto the windshield. It’s only eight-thirty but the clinic parking lot is already full. There’s a nasty flu going around. For almost two weeks the drop-in waiting area has been jammed with bleary-eyed people blowing their noses.
I gather my strength and pull the door handle. “I’m fine, Baba. I’m just having a hard time waking up.”
The truth is, my head is pounding and I feel like there’s a golf ball lodged in my throat. I dragged myself out of bed, though, because I’m scheduled to volunteer until 11:00 and I can’t afford to pull out at the last minute. I’m counting on a good recommendation from this place.
Standing in the cold as the Subaru pulls around the corner and out of sight, I wave and even manage an upbeat smile. But after the previous night’s fiasco, I actually feel anything but upbeat. Okay, so the riot at Bruno’s fizzled out about as quickly as it started and, amazingly, nobody got hurt, but Bruno was clear that Lemonade Mouth would never play there again. And the fact that he banned Mudslide Crush too was no consolation.
What a disaster.
And that wasn’t even the worst of it. At home after the show I got into a big argument with my father, which is why we hardly said anything to each other in the car this morning. Last night, Charlie’s mom ended up giving me a ride in her van and Charlie insisted on walking me to my door, so when my dad met me at our front porch he found the two of us together. Even before the Hirsh’s van pulled out of the driveway I knew from the suspicious look on my father’s face that something was up. He didn’t waste any time getting to it, either. He didn’t even ask me how the show went. He just said, “I want you to stop spending so much time with that boy.”
“Wh-what?” I didn’t understand right away. My head was still reeling from what happened at Bruno’s.
“You know exactly what I mean, Monu. He seems a little too comfortable around you.”
Now, this was maybe the third or fourth time my dad had brought up Charlie so by now I understood what he wanted. All he was really looking for was a little reassurance. He seemed to need that every now and then. Normally I would have said something like, “Baba, you really don’t need to worry. There’s nothing going on between Charlie and me. We’re only friends. I promise. Okay?” And I’m sure if I’d said that then everything would have been all right.
But last night I was in no mood to go through the same old script again. It had already been a tough evening, I wasn’t feeling well and I could barely think straight. Plus, over the past few weeks I’ve been mulling over what Selina Sinha said in temple about her dad, and I’ve been getting frustrated about having to constantly assure my own father what a good girl I am. It’s ridiculous. Am I really so wild?
Besides, deep down I knew that my dad’s concerns were well founded. For weeks I’ve been careful to avoid being alone with Charlie. I’m almost always the last to arrive at our practices, and the first to leave. I never linger at the Freak Table. I avoid walking with him to class. But I never stop thinking about him.
That’s the frustrating truth.
Of course, last night I didn’t tell my dad any of that. Instead I kind of lost my temper. “Leave me alone, Baba! I’m not a little kid!”
He was obviously surprised. I don’t normally talk back to my father. Briefly I saw that panic again, that tightrope look. But then almost immediately the shadows on his face darkened. “You’re too young to know what’s right for you! Certainly too young to have ideas about this boy!”
I didn’t answer. I could feel my pulse booming in my temples.
“Oh, you think I’m blind?” he continued. “You don’t think I see the way he looks at you? Or how you look at him?”
I glared at him. This felt like the last straw at the end of a long day full of last straws. “Well, what if I do like him!” I snapped. “Is that really so wrong? Don’t you know me well enough to trust me to make my own decisions? I’m fourteen, you know, and perfectly capable of making good choices, but you just want me to keep being your little girl, don’t you? Well, I’m not a little girl anymore, Baba, and this isn’t Calcutta!”
His eyes went wide. He wasn’t used to me talking this way to him, and to be honest, neither was I. When he spoke next, his voice was quiet and his teeth were clenched.
“While you are living under this roof, child, you will respect your family’s wishes.”
His words were certain but his eyes still looked frightened. And then it hit me what my dad’s been scared of all this time. He’s scared of me. He’s afraid of what might happen if he loses control.
And what’s more, I realized that I’ve been just as frightened of that as he’s been.
All at once I felt like a jerk for putting him through this. My dad doesn’t always come off that way, but he’s actually a real softy and he’s only doing what he thinks is best for me. I was so confused I didn’t know what to say.
“What’s the matter here?” asked my mother from the stairs.
Finally, still locking eyes with him, I said, “I guess I don’t really have much choice, do I?” Then I marched upstairs, brushing past my mother in a frustrated huff. I didn’t even end up telling them about what happened at Bruno’s.
Anyway, last night left me a little rattled.
Now, in front of the clinic, I fight back a shiver and trudge up the walkway to the building, ignoring the dizziness in my head and the ache in my bones. I don’t have the flu. I have a big Pre-calc exam to study for this weekend and even though the class is killing me, I had to get special permission to get into it as a freshman so I’m determined not to blow it. Plus I have a Social Studies paper due on Tuesday, and a debate tournament on Thursday. Not to mention Catch A RI-Zing Star in just a few hours.
I can’t be sick. I refuse.
The world spins slightly as I lumber through the front entrance. I guess I’m not paying enough attention to where I’m going, because in that little decompression area between the two sets of automatic doors I walk right into a raggedy blue dough-boy jacket.
“Oops, I’m so sorry,” I say. I look up. It’s a heavyset guy in one of those fuzzy caps with earflaps. It’s a couple of seconds before I recognize him.
“Charlie . . . ? What are you doing here?”
“Waiting for you.”
This is strange. I feel my heart quicken. Waiting for me? Why? And why this morning, of all mornings?
“I’m a little late,” I say. “I have to sign in.”
“Just a second.” He pulls off his cap. “I . . . I have something I need to say to you. It won’t take any time, I promise.”
I feel the blood rush into my face. But I wait.
“Mo, I . . .” He blinks and then looks away, first at the ceiling and then his feet. “I’m sorry. This isn’t easy for me.”
The automatic doors slide open and a blast of arctic air catches my back. We stay quiet. An old lady with a cane ambles past us and through the second set of doors. Even when we’re alone again Charlie keeps gazing at the floor. Which feels weird. What’s he doing?
“For a long time I’ve wanted to tell you something,” he says finally. “But, well, you were with Scott and then after that it just didn’t happen. Besides, I wasn’t sure how you felt about me and I didn’t want to wreck anything. Plus there’s Lemonade Mouth and all that. And so I thought maybe it’d be better if I just kept quiet. But t
he truth is I don’t think I can keep my mouth shut anymore.”
I fidget. He isn’t making sense.
He takes a deep breath. “Thing is . . . I like you, Mo. And more than just as a friend, I mean. I always have. There. I’ve said it.”
Now I’m having a weird flashback to last night’s conversation with my dad, because Charlie’s words sound confident but his eyes look scared. He waits for me to say something, but I feel a sudden, rising panic, along with a tsunami of other emotions. Part of me wants to jump for joy. Another part is terrified. I’ve been trying so hard to stay in charge of all the different pieces of my life, but now it feels like everything is spinning out of control. I need to keep my eyes on the big picture. Sweating and shivering in the cold, I suddenly need to get away. I want to run. Clear my head somehow.
Which is probably why, before I even know what I’m doing, I find myself biting Charlie’s head off.
“Didn’t we already talk about this?” I snap. “Didn’t we already agree that you and I are going to be friends and nothing more? Oh, Charlie . . . you know about my grand plan. You know about my family. You know I can’t. What are you trying to do? Ruin what we already have?”
I see the hurt look on his face, but the words are already out.
That’s when I duck my head and storm past him, feeling like the frontrunner in the contest for Heartless Dragonlady of the Year. And now my head is throbbing worse than ever and even my knees feel weak. But I remind myself that I have no choice. Right now I’m focusing on school and nothing else. Later I’ll study medicine. Eventually, I’ll marry another doctor or a lawyer or something like that—somebody as ambitious as me. I have my plans. And Charlie isn’t part of them.
And I’m not about to start tiptoeing around my parents again. No way.
As I stagger over to the volunteer desk, my whole body is shaking. Behind the desk sits a tubby, bleached-blond lady reading a magazine. She must be new because I don’t recognize her.
Lemonade Mouth Page 21
