This Is What It Feels Like

by Rebecca Barrow

  “Hold up,” Nina said. “Go back. You entered a music contest? Without telling us?”

  Dia picked up her fork and pushed her food around her plate. “I know,” she said. “There wasn’t really time. We had to get our entry together to submit really fast, and I would have told you, but—”

  “We?” her mom said now. “Who’s that?”

  “Me and Jules,” Dia said, and then quickly, “and Hanna.”

  Her dad nodded, his smile a thousand watts. He had always been her biggest supporter, teaching her to play, buying her books and equipment basically whenever she needed it, even when they couldn’t really afford it. “It’s about time,” he said.

  But her mom was frowning. “You have a lot on your plate already,” she said. “Are you sure this is a good idea?”

  “Yeah?” Dia said, trying to figure out what her mom wanted to hear. “Maybe? You know, it’ll be like old times. And if—big if—we won, the money would be really good for us. For college, for Lex . . .”

  “Like old times?” Her mom’s mouth turned down, the lines there deepening. “I don’t know that I like the sound of that. After everything that happened? You and your friends, Hanna—” She waved a hand toward Lex in her highchair. “This one. I don’t know.”

  “Okay, not like old times,” Dia said. “New. And the contest part is only for the summer. It’ll be over by the time the semester starts, and I’ll be totally focused on school.”

  “I think it sounds good,” her dad said. “It’s a lot of money, if you won. And besides that, it’ll be good for you to be back in the scene, making music again. Guitars have to be played, not hidden away.”

  “I know.” Dia could see her mom’s brain working, coming up with more reasons that it was a bad idea, and so Dia played a dirty card. “You know, I do miss playing, Mom. It used to make me really happy. You want me to be happy, right?”

  Nina gave her daughter a sharp glance. “Don’t even,” she said. “Dia, please do not try to manipulate me. You’re better than that.”

  “Sorry,” Dia said, not very.

  “Nina,” her dad said, turning to her mom. “I get what you’re saying, and yes, we all know some stuff went down the last time around. But that was then, it’s done now. And I get that it’s another thing to take on, on top of everything else she’s got, but . . .” He looked at Dia now. “I feel like you know what you’re doing.”

  Dia let out a surprised laugh. “I do?”

  “Well, you told us you would graduate, and you did. You told us you’d keep your job, and you did. You told us you’d be a good mom, and you are,” Max said. “At some point, we have to think you might have learned some things.”

  “Um . . .” Dia knocked her hand against her leg. “Thanks.”

  Nina’s frown eased. “Well,” she said. “That may be true. I just don’t want you to get overwhelmed with everything. Some things, you can’t exactly drop the ball on.”

  Dia reached over and ran her fingers through Lex’s curls as her daughter ate a handful of sweetcorn. “I know,” she said. “Trust me, I know.”

  Her mom shook her head now. “Well, then,” she said, looking from Dia to Max and back again. “I suppose it’s okay.”

  “Really?” Dia’s smile was megawatt, too. “Thank you, Mama!”

  “But there are going to be rules,” Nina said. “Guidelines, let’s call them. One: If things start slipping around here, or at work—we’ll have words. And two: Be careful. Of distractions and things and people that aren’t worth your time. Because you’re very special, my love. You know that, right?”

  Dia looked to the ceiling. She wasn’t special, no more than anybody else. Her mom only said those kind of things because she was a good mom, in the same way Dia said them to Lex. “Sure,” she said.

  Nina reached across the table to take Dia’s hand. “And of course I know you miss playing. I was there, too. I pay attention.”

  “I know,” Dia said, looking at her dad, too. “I love it. I love you both.”

  Dia

  Today is a good day, Dia decided on Monday morning.

  At day care Lex went in without even one single tear, a true miracle, waving as Dia blew her a kiss. The coffee place down the street had just put out lemon muffins, the glaze still warm, and Dia ate one while she waited for the bus—which came exactly on time, so that when she got to work she clocked in five minutes early. “Good morning,” she singsonged to Stacey in the back, tying her scarf around her hair as she went in, and ignoring the odd look Stacey gave her.

  “It’s too early for that,” Imelda said, pulling Dia’s tasks for the morning from her board. “Be normal, moody Dia. Much better.”

  Dia took the order forms from Imelda’s outstretched hand. “I thought perky was part of the brand,” she said. “Look, I’m actually doing my job properly for once.”

  Imelda laughed at her. “You have a point.”

  Dia got to work, her good mood making her whipping a little softer, her chocolate-chip sprinkling liberal. They’d have to work out a practice schedule, start working on new material. Because they had to have new material to play for the judges, Dia didn’t want them going in with anything old. It was okay to get them in, but now they needed to show who they really were, what they could do, and she knew they could do better.

  She wondered, loading pans into the ovens, if Hanna had stopped writing these past two years. She always had the most heartbreaking, razor-sharp lyrics. Even at her worst, she’d produced great things for them.

  Jules was right: Hanna was a part of them, for better or worse.

  After her break, Dia was on counter duty, the quiet moment after the morning busyness. Usually she hated working the counter, serving customers and making small talk. She much preferred being in the back, scoring bread and loading pastries into the ovens. But today she let her good mood spill over into her Have a great day!, sometimes actually meaning it.

  She turned the radio up a little as the bell over the door chimed, and when she looked up she gave her extra-special, real smile to one of her favorite customers. “Welcome to the Flour Shop, how can I help you?” She tipped her head to the side. “Butterscotch cookies? Or jelly doughnut today?”

  “Maybe I’ll get both,” Jesse said. “Maybe I’ll get something completely different.”

  “And maybe you’ll get the cookies like always,” Dia said. “What’s up?”

  Jesse ran a hand over his head. His hair had grown out as far as he ever let it, into tight spiral curls, faded up on the sides. It was a good look. Although Dia was not supposed to notice that. Focus.

  “Nothing,” he said. “What’s up with you?”

  “What?”

  He eyed her. “You’re all . . . up.”

  “Am I not allowed to be happy to see you?” Dia said, and then pressed her tongue against her teeth.

  For god’s sake, mouth. Stop saying things you’re not supposed to.

  Jesse leaned his elbows on the counter. “What time do you finish?” he asked. “Come by the skate park for a little bit.”

  “You know I can’t watch you,” Dia said. “It’s terrifying.”

  “It’s nothing,” Jesse said, laughing. “I get hurt more at work. See?” He stepped back to lift his shirt, and on his stomach a deep purple bruise spread down from his hip to almost beneath the waist of his jeans. “That was Mickey smacking into me with a crate.”

  Dia rolled her eyes, even though his little trick totally worked and she could feel her pulse going up. “Oh, please,” she said. “You’re not going to break your neck serving pizza, though, right?”

  “I’m not going to break my neck at all,” Jesse said, dropping his shirt with a grin. “But it’s nice to know you care.”

  He gave her that slow smile of his, and Dia was stuck for a moment. This was the thing: somehow it always tipped over from showing off, flirting innocently, to saying things they really meant and were supposed to keep to themselves.

  At least Dia manag
ed to keep it to that only. She never let herself do what she wanted to do every time he rolled up with another bruise, another break—place her careful hands on him and make sure he was okay, that he didn’t hurt too much, that he wasn’t about to disappear on her. She always kept her voice light when she told him how she worried, but only to hide the truth. That she was afraid of him getting hurt all the time, that the next time might be the last time, that one day he might wreck himself harder than his bike and then what would she do?

  Eventually she made a face at him and said, “Yeah, I’m a sweetheart, aren’t I?”

  “Seriously, though,” he said. “What are you doing later?”

  Dia glanced out the front of the shop; it looked quiet, no one about to come in. She could tell him about the contest now, if she wanted.

  But did she want to?

  She knew what would happen if she said the words We got into Sun City. Jesse would be all psyched, and she’d let it make her feel good, and then she’d say something over the line, because she always did that when she felt good, and then she’d have to remember why she didn’t do that.

  That phone call, Dia thought. The fresh grave. The funeral dress.

  She wouldn’t say anything.

  “I have to do something with my dad,” she said, inventing cover for the time she’d be spending in Hanna’s garage tonight while her parents were out. She opened the display case, grabbing a cookie and sliding it across the counter to him. “Here.”

  “Uh-huh,” Jesse said, sounding like he didn’t believe her, but he took the cookie and bit it in half. “So you don’t have time for tacos?”

  “Well . . . ,” Dia said, looking at him. It was only food. They ate food all the time. She would remain in control of her mouth and her flirty, traitor brain, and they’d eat and have fun and be completely normal. “I finish in an hour.”

  Jesse brandished the remaining half of his cookie as he headed for the door. “See you later, Dee.”

  “Bye,” she called, watching him leave and pinching the inside of her elbow.

  Danger.

  Hanna

  “Don’t touch that,” Hanna called out, watching Ciara closely. “We have a serious you-break-it-you-bought-it policy.”

  Ciara pulled her hand back from the old-fashioned wardrobe. “Yeah, I don’t have room for that in my house.” She wandered back up to the desk that Hanna sat behind. “Don’t you get bored?”

  Hanna lifted her pen from the legal pad she’d been using as a sketchpad, the lines covered up with her wonky doodles. “Out of my mind,” she said. “But they pay me.” She glanced at her phone as it buzzed with a text, and let out a sigh.

  “What?”

  “Jules,” Hanna said, pushing her phone away. “They’re coming to my house later. To practice. I don’t think I really thought this through.”

  No, she hadn’t. She hadn’t really thought past their recording attempt because, truthfully, she hadn’t thought they’d ever make it in. But somehow, thanks to some trick of the universe, they had.

  And now Hanna had to, like, work with them. Practice and have them in her head and reply to their texts.

  “I think you did,” Ciara said, leaning her elbows on the counter. “I think you knew exactly what you were getting into. You had an opportunity and you took it. Why wouldn’t you?”

  Of course Ciara would think that; when Hanna had told her what she was doing, Ciara had honest to god jumped up and down with excitement.

  “Why wouldn’t I? Let’s see—because we don’t know each other anymore?” Hanna said, counting the reasons off on her fingers. “Because Dia looks at me like I stole something from her? Because being around them is kind of scary but also scary familiar?”

  “Sometimes scary can be good,” Ciara said, pushing up her round glasses. “You should chill. It’s going to work out. You know what could happen if this all goes right?”

  Hanna rolled her eyes. “And you know what might happen if it all goes wrong?” she asked. “Which do you think is more likely?”

  “I was there, I remember,” Ciara said. “But that doesn’t mean it has to happen all over again. Two years is a long time in teenage years.”

  “Like you’re so much older and wiser,” Hanna said. “You’re twenty-three.”

  “Exactly,” Ciara said. “You’re a baby to me.” She paused. “You don’t have to be their friend, if you really don’t want to. You don’t even have to like them, I guess. But you still know them. You used to be inseparable.”

  “I know.” Hanna looked down at her nails, the black polish chipping off. Inseparable. Three parts of one whole. Until they weren’t.

  When Dia had called her to tell her they were in, it had been awkward. But civil, right? Until Dia had started talking about Hanna hating her and Hanna had found herself somehow saying that she didn’t.

  I don’t hate you, Dia.

  Was that true?

  She didn’t know.

  It would have been easier to let Dia think she hated her. Easier, that way, to cover up her guilt and let the anger take control. But she didn’t like how Dia had sounded: so superior, telling Hanna how things were when really, she had no idea. Not anymore.

  When Hanna looked up, Ciara was watching her carefully. “They don’t even really know you now,” she said. “Not this version of you.”

  “I know,” Hanna said. “That’s the problem.”

  “So show them. And change their minds.” Ciara stood back and shrugged. “Or don’t. It’s up to you. I’m just saying, I know this you, and this Hanna is not the kind of girl to be scared away from what she wants. Is she?”

  Hanna met Ciara’s gaze and held it.

  Am I?

  Hanna

  When Hanna got home, Dia and Jules were already there, waiting for her. “Hi,” she said, and curled her hands into fists, hid them behind her back. Ciara was right; she was not going to be scared off. She could do this, she could show them who she was now and let their judgmental looks roll off her. She was the new Hanna now. “Come in.”

  She took them through the house and into the garage, kept the door rolled down even though it was stiflingly hot. “Okay,” she said as Jules and Dia got their guitars out. “So—what now?”

  “Did you see the email?” Dia said. “I forwarded it to you.”

  Hanna nodded. In a little over three weeks they’d go and perform for the three contest judges. One original song, live and up close. And then—maybe glory. Maybe misery.

  If they could get that far.

  “They’ll announce the winner on July twenty-seventh,” Dia said. “There’s going to be a whole thing at Revelry.”

  “I wonder who else is doing it,” Jules said, slinging her bass around her body. “Like, people we used to know. Maybe Automatic Neon?” She paused. “Maybe Ciara?”

  Dia shrugged as she plugged into an amp. “Maybe.”

  “No,” Hanna said. “She’s not doing it.”

  They both looked at her, surprised. “How do you know that?” Jules asked.

  Hanna raised her eyebrows. “She told me.”

  “You talk to Ciara?” Dia’s voice was sharp.

  “Yeah,” Hanna said, adjusting her ponytail as she sat behind her drums. “When she’s around, we hang out. And she’s around now, so . . .”

  She watched as they exchanged a look and felt a petty triumph rise. See: she wasn’t the only one who’d lost something when it all went down. It had taken her time to start talking to Ciara again, but she knew that Dia and Jules hadn’t spoken to her at all. Ciara said she didn’t mind, things were difficult, she understood. But still—after everything Ciara had done for them? And they couldn’t even be bothered to reach out, text on her birthday, keep in some kind of contact?

  Ungrateful.

  Jules nodded. “That’s cool,” she said. “I haven’t seen her in so long.”

  Hanna picked up her sticks. “Well, she’s here,” she said. “No one’s stopping you.”

  “C
an we actually practice?” Dia said. “I have to pick up my kid soon.”

  Hanna spun her sticks. “Ready when you are.” She wasn’t sure if the tension in the air was good or a sign of them falling back. They were past that first shock of being together again; now was when they figured out if they could actually do this, stand each other long enough to make this work. So far it felt like one step forward, two steps back.

  They played through “Hills” again a couple times, and then moved on to some of their other old material. Just trying to get a feel for it, to get back into the swing of playing consistently. It was better when they weren’t talking, Hanna thought. Something about their words felt barbed. But their music felt sharpened in a good way, like a weapon, like they were protected by it.

  And she felt better when she was pounding her old drums, muscles in her shoulders waking up, rhythms patterning though her hands. They still sounded so good—to Hanna’s ears, at least. They still had that energy that made her want more, more, more.

  After a while they stopped for a break, and Jules sat on the floor. “So we should probably get started writing new material,” she said. “Right?”

  “Definitely,” Dia said. “We have more than three weeks; we should use them.”

  “I have—” Hanna stopped. “Wait one minute.”

  She got up and went inside the house, upstairs to her room. She opened the bottom drawer of her nightstand and let out a long, slow breath as she placed her hands on top of her notebooks.

  They weren’t just writings; they were her lifeline, in a way. Her way of taking control, turning her inward hate into something good, writing her way from confusion to some kind of clarity.

  There was a lot in here. Dark things, secret things, wild things. Words she hadn’t planned on showing people.

  Except, when it came down to it, this was not people. This was Dia and Jules.

  And as confused as Hanna was about where exactly she stood with them, what she really felt, she knew that they would understand all of it. Her words, her lyrics. This was how they got each other, wasn’t it?