The Secrets of Attraction

by Robin Constantine

  He laughed. “If you can call it that. Sticky Wicket.”

  “Cool name,” Tanner said, sidling up to me. He was practically foaming at the mouth to get this guy. I still wasn’t sold, but the Animal shirt was growing on me.

  “Doesn’t sound familiar.”

  “Well, it wouldn’t,” he said. “We only ever did house parties, and that was when we felt like it. Guitarist was a major stoner. The band split a few months ago. Cool guy, just not as serious as I wanted to be. Do you guys play out?”

  “That’s the goal, we’ve done a few parties. We were in the battle last year. We have some prospects, a few CDs making rounds,” I said, embellishing. We had one CD. That I’d sent before it all went to shit.

  “That sounds cool,” he said, standing up. “If you don’t mind me asking . . . why are you looking for a new drummer?”

  “Dude’s a dou—”

  “Creative stuff, you know how it is,” I said, cutting off Mr. Truth. No need to spill anything until we knew this guy was in; we did have one more person to see. “Are you willing to do originals?”

  “Hell yeah.”

  “Great, well, round two is seeing how we fit.”

  “Yeah, thought you’d be playing today.”

  “What’s your name?”

  “Grayson Barrett.”

  “I’m Jesse, this is Tanner. I’ll send you a set list, but it’s mostly the bands from the flyer. We have your number. Maybe next Friday?”

  “Um, Friday’s no good, but the rest of the week is cool.”

  Tanner waited until Grayson was out of the room before speaking.

  “Round two? Dude, what the hell are you talking about? We’d be insane not to take this guy on.”

  “Can’t let him know that. And what if this was a fluke? At least we have an out. Don’t want to look desperate.”

  He laughed. “Nice to have you back.”

  “What?”

  “Now if we can only get rid of that dorky infinity bracelet, you’ll be yourself.”

  “It’s a wristband, not a bracelet.”

  “Whatever, bring it in,” Tanner said, raising his hand.

  “The high five is dead, T.”

  “But Yellow Number Five isn’t.”

  Duncan sat at his drum kit in the middle of Mugshot. There was a party going on around him, but he kept pounding away. I yelled over to him, but my mouth was gummy; the words wouldn’t come out. Why was he auditioning? I searched over the sea of heads to find Tanner, who was busy wiping down tables . . . with Hannah. Where was my Mugshot shirt? Why wasn’t I behind the counter? We don’t need you! I wanted to yell to Duncan. Then I felt a tug on my jacket. That girl with the short hair who came in after yoga . . . Madison . . . stood there, smiling at me. You should give him the song, she said. Her eyes were so blue; I’d never noticed that before. She kept tugging at my jacket.

  “Wake up, Jesse.”

  I could feel myself being pulled from the dream, I wanted to stay there, like I was on the cusp of understanding something important, but there really was someone shaking me . . . small hands on my shoulders.

  “Jess, someone’s at the door!”

  Daisy stood next to my bed, dressed in her unicorn pajamas, her eyes puffy from tears. I sat up.

  “Whyareyatellinme?” I yawned, propping myself up on my elbows. “Where’s Dad?”

  “He and Ty went out to get bagels. It’s Mom’s Saturday at the office. The doorbell is freaking me out. I let it ring like Dad said to when I’m by myself, but they won’t go away.”

  I ran a hand across my face. The bell rang again. And again.

  And again.

  I grabbed my phone off the charger. Twenty messages from Tanner. And it was 8:30 a.m. WTF?

  “It’s gotta be Tanner,” I said, ignoring the messages. “I’ll be down in a minute.”

  “What if it’s those guys who always talk about the end of the world?”

  I rubbed my eyes. “They wouldn’t be this rude. Wait in the hall, I’ll be right there.”

  Daisy waited outside my room until I was dressed and followed me down the stairs, holding on to the back of my hoodie. As if there was anything I could do in the face of a maniac at the door. Every so often it was nice to be the big brother, I guess.

  “There’d better be a meteor headed straight for the planet, T,” I mumbled as I got to the landing. Sure enough, when I opened the door, Tanner was there, finger poised on the bell. The moment he saw me he rushed in.

  “Smegma’s got a gig.”

  “Come in,” I said, closing the door behind him.

  “Didn’t you see your messages? Freakin’ Smegma—already.”

  “Smegma?” Daisy asked as Tanner nearly steamrolled her.

  “You mean Plasma, right?” I asked, motioning with my eyes toward Daisy, who did not need to learn any new words from Tanner.

  “Oh, yeah, Plasma,” he said, turning toward me.

  “Duncan’s new band?” Daisy asked.

  T and I did synchronized head-whips toward her.

  “What?” I asked.

  “Hannah broke up with you, not me,” she said, smirking. “We talk.”

  In Tanner’s presence she turned from lil’ sis back to devil’s minion. I glared at her. She grabbed her tablet from the coffee table and slumped on the couch.

  “What else do you talk about?” I asked.

  She shrugged as she searched out yet another Minecraft video to watch.

  “Oh, and Dad said if you got up before he got back, you should start the coffee.”

  Does Hannah say anything about me? was on the tip of my tongue but Daisy was already lost in YouTube Land and well, Tanner, my Forget-about-Hannah sponsor, was there, watching. I walked into the kitchen, motioning for Tanner to follow me.

  “What is this about Plasma now?” I asked, filling up the coffeepot with water.

  Tanner leaned against the counter, pulled off his toboggan hat. “They’re playing a dance at Sacred Heart next Friday. I think we should go.”

  I put a filter in the coffeemaker and popped the lid off the ginormous can of cheap coffee Dad insisted on buying from Costco. At least it was still fresh, the familiar robust aroma releasing into the air. Nothing like the smell of our Mugshot brews, but it made me think of Madison. Madison? She drinks chai. Why would I dream about her telling me to give Duncan the song? Why would I dream about her at all?

  “Aww, Tanner, I’m touched. Are you asking me to the dance?”

  “We’re hoooome,” my dad announced, followed by quick little steps galloping into the kitchen.

  “Teeeee!”

  “Tyyyyy!” Tanner said, opening his arms to my little brother. He crouched down and held up his hand.

  “Slap me high, little man.”

  Tyler reached up and whacked Tanner’s outstretched palm.

  “Slap me low, too slow,” T said, lowering his hand and then pulling it out before Tyler could slap it, sending Ty into a fit of hysterical laughter. In my little brother’s eyes, Tanner was the bomb. Same mentality. Tyler wrestled out of his coat and left it on the kitchen floor as he ran out to haunt Daisy.

  “To what do we owe this pleasure?” my dad asked T.

  “Tanner asked Jesse to a dance,” Daisy yelled from the couch.

  “Well, good to see you two getting along,” my father said, crouching down to pick up Tyler’s coat. He put the bag of bagels on the table, and walked off to the closet.

  “For a recon mission, Mr. McMann,” Tanner called after him. “Duncan is going to be playing with the new band.” He pulled out a chair from the table and rummaged through the bag, taking out a salt bagel. I grabbed some silverware and the cream cheese and slid it over to him.

  “Butter?” he said.

  “You did not come here to mooch a bagel,” I said, taking the butter out of the fridge and sitting across from him. “Is Plasma playing a dance something you couldn’t tell me at noon?

  “Ah, checking out the competition, classic mov
e.” Dad walked back into the kitchen, Tyler in tow. He settled Ty into his high chair and took the seat next to him.

  “I couldn’t sleep. I think we need to choose a drummer, today.”

  “We’ve got time,” I said, cutting into my own salt bagel.

  “How are the prospects?” Dad asked.

  “Two guys . . . hard to choose . . .” Tanner said between bites.

  The guy who’d come in after Grayson was good too but he’d been the first drummer for Plasma, not the one that Duncan replaced—Kenny Ashe went through drummers pretty quickly. There was something that didn’t feel right about him, though. Technically he was incredible, and he had more experience than Grayson, but choosing him . . . I don’t know, it felt like it would just drag us down into weird band politics, which I hated. Like if we picked him we’d be saying: You have our drummer, now we have yours. I wanted to start something new, not recycle. On the other hand, if we went with him we might be able to play out sooner.

  “You know who you want,” my father said, lifting his chin to me.

  “You do?” Tanner asked, as if I was keeping a secret from him.

  I shook my head.

  “Sure you do, it’s in the gut. Whenever we needed some fresh blood for Backtalk, it always ended up being a gut decision,” Dad said, spreading his sesame bagel with butter and tearing off a piece for Ty.

  “The sooner we pick someone, the sooner we can play out. We could be doing dances and stuff—”

  “Screw dances, I want to play for people who want to hear a band, not slow dance,” I said.

  “Croooo dance,” Tyler said, raising his fistful of bagel.

  “It’s basically money for practicing,” Tanner said.

  “He has a point,” Dad said.

  “I’d rather play the Whiskey.”

  “You want to be your best for Declan.” Declan was Dad’s old bandmate and the only one of them who had ended up doing anything remotely related to music. His bar, Whiskey Business, had been the place where Electric Hookah, a thrash band from Manalapan, had been discovered by a small indie label. Now it was every band’s wet dream to be plucked from obscurity, and dates were booked far out. I’d dropped our CD off right before HannahDunk. It was cover songs, but that’s what they focused on for the eighteen-and-over nights. I was pretty sure Dad could call in a favor. Maybe if we took on the second guy and had some intense practice, we’d be ready soon. But did I want a favor? Wouldn’t it be better to earn it?

  “I don’t know, T . . .”

  “Procrastination is really fear of the future,” my father said, full-on college-professor mode.

  Tanner nodded. “Wow, um, what he said. C’mon, Jess, we can jam with them this week, make a decision, and start practicing.”

  What if we chose the wrong guy? What if we were never as good as we were before? But what if we were better? Wondering about it was safe . . . and stupid.

  “Okay, let’s do it. Guess we’re going to a dance next Friday.”

  FIVE

  MADISON

  ON SATURDAY MORNING, MOM DROVE ME, JAZZ, and Wren to the mall to hunt for something to wear for the Sadie Hawkins thing. Wren had already purchased the perfect little black dress weeks ago so she was there to help us get our glam on—and maybe hit the food court for lunch afterward.

  “What do you think?” I asked, checking myself out in the three-way mirror. The lacy cream-colored dress draped perfectly over one shoulder and came to a flirty but chaste stop right above my knees, perfect for a Sacred Heart event.

  And something a granny might wear.

  A hip granny with rockin’ shoulders, but still.

  “It’s pretty; you just don’t look like you,” she said.

  “You should talk, where would you wear that?”

  Wren was on tiptoe, pivoting to see the back view of a tiny black miniskirt with zipper pockets and barely there halter top she was modeling.

  “You don’t think it’s appropriate for Brooke’s baby shower?”

  “Have they changed the theme from tropical to S&M? Wait, that would probably be more fun for you,” I laughed, doing a twirl of my own. Nope, still not me.

  “No, Gray might . . . might,” she said, knocking on the wall for luck, “actually make it into this band he auditioned for yesterday. Just trying the rocker-chick look on for size in case, you know, we get to see them play out. Think he could handle my edgy side?”

  “The bigger question is, can you handle him handling your edgy side? Because I think he’d handle it fine.”

  “Hmm, exactly what I was going for,” she said, pivoting one last time, a sly grin crossing her face.

  “Okay, how about this one,” Jazz said, slinking out of the dressing room in a red cocktail dress with an A-line skirt.

  “Jasmine Ka-Day-am—that is . . .”

  “Stunning,” Wren finished.

  “No, come on, better than the white one?”

  She stood before the mirror, lifting out the skirt a bit and then letting it swish back into place. The color complemented her bronze skin and dark hair in a way that made her look lit-up. Not sure how she pulled it off, but she looked sexy and modest at the same time.

  “The other one was nice, but this is, wow,” I said, stepping back to take in the dress again.

  “That’s just it, I think it might be too special,” she said, turning to the side. “It’s not like it’s prom or anything. Just a dance with someone I barely know.”

  “No, this is the dress that Logan is going to see you in and forget why he’s there with Darby,” Wren said.

  “Are you bummed that you’re going with Kyle?” I asked.

  She crossed her arms and leaned against the wall. “No, I’m happy I’m going with him, I guess. He’s cute, nice, can carry on a conversation, but he’s, well, I already know I don’t want to, like, hook up with him, and shouldn’t that be part of a dance? Shouldn’t you want to kiss your date? I mean, if it happens, great, but I’m thinking more about Logan. It doesn’t feel right.”

  “You’re putting too much importance on what things should be like,” I said, popping back into my dressing room to try on my next choice—a strapless black-and-white brocade dress with a high/low illusion hemline. I fumbled with the zipper for a moment, then went back out to the mirror.

  Wren clapped. “Now that is you.”

  “Absolutely.” Jazz grinned.

  “Yep, I think this is it,” I said, twirling. The dress showed off my legs, which were seriously toned from months of crescent lunges and downward dogs. I pulled both Wren and Jazz next to me and we struck a vampy pose. The saleslady breezed in to collect the clothes off the reject rack.

  “How are you girls— Ooh, so pretty,” she said. “What’s the occasion?”

  We stepped away from each other, giggling.

  “Oh, um—Sadie Hawkins Dance,” I said.

  “Fun. I have to say that red dress is lovely. Didn’t seem like much on the hanger, but on you it’s really smashing. Let me know if you girls need anything else.” She darted out of the dressing room with clothes draped over her arm.

  “See?” I said. “Even the saleslady thinks you look smashing.”

  “She’s not exactly impartial.” Jazz checked out the price tag near her armpit. “And hey, look, all of my birthday money and a month’s worth of working for my mom just for what’s pretty much a practice date.”

  “Okay, you’ve got to stop this—so what if you’re not in love with this guy? We all can’t be Wren and Gray.”

  They both gave me quizzical looks.

  “Aren’t you in love with Zach?” Jazz asked.

  I laughed, but when neither of them joined in, I stopped.

  “No, I’m not,” I said. It felt strange to be declaring it out loud in front of a three-way mirror—endless images of me saying the same thing. “I mean, I like him a lot— we have fun and all, but do I think this is love? Hell-to-the-no, but I’m not hung up on it. Neither is he.”

  My little s
peech was met with an uncomfortable silence. Was it really so awful that I felt that way? Wren checked her butt out in the mirror again. Jazz looked at the floor.

  “I just don’t know if I can do that. Be all casual,” she said.

  “Omigod—lighten up. Consider it an experiment. You didn’t ask the guy to marry you, it’s a freakin’ dance in a high school gym. You’re not going to wreck your love life with one awkward date. There are worse ways to spend a Friday night.”

  “She’s right, Jazz. Kyle’s hot and you guys seemed to hit it off that night at the movies. I like the experiment idea.”

  “Buy the dress. Kiss the wrong boy. Flirt your butt off.”

  Jazz face-palmed, but laughed. “Guys . . . ugh . . . okay. Yes. You’re right.”

  “Success,” Wren said, waving her hand in the air as she returned to her dressing room.

  After our purchases, we wandered over to the food court to meet Mom in front of Jamba Juice. My stomach growled. A berry smoothie would not cut it. What I really wanted was a honking plate of nachos from the Tex-Mex food stand.

  “Hey, you guys want to split nach—”

  The words stopped as my eyes landed on my mother.

  Sitting in front of Jamba Juice.

  “Is that Leif? With your mother?” Wren asked.

  “Yes.”

  Was it him? He looked different in jeans, although I guess it was ridiculous to think he’d be roaming the mall in yoga pants and his mat strapped to his back. He had a life outside the yoga studio, of course. Damn, he wore it just as well. I could not for the life of me understand how my mother could compartmentalize Leif into yoga-information guy. There was a stack of books between them. My mother spoke using gestures that made her look like she was swirling the air around her.

  “That’s Hot Yogi?” Jazz asked.

  “Are they on a date?”

  “Nah,” I said. “My mom’s thinking of becoming a yoga teacher—Leif is, like, her young hot mentor.”

  Mom spotted us and waved us over. She was glowing—no, really—like the space around her was charged. Leif sat with one leg loosely crossed over the other, as if hanging with my mom was the way he spent every Saturday at the mall.