Lovestruck Summer

by Melissa Walker

  120 me in my wide wooden chair. A waiter comes by to get us drinks from the bar, and Russ orders a root beer. It sounds so good, I get one too. When they come, they’re extra cold and frothy. “Good choice,”I say. “Cheers,”says Russ, clinking his mug with mine. An older couple wanders down the lawn and joins us, sitting on the bench to our left. They’re holding hands, I notice, which I always think is really annoying among people my age, but somehow sweet between couples like my par- ents’age and older. Maybe that’s because my parents never hold hands. They love each other and all, but they just don’t show it that way. This couple, though, is more like my grandpar- ents’age. “You two waiting for the bats?”asks the husband. “Yes, sir,”says Russ. “It’ll be the fi rst time for Priscilla here.”“We watched last night, but they didn’t show,”says the wife, looking at me.

  121 I glance over at Russ. “It’s not a sure thing,”he says. “But I thought it’d be fun to try.”“I guess bats are fi ckle,”I say, looking back at the old couple. “The concierge at the hotel says the bats are still pregnant and might not be ready to come out and feed yet,”says the husband. The way he says “feed”sounds a little gross to me, but I’m curious to see this bat phenom- enon. We sit silently for a few more minutes, and Russ and I sip our root beers. Even without the bats fl ying, this time around day’s end is stunning. There is a brief golden moment that seems like it comes straight out of a cinematographer’s fi lmic dream—the sparkling glow on the water, the bright green of the grass under the rose-hued sky. And Russ’s hair with a shimmer of sundown in it. It’s like a song. “Are you disappointed?”he asks me, when the sun sets and we’re left in the blue glow of twilight, sans fl ying rodents. “No,”I say. “It was lovely.”

  122 Chapter 12 On Friday night, I have plans to meet Jade and Sebastian at Dirty’s. I go to Jade’s house first to pick her up—she doesn’t live too far from the Drag, which is this main strip near campus, and it’s definitely my turn to drive. When she gets in the Festiva, Jade instantly comments on the music. I realize I’ve been play- ing Russ’s dusty-ass tape for days. I’m kind of into it. “Old-school!”she says, when some insanely ancient Green Day song comes on. “I think this is Russ’s older brother’s high school mix tape or something,”I say. “The family can’t be all bad if he was into Billy Joe back in the day,”says Jade. By the time we get to Dirty’s, Sebastian

  123 is already spinning, and Jade and I grab two sodas and settle into our regular booth. “I tried to see the bats this week,”I say. “It’s early,”she says. “They’re probably still pregnant.”Funny how the bats are this normal thing to talk about in Austin. It’s like I just said, “Oh, I went to the supermarket today.”But I’m talking about fl ying mice here. “Yeah, Russ took me down to the lawn by the Four Seasons and we were just—”I start. “Wait,”interrupts Jade. “You went on a date with your fratty neighbor? And you have his mix tape playing in your car . . . ?”“It was not a date,”I say fi rmly. “More like I was looking for something to do. That’s all.”“You must have been really bored,”says Jade, taking a sip of her drink and looking back toward Sebastian. “Russ isn’t that bad,”I say. “He’s not?”she asks. “You’re always acting like he’s the biggest a-hole on the planet with the way he won’t call you ‘Quinn’and how he

  124 hangs around all the time.”“Yeah,”I say. “That’s true. He does irritate me.”“Good thing you have Sebastian to focus on,”says Jade, smiling. I look over and see his fast hands replac- ing the Fretless Coma album that just played. Sebastian really is hot. I hear the bells over the door jingle. “Hey, there’s Rick,”I say to Jade, whose back is to the entrance. She doesn’t turn around. “Rick!”I shout, waving at him. He looks at me for a minute, like he’s trying to decide whether to come over. Does he think he’s too cool to sit at a table with interns? He’s always so nice at the Amalgam offi ce. “Hey, Quinn,”he says, when he fi nally graces us with his presence. “Hey there, Jade.”She gives a barely audible “hi,”still not look- ing up. “Sit down,”I say to Rick, scooting over in the booth. It’s bizarre to see your boss out. It’s kind of like seeing a teacher in the drugstore, when you realize that he is a person who has a life outside of your classroom, and maybe he’s

  125 even wearing normal clothes or laughing with his wife or something. It’s all very humanizing. And seeing Rick out is, of course, way cooler than seeing a teacher, because he’s an amazing indie- record-label boss. So I really hope he sits down. But he doesn’t. “I’m here to check out a band that’s on after Sebastian,”says Rick, looking only at me and not at Jade, I notice. She has her eyes down slightly. “I’ve got friends coming, so I’m just gonna wait at the bar.”And then, even though I know he’s my boss and I really shouldn’t talk back or question him or whatever, it has to be said: “You guys are being weird,”I say. “Did Jade get fi red or something?”I’m just joking but my comment is met with Silence. Jade’s head lowers like the top of the table is the most interesting thing she’s ever seen in her life. “You guys have a good night, okay?”says Rick, backing away. “I see my friends over there, so . . .”“Dude, what the eff?”I ask Jade after Rick

  126 is out of earshot. I smile inwardly at the fact that I self-censored my language, just like Russ did the other day. But when I see Jade raise her head, I real- ize this is something serious. Her mascara is streaked in canals down her cheeks, and her bright red mouth is curved into an unnatural shape of angst. “Oh my God,”I say. “You did get fi red.”“It’s not that,”says Jade, reaching for a tissue in her black canvas bag. Her voice is one of those jagged whispers that only crying people do well. She puts the tissue over her nose and blows. “I looked up to Pitt,”she says. “Huh?”I ask. “Looked up to Pitt? You mean Brad? I guess he’s kind of a role model, but I don’t think he’s anyone to get obsessed with. He’s old, and he cheated on Jennifer Aniston.”Why do I know this stuff? Jade lowers the tissue and looks me dead in the eye. “I hooked up with Rick,”she says, slowly and clearly. “Oh,”I say. Ooooooh. This is bad. “Is that legal?”I ask.

  127 “Yes!”she snaps. “I’m eighteen.”Okay, okay, I guess that wasn’t the best question I could have asked. But I’m not sure what to say here. “Do you guys like each other?”I ask, trying again. “Well, I like him!”she says, shredding, piece by piece, the poor, wet tissue as she stares down at the table. “Is he looking at us?”I glance over her shoulder at the bar, where Rick is sitting on a stool and slapping the back of some overweight guy with a leather jacket and a buzz cut. “No,”I say, not sure if that’s what Jade wants to hear. She rips the tissue in half violently. Over the next twenty minutes, I’m able to glean through sniffl ing tones that Jade has always had a crush on Rick, and that being in the offi ce together this summer was part of her seduction plan. They had been fl irting con- stantly and hanging out sometimes after work. Which explains why Jade never wanted to talk about her own love life, and never called me to do anything during the week. And then last

  128 night it came to a head. She and Rick hooked up in the demo closet. “That actually sounds kind of amazing,”I say. I’m picturing me with a guy in the Amalgam closet, listening to the Walters’still-unreleased album over the stereo while I prop my leg up on a mid-level shelf and get hot and heavy among the indie rock. “It was,”says Jade, looking at me with intense eyes and bringing me out of my fantasy. “Until he broke away from me and told me he thinks I’m hot but that I’m just a kid.”“Ouch,”I say. “He said ‘just a kid’? Those words? That’s like a lame sitcom diss.”“Yeah,”says Jade. “It’s the worst. I called in sick today and I don’t know if I can go back.”“I’ll be there for you Monday,”I say. “You have to show him that you don’t care. That you’re young and smoking and can get anyone you want.”“You think?”she asks. “Of course!”I say. “He’s lucky you turned those sexy brown eyes his way for a moment, but if he isn’t smitten, he’s forgotten.”

  129 I sound like one of Penny’s self-help rela- tionship books. But it seems like the r
ight thing to say, because Jade is perking up. “That’s pretty harsh,”says Jade, her voice fi nally losing that crying edge. “I don’t know if I can turn my feelings around like that. I just always thought he was my ideal. I mean, he’s the head of Amalgam Records, the guy who knows everyone in town, who has so much power and is still such a great person.”“It also doesn’t hurt that he’s pretty hot for a near-thirty-year-old,”I say. She smiles. “That’s true too.”“You don’t have to turn off your feelings,”I say. “You just have to be the intern. Go to work, be your professional self, then leave. You’ll fi nd another guy—a much more ideal summer fl ing fi t.”“Like you and Sebastian?”she asks. “Yeah,”I say. But when I look over at him, although I know he’s so beautiful and all, I don’t feel totally excited. And then I realize that when I imagined the Amalgam closet make-out ses- sion, I didn’t picture myself with Sebastian. I shake my head to clear my weird thoughts.

  130 Sebastian is exactly the guy I am looking for this summer. Then I refocus on Jade. “Bright side?”I ask. “Please,”she says. “Your mascara is streaked in this really great way that makes you look like a hardcore eighties album-cover girl,”I say. Jade sticks out her tongue and gives me the hard-rock hand sign. “Thanks, Quinn,”she says. “Anytime,”I say. “Hey, you wanna get out of here?”“Yeah,”she says. “But you stay—I know you want to meet up with Sebastian after his set. I can take the bus or something.”“It’s okay,”I say. “I kind of feel like going home myself.”When I get back to the condo, I call Raina but she doesn’t pick up. Penny’s not around, which would normally be a good thing, but I kind of feel like talking to someone right now. I walk out onto the back deck to get some air, and I smell a delicious burger cooking. I look over at Russ and Chrissy’s deck, which is

  131 connected to ours, and see that someone has the grill going. Then Russ walks outside with a spatula in his hand. He’s wearing a bright blue polo shirt that makes his eyes look even more unreal than usual. Of course, he has on khaki cargo shorts too. The guy is a walking frat stereotype. So why can’t I stop thinking about him? “What’s up, Priscilla?”He smiles at me and cocks his head. “Date end early?”“I was just out,”I say. “It wasn’t really a date or anything.”Not that this is any of his business. “Want a burger?”he asks. Yes. “Isn’t it a weird time to be grilling?”I ask. “It’s, like, midnight.”“I got hungry,”he says. “And I have American cheese, which I know you can’t resist.”He points to the Velveeta slices on his picnic table. “Come on over.”We’re divided by a small wooden barrier, so I walk down the three short steps off of Penny’s deck and up the steps to his. The siren song of burgers with American cheese is too much for

  132 my weak carnivorous self to resist. I sit down on the wooden bench and stare at the condiment tray Russ has brought out—it has ketchup, mustard, mayonnaise, dill pickles, sliced onions, lettuce, and tomatoes. “You’re a regular outdoor caféover here,”I say. “I like grilling,”says Russ. “And then I really like loading up a burger and eating.”I tuck my hair, which is slowly growing out and getting practically girl-length, behind my ears. “So how come you aren’t out?”I ask. “I felt like taking it easy tonight,”he says. “I was watching Rocky on TV, but then I got hungry, so . . .”“Here we are,”I say. “Here we are,”he says. He’s looking at me and suddenly the grill starts shooting fl ames. A black cloud of smoke spits up, and Russ yells, “Dang! I hope you like ’em well done!”He’s standing back from the grill and trying to use the long spatula to rescue the sad little burger that has just been charred to a crisp. I clap my hand over my mouth, trying so

  133 hard to hold in my laughter that I feel tears come to my eyes. Russ takes off his fl ip-fl op and starts waving it around to clear the smoke. It only makes me laugh more. “If you keep laughing, I’m gonna make you eat that one,”says Russ, fi nally nabbing the burn-victim burger. “I’m sorry,”I say, still unable to hide my amusement. “You seemed like you were really good at all this until a minute ago.”“Yeah, well, you distracted me,”says Russ, pretending to be huffy. He puts another two patties on the grill. “Let’s try this again.”“Medium rare,”I say. “Yes, Queen Priscilla.”He bows. “So is Russ your real name?”I ask him, trying to turn the tables on this whole Priscilla thing. “Yup,”he says. “Russ Jay Barnes. Not Russell or Rusty or Russert. Just Russ. My par- ents are one-syllable folks.”“Oh,”I say. “Then maybe you should under- stand that I’m a one-syllable girl, too. Quinn. Can you say it? Quiiiinnn.”“Why do you fi ght your real name?”asks

  134 Russ. “It fi ts you so perfectly.”“It does not!”I say. “It’s old-fashioned, for one. And it’s just so prissy. It even sounds like the word prissy. I am so not a Priscilla.”“That’s where you’re wrong,”says Russ, turning back to the grill. “Priscilla is the rock- ingest name in the book.”He turns around with his lip curled up. “Come on, ’Cilla,”he says. I fi ght to keep from laughing again. “Is that the best Elvis you can do?”I deadpan. “Wiiiise men say . . . only fools rush in . . .”He starts singing “Can’t Help Falling in Love,”which I now have about four versions of on my iPod. Then he comes around to my side of the picnic table and reaches for my hand. And before I can fi gure out how to deter him, we’re dancing on this silly condo deck at midnight to the sound of Russ’s bad Elvis impersonation. I spin around a few times, trying to keep my head turned to the side, trying to fi gure out what it is that I’m feeling right now as my fi ngers lightly brush the back of his cotton polo shirt. What am I doing? This guy is a jock-y goofball

  135 with big muscles and a taste for country music. “The burgers are gonna burn,”I say after a minute. Russ backs away from me and smiles. “You’re right, ’Cilla,”he says, still doing Elvis. “We got a hunka hunka burning meat to attend to.”“Gross,”I say. I sit back down at the table. I try not to look up at him as I get my sesame- seed bun ready with condiments and toppings. I don’t want him to think that I like him, or that he has a shot or whatever. He doesn’t. When I dig into the burger Russ cooked, I soften a little and smile. It’s delicious, especially since he insisted I slather it with every condi- ment on the table. I tried to skip the mayo, but Russ insisted that a touch of it mixed with the ketchup was key. And he’s not wrong. “Mmm . . .”I say with a full mouth. Russ looks at me and laughs, bringing a napkin up to my chin. “Enjoying yourself, juice face?”he asks as he wipes my face like I’m fi ve. I put the burger down, slightly embarrassed. “So what did happen tonight, anyway?”

  136 Russ asks. “You seemed kind of upset when you came out on the deck earlier.”“Oh, nothing,”I say. “My friend Jade is having guy issues, so we were talking about that and then I just didn’t feel like staying out.”“So it was your friend having guy issues,”says Russ. “Not you.”“No,”I say defensively. “Not me. I’m into Sebastian. He’s cool and really smart and he knows a ton about music.”Russ curls his lip again. “But can he do the King?”he asks. I laugh. “What is it with you country boys and Elvis?”I ask. “The guy died decades before we were even born.”“It’s not like I’ve got a shrine to Graceland in my room,”says Russ. “But, you know, he was really infl uential on the stuff I listen to now—the same stuff you listen to now, too, by the way.”“He’s okay,”I say. “But he’s kinda country. I just don’t like that kind of music.”“Priscilla, are you gonna keep saying that kind of stupid thing all summer?”Russ asks. “I thought Austin would have opened your eyes a little by now.”

  137 I look at him, and I realize that he’s being serious. He might even be a little bit annoyed with me. “I’m seeing a lot of local bands,”I say. “I mean, I’ve been going to shows with Jade and everything.”“I just hope you’re going to more than Dirty’s,”says Russ. “Not that it’s a bad venue, but you need to be getting all the fl avor here.”“I know what I like,”I say. “It’s a certain type of music and I’m just not into stuff like bluegrass and banjos.”“Music is music, Priscilla,”says Russ. “If you love music, you give it all a listen. You see what there is to learn in every so
ng you hear. You take chances on shows. That’s part of it.”“You think that manufactured pop count- down stuff is music?”I ask. “Lots of your indie bands end up on those charts, let’s not forget,”says Russ. “I know,”I say bitterly. “And I hate that. I hate when annoying giggly girls know one song from a great band because it just hap- pened to be on a movie soundtrack or some- thing. They’re totally co-opting the music and

  138 selling out the sound.”Russ laughs. “Do you hear yourself?”he asks. “You sound like a conspiracy theorist.”“It’s true!”I say. “I loved 201 Bunnies Named Earl way before anyone else, and then one of their songs shows up in a cell phone commercial and now it’s Penny’s ringtone.”“For a smart girl, you sure say a lot of idiotic things,”says Russ. “What did you say to me?”I ask. “It’s true,”he says. “Who cares about Penny’s ringtone? If she likes the music, she likes the music. You don’t own it. You can’t tell people what to like—you can’t control who likes the bands you like.”He shakes his head. “Are you gonna go to college with that small-minded attitude?”Then he stands up and turns his back to me. He starts cleaning the grill. “I am not small-minded!”I shout, which is all I can think of to say even though I want to say something better, more biting. I settle for standing up and marching down his stairs, then up mine. I get enough stomping in to communicate the fact that I feel insulted,

  139 but Russ doesn’t look up from the grill. “Thanks for the food,”I say angrily, not understanding how Russ can take me from laughing and dancing to yelling and stomping in less then fi ve minutes. “I only wish the conver- sation had been as good as the burger!”I shout, grasping for some sort of dig. “You’re welcome, Priscilla,”Russ says calmly, not turning around. Ooh, he makes me mad! I slide open the glass door, and if it weren’t so heavy I’d have a mind to slam it, but I can’t, so I just shut it tightly and fl ip the lock loudly so I’m sure Russ hears it and feels unwelcome in the condo. And that goes for my thoughts, too!