She plopped an olive into the drink and handed it over to a girl with brown curls and green eyes. Their fingers brushed, just for a second. The girl smiled, her gaze slipping down from Brighton’s own dark eyes and pale face to the black-and-gray tattoo of the Moon tarot card surrounded by peonies on her upper right arm.
“I love that,” the girl said, eyes back on Brighton’s.
“Thank you,” Brighton said, feeling her cheeks warm, and rested her forearms on the bar. She rightly sucked at dating, but hookups she could do. She looked at the girl through her lashes, smiled with one corner of her mouth. “It’s—”
But she froze as the musician onstage shifted from “Silver Bells” to a song that most definitely wasnota Christmas tune, the familiar, catchy melody like a splash of ice water in Brighton’s face.
Rain is gone and I’m feeling light
Your ripped jeans like silk and wine
Cherry lipstick still on my mind
Can’t blame me, darling, I’m back in line
Brighton closed her eyes, tried to block out the lyrics she’d heard onSaturday Night Livea month ago and now couldn’t seem to escape, even sitting in her own bar. The song, “Cherry Lipstick,” was everywhere—Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, Spotify, covered at least twice a week in Ampersand. In the last six months, the band, a trio of queer women called the Katies, had rocketed from near nothingness to the hottest thing to hit millennial and Gen Z ears since Halsey.
To most people, “Cherry Lipstick” was just a song—a damn good indie pop song that many a gal would probably attach to their queer awakening, but a song nonetheless—and the Katies were just a band finding some success. Good on them. So this ubiquitous song playing in all corners of the world was fine and dandy…except for the fact that a mere nine months ago, Brighton had been the Katies’ lead singer.
And now she most definitely was not.
The singer arrived at the chorus, belting out the lyrics with such gusto, Brighton was positive the woman was in the middle of her own awakening.
“Oh, I love this song.” The girl was still standing in front of Brighton, martini in hand. “Don’t you?”
“Ah, Christ,” Adele said under her breath. “Here we go.”
Brighton glared at her friend, then turned a saccharine smile on the girl. “It’s a fucking masterpiece.”
At Brighton’s tone, the girl’s smile dimmed, and she drifted away toward her friends. Just as well. Brighton was clearly in nomood to be accommodating, and anyone who loved “Cherry Lipstick” was bound to be horrible in bed. Granted, Brighton knew her logic there made absolutely zero sense, but it made her feel better in the moment, so she went with it.
“Isn’t it time for your break?” Adele asked.
Brighton sighed, pressed her fingers into her eyes. “Yeah.”
“Then by all means.” Adele waved her hand toward the back room, but her expression was soft. Adele knew all about the Katies and Brighton, knew the whole affair was still an open wound. Knew Brighton hadn’t touched her guitar or sung a single note since Alice and Emily’s betrayal nine months ago.
Adele reached over and squeezed Brighton’s hand, then gave her shoulder a little shove. “Go. Jake’s got this.”
Brighton obeyed, nodding to Jake, the other evening bartender, before pouring herself a large glass of water. She disappeared into the back, passing through the bustling kitchen, fry cooks dipping Monte Cristos into vats of oil, until she reached Adele’s office. The song followed after her like a ghost.
I can’t, I can’t forget the taste
Your cherry lips, your swaying hips…
She gulped her water, then set the empty glass on Adele’s desk and kept moving, passing by the big leather couch on her way to the back door. She burst outside into the cold December air, breathing it into her lungs like a new form of oxygen. She leaned against the building’s red brick and closed her eyes, which were starting to feel tight and watery. On Demonbreun Street, she could hear the bustle of the Saturday night crowd—laughter, more live music, all the sounds she used to love.
The sounds she used to be a part of.
Because she clearly loved being miserable, Brighton took out her phone and opened up the Katies’ Instagram page. Three hundred and ninety-three thousand followers. And counting, no doubt. Emily’s dark curls haloed around her lovely face, falling nearly to her shoulders. She favored crop tops and plaid pants, and Brighton even spotted the pink-and-green pair Brighton herself had found at that thrift store in the Gulch last winter. Alice was brooding, as always. A tiny, dark-haired pixie with huge butch energy.
Brighton and Emily had first met at a restaurant in Green Hills where Brighton had gotten a job as a server when she first moved to Nashville five years ago. They bonded quickly over music, melancholy queers like Phoebe Bridgers and Brandi Carlile. They started playing together on their days off, messing around on Brighton’s guitar and Emily’s keyboard in Emily’s tiny East Nashville apartment that she shared with three roommates, but they soon began writing. Lyrics turned into whole songs, which turned into small gigs at coffee shops, just to try it out.
That was how they met Alice.
They’d just finished playing a late-afternoon set at J&J’s, a quirky coffee shop–slash–convenience store on Broadway that also hosted live music, and Alice walked up to them afterward, declaring they needed a drummer.
“And you’re just such a drummer?” Emily had asked.
