How did she pay for it though, the cab I mean? She also has a secret credit card that she stole before coming to St. Mary’s, and if she uses it in a very limited capacity, charges sort of go unnoticed. Or at least they have so far.
And how are we going to get into a bar even though we’re underage? That’s Callie’s department. She says that the bartender at this particular bar is a friend and he’ll let us in as long as all we do is dancing and no drinking.
I don’t care about that.
I don’t want to drink. I don’t want to dance either.
I’m not sneaking out for any of that.
I’m sneaking out because my heart is witchy and I have dangerous urges.
The bar that we’re at is called Ballad of the Bards.
I’ve heard of it, actually. It’s a bar famous for its love songs. Meaning they don’t play the regular, dancing music. They playthe music of the bards, the poets. The songs of sad love and misery.
I’ve always wanted to go here. It’s at the border of the town of St. Mary’s and another town called Bardstown. And since I was sorta happy to know that we were coming here, I even let them put lipstick on me, on the way over.
“Every girl deserves a little lip lovin’,” said Poe, while painting my lips with Teenage Decay, which is a dark coral color.
It reminds me of the sun.
It reminds me of him.
With that on my lips, I feel like he’s close.
He might as well be. The press conference was a couple of days ago. We, at St. Mary’s School for Troubled Teenagers, move slower than the rest of the world.
Maybe he’s already back.
Maybe he’s in town right now.
And maybe…
Okay, stop thinking about him.
Stop.
But I don’t think that’s possible.
At all.
Because as soon as we enter the bar and glance around the industrial-looking space with low-hanging light bulbs, rough brick walls and metal beams, I catch sight of something.
A baseball cap.
It’s too dark in here to tell the color of it.
But I don’t need the light in order to do that. I know what color it is.
It’s gray.
Like all the other things in his life – his workout sneakers, his soccer cleats, his sweaters, his sweatpants.
His t-shirts.
Yeah, he has a bunch of gray t-shirts.
In fact, I’m wearing one now, under my chunky sweater, his t-shirt that I stole.
