She jumped, hand over heart. She relaxed when she saw who it was, but then fear flicked her at the base of her throat. Something was off about him. “No. I’m good.” She tried to make her face pleasant. “Thanks, though.”
She shoved her hands deep in her pockets, head down, intending to hurry home as fast as she could without it looking like she was running. He’d been sitting inside his car, windows rolled down, waiting for someone. Nother, certainly. The pinch of fear returned, reaching her stomach this time. Thirty feet away and behind, the diner door opened, releasing the noises inside: laughter, muttering, the clank of dishes. She inhaled a wave of fryer grease that suddenly smelled so welcoming she wanted to weep.
That decided it. She turned to head back inside the restaurant. Who cared if he thought she was a flake? But then, so fast it was like a snakebite, he slid out of his car and was standing next to her, gripping her arm.
She twisted it free.
“Hey now,” he said, holding up his hands, his voice deep but hitched. Was he excited? “I’m tryna be nice. You have a problem with nice guys?”
He laughed, and the twist in her guts turned into a horse kick. She glanced toward the diner again. Lisa was looking out the window, seemed to be staring straight at her, but that was an illusion. It was too bright inside, too dark out.
“I left something in the diner,” Beth said, leaning away from him, heart stuttering. “I’ll be right back.”
She didn’t know why she’d tacked on that last part, where the impulse to soothe him had come from. She had no intention of returning, would stay inside until Mark came to get her. Damn, she couldn’t wait to ditch this place for California. As she turned away, she took him in out of the corner of her eye, this man she’d seen so many times before.
He was smiling, his body relaxed.
But no, that wasn’t right. He was coiling, gathering his muscles. He still wore the take-it-easy grin as his fist sank into her throat, paralyzing her voice, sealing off her access to air.
Only his eyes changed. His pupils dilated, big liquid pools cracking like black yolks, spilling into his irises. Otherwise, he held that serene smile, as if he were asking her about the weather or advising her on a sound investment.
That’s so weird,she thought as she crumpled toward the ground, her brain easing on down the road.
CHAPTER 1
The drums made me something better.
Something whole.
Bam, ba bum.Bam, ba bum.Bam bam bam.
Directly in front of me, Brenda wailed into the microphone, lighting up her guitar like she’d been born to it, a spotlight seeming to shine on her even inside Maureen’s dingy garage. She suddenly spun her axe behind her back, her strap hugging it snug to her butt.
Yeah you turn me on...
I grinned and howled along with her, driving my sticks into the skin.
To my right, Maureen cradled her bass, head tilted, sheets of feathered, green-streaked hair forming a private tent where it was just her and the music. A teacher had once told Maureen she reminded him of Sharon Tate, only prettier. She’d told him to suck a pipe.
I beamed thinking of it while matching Maureen’s throbbing beat, her bass lines all woven through and glowing with percussive thumps, each of them so throaty and strong I couldseethem bruising the air. Maureen hadn’t been herself lately, was all twitchy with faraway stares and an expensive new Black Hills gold ring she swore she’d bought with her own money, but when we played, when we made music together, I forgot all about the way things were changing.
I entered a different world.
You’ve felt yourself on the edge of it when a cheery song hits the radio. You’re driving, windows rolled down to the nubs, a warm breeze kissing your neck, the world tasting like hope and blue sky.Turn it up!Your hips can’t help but wiggle. Man, it feels like that song was written for you, like you’re gorgeous and loved and the entire planet is in order.
But here’s the thing they don’t tell you: That magic, king-or-queen-of-the-world sensation? It’s a million times better when you’re the one playing the music.
Maybe even a billion.
Green-haired Maureen called the feeling Valhalla, and she had enough attitude she could get away with saying things like that. Back before my accident, my mom and Maureen’s had been best friends. They’d drink Sanka and smoke Kools while Maureen and I stared at each other across the portable crib. When we outgrew that, they let us play in the living room and then, finally, sent us down into the tunnels. That’s just how it rolled in Pantown. Then Mom changed, Mrs.Hansen stopped coming around, and Maureen got boobs. All of a sudden, the boys were treating her differently, and there’s nothing to do when you’re treated differently except to act differently.
Maybe that explained Maureen’s twitchy moods lately.
But even before those, Maureen had been end-of-summer energy in a bottle. Never still, racing to cram all the good stuff in before the grind. Except she was like that year-round, shivering with something electric and a little bit scary, to me, at least. Brenda, on the other hand, was one of those girls you knew was gonna be a mom one day. Didn’t matter that she was the youngest in her family: she was born with her roots sunk deep in the ground, made you relax just standing next to her. That’s why the three of us made such a good band, nurturing Brenda our lead singer and guitarist, Maureen our witchy Stevie Nicks singing backup and playing bass, and me holding true north on the drums.
We shot onto a whole nother plane when we played music, even when banging out covers, which is what we mostly did. We called ourselves the Girls, and the first songs we learned were “Pretty Woman,” “Brandy,” and “Love Me Do,” in that order. We played them well enough that you could recognize the tune. Brenda would figure out the opening bars, and I’d lay down a steady beat. Slap the lyrics on top of that, shimmy like you know what you’re doing, and people were happy.
At least, the only two people who’d ever watched us play were.
