Russ had gotten married after law school to someone Cherry had never met—a Marian girl who worked at the Community Foundation. (Marian was one of the Omaha schools where rich Catholic girls went.) They had one kid, an eight-year-old boy named Liam—he was at Saint Margaret Mary now. Did Cherry want to see a photo? Yeah. She did. She looked at Russ’s phone and smiled. His son was a doll. She said so.
Cherry didn’t have any photos to show Russ. She wasn’t going to show him a picture of Stevie—that would be too sad. (... Even if Cherry did have a thousand of them on her phone.) And she didn’t want to talk about Tom. Shecouldn’ttalk about Tom the way Russ talked about his ex-wife—like she was just another thing that had happened in the years since he and Cherry last talked.
“I can’t believe you work inmanagement,” Russ said. The opening act had finished their set. Goldenrod would be starting soon. “You were always so creative.”
“I’m still creative,” Cherry said, affronted. She was chewing on ice. She swallowed it. “There aren’t very many people who can be creativeandpractical. It’s my magic power, actually. I can make sure the work is good, and I can make sure it gets done. And I can talk to the numbers and money people.”
“Huh.” Russ looked at her glass. “Do you want another Coke Zero?”
She shook her head.
“Don’t you miss being an artist?” he asked.
“I know I’m supposed to say yes, but... I think I’m a better executive. I don’t think I wasevermuch of an artist.”
“Sure you were.”
She rolled her eyes. “When did you ever see my art, Russ?”
He shrugged. “I just don’t think you would have been an art major if you were shitty at it.”
Well. That was true. “I got by,” Cherry conceded. “But I wasn’t an artist.” Not like the other people she went to school with. Not like Tom. “If I had to go back to design, I’d miss what I’m doing now.”
“I just can’t picture you at the railroad,” Russ said. “As anindustrialist.”
“I’m not a robber baron.”
He laughed. “Do you still see Stacia and all those guys?”
Cherry nodded. Minimally. “Yeah. Same old crowd.”
Russ shook his head, like he was remembering something fondly. Cherry could imagine some of the details.
A guy walked past their table and waved at Russ. Russ waved back.
“Do you ever wish that you got out of Omaha?” Cherry asked.
He cut his eyes toward her. “What do you mean?”
Cherry looked up at him. He was a bit taller than her, standing by her chair. “Just... the same old faces,” she said. “The same old intersecting circles. Do you ever wish you’d gotten out?”
Russ smiled a little. His eyes looked extra alive. “Not tonight.”
Cherry ran to the bathroom before the show started, and when she came back, Russ was sitting in her seat. He smiled at her and got up. The band was walking onstage. Cherry climbed onto the chair, clapping. She was so excited for this show. Even more excited now that it was starting.
The first song began—and Cherry immediately felt herself sliding backwards. Back to her early twenties. To her senior year of college, when she’d had this CD on repeat. Goldenrod was the band that made “Omaha emo” a thing. Simple, pretty guitars. Whiny, breathy vocals. Base-level unhappiness. All of Goldenrod’s songs were about being lonely or feeling guilty. The lead singer was a famous depressive. He was wearing a paper crown tonight, playing the first few chords of the song on an acoustic guitar.
God, Cherrylovedthis song. She loved thisfeeling. She laughed a little, just for the joy of it. People around her were whooping.
Russ had moved to Cherry’s side of the table, to face the band. He turned to her, smiling, and sang the first lyric—“I was young, and I was tired, and I was splitting in three.”
Cherry grinned.
These concerts were all the rage now—bands playing their best-loved albums all the way through—and after a few songs, Cherry could see why. It wasdelightful. Hearing all the songs you wouldn’t usually hear at a concert, the not-even B-sides. Hearing the songs in the precise order that you knew them best.
Cherry kept smiling. She kept tearing up. She kept looking over at Russ—she still wasn’t over the shock ofseeinghim again, and there he was, standing right next to her. Standing so close that his arm brushed against hers every time he took a drink.Russ Sutton, as she lived and breathed.
There were songs on this first Goldenrod album that had always reminded Cherry of Russ, that she’d twisted to fit her hopeless crush on him—obviouslyshe’d had a crush on him—and now he was right there beside her, singing along.
