But the truth is, I understand what she’s saying. Iamholding myself back. Iamafraid to give in completely to how I feel about X.
“Not to worry,” she says to me as we’re leaving. “Tango comes for everyone. You will learn to let go eventually.”
CHAPTER 40
Declarations
“YOU GUYS WEREway better than I thought you’d be!” Cassidy shouts to X, Jamal and Kevin after their show.
X laughs. “I’ll take that,” he says, grabbing extra chairs for the table.
Kevin and Jamal give Cassidy awho the hell are you, white girl?look that she shrugs off.
“Don’t listen to Cassidy,” Sophie says. “You guys were great.”
“This was my first rock and roll show,” says Martin, sounding like someone’s great-great-great-grandparent from another planet. “It was incredible.”
X does the introductions and makes his way around the table to me. His eyes are doing that electric, glittering thing I noticed the first time I saw him play. He tugs me to my feet and then picks me up and twirls me around. I yelp and hold on tight while he laughs into my hair.
“We do okay?” he asks.
“Amazing,” I say.
He smiles against my neck, and his dreads are softly scratchy against my cheek.
I press myself closer. There’s a feeling inside me like a balloon that’s one breath away from bursting. We’ve spent so much time together lately, just the two of us: dancing, texting, talking until way too late into the night. It feels good to be out with our friends, but it feels like a big step too. Like we’re making a public declaration to his friends and mine.
I feel like I’m making a declaration to myself. Despite what the visions have taught me, I’m still doing this thing with X.
X sits down in my chair and I sit on his lap. He wraps his arms around my waist. Everyone’s talking and laughing, but I’m barely listening. The club is even darker and smaller and smellier than I remember. I think maybe their cleaning products are actually made from stale beer and pee. The main act is getting set up onstage, and the club fills with even more people. X laughs at something, and I feel the rumble of it against my back. I love the way he laughs, free and open and with all of himself.
After a while Jamal and Kevin take off. They have dates with some “lovely concertgoers,” as Jamal puts it. X fist-bumps them both goodbye. I watch the two of them disappear into the arms of a group of outrageously hip people.
None of us wants the night to end, so we end up back at Cassidy’s house. As usual, her parents are away, on location for a movie shoot. She takes us out to their “outdoor entertaining area.” It’s more like a miniature country club than a backyard, and it’s beautiful. My favorite part is the blue-green lazy river that bubbles and meanders up and through the sloping lawn. Café lights flicker overhead, strung between tall, wide palm trees. There’s a full bar, couches, love seats and even a gas fireplace filled with bright-blue glass and lava rocks.
Cassidy turns on the fireplace and gets us all drinks from the bar. Something about a fire makes you want to stare into it. For a few minutes we sit there watching the flames while listening to the bubbling of the pool and the rush of the Santa Ana winds through the palm trees.
“My parents never, ever come out here,” Cassidy confesses into our silence.
Sophie tips her head onto Cassidy’s shoulder, and Cassidy takes a sip of whatever she’s drinking.
“Thanks for inviting us,” X says. “Hands down the nicest damn house party I’ve ever been to.”
She laughs. “It is fabulous, right? I’m glad you guys came.”
Martin’s sitting in the single armchair across from me andX. He nudges me with his foot. “Did you really write that ‘Black Box’ song?” he asks.
Right before the band launched into it at the show earlier, X told the audience that I’d written the lyrics.
“That one was my favorite,” Sophie says.
“I only helped a little,” I say.
X shakes his head. “She means a lot.”
Everyone’s eyes are on us, and I’m more than a little self-conscious.
Cassidy gets a mischievous gleam in her eye that tells me she’s going to embarrass me. “Aww, you guys are so cute,” sheteases.
