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“Vicky!” I laughed. “Since when do you get stage fright?”
“Uh, since my whole life?”
“But you’ve performed in a zillion things. You were a cheerleader,” I reminded her.
“Yeah, and shouting, ‘Roosevelt Roosters, go go go!’ in a yellow-and-green unitard really prepared me for singing in front of Start. Anyway, this is the first time I’ve performed my songs. Songs that I wrote. Not to mention the first time the Dirty Curtains have performed anywhere, ever. Like, all of a sudden the Dirty Curtains are a real band, instead of a few dudes who play video games on my TV and shed beard hair all over my rug while I try to make them rehearse.”
I glanced over at the other two Dirty Curtains, who were plugging their instruments into amps and saying, “Testing, one two three,” and, “Is this thing on?” and, “Cocksucker cocksucker cocksucker” into their mics.
“They seem like a real band to me,” I said.
“I just don’t want you to regret asking us to play on your big night,” Vicky said. “We might suck. Are you prepared for people hearing us and, like, vomiting all over your dance floor?”
“Vicky,” I said, resting my hands on her shoulders. “Repeat after me. I deserve to be here.”
“I deserve to be here,” Vicky said, looking into my eyes.
“I don’t care if anyone thinks I look stupid.”
“I don’t care if anyone thinks I look stupid,” Vicky echoed quietly.
“Okay.” I took my hands off her shoulders. “Do your stuff out there. Show no mercy.”
Then Vicky went to help set up, while I went to the booth and put on my headphones. I cued up the Undertones’ “Teenage Kicks.” Then the clock hit ten, Mel opened the door, and the crowd came pouring in. The night had begun.
It felt different, DJing a party that was all my own. The whole success of the night rested on me. If I messed up, I didn’t have Char there to save me. But there was something about it that I liked, too. Because if the night was a success, I didn’t have Char there to take the credit. That was all mine.
And by midnight, I was ready to say it: the night was a success. The dance floor was full, a pulsating mass of bodies moving to every track I played. Char had talked about reading the crowd like you’d read a book, but tonight I had moved beyond even that. It felt like invisible veins and arteries ran between me and every person in that room, communicating information between us instantly and noiselessly. It wasn’t like reading a story. It was like I was writing a story.
And everyone was there. I saw the Dirty Curtains, of course, flitting through the crowd, and Pippa, Pete, Flash Tommy, Emily Wallace and her friends, my dad.
Everyone was there, except for Char. His absence still hurt me. But it hurt less now than I had thought it would.
Shortly after midnight, Vicky showed up next to the DJ booth. “Ready?” she asked me. The Dirty Curtains were up on stage, Dave strapping his guitar over his shoulder and Harry adjusting his mic stand.
“So ready.”
She flashed me a grin, then hopped up on the stage. I faded out the music, and Vicky shouted into the mic, “Ladies and gentlemen of Start, I have one question for you: Are you ready to party?”
“Woo!” a few people shouted, moving closer to the stage.
“Hit it!” Vicky said, and the Dirty Curtains began to play.
They were extraordinary.
I say this not as Vicky’s friend, and not as the girl who booked the band to play, but as a DJ who has listened to thousands upon thousands of bands, who lives with earphones on, who attended her first live concert at the age of eight months because, as my father said, “Even infants like James Brown, right?” I’ve heard it all and I’m hard to impress.
But Vicky’s band blew me away.
In a flapper-style dress and gold heels, she strutted around the stage like Tina Turner on steroids, her hair cascading down her back, her eyes flirting with the crowd, her voice never faltering. Behind her, the guys played their instruments madly, building a wall of sound for Vicky’s vocals to rest on top of.
Everyone in the club pressed closer to the stage, and the cameras came out. The room filled with bright sparks of light.
Vicky marched to the front of the stage and held the mic up to her bright-red lips, almost like she was kissing it. The words came out of her like a ca
“Hey there. Yeah, you. You with the eyes.
Do you like what you see?
Do you like my chest?
Yeah, do you, do you?
Do I pass your test?
Yeah, do I, do I?
Do you like my hair?
Well, here’s the thing, baby…”
Here she leaned forward, like she was about to tell the audience a secret, and she snapped out the last line:
“I don’t care!”
The room filled with whoops and cheers as the Dirty Curtains slammed through the final chords of the song. When it was over, Harry was visibly covered in sweat, and Dave chugged about half a bottle of beer, his hand shaking. But Vicky looked as crisp as if she’d just emerged from a day at the spa.
“Hey, Start,” she said into the mic, batting her false eyelashes. “We’re the Dirty Curtains. And we like you.”
“We like you, too!” shouted a voice from the back of the room.
Vicky chuckled. “Well, you’re about to like us just a little bit more. Boys, let’s go!”
Harry smacked his drumsticks together, and they were on to the next song.
I was so captivated by Vicky’s performance that I didn’t even notice Pippa approaching me until she was standing right next to me in the booth. She was wearing a black slip dress and a large hairclip with jewels and feathers. She had a cocktail in her hand, which made me suspect that whatever sort of anti-partying ethic her parents had tried to instill in her over the past few weeks hadn’t worked that well.
“Hi, Pippa.” I felt my heart beat faster.
“Hiya,” Pippa replied, blinking rapidly. “Um, Vicky’s doing great, isn’t she?”
I nodded and waited for her to go on, because no way Pippa had come over here just to tell me that Vicky was “doing great”—which was, by the way, the understatement of the year.
“Look, Elise, I just wanted to say … well, thank you.”
“For what?” I asked.
“For this.” Pippa gestured around the room. “Thank you for giving Vicky the chance to play.”
I shrugged. “I’m not doing her a favor or anything,” I said. “She’s incredibly talented. She deserves this.”
“Obviously,” Pippa agreed. “But people don’t always get what they deserve.” She shifted her weight from foot to foot. After a pause, she spoke again. “Vicky is my best friend. I’d do anything for her. Anyone who makes Vicky this happy is good with me. No matter what.”
“Thank you,” I said quietly. “And I’m sorry,” I added, “about the whole Char thing.”
“Oh.” Pippa’s cheeks flushed a little. “Yeah.”
“But you know,” I went on, hoping that Pippa could handle a little honesty, “it wasn’t all my fault. Char kissed me first. I just kissed back.”
Pippa’s face drooped, like the idea of Char kissing me physically hurt her. “I know,” she said. “I mean, I figured. I guess I told myself it was all your fault so that I could keep believing it wasn’t what Char wanted. I think I just … wanted him to be something that he isn’t.”
“Me, too,” I said. “But he isn’t.”
“But I really think,” Pippa said, perking up, “that he could be. You know?”
“What?”
“Obviously Char made mistakes. And so did I, and so did you. But I just know that if I give him some time to think it through, and explain to him why he hurt me, he will be better next time.”
“Seriously?” I said.
Pippa’s eyes were bright with feverish intensity as she said, “Listen, Elise. I have met a million guys, and I have never felt about any of them the way that I feel about Char. Everything about him is perfect. I mean, except for some of the things he’s done to me. But I honestly, honestly believe I can fix that part.”