At breakfast, I was the only one sitting at the table, and when Theo stopped in to grab a juice, he just raised an eyebrow and shrugged. Apparently, he’s as much in the dark as I am. A few minutes later, Rachel came in, and she did that busy thing she does, where she talks out loud to no one in particular, or maybe to herself, a whirling dervish of nervous energy and rhetorical questions.
“Coffee! Where’s the coffee?” she asked, though it was exactly where it always is. In the coffeemaker, brewed by Gloria or an automatic early-morning timer, I’m not sure which, though I put my money on the former. Gloria is amazing at doing things without you seeing her do things, and also doing all the things you didn’t even know you needed done in the first place. If we have to leave, I might miss Gloria the most. She calls me Yessie and folds my pajamas under my pillow and insists I eat chocolate calcium chews. “And keys. Where are you, keys? In my bag. Damn it, where’s my bag?”
Like all of Rachel’s belongings, apparently, my dad was also MIA, and for a second, I panicked that maybe he’d taken off without me and headed back east. When the worst thing you could possibly imagine happens to you, you think maybe other previously inconceivably bad things can happen too. But no way would he ditch me. Of course, I never thought he’d lie about a convention and come back remarried instead of loaded up with samples to give to his middle-age friends like a normal person, but still. Except for the last few months, he’s been a good dad.
“Sunglasses?” Rachel asked, which made me realize just how rattled she must have been by last night’s fight, because she started patting down the empty white countertops, as if her sunglasses would appear out of thin air. Sunglasses are not usually part of her morning soliloquy.
“On your head,” I said.
And then she jumped a little and looked up at me, as if my voice caught her by surprise and she was just noticing I was sitting here. She looked sad for a moment, or disappointed. But then she pulled her glasses off her head and put them on, and just like that, most of her face was covered, and I couldn’t read her at all.
—
Liam’s sitting on the desk when I get to work, playing his guitar and singing to an audience of zero. Turns out I was right: Book Out Below! doesn’t get a whole lot of customer action. A few regulars here and there, one guy who thumbs books in the self-help section but never buys, and that’s about it.
“?‘Imagine,’ huh? A classic.” I’m surprised by Liam’s voice. It’s soft, earnest, almost sweet. He looks different with a guitar. Dri’s crush makes total sense.
“Sorry. Didn’t hear you come in.” Liam swings Earl off his shoulder and slides him back into his purple fur-lined case. It’s a graceful move, one I’m sure he’s done a thousand times.
“You don’t have to stop on my account.” I wonder if I can somehow slip my phone out and secretly record him for Dri but then realize that’s just too weird and invasive. “You’re good. I mean, for real.”
“Thanks. I wanna go to Berklee College of Music next year, if I get in, but my mom doesn’t want me going so far,” he says.
“Wow,” I say. “That’s in Boston, right?”
“Yup. Honestly, what I’d really like to do is skip college and try to hit it big with the Oville guys. But my mom would go postal. I keep telling her that’s what Maroon 5 did—they’re from Brentwood School, you know—but she’s all, ‘Maroon what’?”
I laugh, try to think of what to say next.
“So are you coming?” he asks, saving me from my embarrassingly blank brain.
“Excuse me?”
“To my gig. At Gem’s party.”
“When is it, again?” Of course, I remember when it is. Dri and Agnes have already convinced me that we should all go, and have even picked out my outfit. They claim Crystal and Gem will be so wasted they won’t even notice I’m there.
“Next Saturday night,” Liam says. “Okay, so it’s not a real gig at a club or anything. But it’ll be fun. Promise.”
“Cool, I’ll definitely try to make it.” Liam pats the desk, an invitation for me to sit next to him. I jump up and sit cross-legged but turn so my back rests against the wall. I scan the children’s section behind his head, check out the bright covers of the books, which are shelved to face outward. They are not shy at all.
“Are you working today too?” I ask.
I hope not. Working with Liam makes me uncomfortable; it’s hard to make conversation for three hours in a row. There are only so many times he can tell me about the food at his Google internship, which apparently was really, really good. I mean, we don’t talk the whole time—thank God for my iPhone, which I pull out whenever I feel awkward, but that only gets me so far. Now that I know the basics here, I’m not sure why we would both need to be on duty. It’s not like there’s anything to really do anyway.
“Yeah, if you don’t mind. I need the cash, so…”
“Oh, I mean, do you want me to go, then?” I ask, and my heart sinks. Dri and Agnes go to Coffee Bean every day after school. As sad as it sounds, I need Ice Blended money.
And also this: I don’t want to go home.