Encore to an Empty Room (5 page)

It feels like the awkward moment has been averted, but I'm still worried as I make my way through the crowd.

There's no greenroom backstage, just a square marked out with yellow rope encircling a honey bucket and a folding table with bottles of water. Most are empty and rolling around, or standing half finished. There are a few folding chairs but they're covered by stacks of instrument cases.

“Good set, guys,” I say, but everyone's just packing up quietly. Once Caleb has stashed his guitar he glares at Jon's back.

“Hey . . . ,” he says.

Jon feels Caleb's gaze. “What?”

“What the hell was that up there?”

Jon's face scrunches. “What was what?”

“Playing that Allegiance riff,” says Caleb.

“Calm down, it was a joke,” says Jon. “I was just trying to appease the masses.”

“It felt more like fanning the flames,” says Caleb.

“Actually, what I was trying to do was take some of the heat off you,” says Jon. “Besides, they're not just asking
you
to play a cover, they're asking the whole band. Man . . .”

Jon turns and continues packing his gear.

Caleb looks like he's about to say more but I catch his eye and plead with him not to. I know why Caleb is mad, but I also think Jon has a point.

“Hey,” says Val, “let's talk more about it at practice. The best thing we can do with all this Eli business is focus on making our statement with our music.”

I completely agree, but don't say anything. I don't have to. Val has proven herself as the most intense about practice, and about making our performance excellent. And it's more important these next two weeks than ever. Recording a great EP is the best thing this band can do right now to let people know who we are. And really the only thing we can control.

The band finishes packing without a word and we start lugging gear to the parking lot.

Caleb and I have plans to hang out. “Do you want to join us?” I ask Val. Not that I really want her to. But I feel like I should ask.

Luckily, Val just scowls. “Nope. See you at home,” she says to Caleb.

We take Caleb's stuff to his car. “Where do you want to go?” I ask.

“I don't know,” he says glumly.

I almost want to tell him to snap out of it, but I know it's been a long night. “Well, the Spritz is closed. We could go to Tina's.”

“I'm not in the mood for fro yo.”

“Traffic should be almost done. How about we drive up to Portola?”

Caleb shakes his head again.

“Well, then, I guess it's back to the PopArts fund-raiser table. More bake sales are good for my grade, anyway.”

About ten steps into our walk Caleb puts his arm around me and I can feel him exhale hard. “Sorry,” he says. “I probably shouldn't have said anything to Jon.”

“It's okay,” I say, “you had a point. But Jon was just trying to help. He probably thought that making a little joke would diffuse the situation.”

“Yeah,” Caleb agrees. “I'll patch it up with him tomorrow.”

I lean into him, and the feel of his arm and the smell of him post-gig swats away all the buzzing thoughts for a moment. I feel warm, and content, and find myself amazed at how often I forget about this feeling. It's like we have so much going on all the time that I take this for granted,
us
for granted. Which sounds like something an old married couple should be saying.

I turn and stop him in his tracks and mash my lips against his.

“Mmm,” he says in surprise, like he's been pulled back into the moment, too. We're both like that, lost in our thoughts too much. But as our mouths remember each other, I let my hands fall down his shoulders, and he rubs the small of my back, and the sounds of nearby people and tinny holiday music retreat. I become aware of each inch of our skin that is touching, and even more achingly conscious of which inches could be, want to be, need to be . . .

But it's even more than that. There's something I want to tell him. We've been dating for almost three months, and sure, I was into him the moment I met him, but it's different now. It's more. In a way that is almost scary. I've been feeling lately like I might want to tell him that I love him, and even though it's just a word, it feels like a big deal. And it's scary because is he feeling that, too? I think so. I know so . . . don't I? What if I say it and he doesn't say it back? Or he does but only because he feels like he has to? Would I even know?

“What?” he asks. I realize that my kissing lost its intensity.

“Nothing . . . everything. It's all good.” I smile. It is.

We both take deep breaths, leaning our foreheads together.

“Not fair that we can't go back to my house tonight,” says Caleb.

“I know,” I say. “Why does your mom have to wrap presents on the downstairs couch?”

“She wouldn't if she knew what we did there.”

I laugh and punch him in the arm, but leave my hand there and squeeze for a moment, then slide it down to his side, to his waist.

“Stop,” he says, taking my hand and spinning me.

I roll my eyes. “Fine.”

We make our way to the back table to get hot chocolates and split a candy cane cupcake. A group of girls walks by, and one of them gives Caleb the long stare.

“Did you see that?” says Caleb. He pulls me closer again.

“I most certainly did,” I say, sinking into his arm.

“That wouldn't have happened before all this Eli business.”

“Um, yes it would have. Don't forget you're still the hot lead singer in a great band.”

He smiles and we kiss. “So, should we get back to the top secret research tomorrow?”

That sounds great. Usually research involves lounging on Caleb's couch, half draped on each other, doing a little more searching than just Google. Except then I remember: “I can't. I have the visit.”

“Oh, right.”

“I know,” I say, crashing back to earth with the thought
of my Saturday obligation. “I'd almost succeeded in pretending that didn't exist.”

“It won't be that bad,” says Caleb. “I expect frequent texts.”

I smile but it's a little forced. Thinking about tomorrow just reminds me that Caleb isn't the only one living in a shadow. If there's any upside to his situation, it's that at least everyone knows so he can talk about it freely. The shadow I'm dealing with is more like that dark matter, an omission that seems to be growing. It blots out the free and easy feelings, gets in the way of possibility. It might even be the reason I haven't told Caleb I love him. And with every day of senior year, it feels more and more likely to swallow me up.

“Some students have a background or story that is so central to their identity that they believe their application would be incomplete without it. If this sounds like you, then please share your story.”

“Mmm,” says Dad. “Probably not that one. That's your penalty for being part of the bourgeoisie establishment. That and a lack of financial aid.”

“Yeah,” I say, my finger running down to the next essay question on the common application.

“How much further?” Mom asks.

“Two miles,” says Dad, checking the map on his phone. “Might as well be two hours though at this pace.”

We're crawling along on the 405. Have been for an hour.

“I know I could use a bathroom sooner than later. You in the same boat, Cat?” Mom asks.

“I'm okay,” I mutter. The nickname annoys me as usual, but I let it slide.

We are on our way to UCLA. Dad has a friend, Elaine, who works in the economics department. Her daughter, Stacia, is a sophomore. Stacia's agreed to show me around for the afternoon and evening. My dad set it all up. He is at least perceptive enough to notice that my heart isn't totally in this college application process, so he's hoping this will help give me a boost. I'm going along with it because that's the contract. The more I fulfill their vision of me, the less they pay attention to mine. And yet, the more senior year ticks along, the more the college future and the Dangerheart present heat up, the more I feel like Summer and Catherine are headed for a cage match.

“Hmm . . .” Mom is looking at her phone. “Santa Monica Boulevard is still pretty clear,” she reports grimly.

“Of course it is,” says Dad sarcastically. They're not fighting. Just calculating their score against the universe. They debated which route to take for like ten miles. When they decided on the 10 to the 405, it was with all the seriousness of two astronauts who'd realized the only way to stop the asteroid from hitting earth was to ram their ship into it.

And yet, Dad's first instinct had been Santa Monica. But Carlson Squared would never make that choice. I feel like pointing this out to them, but I'll just sound like the
typical teen who thinks she knows better, but who of course isn't thinking rationally. Instead I just gaze out at the brown outline of downtown.

“What's next?” Dad asks me.

“Umm . . .” I scroll down the list of application questions. I feel like I could easily answer that first one, or rather, Summer could. Summer, who has made music a central part of her identity. Catherine, on the other hand, what's her biggest background story?
That I feel like I'm living a double identity? A sleeper agent in my own house?
But I don't want to write about that because my parents will no doubt want to proofread this essay and that's the last thing I need.

College applications are due for just about everywhere I'm applying on January 2. That includes Stanford, my number one, but extremely unlikely, choice. I'm a good student, really good, but Stanford is uber-selective. I'm also trying for Pomona, UC Berkeley, and Colorado College.

And I'm doing all that while wondering whether or not I even want to go. Sometimes when I imagine how Summer might spend next year, it's completely different.

“
Recount an incident or time when you experienced failure
,” I read from the question list. “
How did it affect you, and what lessons did you learn?
”

“That's a tough one for someone so successful,” says Mom.

It's one of those compliments that I appreciate and yet it also makes me want to barf a little.

“What about losing in that debate club freshman year?” Dad suggests. “Or getting cut from JV volleyball?”

“I'm not sure those are going to make me stand out to an admissions committee,” I mutter. Summer's stories about Ethan and Postcards from Ariel would. Or the story about how I lied to Dangerheart back in the fall and kept Jason's gig offer from them, how I did that as much for me as for them and how it blew up in my face in a crappy basement club in San Francisco and nearly ended the band. That qualifies.

I mean, even Catherine has bigger failures than my parents know. Debate club! Sheesh. How about two summers ago, the very first time I ever had sex, with my then-boyfriend Todd Forster? My period ended up being late by almost two weeks and I was in a total panic, imagining I was pregnant, having to tell my parents, who I assume realize that I'm having sex by now, but who don't let on if they do. I didn't even tell Todd for like a week, worried about how he'd react, and then when I finally did he freaked out and treated me like some kind of criminal. If nothing else that helped me learn to trust my instincts. I'd always suspected Todd was a jerk.

It turned out to be a false alarm. And I realize now that none of that was actually a failure on my part. Still, it felt like one for a while. I was a wreck for months.

But that's definitely nothing compared to the indignity of being cut from JV volleyball! Except I can't really blame
my parents for thinking that's my biggest drama when I don't share the other ones with them.

“Okay, finally,” says Dad as we slide into the exit lane. “Let Elaine know we'll be there in about ten minutes.”

As we drive onto campus, I read the next common app question to myself:
Reflect on a time when you challenged a belief or idea. What prompted you to act? Would you make the same decision again?

The question feels like an accusation. Here I am sitting in the car feeling like I live a double life, and yet what am I doing to change that? Meanwhile, the closer we get to campus, the more my nerves ratchet up inside. Even the traffic can't keep me from getting to my future forever. Part of me wants to kick and scream in a tantrum, part of me knows I'm better than that. Part of me feels like there must be some way that these parts of me could fit together, if I was just strong enough, or something . . . but I just don't get how yet.

After a brief visit with Elaine, I am released onto campus. I decline the paper map, just so I don't look like a total newbie, and use my phone instead to find Kerckhoff Hall, where I am meeting Stacia.

I cross two quads, and I like the peace and sound around me. It's Saturday evening of finals week, so there aren't too many students around. The large triangles of grass between pathways are dotted with solitary people reading, or pairs
talking quietly and looking over a notebook. Far in the distance, music blares from a dorm room window. A peal of laughter echoes between the buildings.

I'm supposed to meet Stacia outside a lecture hall. She's seeing some special visiting speaker. I enter Kerckhoff and walk down a wide hall. Doors open to classrooms that, even though they are empty, feel busy and somehow more alive than any room at Mount Hope, except maybe the Green Room. I find myself wanting to look around, to read the urgent, multicolored notes on the whiteboards, to study the piles of papers and bookcases. This place feels like a busy hive of learning, inviting me to explore.

I wait outside the lecture hall for five minutes before it empties. I barely remember what Stacia looks like but—

“Summer!”

Luckily, she remembers me. She steps out of the stream of students, slinging her shoulder bag back. She's wearing sweatpants and a cardigan, flip-flops, her hair up in a baseball cap. I was sort of picturing her dressed a little more stylish, I'm not sure why, maybe just because she's older and college sounds somehow more pro, but instead she looks like she's dressed to lounge around on a Sunday. I notice that sweats and hats are pretty common attire for the audience leaving the lecture. I went for fashionable jeans and a black shirt with my hair down and suddenly I feel like I'm trying too hard.

“It's great to see you,” says Stacia. We join the flow
heading out the doors. “So, your dad wants me to show you the college ropes, get you excited. Are you ready to
party
?” She throws a fist in the air, bending the last word into a squeal.

“Sure,” I say, wondering what I'm about to get myself into.

Then she laughs. “Just kidding. My version of a big night is eating nachos at the café and catching my roommate's a cappella show. If you were hoping for a kegger at a frat house or something, I'm sorry to disappoint you.”

“No,” I say, “that sounds much better.”

We walk to Stacia's dorm so she can drop off her books, and then to a campus café. We pass one roped-off area outside of a dorm where a party is in full swing. Lots of shirtless boys, clusters of girls, everyone with red cups. Other than that, though, mostly what I see is people who look smart, interesting, either sitting and chatting or strolling somewhere. I catch snippets of conversation: everything from movies to literature to politics. There are people entering a hall where stringed instruments are tuning. A pair just behind us on their way to a reading. Clumps headed to a campus bar to watch a pivotal basketball game.

All this happening in the cooling evening, amidst grass and trees. No one checking with their parents. No one getting in cars.

By the time we're sitting at a table at the café, I find that my dad's clever ploy is working. I am starting to picture
myself here. And I don't just mean Catherine. Summer, too. More than anything, it's the freedom to think. The whole place feels like an opportunity rather than an obligation. An invitation to wonder about stuff and check it out. It's a feeling that couldn't be more different from high school.

“What's your major?” I ask Stacia.

“International Law,” she says, “and I'm minoring in Visual Art. Sculpture.”

“Oh, that's cool,” I say, and here is another thing: looking at Stacia, I would have thought . . . well, I would have had no idea what she was studying. She's many layers more than how she appears.

It makes me wonder: maybe it's not just me that creates the frustration between who I am and how I have to appear. Maybe that's also just high school. Everyone looks like a specific type there. You pick one and identify yourself by how you act and dress. Here, it seems like you can be anyone, multiple versions even, and that reality is so self-evident that you don't have to show it with your appearance unless you want to.

Stacia yawns. “I also do a jazz radio show at three a.m., which is dumb.”

“I think that's awesome.”

“What do you do?”

I explain about band managing as we gorge on nachos. I give her what I hope is my most mature-sounding version of how it's not what my parents want me to be doing and
how that drives me crazy.

“Ah,” Stacia says, waving her hand, “don't worry about that. You think my mom is cool with forking out twenty grand a semester so I can make penises out of clay?”

I almost snort cheese.

“But that's the thing,” Stacia says, “once you get to college, it's not about what they want anymore. It's about you. Want my advice?”

“Definitely.”

“Smile and nod, and get yourself out of Mount Hope. It will be so much easier to do your thing once you're out of there. It's like you'll finally be able to see straight. I mean, you do need the support of those pesky parents, for tuition if nothing else. But it's worth playing their game a bit, as long as it gets you out.”

Stacia's roommate and seven other girls come onstage and start an a cappella version of what I think is an Andrews Sisters song. I don't know what to make of a cappella, but they are making the 1940s sound pretty sultry. They go more modern after that, and we could debate the pros and cons of beat box sounds and lots of doot-doo-waahs, but the bottom line is, just like everything else here, they are doing their thing with not a care as to what anyone might think.

And watching them and soaking it all in makes me wonder:

Reflect on a time when you challenged a belief or idea.

Maybe the belief I need to challenge is my own. Just
because my parents want something for me, doesn't mean that's what I have to want, but maybe that's not even the point. Maybe it doesn't even have to be one or the other. Maybe both of those things, what they want, and what I want, can just be. And the older I get, the less it will matter.

Maybe the feeling of being trapped in a life I don't want is just intense lately because, if I play my cards right, this could be the last six months of my sentence. Of high school, of faking it. My other plan: where Summer stays home? Maybe that's just subjecting myself to more of the same dynamic, to feeling like I have to be two people at once, with the added drawback of my parents being disappointed with me.

Why exactly would I do that?

Caleb, for one. The band, too. Managing a band is an organic process. Sure, I could do some promotion and show booking from afar, but to manage a band you need to be there. Practices, time sitting around discussing the plan, the art, and the little stuff in everyone's lives, these are the real ingredients of growing a band. Stanford is six hours away from all that. Caleb says, when he's at his most supportive, that weekend trips would work, that the band could play gigs up there. . . .

But then there's the personal side. Could Caleb and I really keep our relationship going with that little time together, and with our time apart spent in different worlds? Right now, I feel like we could, and yet, I can't shake this
feeling like I should know better.

Looking around this place, I see people living in one world, not two. Being present here and now. Why go to college if you're just going to spend it trying to be somewhere else? Why be here if you can't wander into those inviting classrooms, those lectures and concerts where something new awaits? I think if I'm honest I know that I want to throw myself into what I'm doing. Into the future. The problem is now I feel like there are two futures. And I can't have both.