Breakout (8 page)

“No, we’re not doing
that
,” I say, the nerve sword stabbing again. We put a BandSpace page together for the Rusty Soles last year. All it has is the live recording of our song from the Spring Arts Night last year. We got like thirty-five plays and ten downloads, which isn’t much but it was fun, although I think eight or nine of those downloads were our parents. Still, I am not ready to have my singing out there where anyone in the world could hear it.

“But,” I say, “I mean, if the words sound okay … I could try to do them for Arts Night.”

I wonder if Keenan will be bothered by this idea, because it would be me doing too much … but his eyes light up. “We could still play!” he says. “The Rusty Soles are back!”

“Well, not definitely,” I say, and I feel my face getting red. “Just, maybe …” I am feeling crazy inside, like,
Yes!
because again, this could happen, we could still play the show. I could sing, and the band would be complete!

Keenan is still smiling, but then his eyes kind of widen as he looks over my shoulder. “Hey, look!” he whispers to us, nodding his chin toward the door.

I turn and see that Valerie and her friend Lena have just walked in.

I turn back around, trying to keep my cool.

But Skye’s girl radar immediately notices. “No way!” she says. “Anthony likes Valerie?” She makes this face that is one of the most annoying faces that an ex-girlfriend who’s still your friend can make. It’s that smiley, knowing,
I’ve seen you act like that about me
look.

“Shut up,” I mutter.

“He totally does,” says Keenan, also grinning. “She’s a really good drummer.”

He means it in my defense but then Skye turns to him with the raised eyebrow in full effect. “So what, you’re in love with her too?”

“Duh, no!” says Keenan, but Skye is pulling her arm back and that makes him spill his mocha a little. “Ugh,” he says. He glances over my shoulder again. “She’s coming this way.”

Suddenly I’m feeling completely unprepared, like, are my shoes tied? And is my fly up? And are my hoodie straps caught in my collar or anything?

“Hey, guys.” Valerie and Lena arrive beside us. When you’re sitting, Valerie really is pretty tall and she’s kinda looming over us. She is wearing this cool vintage wool coat that’s oversized and probably for a guy, and a knitted purple hat with snowflakes on it and her black hair is coming out of it in two braids. I am noticing these things and thinking again that she is probably cute, which is obviously why Keenan and Skye have these jerk-big smiles on their faces. I also realize that the
clock is ticking since she said hi and I haven’t said anything yet and I need to
say something
.

“Hey,” I say, and that’s it and I say it totally normal but still I hear Keenan snicker quietly and I consider deforming his face with my mocha. Then I say to Valerie, “Did you hear about Sadie?”

Valerie’s mouth scrunches like she’s disappointed. It’s sorta cute. “Yeah,” she says. “So, I guess we’re kinda screwed.”

“Anthony wrote some lyrics!” Keenan practically shouts.

I turn to him and try to make sure he understands that the look I give him for a split second says,
You are a dead man
. It was one thing to show him and Skye …

But then Valerie says, “Oh wow, really? Anthony, you write lyrics too?”

“Well,” I say, “sometimes. I mean … this time I did.” My pulse is starting to sprint.

“They’re for the Rusty Soles,” says Keenan like he’s my agent or something. “He’s going to sing them and we can still play the show.”

Valerie gets this big grin that makes her eyes kinda squint. “Can I see them?”

“Uh,” I say, and for a second I just sit there like I’m a frozen screen, my operating system stuck on the idea.
You can’t really show her, you don’t know if they’re that great, or what she’ll think, or
—

But then Keenan says, “Here,” and just grabs my notebook and hands it over.

I know it would be ridiculous to snatch it back. “There,”
I say, pointing to the right spot on the page. Then I glare at Keenan again. I kinda want to kill him. He smiles at me like he thinks he did me a huge favor. Okay, maybe he did.

Valerie’s eyes scan down the page. Still reading … It seems to take her longer than it should. Too long. I sit there wondering,
What will she think? What is she thinking? What did she already think? Did she think they were stupid and now she’s buying time trying to think of a good lie?

Another second passes.

Okay, yes, she definitely thought they were garbage.

I wish I hadn’t showed her.

Then she finally looks up. “They’re really good,” she says, and even though I hear her, it takes me a second to realize that she actually sounds like she means it.

She is looking at me and I notice that her eyes are really big and dark brown. A little bit like a shark’s, but in a good way. That’s probably not something I should tell her, ever.

“I mean, this would be a cool song,” Valerie says. “Are you going to write more?”

“Yeah,” I say, trying to make it sound like
of course
I’m going to write more, that it’s just a matter of selecting the perfect words for the deep artistic vision I clearly have and you can’t rush these things.

“Cool,” she says, and smiles at me.

I smile back.

We are smiling.

And then a second passes and nobody has said anything and suddenly it’s awkward, like we’re stuck in this smiling position
and neither of us knows what to do next. I can feel Keenan and Skye working their couple-spreading spells behind me, like if I turn around I will find them wiggling their fingers and wearing floppy wizard hats. And I can feel myself starting to sweat because I have no idea what to say next. There has to be something.…

Then I see Lena nudge Valerie with her elbow, and Valerie makes this little surprised face, and then she says, “Oh hey, it’s Friday.” It almost seems like she’s going to stop there, which would be really strange, but then she adds, “Are you guys doing anything tonight?”

“Um,” I say. If there was a heart-rate meter bar beside me like in
Liberation Force
it would be spiking with all the red bars lit and I would be looking for a chunk of blasted wall to crouch behind and build my strength back up and hopefully there’d be a med kit there too, but here in Jupiter Coffee there’s no cover.

“Because,” Valerie continues, “there’s a show down at the Vera Project tonight. Have you heard of Fractured Senses?”

“Ooh, yeah,” says Keenan. “They’re pretty cool.”

I shoot him a look that says that answer was
mine
. He shrugs.

“They’re playing with the Clones and Lost Puppy,” Valerie continues. “Lena’s brother is in Lost Puppy. They’re good.”

“Nice,” I say.

“Well, anyway, um, we’ll be there,” Valerie finishes, and suddenly it gets quiet again.

I am just kind of sitting there, screen still frozen, when
suddenly I realize that
duh
, this is an invitation. “Oh,” I say, a little too loudly. “Well, yeah, we, um, we could maybe do that too.” I turn to Keenan and Skye. “What do you think? Wanna go?” I ask, nodding slightly at Keenan.

Keenan says, “Sure,” except then when he looks at Skye she scowls and looks away. Poor Keenan, he thought they were still in couple-magic mode, but it’s obvious from Skye’s face that she had something else in mind for tonight, so that’s going to be a whole big thing, but who cares? They’ve been dating for forever. She can deal.

“Great,” says Valerie. “So … maybe we’ll see you there?”

“Yeah,” I say, “definitely.”

There is
another
silent second and then Valerie kind of shrugs and her mouth moves like she’s telling herself something and then she says, “Well, bye,” and they walk away.

“See you later,” I say.

When I turn back around I am smiling. And a mess: I notice my sweaty palms and a light-headed feeling. Either this is one giant sugar rush or … I am pretty into Valerie. More than I’d even thought about.

I mean, other than Skye, my only other girlfriend ever was Elana and that started at last year’s spring dance when we were dancing to “Torn Socket” by the Kneebacks, and it ended fifty-two minutes later when she sent Clara to break up with me while I was standing in the drink line. So, this is feeling like something.

Definitely something.

I would revel in this girl-success moment with Keenan a bit, except he is busy doing damage control with Skye, who is slouched and pouty about whatever she had on her mind to do tonight. She probably told him and he just spaced, and she should understand that he was just trying to help out his best friend, but knowing Skye, she’ll be mad for days.

I look down at my notebook, at the lyrics, and consider that maybe a crappy week like this one is actually going to end in victory. Lyrics, Arts Night saved, and a date! With a killer drummer. For once, it feels like I have the timing right.

On the way home we agree to ask our parents about going down to Vera. Well, Keenan and I agree. Skye is silent. And poor Keenan has to talk to me in that low, I’m-in-the-doghouse way so he doesn’t make things worse. We plan to text about meeting there around seven. My parents never have a problem with me going to Vera, because it’s all-ages and a nonprofit and all that.

I spend the rest of the walk to my house buzzing about tonight, about hanging out with Valerie, but I am also excited to get home and get in a couple hours working on Killer G and trying out the lyrics and melody that are suddenly real.

I’m almost to my house before I remember the whole thing
with Ms. Rosaz. Did she send an email home, or was she too tired to bother? I bet she let it go. Friday, weekend, and what I did wasn’t even a big deal so whatever.

Inside, Erica is watching some annoying movie about a girl who by day is a high school student but by night is some kind of space-traveling princess. She has a sidekick who’s something like a sardine crossed with a stalk of broccoli and wears sunglasses and it’s like … who even knows where all these show ideas come from? I’m glad I was little during the age of cartoons that were cool and actually made sense, like
SpongeBob
.

Mom is in the dining room, which is also the office. I grab my waiting plate of stalag rations. Today we have nonfat cottage cheese and grapes and kiwi slices and nine almonds.

I head straight for my room and just call out, “Hey, Mom, gonna practice and then I’m gonna go to Vera tonight for a show at seven. I don’t need a ride, I can take the bus, okay? Cool.” I’m starting up the stairs as I finish.

There is no answer right away. All is quiet on the front.…

But I am only a few steps up when Mom says, “Anthony!” and the tone of her voice is like the distant rumble of panzers in the peaceful valleys of the Ardennes. (That’s part of the movie intro to
LF
, where the Germans ran a blitzkrieg through exactly the one place the French thought they wouldn’t because it was this really forested area.)

I stop. “Yeah?”

“Come down here.”

“What?” I huff and turn around and head into the dining room, trying to sound like I couldn’t possibly know what’s up.

The farmer stands at the banks of the gently curving Meuse, herding his dairy cattle for a drink at the water’s edge. On the other side of the wide river, old trees stretch to steep mountains, the border of Belgium. Wind shakes them and for a second he wonders if he just heard the rumble of machinery
.

Mom looks up at me with the blue glow of her laptop reflecting against her glasses and does she look mad? Or just tired? It’s still possible that we’ll be okay here.

“That’s cool about Vera tonight, right?” I ask innocently.

“Anthony.”

There is another rumble, but it’s probably just thunder and that’s fine because his fields could use the rain. The cows bump around each other and their bells jangle. Nearby, the farmer’s neighbor is plowing his champagne vineyard. Spring birds sing in the trees and the river gurgles. It was probably nothing.…

And yet I know what’s coming.

“Care to explain what happened in English class today?”

Bam!
The trees blast apart and the great mechanized beasts lunge over the bank and into the river, their toothy tracks churning the water into mud
.

“What?” I say, trying to sound like I have no idea what she’s talking about.

“I got an email from Ms. Rosaz,” says Mom, “informing me that you mouthed off and got sent out of class, and then on top of that you didn’t even turn in your writing work.”

The tanks run up the bank. The farmer tries to herd the cows to safety, but they scatter and some drown and others are mashed to hamburger beneath the giant clutching tracks. The tanks blow through the old walls that were used as defenses as far back as Charlemagne, scattering the rocks like a child’s plastic blocks
.

“Mom!” I say, and even though I knew there was a chance of this, I still can’t believe it, and I feel like what I say next is true. “That’s so unfair!” Because it’s not like I send emails to Principal Tiernan whenever Ms. Rosaz gives us a boring lesson or a dumb assignment or yawns while someone is reading in class! And I know my defenses aren’t going to hold, I know I’m no match for the email blitzkrieg, but I have to try.

“She didn’t give me a chance to get started,” I say. “And I was only late because we were talking to Mr. Darren about how Sadie got suspended. And then I
did
the work, the stupid list thing, I did it! But she told me it wasn’t good enough anyway.”

“She said you were causing a disruption in class,” says Mom, her voice low like she’s trying to keep her cool, “and that you used inappropriate language.”

“No, she’s the one who caused the disruption!” I’m starting to shout but I can’t help it. “ ’Cause she sent me out of class even though I did the work!”

“Anthony”—I can hear the frustration building in her voice—“this is twice in two days!”

“She hates me, Mom!” I say. “She’s got her favorites like Clara and they can do whatever they want but then I get singled out!” And I feel like that’s a little bit true. I mean, does
Ms. Rosaz honestly like me as much as Clara? There’s no way. And I know this argument isn’t going to work either, but at this point the tanks are rolling on toward Sedan and nobody knows they’re coming and I am just standing there in cow guts.