this…before, and I shouldn’t have been. I’m trying to make up for it now, so let me, okay? It’s exciting. She’s…Ruby. Tell me everything.”
But something clenched in my stomach, and in the face of her unexpected, wide-open encouragement, I found myself with nothing to say. This is what you wanted, I told myself. Jamie was happy for me, or at least supportive, which was the least she could be. There was no weird, painful tension, no snotty retort or disinterested nod. She cared. She wanted to know more. I should have been so much more relieved than I was.
“Nothing significant.” I shrugged. That sounded unpromising, so I added, exaggerating, “But it’s been a lot.”
“Are you gonna hang out?”
“Well, technically we have.”
Jamie’s eyes widened. “What? When?”
“Just the other night. We made the posters for this.” I swept my hand around the room, and glanced at the stage. The music was picking up now, and Ruby resumed her rightful place at the mic.
Jamie nodded, a small smile pulling at her face. “I thought that handwriting looked familiar.”
“You are the foremost expert.”
Jamie had once kept all the letters I’d written her in a Batman folder labeled WORLD STUDIES—for maximum discretion—beneath her bed. It was stuffed fat with my notes and printed emails, and I only found it a few weeks before we broke up. At the time, I had taken it as evidence she’d love me forever. I wanted to know if she still had it, but I really didn’t want to know if she didn’t. To keep myself from asking her I turned back to the stage, where the band was winding down. How was I going to tell Ruby which song I’d liked best when I kept missing them? I vowed to listen to the next one carefully—whatever it was, it would have to be my favorite. Ruby sidled up behind the mic stand like it was a person, pressing her body against it, and I felt my mouth go dry. Then she looked straight at me, again. She smiled at me, and I smiled back. Fireworks crackled in my chest.
“Thank you guys for coming out to see us,” she said. “It’s exciting to play somewhere new that, like, actually has room for people to stand.”
Everyone laughed but Mikey, who glowered visibly at Ruby’s words. It felt so good.
Ben lifted his arms and smacked his drumsticks together, and Ruby shouted, “We’ve been Sweets, and you can get our new EP, Type Two, after the show!”
“Type Two”? I whispered to Jamie. “Like, diabetes?”
“I know.” She nodded, wincing a little. “It’s their second one. Get it?”
“Mmm.” Shit, I was supposed to be listening. “What’s this one called again?”
“?‘If You Say So.’?”
“Right.” The track was one of their new ones and, judging by the crowd, an early favorite. It was catchy, and a little bit punk, and between verses Ruby jumped up and down to the beat, swinging her braids side to side. I even found myself shouting along to the chorus, or at least the half of it I could make out: “IF! YOU! SAY! SO! IF! YOU! SAY! SO!”
When it was over, the crowd whistled and clapped, and one of the girls up front flung a ninety-nine-cent grocery-store rose still wrapped in plastic onstage. It smacked into David’s shin and fell to his feet. He ignored it in favor of pushing his hair back, and lifted the hem of his T-shirt to wipe his forehead, revealing four inches of scrawny boy stomach “by accident.” Ruby bowed deeply, while Ben and Mikey gave little nods and waves and refused to smile. Together they hustled offstage, but they left all their instruments onstage, so it was clear they weren’t really done. The crowd cheered and clapped and chanted, stretching the band’s name into two syllables: “SWEE-EETS! SWEE-EETS!”
I leaned over to Jamie. “Is it really an encore if they make you do it?”
“I know,” she yelled back. “It’s like, guys…you’re not fooling anyone.”
“?‘Bye! We’re definitely finished!’?”
“?‘The only song we didn’t play is your favorite, see ya!’?”