Now That I've Found You - Kristina Forest Page 0,22

that only Milo can hear, I add, “Thanks for explaining.”

“Sorry to rush this, but can we focus on the shirts?” Ben asks. “I’d like to be in bed before midnight after a band meeting for once.”

“It’s not our fault you have the bedtime of a senior citizen,” Raf grumbles.

“I kind of like the logo,” Milo says. “Ben, Vinny, what do you think?”

Vinny sighs. “I think that I’ll add this to the list of Things I Shouldn’t Show My Parents. They’ll just say I need to quit the band and put all of my focus into music school. The logo is cool, though.”

“Vinny is a music major at Brooklyn College,” Milo whispers to me. “He’s the only one of us who didn’t take a year off after high school.”

“I heard that,” Vinny says. “I’m the only one who has a backup plan.”

“Excuse me,” Raf says. “Can we go back to how Vinny said the design was cool? That’s it? Just cool?”

Vinny shakes his head, confused. “What’s wrong with cool?”

“Nothing, just that cool means mediocre. The response I’m looking for is Wow, Raf, this new logo is absolutely exceptional. Thanks for always being one step ahead of the game.”

Vinny snorts. “Do you want me to praise the logo or you?”

“It doesn’t matter either way,” Ben interjects. “No one pays attention to band logos anymore. It’s not the 1970s.”

“Ha! Okay, funny guy,” Raf says. “They’ll be paying attention to our logo tomorrow night, because this is what we’re wearing to the gig.”

“Now, wait a minute,” Vinny says. “That’s something we all have to agree on.”

They start talking about their show and continue to go back and forth on the logo. Raf defends wearing the T-shirts like his life depends on it, and Ben and Vinny both oppose him. I get the feeling they’re not doing so because they dislike the shirts as much as they enjoy poking fun at Raf. All this back-and-forth banter is fascinating to watch, like I’m getting an exclusive tutorial on the art of friend groups.

“I’m the lead singer!” Raf bursts out. “I should make all final decisions.”

“Yeah, but Milo writes the songs,” Ben counters.

Intrigued, I glance at Milo, who just shakes his head and sighs. “They’re only T-shirts,” he says. “It’s not that big of a deal.”

“It is a big deal,” Raf says. “Everybody needs to love the shirts just like they loved the outfits I chose for our ‘Leather Pants’ video.”

I guess that must have been the video Gigi mentioned earlier, because then Raf starts to argue that their outfits were one of the reasons their video went viral in the first place. I’ve never heard of their band or seen the video, obviously, so I have no idea what they’re talking about. You fall completely out of the loop when you delete all of your social media.

Finally, when there are no more fries and the boys have more or less agreed to wear the T-shirts, one of Raf’s coworkers appears at the table. She’s short and curvy, with long Senegalese twists.

“If you’re done eating, you need to go,” she says to Raf. “You can’t keep taking up the biggest table for your band meetings.”

“Charisse, babe, there’s no need to be rude,” Raf says smoothly. “We’re leaving now.”

“We broke up three months ago,” Charisse snaps. “Stop calling me babe.”

“Okay, babe.” Raf stands up and dodges out of the way just in time as Charisse swats at him. He laughs. “Okay, sorry! I was kidding!”

“Get out,” she barks.

“We’re leaving, I swear,” Milo says, steering Raf toward the door. I follow behind Milo, and Ben and Vinny bring up the rear.

We cut through Washington Square Park to get back to the subway station. I lag behind the boys in my uncomfortable shoes as they continue to discuss their set list for tomorrow night. They keep mentioning their song “Leather Pants,” and I can’t even begin to guess how they came up with that song title.

We pass a row of nice town houses, not unlike Gigi’s town house on the Upper West Side, and it’s funny that I’ve been to New York City so many times but never actually had the chance to walk around and explore the city on my own. These town houses are so different from the apartment where Gigi grew up in Brooklyn. Once, almost five years ago now, she asked Frank to drive us there so that she could show me what it looked like. She was dressed in one of her elaborate disguises, complete