Read an Excerpt
Chapter 1: Beau
How do you give a girl her panties back?
Probably not at the party where she’s going to be with her boyfriend. But I’m going to do it anyway.
“Will you get out already?” Celine says. “Daniel is waiting for me.”
“For a supposedly doting big sister, you’re not very supportive.”
“Shut up, Beau. You should be happy I brought you at all. You could have driven yourself if you hadn’t fucked up. Stealing the car like a delinquent.”
“Taking without permission is not always the same as stealing. And I was going to see a girl. Not like I was joyriding or baseball-batting mailboxes. Plus, you’re overlooking the critical fact that I
brought it back.”
“Like you’re going to do with that girl’s underwear?”
“Excuse me,” I say. “They were
given to me. I didn’t
take them. That would be a weird, perverted crime.”
Celine makes a face that communicates not judgment but a universal skepticism about all my choices. She’s never approved of any girlfriend I’ve ever had—but maybe that’s because none of the girls who have been in the back seat of this very car have ever been
actual girlfriends.
“When I want to give someone something, I give them, like, candy,” she adds.
“Yeah, well, it’s complicated.”
“So is everything.”
“Yeah,” I sigh. “So is everything.”
The underwear is folded neatly in my pocket. I didn’t want them to be all wrinkled when I gave them back. I gaze at the house, every window already filled with people from school.
What the hell am I doing here?
“I’m not going to ask why she gave them to you,” Celine says. “But why are you giving them back?”
“Because I think it’s over. She got back together with her boyfriend.” I pause. “Again.”
“Pardon me, her
what? Is she bi?”
“No. I mean, maybe. I don’t know. I don’t think she does either.”
A moment of silence sits between us. I don’t know what Celine is thinking, but I’m thinking two things: (1) I never should’ve thought Maia would stay broken up with Tatum, and (2) I never should’ve told Celine anything about this to begin with. Too often I think I’m talking to my big sister, and then it’s like she does an internal calculation of how many daylight hours our mom has been home this week (like, seven) and decides to fill in.
When Celine finally speaks, though, she decides to stay in big-sister territory (for now).
“So she gave you her panties while she was on a break with her boyfriend?”
“Something like that,” I say, deciding not to share the part where a good percentage of the times we made out were while she was still with Tate.
“But she’s not bi? What’s she doing giving you her panties then?”
One thing I’ve noticed about myself is that if I have too many feelings at once, they start to feel like missiles. I feel the defense shield creeping up.
“What so-called straight girls always do when they’re feeling experimental,” I say. “Anyway, it doesn’t matter. I’m over it.”
“That’s what you always say when you’re not.”
“Shut up.”
“You said you were over it about drumming, too. Now look. You’re in my band. And you write ninety percent of our song lyrics.”
“
Our band. And I have writer’s block.”
“Surely not for lack of a muse?”
“Oh, shut
up.”
“Is this girl’s boyfriend going to be here too?” Celine asks, ignoring me.
“Yup.”
“Jesus. Godspeed, little sis.” She leans forward, peering toward Andi’s behemoth house, as if she can already see the mess of my life splattered all over the sidewalk in front of the classy bay windows.
That’s my cue to get out of the car, so I do, but even after Celine has driven off, I stand there by the street for a minute, watching people stream into the house, which is already vibrating with music. Everyone shows up to these things with a plan. Dance with that guy; get that girl’s attention; convince everyone there you’re not the loser they thought you were for the past four years. I have a plan too, though Celine’s comments are making me doubt it even more than I already was. I remind myself of the speech I rehearsed:
This has been fun, but I think it’s run its course. You say I’m not just a hookup, but I only ever see you at the bowling alley. We never talk in public. You break up with Tate and say you’re done and then turn around and get back together. Remember the last time you came to my job? We made out in the back room, and when you left, you put your underwear in my pocket and told me to keep them for you. That was months ago. This is going nowhere, so what am I keeping them for? The speech is too long, now that I think about it. Declarations are supposed to be short and punchy. I could just say,
Here’s your panties back, we’re done. But that implies I actually thought there was a “we” to begin with, and there’s no way I’m giving her that satisfaction, let alone admitting it to myself. Ugh. This is ridiculous. I’ve hooked up with a dozen so-called straight girls and never planned a speech for any of them. Not catching feelings was an easy rule—until now. I’m not in love or anything like that, but something about the way she smiles after she sucks on my bottom lip has been haunting me. And her ghost has a switchblade that flicks out and stabs me whenever I see her with Tatum Westbrook.
Speaking of the crew-cut devil, the door to Andi’s garage opens and there he stands, wearing one of those tank tops with the sides cut out so there’s just a thin piece of material between his pecs. Slut-o-rama. And there’s Gary “I Can Drink a Beer Before a Game and Still Win” Bevin backing his car into the garage, Tate directing him, shouting, “LEFT. No, cut LEFT.” The trunk, I assume, is full of supplemental booze. The party has been going on for a while, so supplies must be running low. But what’s important here is that this means Tate will be occupied for at least the next ten minutes. I’m doing this. Now.
I walk purposefully up the golf-course-sized lawn to the house, plotting this out. I’ll get her alone, give her my too-long speech before I take her underwear out of my pocket and... then what? I haven’t planned my exit, because it depends on what she says back. I can hear my sister’s voice:
What do you want
her to say? I hate that kind of question, and it’s the kind Celine loves asking. But what I
want the girl to say doesn’t matter—there’s only what she will or won’t say. There’s only what she will or won’t
do. And if the past five months are any indication, she’ll do the same thing at this party that she does in the back room of the bowling alley when I’m on my break: run her tongue along my teeth and avoid answering questions directly. She’s good at that. She knows she can get away with it. That I’ll let her. Because what are you supposed to say when the smell of her is all over your clothes, taking up so much space in your brain there’s no room for rational thought? She floats in my nose for hours after I’ve been close to her. Brown sugar and a smoky smell, like she’s always on the edge of burning.
But that’s
not going to happen tonight. I’m focused. And also fed the fuck up.
Luckily (kind of) for me: another smell hits me when I step in through the front door of the party. The stinging scent of alcohol and... people.
That’s the thing about parties—there are so many people. I haven’t been to one since Kay left in December—RIP. (She’s not dead—just moved to Toledo. Which she says is the same thing.) She enjoyed shit like this. Everyone in outfits chosen with usually one person in mind. Music like the first few notes of an earthquake. The music, at least, I don’t usually mind. The louder the better. It’s just never loud enough to drown out the sound of... well, people. And the thing about parties at Andi’s house is that there are a certain
kind of people. The kind who have the power that comes from popularity and get a little George R. R. Martin-y from where they sit on their thrones.
I muscle past two guys on the football team who are trying to out-bro each other: half fighting, half joking in the entranceway. One starts to tell me off but then sees it’s me and just nudges the other guy, grinning. Their bro-off is postponed for the sake of a little casual homophobia.
“Hey, Kitty, looking for fish?”
I know humans’ brains don’t finish developing until we’re twenty-five or whatever, but I don’t have much hope for these guys.
“Were you addressing me?” I ask. “Because my name is Beau.”
“Are. You. Looking. For. Fish?” he enunciates.
“Ohh.” I stop now, turning back to face them fully. “Are you talking about... pussy? Is this a joke about vaginas? Sorry, I didn’t get it, because I actually know what they smell like. Unlike you.”
He’s already drunk, and I can tell he doesn’t take in much of what I say, but he gets that it’s an insult, so he reddens in the face and neck and fires off some sloppy-mouthed slurs before his friend tells me I’m a bitch, etc., etc. Finally they drag their knuckles toward the kitchen to bond over more beer. Healthy masculinity on display.
Jesus, why isn’t the music louder?
And why isn’t the music
better?
When Andi and Maia were still actual friends, she would let Maia have the aux, but this current selection has Andi written all over it. I wasn’t surprised when they drifted apart. You could see it coming if you saw the way they each DJed a party: Andi choosing all the songs that she liked, regardless of the crowd. Maia, playing stuff she knew people would enjoy, whether she liked it or not. Maybe that’s why everyone seems extra drunk—to cope with the playlist.
Regardless, people are dancing. I, for one, do not dance in public. The great thing about being in a band is (1) girls love it and (2) you can enjoy the music without having to dance. But drumming is not an option at a party, so I post myself on the wall and scan the room for the owner of the panties, who, conversely, loves to dance. She’s not one of those girls who just flips her hair around when she’s feeling the song. Her body finds all the rhythms: her legs and hips on beat, her hands finding the melody. It’s bullshit how beautiful she is when she dances, honestly.
And bullshit that I’m at this party looking for her, when there’s no way she’s looking for me. What am I doing? If Kay were here, she’d smack me in the back of the head. But she’s not. It’s just me, lurking on the edge of the party like a raccoon waiting for the lights to go off.
“Hey, Beau,” someone says near my ear. My skin prickles, and for a half second I think it’s her. But I know it isn’t. She wouldn’t get this close in public, which is the problem. I turn slowly and find myself eye to eye with Trina Perry instead.
“Hey, Trina,” I say.
“Hey,” she says, with fake attitude. She’s one of those girls who thinks flirting means pretending to be mad at you.
“You okay?”
“Oh, sure,” she says, arching one of her perfect black eyebrows. “I don’t mind at all that you ghosted me.”
I sigh.
“It’s not ghosting if we talked about it. I told you I was going to be really busy practicing with my band.”
“It’s not your band. It’s your sister’s band.”
I roll my eyes. “It’s
our band.”
“Not too busy to come to Andi’s party,” she says. She drops the tough-girl act and fake pouts. “But too busy to text me back?”
Trina does this thing where she picks up conversations from weeks ago, as if you’re still right in the middle of them. I haven’t touched her in months. We’d been messing around after she and her boyfriend had a fight—I remember Trina’s exact words:
we are so done. But “so done,” as it turned out, meant “so done for twelve days,” and then I saw Trina sitting on his lap at lunch. Now she just pops up every so often wanting attention or hinting about making out. Not wanting
me, necessarily, but wanting to know if I still want her. I always just say I’m busy—it’s a lot simpler than preparing a damn speech.
“I won’t be here long,” I say, breaking away. “Besides, I’m sure Jeremy is keeping you company. You’ve been dating, what, five months now?”
She frowns playfully. “Come on, Beau.”
I swear, the only things that love me more than mosquitoes are straight girls. But I’m not talking about love. I just have underwear to return and a situationship to end.
I cruise more of the downstairs, but I don’t really expect to see Maia anywhere else. She doesn’t usually do the pool, even if it is heated. She wouldn’t be playing foosball because people smoke down there.
If it’s just a hookup, why do I know all this shit about her? When I give her the panties back, I wish I could also plop the part of my brain she’s been occupying into her hand along with the red satin.
I focus back on the dance floor, watching other faces I vaguely recognize sway and grind to the music. I see Ezra King from English—the only person who was out of the closet before me, so we have a mutual gay respect. He’s dancing with the girl I see him with all the time. Her eyes are closed behind her glasses, and even though she’s not the girl I’m looking for, she too is dancing like it’s going to save her life.
I’m just noticing the girl’s smile—floating on her face like she’s having a beautiful dream—when a flash of yellow in the background catches my eye.
Maia.
Distracted by the girl dancing, I almost missed her. She’s by the speakers, switching the music to a pop song like a million other pop songs. It’s not special, but she is. Even now, through my anger, I can smell her.
“Get your shit together, Beau,” I whisper.
But by the time I do, she’s melted into the crowd.
