Sure. And you better give me the SCOOP on your mood.
He replies: It’s fro yo, more like the DISH .
Finally, I smile a little. :) See you then.
UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE
HarperCollins Publishers
..................................................................
6
MoonflowerAM @catherinefornevr 2h
Summer’s not here right now. She’s eating frozen yogurt in the future. #whereismyTARDIS
I clear the evening with my parents. They’re usually fine with this kind of thing. They know the grades are off to a good start, and Dad keeps bringing up schools with good law programs. I strategically humored him one night and looked over his search results, even though the idea of college makes me ill. I mean, it’s always been assumed that I’ll go. I’m just worried it will change me.
That’s what happened to my older brother, Bradley. We’re not that close, but when he was in high school, playing sax and piano and operating as a mid-level rebel, I looked up to him. Now he’s a senior at Pomona and applying to med schools and he spends his breaks at home talkingabout residencies and the changing face of health care. These days, he feels more like a junior partner in Carlson Squared.
I get my homework done at a coffee shop, then grab a bus across town, anxious to talk to Caleb, frustrated that it’s three transfers to get to the Hive. My parents have offered to get me a car, but I don’t want one. I can use one of theirs when I need it. I like the bus. And a car feels like a contract, like: here is this BIG THING that now means we have more say over you because we OWN the big thing and we can take it away. Not that they’d necessarily pull that kind of crap. But the bus keeps it from ever being an option.
The Hive is a concrete block of converted factory. The white facade has giant windows that make you think there’d be a cavernous space waiting inside, but instead, the windows look in on walls, and the whole thing has been cubed up into hall after hall of tiny practice spaces.
The entrance is flanked by clusters of musicians shrouded in cigarette smoke. There’s every breed of band: hipsters in clutching T-shirts, pencil-thin jeans, and brightly colored sneakers; straight-up rockers, jeans torn and flannels ratty; metal bands, so many metal bands, with chains and hair and acne and sneers; a lost-looking trio of quirky kids who probably jam too much, clad in fez and tweed and thinking that anyone who plays a song shorter than five minutes is a slave to the corporate overlord. Everywhere, skin is tattooed and chins are rough with all manner of facial hair,most not quite successful. Passing among them is to suffer an onslaught of sweat and hair product and secondhand smoke.
I keep my eyes straight ahead. Musicians aren’t like jocks; they don’t catcall, they’re all too cool for that. But when it comes to ogling, I almost prefer jocks: they just dumbly assess your dimensions on some primal mating level, like we live on a savannah. You feel like they can’t even help themselves. Musicians, though, they judge you silently. Your coat. Your expression. The brand on your guitar case. Anything they can. Are you cooler than they are? Do you think you are? Are you the real thing? But you can’t be. There must be flaws. Let’s find them.
Inside, the claustrophobia increases. The air is stuffy, sour with pot and rank with body odor. As I move down the hall, there’s an acidic twinge of vomit and urine. Dangerheart’s room is on the fourth floor, up concrete stairs made uneven by years of gum deposits. The air is sticky with humanity, and everywhere there is the throbbing muffled pulse of bands, each room a cell in this musical organism, one riff bleeding into another as you pass each door.
I have to use the bathroom, but when I step inside, past the wild splatters of vomit and God-knows-what-else, and push open the only working stall door, I jump back at the sight of a girl making out with a guy.
She
He replies: It’s fro yo, more like the DISH .
Finally, I smile a little. :) See you then.
UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE
HarperCollins Publishers
..................................................................
6
MoonflowerAM @catherinefornevr 2h
Summer’s not here right now. She’s eating frozen yogurt in the future. #whereismyTARDIS
I clear the evening with my parents. They’re usually fine with this kind of thing. They know the grades are off to a good start, and Dad keeps bringing up schools with good law programs. I strategically humored him one night and looked over his search results, even though the idea of college makes me ill. I mean, it’s always been assumed that I’ll go. I’m just worried it will change me.
That’s what happened to my older brother, Bradley. We’re not that close, but when he was in high school, playing sax and piano and operating as a mid-level rebel, I looked up to him. Now he’s a senior at Pomona and applying to med schools and he spends his breaks at home talkingabout residencies and the changing face of health care. These days, he feels more like a junior partner in Carlson Squared.
I get my homework done at a coffee shop, then grab a bus across town, anxious to talk to Caleb, frustrated that it’s three transfers to get to the Hive. My parents have offered to get me a car, but I don’t want one. I can use one of theirs when I need it. I like the bus. And a car feels like a contract, like: here is this BIG THING that now means we have more say over you because we OWN the big thing and we can take it away. Not that they’d necessarily pull that kind of crap. But the bus keeps it from ever being an option.
The Hive is a concrete block of converted factory. The white facade has giant windows that make you think there’d be a cavernous space waiting inside, but instead, the windows look in on walls, and the whole thing has been cubed up into hall after hall of tiny practice spaces.
The entrance is flanked by clusters of musicians shrouded in cigarette smoke. There’s every breed of band: hipsters in clutching T-shirts, pencil-thin jeans, and brightly colored sneakers; straight-up rockers, jeans torn and flannels ratty; metal bands, so many metal bands, with chains and hair and acne and sneers; a lost-looking trio of quirky kids who probably jam too much, clad in fez and tweed and thinking that anyone who plays a song shorter than five minutes is a slave to the corporate overlord. Everywhere, skin is tattooed and chins are rough with all manner of facial hair,most not quite successful. Passing among them is to suffer an onslaught of sweat and hair product and secondhand smoke.
I keep my eyes straight ahead. Musicians aren’t like jocks; they don’t catcall, they’re all too cool for that. But when it comes to ogling, I almost prefer jocks: they just dumbly assess your dimensions on some primal mating level, like we live on a savannah. You feel like they can’t even help themselves. Musicians, though, they judge you silently. Your coat. Your expression. The brand on your guitar case. Anything they can. Are you cooler than they are? Do you think you are? Are you the real thing? But you can’t be. There must be flaws. Let’s find them.
Inside, the claustrophobia increases. The air is stuffy, sour with pot and rank with body odor. As I move down the hall, there’s an acidic twinge of vomit and urine. Dangerheart’s room is on the fourth floor, up concrete stairs made uneven by years of gum deposits. The air is sticky with humanity, and everywhere there is the throbbing muffled pulse of bands, each room a cell in this musical organism, one riff bleeding into another as you pass each door.
I have to use the bathroom, but when I step inside, past the wild splatters of vomit and God-knows-what-else, and push open the only working stall door, I jump back at the sight of a girl making out with a guy.
She
Similar Books
