By the time she walked up from the F train subway station, the rain had stopped, and there was only a damp, briny-smelling wind blowing down East Broadway. She ditched her wind-mangled umbrella in a metal garbage can, and then turned to the left and right, searching the block for Club Neshka. From what she could see, East Broadway was definitely not the Meatpacking District. Instead of fancy boutiques and crowded bistros, this street was lined with a shabby-looking liquor store, a dry cleaner, and a tiny Chinese restaurant with a blinking neon sign that read JOLLY CHAN’S. Above her, the roar of cars on the blue-lit Manhattan Bridge was almost deafening. There didn’t seem to be a club in sight. No wonder she’d never heard of East Broadway, she thought. There was nothing here.
The creaky whine of an opening door made her spin around. Down the block, a young bearded guy and a girl in a white peacoat emerged from a building onto the street. Something told her that they’d just come from Club Neshka.
The couple held the door open for her until she reached it. Luckily, there was no bouncer in sight. She slipped past them and ducked inside, or almost ducked inside.
Club Neshka was so packed that she could barely get through the door. Rail-thin, scruffy guys in skinny jeans and waifish girls in vintage flea market dresses blocked the entrance, chatting and dancing and drinking their bottles of beer. It looked like every twentyish hipster in a five-mile radius had come to this desolate part of town just to hang out at this club.
She edged her way farther inside. If the Luxelle had been trying hard to be chic, this place was trying hard to be cheesy. Strands of blue and white Christmas lights and bunches of silver tinsel were draped along the fake-wood paneled walls. A disco ball spun from the center of the ceiling, and framed pictures from a Russian clothing catalog hung on the walls. It looked like a demented Russian grandmother’s rec room. And even the music sounded weirdly retro. The song on the PA sounded like an old Motown number. It had a thumping bass line and blaring trumpets and a woman singing, “One hundred days, one hundred nights…” A handful of people danced and swayed to it in the center of the room, mouthing the words.
Finally, she found Alex. He stood behind his turntables in the far corner of the room, looking like someone’s kid brother who was sitting in for fun. He held a pair of headphones up to one ear and nodded to the beat, his brown eyes unblinking and totally focused. He almost seemed to be in another world. On the turntables were several milk crates stuffed with albums. Maybe it was all the DJ equipment and how lost he was in the music, but Alex seemed cuter tonight than he had at Luxelle. Except for his T-shirt silk screened with the cover of The Queen Is Dead. Of course, she thought. It was practically a law that artsy guys be into the Smiths.
“Hey,” she said, walking up to him.
“You made it,” he said, genuinely surprised as he put down the headphones. “I didn’t think you’d come.”
“Well, it turns out I do come downtown for other reasons than to shop,” she said, dropping her bag to the floor and walking behind the turntables. “By the way, you were right,” she said, looking around. “Cool place.”
“No cover, six-dollar drinks, and the best sound system on the Lower East Side,” Alex said. “Always a crowd.”
“So what are we listening to?” she asked, glancing down at the turning record.
“Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings,” he said.
“Cool, I love Motown.”
“This isn’t Motown. They played Radio City last week.”
“Oh,” she said, turning back to the albums, pretending not to be embarrassed.
“I’m gonna have to teach you that there’s more out there than Lady Gaga,” he said dryly.
“And I’m gonna have to teach you that being into the Smiths is soooo over. Don’t you use an iPod?”
“First lesson of DJing,” he said, selecting another record from the crate. “Only use vinyl.”
“Why? Because it’s so retro?” she asked sarcastically.
“No, because it’s easier. DJing is really just about mixing.”
“Here,” he said, dropping the record onto the empty deck next to the one playing. Then he pressed a button. The turntable began to move. “This is mixing,” he said.
He held the headphones up to her ear. She could hear another song under the Sharon Jones and Dap-Whatevers, but the bass line of this new song was faster.
“Watch this,” he said. He moved his hand to the console between the two turntables and slowly moved a dial to the left. Now both records were playing through the speakers. The new song’s bass line had slowed down to match the one from the first song but was just a tiny bit different. She recognized it now: “I Feel Good” by James Brown. The crowd heard the James Brown, too, and a small cheer went up in the room.
“Isn’t that cool?” he asked, watching the room. “That’s what DJing is all about. Making sure one song blends into the other, and timing the tracks.”
“How do you know which songs will blend with each other?” she asked.
Alex shrugged. “You try stuff. Here, check this out.” He put her hand on another dial on the mixing board. “You can either turn up the bass or the treble, see?” he said, putting his hand on hers.
She shivered at the warm touch of his hand. But I’m not even into this guy, she thought.
“This is taking away all the bass,” he said as he moved her hand to the right. Now she couldn’t hear the bass, only the high-pitched cymbals crashing in the music. “That’s the treble,” he said in her ear. “Now, here’s the bass without the treble.” He moved her hand in the other direction and all she could hear was the thump of the bass line. “See how many parts there are in a song?” he said. “It’s like a whole landscape. And you’re in control of it. That’s DJing.”
He kept his hand on hers, which gave her a funny, lurching feeling in her stomach. “Wow,” she said. She’d never thought of a song as a landscape before.
They spent the next hour mixing together. She’d line up each record on the turntable, and then watch as Alex dropped the needle and turned the dials, coaxing beats out and into the song that was already playing, so that the two songs were actually playing at once, supporting each other, complementing each other. Alex seemed to know exactly what the crowd wanted. When he mixed in the wamp-a-wamp-a bass funk of “Brick House” over the disco beat of “Rich Girls,” the crowd screamed and began to jump up and down. And when he went from “Brick House” to “Don’t Stop ’til You Get Enough,” people cheered. Carina wasn’t a dancer, but she almost wanted to get out there on the dance floor and join the crowd. She’d never had this much fun when Matty Banks was spinning at one of her dad’s parties.
“Okay, you were right!” she finally yelled over the music. “You are good at this. Are you free December twentieth?”
“So you want me?” he said, grinning.
“You’re hired. But there’s one thing we should talk about,” she said, pausing. “It’s a benefit. Which means you’d have to do it for free.”
“No problem,” Alex said, dropping another album onto the spinning turntable. “As long as you introduce me to some cute girls.”
“Sure.” This was surprising. Especially because of all the hand-touching. “If you’re into those snobby Upper East Side chicks,” she added.
“I don’t get it, though,” he said, holding up one headphone to an ear. “You were gonna ask Matty Banks to work for free?”
“My dad’s kind of a friend of his,” she said. “It wasn’t a big deal.”
“Who’s your dad?” Alex asked.
Carina riffled through the albums in the milk crate. It was always the same dilemma: lie and say she was someone else, which she could never bring herself to do, or tell the truth, and know that the person she told would never see her the same way again. Usually when people found out who her father was, they either liked her a lot less or a lot more. She wasn’t sure which one was worse.
“Karl Jurgensen,” she said casually, looking straight at him.
“What?” Alex exclaimed. His brown eyes almost popped out of his head. “And you can’t pay people?”
“This isn’t a party for me,” she said. “It’s for a charity.”
“Didn’t he make, like, two billion dollars last year?” Alex asked.
“What does that have to do with anything?” she snapped.
“Just that I’d think he’d be helping you out, that’s all.”
“Well, he’s not,” she said. “So don’t assume stuff like that, okay?”
“Fine,” Alex said moodily. “But you are going after your dad’s friends to work this thing.”
“Because the girl who’s in charge wants me to,” she said quickly. “She wants the best DJ, the best food, the best flowers. And she thinks I can do that for her because of my dad.” Even though I let her think that, Carina thought.
“Just tell her that the party doesn’t have to be fancy to be fun,” Alex said, picking out another album. “I mean, look at this place. It’s a hundred times more fun than Luxelle. Because nobody’s trying to be something they’re not. There’s no attitude. People are just free to be themselves and have a good time.”
Carina surveyed the happy, dancing crowd. She knew exactly what Alex meant. But she also knew that Ava would think this place was frowsy, not fun. Still, she was beginning to come around to Alex’s way of thinking.
“Would you be into helping me with this?” she asked cautiously. “Just… suggesting some different ways to do stuff?”
Alex shook his head. “Do I look like a party planner?”
“You wouldn’t be planning it. You’d just be giving me some inspiration. What’s your number? I’ll give you a—” She stopped. Carter. She’d completely forgotten about him. She checked her watch. It was almost nine thirty. “Oh my God!” she started, bumping her hip into the turntable and skipping a record. “I gotta go! I’m supposed to meet someone.” She reached down and grabbed her bag. “Sorry!”
“Well, before you rush off, take this,” Alex said, pulling a business card out of a little black box on the turntable. “That’s my cell,” he said. “Most of the time I pick up.”
She looked down at the card. Above his cell number the card read DJ ALEXX in block letters.
“You know, just between you and me, I’m really not into the second x,” she said.
Alex cocked his head. “What are you, my manager?”
She grinned and stepped into the crowd. “I’ll call you,” she said.
She pushed her way through the dancing hipsters, still grinning. She’d finally gotten her DJ, and she had no doubt that she’d picked the right one. Alex was blunt and kind of a smartass, but he was also talented and kind, and something told her that he might even turn out to be a friend.
As soon as she’d fought her way through the club and out the door onto the empty street, she dialed Carter’s number. It rang as she walked to the subway, the damp wind whipping her hair.
“Hey, this is Carter,” went his voice mail. “Do your thing.” Beeeeep.
“Hey, Carter, it’s Carina,” she said. “I’m soooo sorry I lost track of time, I’m just leaving my friend’s thing, and I’m still waaaay downtown, and I guess it’s a little late—”
There was another loud beep, a click, and then a strange staticky hum.
“Dumb phone,” she muttered, flipping it closed. She could call him back, but that felt too desperate. She could text him, but that might be overkill. Maybe she’d just do nothing. Tomorrow she could explain everything.
As she put the phone back in her bag and crossed the street, she realized that she wasn’t even that disappointed. DJing with Alex had been the most fun she’d had in weeks, maybe even more fun than watching a movie with Carter.
Just before she walked down into the subway, she looked back at the unmarked door to Club Neshka, hidden in the middle of the dreary street. She felt like she’d discovered a whole new New York tonight. All because of Alex. She hoped she’d see it again.