The days leading up to the show fly by. We’re practicing and practicing. Tanasia brings in a new song idea for the encore because Ren says that all bands should be prepared for an encore, even though we won’t have time for one. We spend our mornings in Instrumental perfecting our songs and our afternoons in workshop, making Boom Chachalaca posters and T-shirts and figuring out how to get four tuxedoes by Saturday.

“I might have been a little overly optimistic,” admits Spike the day before the show.

“Ya think?” Tanasia says, with a little edge to her voice.

“I just wanted to do right by Janelle … okay, and to wear a tux.”

We’re sitting among piles of T-shirts and markers and fabric pens, knowing other bands are already putting the final touches on their outfits.

“Well, we could make our own,” says Lara, holding up a black T-shirt and a white one.

“I don’t think making four tuxedoes by tomorrow is exactly a plan,” Tanasia says.

“But what if we did it like this?” Lara says, grabbing some scissors. She cuts the middle out of a black T-shirt, making a kind of jacket. She draws a bow tie on a white T-shirt and then puts it on, slipping her arms through the black fabric. “I mean, I’m no artist, but it could work, right?”

“Don’t give it to your boyfriend to wear to the prom, but yeah, I think it could work,” says Tanasia with a smile. She slips it on over her tank top. We look at each other and nod, grabbing shirts and scissors. We work straight until dinner, our hands tired from cutting and making the posters and all the practicing we’ve been doing.

You can tell the minute you get to Heart that it’s not just us—everyone is exhausted. Every single person in here looks like they could use a nap. Kendra seems to have other plans.

“ARE YOU READY TO ROCK?!” she shouts from the stage. Mouths full of macaroni and cheese, barely lifting our forks from the tables, we all manage a weak “Yeah … ”

“Oh, this will not do!” she shouts into the microphone. “Can we do something about these sad sacks, DJ? We used to have a camp full of rock stars here, as I recall. I think we know what they need.” Ty is in the DJ booth grinning. The bass line comes in right away; it makes my shoulders go up and down even though I thought I was too tired to move. I try to keep them still. “What do you want to do, Ty?” shouts Kendra over the music.

“I want to shoop!” he shouts. The chorus comes in and all the counselors flood the stage shooping at the top of their lungs. They’re showing off their dance moves, busted robots and the cabbage patch, and looking ridiculous. Then they spread through the cafeteria, grabbing us by the hand one by one and spinning us around. Ty comes up to me.

“You know I don’t dance,” I say.

“Mmmhmm,” he says, taking my hand and turning me under his arm. “Oh, look … that’s called dancing!”

I laugh at him and roll my eyes, and then the song changes. Everyone starts hooting and hollering as “Run the World” comes on—apparently everyone, even Spike, even Spike’s coolest friends, loves Beyoncé. Lara is fist-pumping the air and screaming “Girls!” Spike is marching in place like a soldier in Queen Bey’s army. I turn to look for Tanasia. She’s in the corner, like she thinks no one will see her there. Her eyes are closed and her back is to us, the same way I play the bass. She’s moving her shoulders up and down crazy fast, her legs are kicking up and down, taking her down to the floor and back up with the beat. She could be a dancer onstage with Beyoncé.

I approach her when she takes a break. “That was amazing,” I say.

She looks away. “Don’t tell anyone at school, okay?”

“What, that you’re a dance machine who can do crazy things with her body and loves Beyoncé?”

“Yeah. Don’t tell them that. I don’t want to be like … you know … those other girls.”

“Look around. Everyone loves Beyoncé.”

“I know, but first those girls at school know that you have something that they want, then they bring you into their group just so you can teach them dance steps or whatever.”

“Sounds like you’re speaking from experience.”

“Maybe.”

“Leticia?” It’s been so long since I thought of Leticia that it surprises me to hear myself say her name.

“Worse. Monique.”

“You were friends with Monique?”

“For about thirty seconds in seventh grade, until she got tired of me. She realized that just because I’m a good dancer it doesn’t mean I hate school or only like Juicy Couture or want to be mean to people. So, anyway, don’t tell anyone, okay?”

“I won’t. I will keep up your disguise as a big dork, when in fact you’d be like the most popular girl in school.”

“I prefer dorkdom.”

Lara and Spike come over just in time for “Independent Women” and we all throw our hands up at each other and laugh. It is maybe, maybe true that I’m dancing.

That night, Ty checks us in and then tells us to go outside. We all look confused. “It’s a ritual,” he says. “The night before the big show, we go have primal scream to get all the nerves out.” I look at Spike, and she says, “Don’t worry, it’s fun.”

In the middle of campus, halfway between Heart and ESG, there’s a flagpole with a big circular driveway around it. The whole camp is there, forming a circle in the driveway. As more and more girls join, everyone begins to hold hands. Lara and Tanasia find us; Tanasia takes my hand, Lara takes Spike’s, and a minute or so later, the whole camp is joined together.

“Okay,” says Kendra, standing in the middle by the flagpole. “You’ve all worked very hard. You’ve spent this last month trying to find your voices, learning instruments that you’d never seen just four weeks ago. You’ve taken strangers and made them your bandmates, made them your sisters.” Squeezes from Tanasia and Lara on each side of me. “You have been fearless and brave and silly and curious. You have said maybe when everything in you wanted to say no. I’ve watched each and every one of you embrace your fierce, loving, rocking self, and I couldn’t be more proud. And I know you couldn’t be more nervous. But tomorrow is just another day. You’ve done all the work already. The hardest part is over. Whatever happens tomorrow, you are rock stars, you are heroes, and I am so lucky to know you. And you are so lucky to know each other.” I squeeze back. “Tonight, I want you to let go of all of it. Let go of the nerves and the what-will-they-think, let go of any voices of perfectionism or criticism. We’re going to open our mouths and scream because not everyone can make that kind of noise, but we can. And so we must. One … two … three … ”

We hold hands tighter and straighten our arms all the way down. Like we could take off. Like one big mouth, we breathe in, open up, and let it all out. It feels like everything muddy, difficult, and dark inside me is coming up and out. I feel a flutter through my chest as it rises, and a force as it flies out of my mouth. Lara is screaming and smiling at the same time. I think I see a tear in the corners of Spike’s eyes. They’re closed and her face is red and it’s like the scream is coming up from the very bottom of her insides. We all stop, as if by magic, at the same time. All our demons let loose into the night air, carried up to the stars that we can see so clearly here.

“I love you guys. Eat ’em up tomorrow. Now get some sleep.” With that, Kendra dismisses us back to our dorms. Spike and I hug Lara and Tanasia, and we all say, “See you tomorrow,” and even though my voice trembles a little bit at the word tomorrow, we put our hands in for a group high five.

Back on the hall, after Ty checks us in again, Spike and I both sit on her messy, unmade bed.

“You love primal scream, huh?” I ask.

“Yeah. It’s always my favorite part.”

“Can I ask you something?”

“Shoot.”

“Were you crying?”

“Maybe. The end of camp is rough.”

“Why?”

Spike sighs and looks at her dirty sneakers, which she’s still wearing, which I try not to think about because—gross.

“It’s hard. Going back is hard. Eleven months until I get to be here again. Until I get to have friends again.”

“You don’t have friends at home?”

“Don’t sound so surprised.”

“But you have so many friends here!”

“I’ve known people here for a long time. You guys are my closest friends, though.”

“I don’t have any friends at home either, but that’s not much of a surprise.”

“You do now. You have Tanasia. You’re lucky.”

“That’s true. She’ll be the first.”

“I don’t have a Tanasia. I have stupid boys who spit on me when I’m walking down the stairs. I have girls who leave the locker room when I walk in it. And if I’m really lucky, I’ll have Derek again this year.” Her voice is dripping with sarcasm.

“Who’s Derek?”

“He’s the kid in my class, in three of my classes actually, who sat behind me and whispered the word ‘dyke’ at me every single day for forty-five minutes all of last year.”

“Did you complain?”

“I did. They told me that if it were true, a teacher would intervene. It just sucks.” Spike looks defeated. She looks so small to me, this girl with the big voice and the big personality.

“I wish I could go with you,” I tell her.

She smiles, resigned. “I wish you could too.”

“You can come visit—come to school with me and Tanasia for a day. We’ll take you around Brooklyn.”

She nods. “I’d like that.”

“Can I ask you another question?”

“Yeah.”

“Why Spike? I mean, is that what your parents named you?”

“No, they named me something that wasn’t going to help.”

“How do you mean help?’

“Think about it this way: You’re me, right? You’re this gay kid in this tiny town, people want to mess with you. The whole point is that you need to be tough to keep people from messing with you. You need a name that will at least try to keep them away. Rosie wasn’t doing it for me.”

“Your name is ROSIE?”

“It is. Or it was, until I went with Spike.”

I nod. “The thorns instead of the flower.”

“Exactly. We’ve all got our ways of keeping people out, right? Want to play something?” She hands me a guitar and teaches me a few chords. She sings and I play until we fall asleep, shoes on, lights on, sitting upright on her bed.