Mom drives us home. Chuck’s SUV is out front. As we go inside, I hear a toilet flush in the basement. It’s the soundtrack for my life.
I help Chuck for a while. He has me put primer paint on the bathroom walls while he does more mudding and taping on the other side. Chuck doesn’t say anything about the video either. Maybe Mom talked to him. I’m starting to wonder which is worse, people who bug me about it or people who know but don’t say a word. When they don’t say anything, I worry about what they’re thinking.
“Place is shaping up,” Chuck says on the other side of the wall. Until I saw this one get built, I never knew how little there is to a wall. I always thought they were solid stone or wood or something.
“Uh-huh,” I say.
“Think you’re gonna like it?”
“Uh-huh.” Truthfully, I don’t know, and right now I don’t care. I kind of liked the place the way it was, when it was too grungy for adults to want to come down here.
“Good,” Chuck says. “And you know, if your mom ever decides to sell the place, it’ll raise the value.”
“Why would she do that?” I say. I don’t even care. I hear Chuck clear his throat.
“Oh. Well, ah, I don’t know. Just saying. But either way, you have a cool place to hang out.”
I roll on more primer paint. I guess so. It doesn’t feel like my place though. Maybe that doesn’t matter. I mean, what am I going to do here anyway? My music career is over. The way Lisa’s feeling, I’m guessing Two is down to one, so there’s no need to practice here. And Denny’s not rushing over to hang out either. I’m getting a man cave exactly when I don’t need one. Oh man, I wish I could go busking with Lisa again, even if I played the harmonica upside down and looked dumb every time.
I finish painting and tell Chuck I have to go do some homework. I go upstairs and lie on my bed. I stare at the ceiling. Then I get up and really do some homework. Don’t ask me why. To keep from thinking about other stuff, I guess.
When I get to school the next morning, it’s more of the same. I’m at my locker when someone yells, “Ace! Catch!” and what looks like a cutlet comes flying at me.
In homeroom, someone says “Doom Master” in this deep voice and then rips a big belch. In first period, biology class, the teacher says something about a Heimlich maneuver and digestion, and the whole class breaks up. Except for me.
By period two, I’m feeling totally alone. Denny is off being Denny somewhere. After last night, I’m not even going to look for Lisa. I’m walking to class when I feel my phone vibrate. It’s a message from Lisa: mus rm@ lunch k?
My insides do a nosedive. If you thought I was feeling bad before, try me now. I feel as if I’m about to do a faceplant from fifty stories. This is it. I know it. This is when she’s going to tell me officially what I already know. Two is over. I’ve totally blown it. Oh man, why did I go and see her last night? Why did I have to make it worse? Why did I ever listen to Denny?
I drag myself through period two, and then I make myself walk to the music room. I don’t think I’ve ever walked to the music room slowly before. The longer I take, the longer Lisa and I are still playing music together.
I hear voices before I even get to the door. One of them is Lisa’s. “It’ll be so great,” she is saying, “…perfect timing…change everything!” She sounds happy it’s over. Oh, no.
“Excellent,” says another voice. “That’ll be so cool.” It’s a guy’s voice.
“So tell everybody, okay?”
“Hey, for sure.” I know this voice. It’s a grade-eleven guy who’s a good bass player. I look in. Sure enough, he’s there, along with another guy who plays drums. It’s worse than I thought. Lisa has already started her next band. I’m backing away as she turns around. “Ace! Anyway, later,” she says to the guys.
Yeah, I think, you can talk more about your new band after I’m gone. I start backing out again.
Lisa runs over. “Where are you going? You just got here. Listen, I have to tell you something.” Now she’s all serious and intense.
“Sure.” My knees have turned to mashed potatoes. This must be a world record. I’m being dumped by a girl without ever having had her for my girlfriend.
She flips her hair back the way she does and bites her lip. Then she says quickly, “Listen, um, sorry about last night. I just lost it, you know? With everything?” Her face is pink.
“That’s okay.” I’m thinking, Let’s get to the “you’re history” part. That way I’ll have time to eat lunch, throw it all up, get teased some more and still be in time to get beaten up in gym. Now that it’s happening to me, I don’t see why face-to-face is supposed to be so great for getting dumped. A quick text would make it easier for me to crawl away and die.
But Lisa isn’t ready yet. She says, “Anyway, this morning I felt so rotten that I was going to ditch again, but then I got this message—”
“And Rob your boyfriend said he was sorry,” I blurt, sounding sarcastic. And you promised him you wouldn’t do music with me anymore. At least I stop myself from saying that part.
“What?” She tucks in her chin and gives me a look. “He’s never said he’s sorry in his life. Anyway, he doesn’t have anything to do with this.” She waves her hand. Her words are spilling on the floor, she’s talking so fast now.
“So, like I said, I got this message. It was a forward from Denny, and it was from this woman who’s a producer for Garden Avenue Kids.”
“Huh?”
“You know, the TV show.”
“Oh, yeah.” I do know. It’s a pretty good show, for one that doesn’t have galactic death rays. It’s about some kids at a school like ours.
Lisa is racing on, her voice getting higher. “And she saw the video and found out how to contact Denny in his channel details and asked him to send us a message that she liked the song! And she wants to pay us to use it on one of the episodes because it sounds like something two of the characters might record! Isn’t that fantastic? We did it!” Lisa grabs my arms and shakes me. “We did it, we did it!” She is jumping up and down. I think I am too. First, though, I have to ask.
“Are you sure it’s for real? This is from Denny, right?”
“It is, it is! There was an email address in the message, and I emailed her right away and she got back to me. It’s the real thing. We’ve got to text the whole world,” Lisa says, “and then we’ve got to celebrate. What should we do?”
There are lots of answers for that, but for once I know the best one. “Let’s play some music.”