The question caught Molly off guard. “No, I’m just—I’m getting my MFA.”
“In creative writing,” Nina chimed. She knocked back the rest of her tequila.
Cash pursed his lips, confused.
“I’m just not sure what I want to do with my degree,” Molly added quickly. “Maybe teach.”
“This girl is my smartest friend,” Nina crowed drunkenly, wrapping her arms around Molly’s shoulders.
“What do you do again?” Molly asked Cash.
He opened his mouth to speak, just as the bar lights dimmed. Someone cleared their throat into the microphone.
“Ladies and gentlemen,” a male voice bellowed theatrically from the stage. “It is my absolute honor to welcome my dear friends—friends who are more like brothers—the extraordinarily talented Danner Lane to the stage!”
The crowd cheered, the bar quickly emptying as dozens of twenty-and thirtysomething Brooklynites pushed their way toward the back room, toward the stage.
“There are a lot of people here,” Nina observed.
Cash pushed his thick brown hair back from his forehead. “Have you heard Danner Lane’s stuff? Jeb, one of the owners here, the guy who just announced them, is old friends with the Lane brothers. But they’re honestly sick—they’re on iTunes and Spotify now.”
Three guys—all of whom appeared to be in their midtwenties—stepped onto the stage. One sank down behind a massive drum set, and the other two held guitars, positioning themselves in front of the drums.
“Let’s move closer,” Cash suggested. His friends were still at the bar, but he led the way toward the front, worming through the tightly packed crowd, Molly and an enchanted Nina in tow.
“They’re brothers?” Molly asked loudly, glancing up at Cash.
“Those two are brothers.” Cash stabbed his middle and index fingers in the direction of the stage. “Drums and bass guitar. The other one is Jake Danner. He’s guitar and vocals. They all grew up together.”
The Lane brothers looked similar, with wispy auburn hair and pale complexions, their frames lanky. But Jake was the one Molly couldn’t take her eyes off of.
He was the color of honey—honey skin, golden curls that fell in front of his eyes as his fingers expertly plucked the strings of his guitar. When he looked up, Molly saw that his eyes were pale blue, and clipped right to hers, and she suddenly felt glad to be twenty-three and single, living in the greatest city in the world. Her mind—which had felt a bit dark and crowded lately—cleared.
Jake smiled broadly, and Molly felt a drop-kick in her gut. Keeping his eyes fixed to hers, he spoke into the microphone.
“Hey, East Williamsburg.” His voice was clear and perfect in pitch, edged with the slightest twinge of a Southern drawl. “It’s Saturday night, and we’re Danner Lane, and we’re gonna play some music.”
When the same thing would happen years later at Madison Square Garden—when Jake would find and hold Molly’s gaze in the crowd, this time of thousands instead of seventy-five—it would be habitual for them. Danner Lane would be opening for Arcade Fire, and they would be rising in the ranks—soaring, making it—but Jake would still need Molly, his Molly, the one who tethered him to the ground.
In East Williamsburg, he opened his mouth to sing, the melody of a famous Elton John song filling the room, followed by the most exquisite voice Molly had ever heard.
And now I know
Spanish Harlem are not just pretty words to say
Her life, Molly sensed in some deep, subconscious crevice of her heart, as Jake’s eyes pierced hers, would never be the same.
Chapter Two
Molly
May 2022
Meredith Duffy shoves a glass of champagne into Molly’s right hand, so forcefully that the golden liquid sloshes over the rim.
“… and Whitney lets Liam sleep in the DockATot,” Meredith is saying, her voice hushed. “It’s so irresponsible. I don’t know what business she has bringing two more kids into the world.”
Molly stares into her champagne flute, watching tiny bubbles race to the surface.
“I mean, you would never have let Stella sleep in a lounger, would you?” Meredith presses. She leans in toward Molly, so close that Molly can see the shrunken pores on Meredith’s unblemished nose.
“I didn’t have a DockATot with Stella,” Molly answers truthfully. “They weren’t really a thing back then.”
Meredith nods carefully, absorbing this, and Molly is, as usual, tired of these conversations. Like so many young mothers in Flynn Cove, Meredith seems to take great pleasure in backhandedly lambasting her friends’ parenting styles. The gossip makes her voice speed up and her pupils dilate with glee, like a narcotic. Molly doesn’t want to know what Meredith says about her behind her back, but she’s sure it’s something suitably passive-aggressive.