But here’s the thing they don’t tell you: That magic, king-or-queen-of-the-world sensation? It’s a million times better when you’re the one playing the music.
Maybe even a billion.
Green-haired Maureen called the feeling Valhalla, and she had enough attitude she could get away with saying things like that. Back before my accident, my mom and Maureen’s had been best friends. They’d drink Sanka and smoke Kools while Maureen and I stared at each other across the portable crib. When we outgrew that, they let us play in the living room and then, finally, sent us down into the tunnels. That’s just how it rolled in Pantown. Then Mom changed, Mrs. Hansen stopped coming around, and Maureen got boobs. All of a sudden, the boys were treating her differently, and there’s nothing to do when you’re treated differently except to act differently.
Maybe that explained Maureen’s twitchy moods lately.
But even before those, Maureen had been end-of-summer energy in a bottle. Never still, racing to cram all the good stuff in before the grind. Except she was like that year-round, shivering with something electric and a little bit scary, to me, at least. Brenda, on the other hand, was one of those girls you knew was gonna be a mom one day. Didn’t matter that she was the youngest in her family: she was born with her roots sunk deep in the ground, made you relax just standing next to her. That’s why the three of us made such a good band, nurturing Brenda our lead singer and guitarist, Maureen our witchy Stevie Nicks singing backup and playing bass, and me holding true north on the drums.
We shot onto a whole nother plane when we played music, even when banging out covers, which is what we mostly did. We called ourselves the Girls, and the first songs we learned were “Pretty Woman,” “Brandy,” and “Love Me Do,” in that order. We played them well enough that you could recognize the tune. Brenda would figure out the opening bars, and I’d lay down a steady beat. Slap the lyrics on top of that, shimmy like you know what you’re doing, and people were happy.
At least, the only two people who’d ever watched us play were.
Didn’t matter they were my little sister, Junie, and our friend Claude-rhymes-with-howdy. The two of them sat at the front of the garage for nearly every single one of our practice sessions, including today’s.
“Here it comes, Heather!” Brenda yelled over her shoulder.
I grinned. She’d remembered my drum solo. Sometimes I took them spontaneously, like when Maureen sneaked a smoke or Brenda forgot the lyrics, but this one was for real. On purpose. I’d practiced the heck out of it. When I played it, I straight-up left my body, the garage, planet Earth. It felt like I set myself on fire and put myself out at the exact same time. （I’d never say that out loud. I was no Maureen.） My heart picked up in anticipation, matching the beat.
The song was Blue Swede’s “Hooked on a Feeling.” It shouldn’t have had a drum solo, but who was gonna tell us that? We were three teenage girls playing balls-out rock in a garage in Saint Cloud, Minnesota, on a warm early-August day, the deep-summer green so thick you could drink it.
I quick-blinked against a momentary twinge, the sense that I was flying too high, feeling too good, too big for the world. I’d later wonder if that’s what cursed us, our boldness, our joy, but in that moment, it felt too good to stop.
Maureen brushed her streaked hair over her shoulder and tossed me a sideways smile. I hoped it was a sign that she was going to follow me right to the door of the solo. Sometimes she did. When we hit it together, it was really something to hear. Brenda would even stick around to watch us riff off each other.
But that’s not what Maureen’d been signaling.
In fact, she wasn’t smiling at me at all.
A shadow had fallen across the driveway.
Tucked in the back, I had to wait until he showed his face.
CHAPTER 2
The guy Maureen had been smiling at had an all-right mug if you didn’t know him. Shaggy brown hair. Hazel eyes a little too close together, like bowling ball holes. I’d thought he was cute back in grade school. A lot of us did. He was the first boy in Pantown to get a car. Plus, he was older. Too much older. At least that’s what I’d told Maureen when she’d asked me a couple days ago what I thought of him.
Heinrich? Heinrich the Gooseman? He’s a chump.
Better a chump than a snore, she’d said, then laughed her calliope laugh.
I should’ve guessed he’d show up to our practice eventually, given her question and the extra care she’d been putting into her appearance, her hair always curled, lips extra glossy.