19. Naomi

CHAPTER 19

Naomi

I whoop and clap for longer than anyone else in the room when Priya climbs down off the stage with her clarinet in hand. She beams as she wades through the crowd to rejoin us.

A rumble of chatter takes over the bar as the applause fades. We're half an hour into the open mic night, and the crowd is way bigger than I expected. Despite the air conditioning, the room is warm enough to have my t-shirt sticking to my back and condensation forming rings around our drinks on the table. The air smells like beer tinged with the lingering scent of coffee from when this place is a café during the day.

I'm still counting it as my first time at a real bar. Andrea is the only one of us without a bright orange ‘under nineteen' wristband on, but she ordered a ginger ale in solidarity.

Priya squints, probably still blinded by the lights pointed at the tiny raised platform serving as a stage. The guy she met at music school steps forward to flag her down.

I've since learned his name is Bill. If I had any worries left about things between me and Priya, they disappeared when neither of us managed to keep a straight face after she told me the cute guy she's ‘kinda, sorta dating' is named Bill .

"You were amazing!" I say once Priya has reclaimed her chair at our table.

"Everyone loved it," Andrea adds from beside me.

"It was beautiful," Bill says as he slides his arm around the back of Priya's chair. He turns to her with a look on his face that almost makes me feel like we should give them a moment.

I glance at Andrea to see if she agrees, but she's not even looking at them. Her gaze is pinned to the mostly empty glass of ginger ale on the table in front of her.

She's been quiet all night, so quiet my stomach started tying itself in knots as I hypothesized about a hundred different things that might be wrong, all of them involving me. I did my therapist proud, though, and fought those thoughts off with a healthy dose of reality when I pulled her aside to ask if she was okay.

She told me she's just nervous about performing, and I chose to believe her. I'm nervous enough myself that the copy of the poem I brought feels as heavy as a brick in my pocket.

"Wait, where's Shal?" Priya asks. "Did she miss my song?"

She starts craning her neck around to look for her sister as disappointment wipes the smile off her face.

"She said she'd watch from the back," I answer. "She didn't want anyone to see whatever outfit she changed into yet. I think—"

The boom of the MC's voice cuts me off. We all turn to watch the beanie-clad guy scan the clipboard in his hands up on stage.

"I think that's the first time we've ever had a clarinet on this stage," he says into the microphone as another smattering of applause breaks out. "Great stuff. Now, please welcome Shal!"

He leaves the stage, and a few seconds of strained silence pass before the murmurs start. Our whole table is looking around for any sign of Shal. She refused to tell anybody what she's performing and disappeared halfway through the act right before Priya's so she could change into a mysterious outfit she brought in a duffel bag.

What feels like a full minute goes by. Priya starts to pull her phone out of her purse with a worried look on her face, but then a jingling sound followed by a few murmured ‘ooh's and ‘ahh's turns everyone's attention to the vary back of the bar.

My jaw drops so fast I'm surprised it doesn't bash into the table. Shal sweeps into the room in a cobalt blue sari paired with piles of gold jewelry that flash like a treasure chest. Combined with the dramatic makeup she already had on earlier tonight, she looks like powerful enough to split the ocean in half instead of just clearing a path through the bar.

Her gaze is pinned to the stage, and even though she's walking with the poise and grace of a seasoned movie star, I can see the way her chest is heaving with nervous breaths. When she's only a few feet away from the glow of the spotlights, I manage to pry my eyes off her and look at Priya.

Her mouth is hanging open as wide as mine. She keeps gawking as Shal steps onto the stage and grabs the microphone.

"This performance is dedicated to my sister."

Priya lets out a squeak and then clamps her hand over her mouth.

"Who you just saw rock the hell out of the clarinet," Shal continues. "My sister Priya is the coolest person I know, and this summer, she's reminded me of what it actually means to be cool. This is cheesy as hell, but it's true, people: being cool means being yourself."

There are some shouts of agreement from the crowd. Shal grins, her voice getting more confident with every word.

"Sometimes it's hard for me to be myself. Sometimes it doesn't feel safe. Sometimes it's just easier to be what other people want, but when I'm riding in the car with my sister singing at the top of our lungs or doing bad reenactments of Bollywood movies in our basement like we have since we were kids, I forget about all that. I'm just me. That's what I want you to know, Pri. I'm always the most me when I'm with you."

A chorus of ‘awwww' fills the bar, and my eyes prick with heat when I look over and see tears are already streaking down Priya's cheeks.

"So in honor of my sister and the true definition of being cool," Shal says, "I am going to risk my dignity by doing a very special dance for you all tonight."

"Oh my god," Priya mumbles from behind her hand. "She's going to do Badtameez Dil ."

The crowd whoops as Shal holds her sari with one hand and uses the other to set the microphone stand down off the edge of the stage.

"There are a lot of white people who have probably never seen a Bollywood movie here tonight," Shal says, loud enough for her voice to carry without the mic, "so allow me to educate you. This is a hit song from the two thousand and thirteen blockbuster Yeh Jawaani Hai Deewani , titled ‘ Badtameez Dil .'"

More whooping follows as Shal steps to the very back of the stage and turns her back to the crowd before striking a dramatic pose. A second later, the song starts thumping through the speakers, and Shal starts busting out moves that have my jaw dropping all over again.

She swivels and pops her hips in ways I didn't know the human body was capable of, her arms flying through a series of complex movements that make the bracelets stacked on her wrists jingle and clack. The whole crowd has started clapping to the beat of the song as they shout their approval.

"Oh my god!" I yell over the noise, leaning across the table towards Priya. "I had no idea she was this good!"

Priya's eyes are bugging out of her head, and she doesn't look away from Shal for even a second as she answers. "Me neither! I've never seen her do that. Holy shit!"

That's all I can think too as Shal whirls through the rest of her routine and winds up earning a thunderous standing ovation. Her face glistens with sweat as she beams at the crowd before taking a bow, her chest heaving with exhaustion.

The applause doesn't let up as she makes her way over to our table. The four of us are still on our feet, clapping and stomping as we yell her name. She fights for her breath and then slams back half a glass of water as the audience starts to calm down and wait for the next act.

The raw joy now bouncing around the room makes me heart feel like it's swelling in my chest. My body thrums with so much energy it's hard to sit back down, but just as Shal and Priya are breaking apart from a tender hug that has my eyes stinging all over again, the MC announces Andrea's turn.

I forgot she was the next in line.

Which means I'm the next next in line.

Adrenaline shoots through my veins, but I'm so high on watching my friends perform I forget to be terrified. We settle ourselves as Andrea pulls her guitar out of its case.

"Good luck," I say as she steps past my chair.

She catches my eye, her expression blazing with an emotion I can't quite read.

The copy of the poem in my pocket feels even heavier now—the copy I scribbled my own words beneath just before we left the house tonight.

Words I won't be able to take back once I speak them up on that stage.

Andrea steps up to the stage and grabs a stool sitting off to the sidelines. The microphone stand has been returned to its place, and she sets the stool behind it before perching on the seat with her guitar resting across her lap.

She's wearing jeans and a cropped black t-shirt, with thick black eyeliner and that same burgundy lipstick from our date. A few rings glint on her fingers, and as I watch her adjust the microphone to the right height, all I can think is that I want more of her.

More date nights in cute dresses. More late night chats in the hot tub. More cuddles under the same blanket while we listen to each other's hearts race and forget all about the movie we're supposed to be watching. More tossing our ice cream cones aside because we can't wait a second longer to kiss each other.

More moments. More stories. More us.

"Hey, everybody."

I feel her voice reverberate through my bones when she speaks into the microphone, even though the sound system isn't nearly loud enough for that.

"I don't know how I'm supposed to follow up that masterpiece we all just witnessed," she says with a grin. "I really hope we're at the point of officially being friends, Shal, because I'm about to brag to this whole bar and tell them you're my friend."

A laugh rolls through the crowd. I glance around and see she's already got the whole room falling under her spell. She was so nervous she couldn't even drink her ginger ale a few minutes ago, but up on stage, there's an ease to her you can't help but sink into yourself.

"Of course we're friends, bitch," Shal yells with her hands cupped around her mouth.

The laughter gets even louder. Andrea chuckles into the mic.

"Spoken like the truest of friends." She shifts her guitar on her lap and gets her fingers set up on the fret board before looking out at the crowd again. "I have a dedication to make too. This song is…for a girl."

Someone wolf whistles at the same time my heart jumps into my throat.

"It's for a girl I'm…" She trails off and clears her throat. "A girl I'm really gonna miss. So yeah, this is a song by Neutral Milk Hotel called ‘In the Aeroplane Over the Sea.'"

My hands fly up to cover my mouth as Andrea strums the familiar chords of the song. I might have only heard it for the first time less than a week ago, but I've replayed the original version enough since then to have every word memorized.

Andrea's fingers move up and down the fret board without hesitation, and my chest tightens when I remember she hadn't heard the song before our date either. She could have played any song she wanted tonight, but she must have spent the past few days learning the one we danced to.

She learned this song so she could play it for me.

I drop one of my hands from my mouth to press my palm to my chest instead, right over the desperate thump of my heart under my shirt. My heart feels like it's trying to beat its way out of me so it can get to her. My feet twitch with the urge to jump up and run to her, to stop this whole performance and tell her she doesn't have to miss me because this doesn't have to end.

Not if we don't want it to.

She gets to the end of the song's intro, and the only thing that stops me from actually going off the rails and careening through the bar towards her is the sound of her voice.

I didn't know she sang.

The first lyric about finding a beautiful face in a beautiful place reverberates through the bar like a magic spell that keeps every eye locked on her. Her singing voice is higher than I would have expected. If I had to guess, I'd have said she'd have one of those rich and raspy rock goddess voices tinged with smoke and flames, but instead, the sound is clear and fresh like sweet rain water trickling down a windowpane.

It's a voice that comes from those slow and still parts of her I've caught glimpses of from time to time, like when I found her out on the deck a few nights ago. It's a voice that tells the world who she really is.

She gets to the chorus and falters for a moment, her eyes squeezing shut, and I realize that voice can't hide the fear she's always running from. The loneliness. The heartache. The dark things lurking over her shoulder that tell her she's not good enough.

I've spent most of my life letting my own shadows do exactly the same thing to me. I've let doubt, shame, and fear keep me in the dark for way too long.

When I met Andrea, I saw a girl who shone like a summer sunrise, so bright it almost hurt to look at her. I tried to hide from that light, to watch it from the shadows like I always do, but she turned the sun on me full blast and decided what she found was not too small or scared or weird or pathetic for someone like her.

She helped me start to believe that maybe I'm not too small for anyone. Maybe I never have been.

And maybe what she needs is for someone to finally reflect her own light back at her and let her see the same thing about herself.

So when she finishes her song to resounding applause and comes back to our table, I ignore the lurch in my stomach when the MC calls my name.

I ignore the way my skin gets hot and itchy as the whole crowd watches me walk to the stage.

I ignore the way my vision swims and my throat goes dry when I'm finally facing a crowd full of people all waiting for me to do the one thing that's scared me the most my entire life: speak.

I ignore every ‘what if' that tells me I can't do this and replace them with, ‘What if I can?'