Chapter 7
Oli, Friday
“I’m serious!” Noah said from the passenger side of Tiff’s yellow Beetle on our way to band practice. “We were tinkering with that new song he wrote on Wednesday, and Jonah actually smiled at me!”
I spread out as best I could in the back, trying to fit myself comfortably into the small interior of the vehicle, watching my two friends in the front with my forearms on their headrests.
“I’m so glad that after a year of playing together and meeting multiple times a week, your bandmate finally smiled at you,” Tiff teased.
Noah whipped his head toward her excitedly. “I know, right?!”
Tiff looked at me in the rearview mirror and grinned.
Noah had been waiting for that smile since the moment he met Jonah. I hadn’t seen the miracle myself, but if Noah was anything, he was honest, so I believed him.
The car stopped just in front of the glass doors of the studio building to let Noah and me out. He swung his gig bag over his shoulder and bent down into the driver’s seat window, kissing his girlfriend into oblivion.
“I’ll see you in a bit to drive you back,” she said, holding Noah’s cheeks and glancing at me. “Don’t go beating each other up with drumsticks or anything of the sort.”
“No! Don’t leave me, my bright, starry night!” Noah grasped her wrists and let them drag from his hold as Tiff pulled away and put the car into gear. She sent one last glittering smile to her boyfriend and drove off. Noah’s attention remained on the car until it was out of sight.
Those two loved each other so much, it made my heart clench. I secretly wanted that too, though I wasn’t sure I’d ever find it. I stopped trying after Alan. I did love meeting people, but people only seemed to like me when I was pulling pranks or making casual conversation. No one really cared for the neat freak who listened to scary music and buried his head in textbooks out of sheer obligation. Unfortunately for my social life, I spent most of my time doing the latter.
“How was last night?” I asked, prying my attention away from my stressful tendencies and directing it toward Noah and Tiff’s fifth-anniversary dinner that he’d been planning for weeks.
Noah, my prettiest friend, sighed sweetly, his bright, blue eyes piercing straight through the dimming afternoon sunlight and his goofy grin remaining ever on full display. “She cuffed and gagged me.”
“Oh, Noah!” I scrunched my face and rubbed my eyebrows, doing my very best to get that image out of my head. Being supportive of Noah usually meant hearing things I didn’t need to know, like how he could never quite shave all the hairs on his ass, or what his girlfriend did to him in private.
I turned toward the door of the rehearsal studio we rented where our lead singer was already waiting, having come early while Noah and I were still in classes. Noah giggled and skipped around me like a puppy as he followed me in.
Inside the studio, Jonah was sprawled on a spinning chair, his guitar stacked next to him and his little notebook in hand, scribbling away with a pen. The thoughts just never stopped flowing out of that guy. He pulled at his long, black hair in one hand as he stared down at what he’d just written, likely unhappy with it. His words never could capture exactly how he felt about her, he always said.
“Hey, Jonah,” Noah said happily, urging me to watch for Jonah’s reaction by nudging me with his elbow.
“What’s up, Noah?” Jonah asked in his typical tone, his lips pressing flat.
“Nothin’.” Noah spoke as if he were talking to his celebrity crush, his hand gripping the strap on his shoulder and his body swiveling from side to side over his feet. His cheeks turned rosy as he grinned my way, widening his gaze to ask if I’d seen it, if I’d seen that Jonah acknowledged him.
I scratched my beard with a smile and shrugged in surrender, admitting silently to Noah that he was, in fact, right. Jonah was officially being friendly to him. Not that Jonah was ever mean to Noah, but if Noah was an energetic golden retriever, Jonah was a little, black cat.
I took a seat on the horrendous, tangerine couch at the back of the studio, spreading myself across it as I looked around. This place was certainly a step up from Jonah recording vocals on a tiny microphone in the dorm room and Noah and me adding in synthetic beats and rhythms. Plus, they had a drum kit for me. My parents never wanted to get me one. I’d gone from the high school set to loaners and rentals, all on my own dime.
Well, I wouldn’t exactly call it my own.
My parents were…well off. And I did a decent job of budgeting what they allowed me, of knowing where to spend and where to save. It took me a long time to get over the fact that as awful as my relationship with my father was, he paid for nearly everything I had. But I kept pushing. I would make good use of what I was given, and I would take my life back. It would be mine, and there wouldn’t be a thing he could say to tear me down.
“Oli,” Jonah called from his seated position. “Come back here. What do you think of this lyric?”
A natural groan escaped me as I lifted off the couch, pushing my weight up through my legs.
“It’s good. It’s really good,” Noah said, nodding with his hands on his hips. “You’re gonna love it. Right, Jonah?” He looked to our gloomy lead singer in search of approval, or friendship, or any hint of connection. Our blonde bassist had already gotten completely carried away with Jonah’s singular show of affection during our last session.
“Uh, sure, Noah. Thanks.” Jonah’s eyes darted between Noah and me twice, his mouth flat, his twitchy nerves on full display.
“Don’t get too friendly, you two,” I teased, snatching the notebook from Jonah’s fingers to read it. “I’ll be jealous if Jonah takes my spot as best man at Noah and Tiff’s inevitable wedding.”
Noah immediately perked up. “Well, then, I’ll have two!” Jonah dropped his head to one side, pulling the skin of his brow together between his fingers. “Right, Jo?”
Jonah’s face twisted rudely. There was only one person who could call him Jo, and she was not in this room.
“Nah,” Noah continued quickly, noting Jonah’s reaction. “Jo-nah. Jo-uhm. Jonah.” Noah crossed his arms in a failed attempt at remaining casual. It might’ve been the first time I’d ever seen his smile falter.
“Hey, Noah?” Jonah said with a sigh. Oh, this was going to be good. Noah’s face went solid. “I like you. So just, like…chill out.”
Noah’s mouth stretched into a giant O-shape which quickly melted into his brightest grin. He flapped his hands around in the air silently before pulling out his phone and clicking around on the screen. “Hey, babe?” he asked, lifting the device to his ear on a newly initiated call. “Yeah, I know it’s only been a few minutes. But you’re not gonna believe this…” His voice trailed off as he stepped out of the room to chat with Tiff.
“Why’d you have to go and get him all excited?” Jonah whined as we were left alone in the dimly lit studio. He rubbed his back on the seat of the chair, scratching himself like a bear on a tree.
I shook my head. “Maybe if you were nicer to him, he wouldn’t get so worked up over a half-smile.”
“I’m perfectly nice to him within the bounds of my own energy levels.”
I chuckled and observed the notebook in my hands, preparing myself to read what would likely be yet another devastating lyric that reminded me my best friend was severely unwell.
And that’s what it was.
I tossed the book on his lap. “It’s weak, Jonah. You know that. It sounds like it’s already been done.”
He humphed.
It’s not that it was bad, it’s just that Jonah’s style was incredibly emotional. He was like black skinny jeans and long, black hair, standing in the rain outside your high school while the girl of your dreams moves away forever and your world crashes around you. So…accurate to his life. I won’t say it wasn’t. But our band wasn’t all eyeliner and side bangs, and it wasn’t 2010 anymore. We were flannels and dirty Converse and skateboards. Our sound was more along the lines of life-sucks-but-it’s-kind-of-funny-that-way. Not I’m-sad-and-actually-this-is-a-cry-for-help-and-I-need-therapy.
There’s a difference.
I think.
Anyway, Jonah did an excellent job of balancing it all out and producing songs that I really thought could become hits one day. We usually just needed to dig through his desolation a bit to find them.
“Let’s do something happier. Save those notes for later,” I said.
“Why?” he asked. “We don’t share our music with anyone anyway. Who cares what we create?” By his tone, I could tell he was just pushing the fact that we did need to get this music out there if we wanted to be heard.
“We have degrees to earn and responsibilities to uphold. We can think about pipe dreams later.”
“We can drop out and start our lives.” He was always making that suggestion. The two things I most often heard come out of Jonah’s mouth were “Kai, please come home” and “Oli, let’s drop out.” I respected his persistence, but we didn’t all live in a delusion like he did. He was a sad little dreamer.
I ignored his comment and pulled up a chair next to him, leaning back to think. “We can write about love. That’s what you’re good at. But let’s lighten it up for this one.”
“If you’re so keen, you give me some inspiration.”
An obnoxious image sprang to mind without my consent. The long, brown waves. Those incredibly well-kept brows that angled down in the middle with anger. God, those eyes. They were so fucking sparkly; it made me want to slam my head on a rock. My jaw tightened at the thought of her.
Juni would hate prankster, musician Oli. I hardly wanted to think about the fact that she was about as disagreeable as I was when it came down to it. And so fucking smart. She didn’t even have to try that hard. She was just naturally intelligent. I couldn’t fucking stand it. Why did she have to be like that? Why couldn’t she have been oblivious or quiet or have any other fucking set of personality traits that would’ve made her easier for someone like me to ignore? If she was cute and sweet and giggled at my jokes in class, I could’ve handled it. That would’ve been a simple reprieve from the stress I endured every day. But that? That intelligence? That eloquence? And now I was supposed to spend time with her twice a week in a private setting?
The universe really whipped its dick out and said, “Hey, Oli, bend over!” I might as well have just carved my still-beating heart out of my chest and handed it to her on a blood-soaked platter, considering she was going to get it anyway, whether she wanted it or not.
“Does Kai ever piss you off?” I asked, swallowing my irritation as best I could.
“Every second of my waking life.” A slight upward curve took Jonah’s lips as he tapped his finger on his armrest. “In my dreams too, sometimes. She’s so fucking sweet until I say something that reminds her I’m not as weak as she thinks, and like clockwork, she turns into a total fucking brat. God, I love when she gets snippy.” He groaned and leaned back in his seat. His mind was probably traveling to places I didn’t want to hear about, but at least he was catching on.
“I was just thinking about that girl, Juni,” I said quietly as if it were no big deal.
His head snapped up, his curiosity immediately piqued. I’d complained about her enough in the last few weeks that he was positive I was into her. I, of course, denied that. Vehemently.
“Not like that,” I said, attempting to extinguish his sudden interest. “We’ve been made project partners.”
He tipped his chin up and laughed. The sad fucker actually laughed.
I clicked my tongue. “I can’t fucking stand her. She’s always saying shit that just makes me want to…” I twisted my face and crushed the air in front of me with my fingers, unable to find the words for what I wanted to do to that girl.
“Tie her to a piece of furniture and torture her until she screams that she’s yours and only yours?” he proposed calmly as if he’d already considered the same scenario with Kai a thousand times.
My face soured. “God, you and Noah both.” I shook my head.
“Oli, I have been pitifully horny for seven years and counting. Give me a break.”
“Then take care of it. I don’t want to hear it.”
“Kai can take care of it,” he grumbled, crossing his arms and sinking deeper into his seat.
“Can we tone down the torture and maybe write something about loving a girl you hate?”
His eyes brightened in a second, his gaze darting back to me. “So you’re in love!”
“Absolutely not!” I pushed out of my seat and paced across the room, officially flustered. “I don’t even fucking know this girl! I’m just offering you some ideas since you can’t seem to keep a straight fucking head these days.” My breathing rocketed as I stared intently at the rug and shoved my thumb between my teeth to chew on my nail.
Noah peeked through the doorway, finished with his call. “Woah,” he said, gesturing in my direction with his hands. “The vibes in here are, like, not the vibe, my musical hermanos. I’m feeling a lot of tension coming from you, Oli-Dolly.”
“Noah, tell Jonah about your anniversary,” I snapped, dragging a hand over my face.
Thankfully, Noah was easy to distract. His mind immediately flipped to the new task as he bounced over to where Jonah was seated. “Oh, Jonah, you gotta hear what Tiff did to me last night!”