24. Twenty-four
Twenty-four
Microphone in hand and computer screen with music notes taunting me, I now know I hate Bo.
He and Libby are side by side at the edge of the crowd, smiling like this is some kind of twisted dream come true. Everyone else in the bar is staring at me in my not-really-even-a-shirt shirt.
I look like a prostitute, and I can’t do this.
“Now the song is a surprise to everyone, even little Birdie here,” the overzealous DJ says with his slicked back hair and obnoxious sequined shirt from his table in the corner.
The music starts. A fiddle riff that anyone born in the last forty years can recognize if they listen to country music. I groan and drop my head. It’s Shania Twain’s “Man! I Feel like a Woman, ” and Bo is an asshole.
When my eyes meet his, he winks. Winks!
The electric guitar starts to play, and the beat of my heart matches its sporadic rhythm. When the first words flash on the screen, my cracked voice only gets half of them out. I wince. Then a break, more lyrics. I sing-say more of them. The ball bouncing over the lyrics on the screen is moving fast—too fast.
I stumble through verse after verse, until the chorus, which of course I know, because I know country music. Someone cheers for me. Then I sing every word—horribly of course—but I’m smiling.
There’s a shimmy I somehow make which causes a group of girls to scream—a bachelorette party, as indicated by a sash that says Bride to Be!
The bachelorette and all her friends storm the small stage to stand next to me—we’re arm in arm singing horribly into one microphone. Their faces mirror mine—we’re smiling. Laughing at how bad we are. This is an alternate universe because we’re— I’m —singing and smiling in front of a room full of people.
By the final, “Man! I Feel like a Woman” we belt out, we all do a thing with our hips where we bump into each other, and we laugh.
Laugh!
These women are singing and dancing and laughing with me and Shania Twain while I wear a scrap of fabric, and I have never felt so free in my whole life.
It’s over; there’s clapping. Some guy cups his hands and yells, “Encore!” and I laugh— again.
The bachelorette and her friends hug me, drunkenly inviting me to the wedding.
When they loudly scream, “I love you, Birdie!”—the only volume they seem to operate at—I hug them back.
I don’t know what this is, but I love it.
All the while, I still hate Bo.
I hate him the entire time I walk off the little stage, through the cackling crowd and right over to him.
I hate him when I put my hands on my hips, square my shoulders to him and say, “Bo, you’re a goddamn asshole, and you’re going to pay for this.”
I especially hate him when he looks at my glaring, drops his head back, and laughs before putting his hands on my face and pulling me in for a kiss so hot that I don’t think I’ll ever come up for air. In front of everyone. In front of everyone, he kisses me in a way that assaults every single one of my senses with his mouth and his hands and his all-consuming Bo Mountain Breeze until the crowd is clapping and howling.
The DJ over the speaker says, “She’s really going to feel like a woman tonight, folks. Next up, we have Toby singing ‘Friends in Low Places.’ Toby, come on up.”
When we pull apart, I’m breathless. He’s smiling.
He holds my face just inches from his. “You were amazing.”
“I hate you,” is all I can say back, but there’s a smile that pulls at my lips.
“Tell me something you like,” he says, soft.
“Murder,” I say. “You?”
“You,” he says, and this time, I don’t laugh. Because his smile drops; he’s serious.
He nods toward the door, and the mood shifts from playful to something else. Because I don’t know what’s on the other side of the door, but it sure as hell isn’t a crowd of people and bad karaoke .
I don’t resist. A flower bending in his Bo Mountain Breeze, moving however he wants me to. Leaning and swaying at his will with no regard for my own.
Libby must see what’s happening better than me, because she comes around the bar, giving me my purse and sweater, and hugs me goodbye. It’s not an awkward hug; it’s real. When she wraps her slender arms around me, it’s a tight squeeze, like she’s imprinting herself in my life, giving me a glimpse of something sweet. A friend I didn’t know I needed.
“I hope I didn’t scare you off,” she says, looking me in the eyes. “Mandy is my sister, but her choices aren’t mine. Bo is family to me, and that boy is in love with you.”
I suck in a breath, eyes cutting to him where he’s saying goodbye to his friends. “That’s not what this is, Libby. And he’s married, and I’m…you know, Pam Beesly complicated.” I laugh softly.
She rolls her eyes. “And also, an idiot. Do you see the way he looks at you?” She shakes her head. “He came by earlier with bottles of organic juice in case you wanted something other than water. That’s not what he does—that’s not what any man does! And Mandy…” Her voice trails off with the pain in her eyes. “They might be married on paper, but that girl’s gone. She left him, left Lucy, left all of us. She chased dreams bigger than all of us.”
I get it then, she doesn’t hurt for Bo, she just hurts. Libby lost her sister.
I hug her again .
“I don’t have any friends,” I blurt out, laughing at my own awkwardness. “If you ever want to go to yoga or something…” My voice trails off with my own insecurity.
She squeezes my arms before dropping her hands by her side. “I’d love that.” She gives me one more smile before retreating behind the bar and lifting her chin in goodbye toward Bo.
He grabs my hand, pulls me close, and leads me toward the door and whatever comes next.