Chapter Ten
Yael and Charlie get to Gina’s show a little too on time for the kind of event it is, and they end up with seats along the catwalk. Charlie slings his coat over the back of his chair. “I’m getting us drinks. Want anything?”
“Surprise me,” Yael says, flipping through the program handed to her at the door. Maiden Oregon is the last of the four acts tonight, which Yael takes to mean that Gina’s good. Nervously, Yael glances around. People are filtering in slowly.
A few more seconds pass, and Yael pulls up her text thread with Gina.
There are only two messages: Charlie and I got tickets!
! from her, which Gina liked, and You better cheer loudest for me from Gina, which Yael loved.
Here!! Break a leg, Yael types out, then deletes.
It feels too earnest. And obvious—Gina will see her, won’t she?
Maybe she’ll send Gina something after the show.
Charlie, thank God, returns to the seat beside Yael, the cups in his hands adorned with limes. “I got us vodka tonics,” he says.
Yael chuckles, raising her brows. “At a gay bar? Brave.”
“Yeah”—Charlie takes a sip and pulls a face—“there’s, like, a hint of tonic in this.”
She plucks hers from his grip and tries it for herself. One of her eyes shuts reflexively at the burn. “‘Hint’ is strong. Maybe ‘whisper’?”
“There is the idea of tonic water in this drink,” Charlie says.
“Yes. I could be convinced that the bartender thought about tonic water as they made it.” The lights dim and the audience erupts. Yael leans toward Charlie, cupping her hand against the noise. “Thank you for coming with me,” she whispers.
In response, he pats her thigh twice. She knows what he means. Of course and You’re welcome and You don’t have to thank me.
The emcee takes the stage, a Black queen in a ballgown, beehive wig, and opera gloves.
She sweeps one arm up, watching it trail skyward, then lowers a pointed finger to her lips.
A hush falls, and she smirks. “Ladies, gentlemen, and other distinguished nobility of Portland, are you ready to be entertained?”
A cacophony again, and this time Yael and Charlie join in.
The three acts before Gina’s are all good—an Adele impersonator with a flawlessly executed, if traditional, lip sync, followed by a king who reenacts the entire workshop scene from Magic Mike XXL, followed by a comedy queen who has Yael’s sides aching from laughter.
The emcee returns, her face grave. “And now, your headliner, a queen who—” She squints at her note card. “Okay, I need y’all to understand that she wrote the next bit. A queen who embodies her craft so fully that she quit boy mode altogether … Ms. Maiden Oregon!”
The applause is thunderous. Yael whoops as the curtains part.
Gina, already pushing six feet, steps out in iridescent platforms, wearing a hospital gown over a skintight silver bodysuit.
Her face is obscured by a cloud of bandages, with only enormous bug-like eyes peeking out.
Slowly, she walks toward the microphone stand, and the crowd quiets, rapt, until they can hear the clack of each step.
“Hello,” Gina murmurs breathily into the microphone.
She reaches up to unpin one end of the bandage and begins to unravel it.
Underneath it are Hollywood-quality prosthetics painted the same silver as her bodysuit.
“I’m the alien Donald Trump told you about last year,” she says, still unwinding.
Quietly, the opening notes of a familiar Beyoncé cut start to play.
Yael feels the anticipation build inside her, in time with the crowd.
When Gina drops the bandage to the floor, Yael holds her breath.
“I hope you’ll forgive my lateness; I had to recover from all my state-mandated transgender surgeries.
” In time with the song, she mouths, Category: bad bitch/I’m the bar/Alien superstar/Whip whip and then rips off her hospital gown and goes into the chorus.
Yael taps Charlie’s thigh, and he taps hers back. Holy shit.
Maiden Oregon has the audience wrapped around her finger. At the second chorus, the music transitions to “E.T.” by Katy Perry.
Singles fly. Charlie and Yael scream themselves hoarse.
“Starships” by Nicki Minaj plays, then “Alien” by Britney Spears, and finally back to “ALIEN SUPERSTAR” for the outro. She blows a kiss, the lights cut out, and the crowd roars.
“Wow,” Charlie says.
“She was amazing!” Yael shrieks.
“Text her,” he says.
She pulls out her phone and fires off something with far too many explanation points. The typing ellipsis appears, then Come say hi backstage. Tell them I sent for you.
Charlie and Yael find Gina in the dressing room, her hair now released from the silver scaly bald cap. She turns toward them, one of her molded-on cheekbones half peeled.
“So?” she asks.
“You were so fucking good, oh my God,” Yael gushes.
Gina grins, genuinely pleased. “I’m glad you liked it. I was a little nervous that the joke would be too deep of a cut at this point.”
“It was perfect,” Yael says.
“And you must be Charlie.” Gina extends her hand, and Charlie takes it.
“So nice to finally meet you,” he says.
The emcee, in men’s clothing now, sticks his head in. “Hey, Gina—we’re heading out for after drinks in fifteen,” he says, and shuts the door behind him.
“Shit, it’s gonna take me that long to get all this off,” Gina says. “I’m really happy you guys finally made it to a show. See you Monday, Yael!”
They say their goodbyes and rush out, and Yael hates the way her chest starts to tighten.
On the walk to Yael’s car, Charlie slings his arm across Yael’s shoulders. He’s tall enough that he has to lean into her as he does it, and she stumbles sideways a half step.
“Sorry,” he mumbles, laughing. “But you gotta spit it out.”
“Spit what out?”
“You’re sad,” he says.
“I’m not sad!” Yael protests, twisting out from under him and skipping forward. “It was a fabulous show.”
“You’re sad,” he repeats, “that Gina didn’t invite you to the postshow drinks.”
Sometimes having a friend know you this well is like being their favorite battered paperback.
She has all these creases in her spine, and Charlie knows exactly where they are.
Where she’ll fall open with the slightest flick of his hand.
Yael picks up her pace, not wanting the streetlights to illuminate whatever expression she wears.
Charlie catches up to her in two quick strides. “Don’t run away, Yael. I’m not trying to be mean.”
“I didn’t think you were,” she mutters. “I’m just embarrassed. I thought … I don’t know, I guess I hoped that this would be the start of some big new friendship. And I think she does want to be friends, but maybe not that kind of friends.”
“Maybe it’s because I’m here. One tagalong isn’t so much trouble, but two’s a crowd.”
Yael wraps her arms around her stomach. It’s an entirely outsize reaction; she knows that. But the disappointment claws at her. “Let’s stop talking about this, please.”
“Okay,” he says.
“So … do you have any new crushes?”
Charlie looks at her with suspicion. “Why?”
Yael shrugs, and Charlie’s suspicion intensifies. “It’s just, you know. Ravi, and then Shane. It could be a lot back-to-back.”
Charlie fixes his sight on something in the distance. “They were more symptoms than causes,” he says.
“Fair.”
She’d offer to talk, but she knows he doesn’t want to. They walk silently in step the rest of the way to the car.
Later, when Charlie falls asleep in front of the movie they put on, Yael texts Kevin.
Yael
I think I’m bad at making friends in person
Kevin
What makes you say that?
The response came quickly, even though it’s a little after one in New York.
She thinks of what he said once about how his evenings after Mia goes to sleep are his only time to himself.
Maybe he likes to extend them, especially when he can sleep in the next day.
She was like that all through grad school. Revenge insomnia.
She texts with him for the next hour, and again when she wakes up on Saturday morning.
He sends her a picture of Making Friends as an Adult for Dummies with the message studying up so I can tutor you. It makes her snort into her coffee. Which makes Charlie say, “Tell Kevin I said hi,” which, in turn, makes her blush down to her toes.
The rest of her weekend passes quickly—hanging out with Charlie and doing chores and texting Kevin, all while watching her podcast hang onto the charts by its fingernails.
On Monday, Yael wakes up to an email that nearly makes her drop her phone.
To: Elle Rex
Subject: The Sophomore English Agenda Production Interest
Hi Elle,
I work at Renegade, the online culture and news satire magazine. Over the past year, we’ve been breaking into the podcast space with shows like Cinefiler and Yentamouth, which have grown significantly with our resources at their disposal.
I’m a huge fan of what you’re doing with The Sophomore English Agenda.
Your voice fits perfectly with our mission to deliver smart, funny, and incisive cultural commentary, and I’d love to pitch it to my team.
Would you be willing to set up a preliminary call to chat about your vision for the show and whether you’d be interested in looking into a partnership?
I look forward to hearing from you.
Sincerely,
Jami Feld
Renegade? She might currently have one of their satirical headlines reposted onto her Instagram story.
She goes to check, and yes, she does: “Newly Discovered Antidepressant Just a Senate Bill to End Daylight Saving Time,” accompanied by a photo of a woman with exaggerated under-eye circles.
Someone at Renegade thinks Yael is funny?
Yael gives the news a little time to breathe, sure that her initial response would be virtually incoherent.
Briefly, she considers waiting for Charlie to wake up and asking him to read the email and help her draft a reply, but that feels like getting ahead of herself.
It’s just an introductory call; it doesn’t mean anything yet.
It may never mean anything. And although she likes to think that she isn’t superstitious (it doesn’t count if you know it’s fake, right?), Yael still holds her breath when driving through tunnels to make a wish, still gets a tiny thrill when she happens to look at a clock at exactly 11:11, and still is afraid to jinx good things before they happen.
So she gets ready for work and decides to buy herself breakfast along the way, slipping out the door before she’s faced with the temptation to spill the news to Charlie.
At Ken’s, which is technically one block east when she should be cutting west (sue her), she orders a cappuccino, a breakfast sandwich, and, fuck it, another canelé.
Maybe if she lets herself celebrate, it’ll feel more real.
At work, emboldened by the treats and fresh air, Yael tucks herself into the library office and types out her response.
To: Jami Feld
RE: The Sophomore English Agenda Production Interest
Hi Jami,
I’m so flattered you like the show. The feeling is entirely mutual—I belly laugh at a Renegade post at least once a week.
Yes, I’d love to call! I work with an editor, Kevin Kissoon. Should I ask him to join as well?
Best,
Elle
To: Elle Rex
RE: The Sophomore English Agenda Production Interest
Hi Elle,
Fantastic! No need to loop your editor in just yet—this is very preliminary, and I can’t make any promises. But if things go further, I would definitely need to chat with him as well.
What’s your schedule like next week? I’m in New York, so I’ll be on EST. Where are you located?
J
Yael tells her she’s in Portland on Pacific time, and after a little back-and-forth, they settle on next Tuesday (ideal, because the next episode won’t be up yet to potentially change Jami’s mind) during her lunch break.
Once the meeting is added to her calendar and her canelé is finished, she tells herself she will stop thinking about this.
On her way home from work, she calls Sanaa.
“I’m going to say something to you because if I don’t tell somebody, I think I’ll explode, but I need you to promise never to bring it up again until I do in case it doesn’t work out. I just need someone to squeal with,” Yael says.
“Done,” Sanaa says.
Yael drops her voice to a whisper, even though nobody on NW Twenty-Second would have any idea who she is or what she’s talking about. “I got an email from someone at Renegade, and they want to have a call to chat about the podcast.”
And boy, does she get that squeal. “Bitch, you’re going to be famous!” Sanaa shrieks.
“God, I hope not,” Yael says. “Besides, I don’t think podcasters can actually get famous, because most people don’t know what they look like.”
“You once called me from your car because you thought you saw Aubrey Gordon at Costco.”
“It was definitely her,” Yael says. Sanaa clicks her tongue. “Okay, but I’m not exactly normal.”
“I mean, that’s true.”
“Yeah, I walked right into that one.”
“This is big, Yael. I’m so proud of you. And also, I told—”
“Sanaa.”
Sanaa laughs, one of Yael’s favorite sounds. So loud and messy, the complete opposite of how you’d picture it from looking at her. “Yes, okay. I promise not to say anything until you do, but if it works out, you better tell me immediately.”
“I will.”
“I have to go—there’s a Women in Design networking thing tonight. Love you, babe.”
“Love you, too,” Yael says just before the call ends, and then she gives herself permission to still feel celebratory the rest of the way home.