Page 114 of 16 Forever

Soon after that, Vivian left yet again, this time to go backpacking in Europe with a few friends. We got a postcard from Venice last week.By 2040, maybe all cities will be like this!she wrote.Miss you, fam.I felt bummed that I didn’t get my own message, but maybe that would’ve been the case even if I hadn’t dated her ex-boyfriend and never told her about it.

Carter, meanwhile, doesn’t talk tome. That night after the wedding, I ran to his house to apologize in person, my attempt at a big, bold gesture of love (and also because my car was blocked in). His mom answered the door and said, with an expression not dissimilar to the emoji yeesh face, that Carter didn’t want to see me. It was a really fun walk home.

I texted him every day after that. Never any response. Then I switched to every other day, and then finally, a couple weeks ago, I gave up. I don’t really blame him. I probably wouldn’t respond to a rotting pile of garbage either.

But I miss him a lot.

“I love our band so much!” Shana shouts now as Ember and I stand up from our instruments and meet Shana in front to do anawkward bow, which I guess is Angry Baby’s thing now. People hoot and cheer some more, and Ron does his two-fingered whistle, loud enough to cut through everything.

“I loveyou guys,” I say to Shana and Ember.

They are great friends. Even in the moments when I’ve become the literal manifestation of our band name.

“Hey,” Ember says, nudging my elbow with their drumstick as the applause ends and people return to loud conversations. “That new song killed. It was really beautiful.”

“Thanks,” I say, not even trying to conceal how meaningful it is to hear that. “You both sounded so good.”

“In full agreement about the new one,” Shana says, putting an arm around my shoulder, “but must be honest, love: I missed playing ‘Stuck.’”

“Same,” Ember says.

“I know, I know,” I say. “I do too. But... I’m glad we didn’t play it. Performing a song about him when he’s not even talking to me feels kinda gross.”

“Rock stars probably do that all the time,” Ember says. “If that makes you feel any better.”

“It doesn’t, but thank you.”

“Come on, though,” Shana says. “Lots of boys get stuck lots of places, you know? We could just say the song is about, I don’t know—”

“A boy stuck in earthquake rubble in Morocco,” I say.

“Yes! Totally! That’s brilliant!”

“Shane. Ember. We’ll do ‘Stuck’ again one day. Just... not now.”

Shana squeezes my shoulder hard. “Integrity looks good on you, girl.”

“Thank you so much,” I say, giggling for the first time in a while.

“Well, that was damn impressive.” It’s our old pal Marigold, her faux-hawk now light green instead of light blue.

“Yeah. Really incredible.” Chord appears from behind her, looking as handsome and impeccably dressed as ever, and I have a moment of panic before I remind myself that things with us are okay now. In my recent attempts at being a less horrible person, I sent Chord a lengthy text explanation about why I broke up with him, including everything that had happened with Carter. He was surprisingly sympathetic.

“Thanks, buddies,” I say, giving Marigold and Chord hugs. I spot Mom and Ron over Chord’s shoulder. “I’m gonna go say hi to my mom.”

“Go for it,” Chord says. “I think I see a passionfruit LaCroix with my name on it anyway.”

The new song Angry Baby played, “They Don’t Hide,” was, of course, written for Mom and Ron—a redo of the one we never even ended up playing at their wedding—inspired by the way they literally didn’t hide from each other that morning before the ceremony. And figuratively don’t hide from each other either.

“Oh, honey,” Mom says as I approach, rising from her seat at an umbrella table and giving me a hug. “That was so wonderful.”

“Did you... like the song I wrote for you?”

“Are you kidding? Welovedit. Ron was bawling.”

“I was,” Ron says, nodding proudly behind her. “The whole set was... It was even tighter than the one at our wedding.”

“Well, that’s not hard to do,” I mutter.