“What do you want?” I looked at Riley in the doorway.
“Can we plug your iPod into the speakers?” she replied.
“Ugh, what for?”
“To watch TV.” She slapped the door then added, “Come on. You’ve got good music on yours. Please Étienne, I never ask you for anything.”
Never ask me for anything. That’s a lie.“All right. But I’ll be the one to plug it in and put something on. I don’t want your friends’ gross hands greasing up my stuff.” I can’t handle people who don’t wash their hands regularly. Like, is it that hard to keep yourself clean?
“Okay. Whatever.”
“I’ll be out in a minute,” I said as I waved at her to leave my room. I went to the bedside table to grab my iPod from the drawer and noticed my Sidekick screen was still flipped open. Riley had stopped me from erasing the message I was about to send.
“Shit.” A blanket of fear fell over me. I accidentally hit send when Riley opened my door.
Guess it was meant to be.
Riley and her boyfriend Nate were sitting literally on top of each other in my mom’s loveseat, while her two friends Alyssa and Ashley sat on the sofa next to me rubbing Frankie’s belly. I looked through the sliding glass doors opposite the couch and could see people running along the track of the school field behind the house.Maybe I’ll go for a run if Thad doesn’t end up wanting to hang out.
“Tell them how you…” my sister began, throwing her arm around her boyfriend.
I connected my iPod to the stereo system next to the sofa.Hmm. ATB? Nah. Tiësto? Not today. Ah, Paul Van Dyk.
“Étienne!”
“What?” I looked up at my sister.
“Did you not hear a thing I said?” She shook her head, her long brown curls falling off her shoulder.
“Oh. Sorry.” I shrugged, pointing to the stereo.
I know. It was probably rude of me to not pay attention to the story. Sometimes I’d turn my ears off when I had no interest in the conversation. It’s hard for me to focus when I’m not interested. People used to think I was a good listener, and I thought I was. But my mind often goes off to another world once I realize what you’re telling me isn’t so interesting.
“You listen to this kind of stuff?” Nate grinned as he sat up and pointed to my iPod before adding, “Who is this?”
I looked up, analyzing my sister’s boyfriend sitting in my mom’s loveseat, legs inappropriately spread out like most straight guys sit. He wasn’t a bad-looking guy, but he had this disheveled dirty-blond mop on his head, and a smirk on his face. The kind of smirk an older brother would tell his little sister to stay away from. Which I probably should have done when she first introduced me to him.
“It’s Paul Van Dyk,” I said.
“Who?” asked Alyssa, my sister’s scrawny and frail lifelong friend.
“Paul Van Dyk. Only the best trance music DJ in existence,” I replied.
“Never heard of him,” said Ashley, flipping her hair off her shoulder.
The three of them asked more questions about him and his music. My sister sat there on the arm of the loveseat she and Nate occupied, and grinned as she noticed I was visibly becoming aggravated that none of them knew Paul Van Dyk. I introduced Riley to this music about a year earlier. She knew everything I knew, yet she wanted me to tell her friends instead of doing it herself.
It really was great music. Sometimes I’d lie out on the grass at night and stare up at the sky as I listened to his music on the highest volume my ears could manage. It really made me feel alive during a time when I felt empty inside.
“He’s coming to perform downtown in September. I’m going to try to see if I can get a fake ID to get into the club,” I explained before increasing the volume.
As the music started and my thoughts began to melt away, I looked up at the ceiling and grimaced at the small ugly popcorn-looking dots on the surface, then down to the wood paneling on the walls, and finally to the old, discolored carpet I guess was once periwinkle.Who designed this place?I wondered. Nothing looked right in this family room. At least not to me.
“So, Riley tells me you’re a swimmer and a runner,” Nate said, breaking the music’s peaceful ambiance.
I nodded, pointing at the stereo with my eyes—we weren’t done listening. That’s one thing I hate, being interrupted while listening to music.
“Swimming? That’s kind of gay,” said Alyssa.