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Amy 31: Magical Sailor Girl Amy Copyright 2015 by Amy Komori The original characters and plot of this story are the property of the author. No infringement of pre-existing copyright is intended. This story is copyright (c) 2015 Amy Komori. All rights reserved. Chapter One: Silicon Valley Boys Are Lonely I was feeling pretty awesome. Even more awesome than the weather, because we'd had a cold, rainy Christmas and New Year's, followed by this bizarre warm spell that led to swimming and sunburns all the way in February, for which the very stupid thanked the weather team at 5 Alive News. It left me feeling completely alert to every possibility, beaming at the sunshine, not sweating the rainy days. But it wasn't just the weather. It was also the fact Sorrel, the owner of the club we were hanging out at a lot, and I had kissed in her office. And I'd finally realized how much I enjoyed doing that, even though I wasn't single. Maybe even not being single made it that more delicious. Because of that, amid the awesomeness that saw me adopt this kind of bounce to the way I walked, I'd suddenly have a tiny panic attack when I realized just how full of myself I was becoming. That didn't happen very often, but just enough to prick my balloon. I had the potential to really mess up something good. Because part of me wanted Sorrel. It was so hard not to. Even though Tamara was an amazing and blazing star, Sorrel was a whole galaxy of cool. I didn't know what I was doing. I just knew they had both kind of swept me off my feet and I was dazzled and high and kind of crazy for both of them at the same time. Tam and Sorrel. Sorrel. Everyone in town knew her, she was interviewed in the local music paper about stuff on the music scene, she had her own club, her own house and all these wicked tattoos I really admired, even if I was too much of a chicken to get any myself. And she'd gotten us to record the demo tape so she could play it for this woman she knew who was starting an all-girl label, which was really cool of her. Also, she had at least a passing acquaintance with my all-time goddess, Mitsuyo, the leader of this all-girl Japanese punk band that had played at Sorrel's club once. To top it off, she'd invited us to her house for this big party, where she probably planned to follow up on our kiss with something more involved. It hung over me like a rapidly-approaching report card day, or a test I hadn't studied for. This was not something I had ever anticipated happening to me. Well, whoever planned for being zapped into another life and having to start over full of uncertainty and dread, finding out what you thought you knew about the world may have been right from one perspective but now you had this whole other one where it all turned out to be false? And while I was starting to come into my own after a lot of struggles, this was a bit more advanced than I was ready for at the time. And yet it made me feel like the Scene Queen of Delacroix High. Riding high. So what if it also every so often made me so scared of my own potential for damage it made my chest suddenly seize up and my face go pale so I had to cover it up with a quick snark remark? I'd had an amazing apprenticeship in that from my sister, from Gina and from Michelle Cho. I took their lessons and really built my own rep for lip on top of it. Especially now that I felt like I didn't have to give a fuck what a bunch of high schoolers thought of me. People would set themselves up and I would fucking knock 'em down. And it only seemed to make some people like me more! Yeah, it made a few people who hadn't known me at all suddenly take a serious disliking to me, too. But mostly people seemed to think I was funny and interesting all of a sudden. I went from a kind of nobody to like a little superstar myself. When I said I didn't have to give a fuck what they thought? Well, I kind of did give a fuck. After all, that was my world now, it was what I knew. The main thing was seeming not to give a fuck made that idea real and once I adopted that, amazingly a lot of people suddenly thought I was cool. And so did I, to be honest. So as flattered and full of myself as I was, I was also completely, totally, head-over-heels in love with Tamara. Which resulted in a war between Good Amy and Evil Amy. I am Amy's will to have sex with Sorrel. The more Amy rejects me and sublimates me, the more obsessed with Sorrel she will become, and she will totally destroy something wonderful she has with Tamara. Once again I seemed ready to mess up my life, and possibly Tamara's too. Oh yeah, and if that wasn't sick enough, Sorrel also had a girlfriend, Frieda, who was this German, trimly muscled, athlete-girl, ex-track star at the university, current sculpture major... and black-belt martial artist. She'd already given me "I kill Amy now, ja?" vibes. I mean, you'd think since I was Japanese and she was German, there'd be some kind of ex-Axis connection there, or immunity or something. But I had a feeling there wasn't. Anyways, as long as the weather held, I was riding high for the most part. Not talking in a louder voice, just a prouder one. With a lot of self-confidence and show-offy power. I attempted my flatspin more at the skatepark and I sassed off to none other than Heidi Fleegleman whenever the opportunity presented itself (not so often). And when this tall, muscular, floppy-haired guy introduced himself one night at the Lava Lamp when we were enjoying a rare early-hours all-ages show (but not performing in it, unfortunately) and said, "I don't think I know you," I cheekily replied, "But you want to." I turned away to talk to Gina and Michelle and felt someone tapping me on the shoulder. I looked back. It was that guy. He had a mushy ol' head of floppy hair, yeah, but he had this friendly kind of Dave Grohl face. Kind of buck-toothed or a big overbite. Something odd around the mouth. He might have been really handsome otherwise, but I had to admit it made his face more interesting than some slick straight-up good looks might have. And once again, the guy was obviously built for strength and there was no mistaking it with the tight tee he was wearing. "I'm Daniel," he said. I gamely stuck out my hand while keeping an eye on Michelle and Gina, and he grabbed it and pumped it up and down, squeezing it so hard it brought tears to my eyes. Despite the aching hand-bones and blurry vision, I managed to seem really cool when I replied, "I'm Amy." He let me go, my hand still throbbing and I pointed at my friends. "This is Gina and this is Michelle Cho." "Gina doesn't have a last name?" "No." "Oh. Okay. So what are you girls drinking?" "Same as everyone else." By which I mean either water or sodas. "Hey, you were right, though," Daniel said, smiling that big toothy smile again. "About what? Everything?" God, I fucking killed me when I said shit like that. "About wanting to know you." "Oh, great. I can always use more friends. I guess." I shrugged and turned away and tried to get back into the conversation with Gina and Michelle, but it turned out we were four that night. Daniel hung with us and we were kind of forced to get to know him. He was a university student, majoring in biology. He liked a lot of the same band I liked and by the end of the night, I gave him my phone number. I didn't imagine it could hurt anything. Then our strawberry spring ended, and it got cold again. Low gray clouds promised snow, and like an untrustworthy lover, never delivered. Chapter Two: No One Cares About Girls Who Are Lonely, Too That's also when my balloon abruptly popped, at least temporarily. Ever since I became a girl, I'd been kind of moody anyways. I didn't think it had anything to do with being a girl so much as it did this was just the way I was now. Changeable and volatile. Mercurial was the way I liked to think of it. That sounded like a more positive way to frame it, at least it did to me. Well, under the weather the awesome went away and I could just feel the ghost memory of it in my nervous system. It started with a headache and at first I thought just maybe it was the cold going around. But the sore throat never came, and instead of funny snappish, I just got snapping turtle snappish and when I wasn't biting off heads and fingers, I was like super down. Being attuned to my own cycle I quickly clued in to what was happening to me and moaned out loud the moment I realized it with the first fully-formed thought featuring the word itself. I wasn't super regular, but from there I had no doubt in my mind what was happening, and one day going to pee I felt the familiar and then got visual confirmation. A red eye staring back at me from the center of my underwear. My fucking period. That didn't help things. At least I was at home and not at school. So instead of like this new me, I just felt cramps and, of course, bleeding. As a guy I hadn't realized sometimes you'd actually feel the blood come out of you. I mean, why would I have? I'd be like going to the fridge or something and kind of have to stop for a second while it oozed. I wondered if Mom knew. Glance over at her and she'd be doing some work for her job at the dining room table. If she did know, she was cool about it, giving me space. Then I'd decide I really didn't want anything in the fridge anyway and haul ass back to my room to call Sarah. Because another thing that happened was I kind of didn't want to see or talk to anyone but her. Yeah, I kind of clung to Sarah more than usual and she babied me through the heaviest flowing days like the amazing best friend she was. The reason was I just trusted Sarah more than anyone and didn't mind her seeing me not exactly at my best. So I didn't feel much like being around my other friends. I even kept Tam at arm's length, but at least I told her why and she was cool with it. She was kind of like, "Well, I don't mind..." "Ugh," I said, clutching my tummy. I managed to spend this particular period dodging everyone at school and keeping everyone but Super Sarah at bay. Just joking about stuff and smiling a lot or scowling when I had to, but then taking off for home as fast as possible and shutting myself in my room, listening to music (mostly Bratmobile for no particular reason other than I was sort of in this Bratmobile phase at the time, too, probably because they were back together) and doodling in notebooks or reading Emily's old books she'd left, a lot of dog-eared Stephen Kings and shit like that. Just the kind of stuff that makes you not feel so dumb about reading it but also doesn't exactly tax your mental power. When I finally emerged from the other end it was to a lot of phone calls from Lena and Gina telling me to get my ass to Silly Monkey practice, where I had to face my friends. And they had no idea Sorrel wasn't helping us just because Silly Monkey was the second coming of the Pretenders. Well, my energy was coming back and so was my Queen Amy attitude, but I still felt kind of distracted. God, I had so much on my mind! "Amy," Sarah said. She had to say it again before I heard her. "Huh?" I muttered, all dazed and dopey. We'd been playing one of our songs, and I guess I zombied out. Sarah carefully told me I'd once again been playing the wrong song. That startled me into wakefulness pretty fast. "Damn, Amy," Gina said. "What's your fucking deal? You skip practice and now you're here, it's like you're still not." "I'm sorry," I whispered, sucked on my lips, and blinked rapidly in warm-cheeked embarrassment. And then that guy Daniel peeped in at us. Pumpkin-faced smile. If finding out I was apparently living on a different planet from my friends, at least musically, was a wake-up, this felt like I'd been punched in the chest. I all but said, "What the fuck?" out loud. Just kind of like this series of blinks and pops and light flashes in my brain and then I was gesturing Gina outside for a little talk while Daniel, with this shit- eating grin on his face like he couldn't believe what a bitch I was being, made himself at home in our practice space. "We need a smoke break," I explained. "Okay," Sarah said, looking very confused. "Why is he here?" I hissed at Gina when we were far enough away from everyone I was fairly confident they wouldn't hear us. We were actually at the end of the driveway. "Maybe we should smoke," Gina said. "Since that's why you supposedly called me out here and all." Momentary panic. Neither of us had cigarettes on us. Oh well, fuck it, I plunged onward: "Why is he here?" "He just is. He's pretty cool." "Pretty cool? We just met him. Once." "YOU'VE only met him once," Gina countered. "Fuck, dude, how are we supposed to practice with an audience?" "You bring Tamara all the time. She's an audience." "That's different, though." "How do you mean?" I stopped. I didn't know. Well, I did. Two differences, in fact. One difference was, I was in love with Tamara so that meant no boundaries. The other difference was, Daniel was some guy. This had always been our space, just girls. But I didn't want to say it. I didn't want to say something about not being comfortable around guys or anything like that. After all, I was around guys all the time at school, at the skatepark, at the show. It's just that sometimes I wanted to be around just girls. Without any of that guyness guys inevitably brought. Especially when it came to our music in its raw state. Explaining all that to Gina would have worn me out, so I finally just shrugged. "Okay," I told her. "It's better than okay," Gina said. "Plus you fucking gave him your phone number." "I did not." "You did, you little liar. Why on earth would you give the guy your phone number if you didn't want to be friends with him?" "Why do I do anything? Because I'm stupid, that's why." "You are not. You're just... you're getting to be a really mean little bitch." "I learned it from you, okay?" "Maybe I learned it from you. Anyways, it's my house and my rules. So Danny-boy is our audience for the day. As my guest, not yours." I gave her a look like I was going to murder her, but who could argue with Gina-logic? The unstoppable force of Amy met the immoveable object of Gina and as a result, we went back to the garage and I steeled myself to play gracious hostess for the next few minutes, chatting Danny-boy up like he was my long-lost brother or something. "What's up, Queen Amy?" Daniel asked me as I started to put on my bass. I gave Gina another look. A sun-rays through a magnifying glass, ant- melting look. Obviously I had been a topic of discussion behind my back at some point. Gina just smiled sweetly at me. Grimacing in a way I hoped was super-fierce I just said, "Nothing much, dude." The rest of practice didn't go so well. I was now moody and angry and even though I meant to be friendly, I acted pretty standoffishly, which made Daniel tease me the whole time, which made me even angrier. But what could I do? I was kind of trapped. I couldn't just storm off because we needed to improve. Well, I did. And I couldn't yell at Daniel because that would be violating Gina's hospitality. But I felt really picked on and I didn't like it. Finally, when Lena couldn't take my fucking up anymore and we'd played our songs about a million times each and Sarah just stood there between them nervous as anything about having someone watching her, the pressure came off because we were finished. I packed my bass and escorted Sarah out of there as fast as we could go without running. Sarah ended up kind of huffing and puffing along behind me, actually. "That fucking sucked," I told her when we were well away, and I'd slowed down enough Sarah could match my pace really easily. We were just kind of walking along. My bass felt like it weighed a billion tons. I had to hold the case's handle with two hands. Sarah nodded. Then she said, "He likes you." I wanted to scream! So I did. I stopped, set down my bass right on the street, balled my aching hands into fists next to my face, closed my eyes and shrieked. This uber-loud, incredibly high-pitched screech that, when I finished and opened my eyes feeling super refreshed, had turned Sarah's face green. She gaped. A woman getting groceries out of a minivan told us to stop messing around in the street or she'd call the cops on us for disturbing the tranquility or something. "Let's go," Sarah whimpered. I picked up my bass and we walked off, but now I had to hurry to keep up with Sarah. Later, after I'd gotten home and fucked around with different clothes for a while and I was taking a shower, I had an epiphany. It went like this: I'm Amy, and I'm strong. My heart beats only for Tamara, who is flat out the most super-spectacular girl in town, and I can resist Sorrel, no matter how sexy she is. Plus, Sorrel has a girlfriend who could kick my ass 80 different ways in a split second. What kind of sicko with a girlfriend deliberately hits on someone else's girlfriend? And who really gives a shit if Daniel likes me or not? Patrick did and we survived that. Well, kind of. That pleased me as I soaped and rinsed. Whenever Danny-boy got up enough courage to make his big, definitive move, I'd just nonchalantly shrug him off like it was no big deal. He'd probably respect that. And if he turned out to be secretly too chickenshit to try anything with me, which I doubted he was since he seemed cocky as all get-out, well, that was okay, too. Maybe even better for me. Anyways, since I was generally riding pretty high, I decided I could put Sorrel and Daniel both behind me, and even having kissed one of them. After all, it wasn't a crime to be attracted to someone other than your girlfriend, or to make dumb mistakes or errors in judgement. As long as I never acted on it again, everything would be fine. I even sang a little while I toweled off. But not Silly Monkey. Happy Monkey Do. Chapter Two: So Now You Know How to Make a Deal And straight on to Sorrel's house, which she shared with Frieda. It was a Victorian home, with wood siding, all painted white. We had to park down the block because there were so many cars along the street that night, but we enjoyed the walk. The night air was cool and comfortable, and not too damp. A pleasant March evening, with Spring Break not too far away. Silly Monkey was in full effect that night. I'd pulled my hair up into a bunch of wild ponytails held together with rubber bands (I did that a lot). And I had on this black muscle tee with a glitter butterfly on the front and these side ties, these rad glittery black jeans and some platform boots (for once, I was actually taller than the lie I told about my height). Gina looked pretty sexy herself, in a sloppy way, in a black sweater, tight pink tee and shiny gray flares. I couldn't help but notice when her waistband slipped she was wearing guy's underpants. Plaid boxers, probably from Target. Sarah wore a long dress and combat boots, and shy little Lena had on this olive cardigan, and a short black skirt with a Chinese dragon print, and yet another pair of combat boots. And Tamara wore this long-sleeved, red zipper-front polo that was a size too small and showed off her navel, and these faded jeans that rode low on her slim, brown hips. She looked like the grooviest supermodel from the Seventies, like she should be slinking up to Studio 54 instead of to some house party. We walked up the steep concrete steps to the front walk and into Total Music Scene. Light glowed warmly through the windows, and a lot of people milled about on the front porch. The door stood wide open, and music cranked on the stereo, some old Talking Heads: "Road to Nowhere." "Yes!" Gina exclaimed. "I love Talking Heads!" It was on. She and I grinned at each other, linked arms and skipped up the steps and through the crowd. We put on a big show for our arrival. A lot of the people there knew us from other parties where we'd clowned around, all uninhibited and drunk. Tamara followed us, and you could almost hear the heads snapping around as hipster guys checked her out. A total fucking superstar. About few minutes later, Gina and I were rolling. The Terrible Twins. Life of the Party. We'd grabbed our plastic cups off the keg, filled them up, and then had taken long drinks. I had a beer foam mustache on my upper lip, so I did my infamous wide-eyed Amy stare and almost choked Gina to death with laughter. I felt like a little goddess, and after another cup I felt even better. A lot of people from bands were there, but I didn't see Sorrel or Frieda. But it was a pretty big party (if a little too laid back for my taste), and a huge house. We stood under vast oak trees, and if I looked up, I could make out the stars through the branches. And a blinking red light from a distant radio tower. "So, do you come 'ere ofteen?" I said to Gina, with this thick, French accent. I raised an eyebrow at her like some kind of Eurotrash perv. "Why, suh, yes, ah do believe ah do," she replied, all Scarlett O'Hara and magnolia trees. Worried Sarah wigged out. "You're not going to act all... like, weird, are you?" "No, honey," I said. "I won't be weird. I'll be whatever you want me to be." "'American Beauty!'" Gina shouted, and sloshed beer over her hand. "Oh hell yeah!" I shouted. The more sedate party-goers gaped. We linked arms again, and left Tamara, Lena and Sarah by the keg. I told Gina, "I really think you and I should get married." "My father will object. He hates the Japanese for what they did to him during the war," Gina said, in this melodramatic Bette Davis voice. "And yet the doctors told him he could never have children," I replied. "And he never did." Sorrel caught us at the foot of the stairs inside the main hall, where we'd pushed our way through the bathroom line and deliberately spilled beer on partygoers. "Never did what?" I stopped short, and Gina almost pulled my arm out its socket before she realized someone had spoken to us. Oh fuck... this wasn't going to be as easy as I'd thought. Sorrel looked amazing. A little on the pale side, but a very Mediterranean paleness. The party lights, this kind of dim Christmassy glow, gave her skin an alluring radiance, too. Like just a kiss of the sun would bring out this delicious brown. Curly dark hair, black tank, tattooed shoulders and arms on display. Not good. I started to crack. I was getting a serious girl-boner. Melting away. I am Amy's will to cheat on Tamara. "Oh hi," Gina greeted her, because I was too sex-struck to talk. "Hey, it's so cool what you're doing for us. We all really appreciate it." "Hey, you girls earned it," Sorrel said, and smiled at me. I blinked, and then found my tongue, but my voice came out thick. Oh fuck, I was probably rapidly coming down with all the symptoms of Sexual Arousal: "Yeah, we fuckin' rock." "Well, you found the keg," Sorrel said. I dragged Gina away right as she started to say something back. I had to get away from Sorrel, and find Tamara. I felt frenzied, and my heart was a hummingbird's. I'd be safe with Tamara, and any sexy thoughts I had would be directed at her. We just had to negotiate this artsy-fartsy crowd. I pulled Gina through the bathroom bunch again, into the kitchen and out the back door. We found a group of guys in black turtlenecks around Sarah, but no Tamara or Lena. "Oh fuck," I gasped. "What?" "Nothing. But we need to save Sarah." "Hold on," Gina said. "I'll be back." Hold on? No. Not hold on. Gina and I were partners, spy girls. Smart asses, and we were going to shake up this party. But instead, she'd spotted Daniel, unmistakable through the kitchen window thanks to his lank black hair and wide-shouldered frame. She darted to him. So! That's what was up, huh? Even with this sudden insight, I felt abandoned. Ditched for a dickhead. Panicked, I crashed Sarah's little scene. "Oh, hi," one of the guys near Sarah said. He had long blond hair, and this really groomed beard and a huge Adam's apple that bobbed. And the wispiest, wimpiest voice I'd ever heard coming from someone with balls, which I assumed he had, but couldn't be too sure. "You're the bassist, right?" "And you are?" I challenged him right away. "Oh, my name's Troy," he told me. Then he went, "Um." "Troy's an artist," Sarah told me. Then she went off on Dallas, and how Troy needed to meet her. "Great," I said with a sickly smile, then dashed back into the house. Fuck that noise. Sarah was on her own. I now had my own problems to deal with. The main one of which turned out to be Troy. Everywhere I went, he turned up, and kept asking me stupid questions about our band, and Japan. And then he'd start on these rambling monologues about anime and manga, and how he loved to draw that way, like just because I was Japanese I gave a shit. And his Adam's apple bobbed constantly (I found myself staring at it with equal parts fascination and repulsion). I used the old "I need to use the bathroom" trick on him a couple of times and hid out in the kitchen or near the keg, but he kept finding me. Then he asked for my phone number, so I gave him a fake one and said I needed to look for my friends. He told me where he'd last seen Sarah, and then hugged me and said how glad he was we'd gotten a chance to really converse, because parties like these "tend to be all about having fun." Well, yeah. What the fuck did he think they were about? I decided to go upstairs and see if maybe Tamara was up there. People tended to sneak off into dark rooms in houses like these so they could smoke pot with just a few intimate friends. And Tamara had this sixth sense for pot. You know, "I see stoned people." Instead, I found Sorrel, Frieda, and some others I'd never met, all in this almost completely unfurnished room with a big-assed fireplace on one end, and one of those multi-setting lamps. They had the lamp dimmed, and were sharing a pipe, all sitting on the floor. Mostly all these older men and women, including this really short guy with gray hair who turned out to be some local author. I felt like a little girl who'd woken up because mom and dad were having friends over and they'd gotten a little too noisy. It was a school night, wasn't it? Or not. Anyway, it wasn't my scene. I shrank under their mild even friendly collective gaze into just this dumb high school kid out of her depth. Plus, to top it off, Frieda didn't seem too pleased to see me. I was about to run for my very life, but Sorrel invited me in. "Everyone, I want you to meet Amy Komori," Sorrel said. "She plays bass for Silly Monkey." I felt like a fucking child among these people, and they forced me to sit with them. Trapped. I could hear the party downstairs (more 80s music... "We can dance if you want to/we can leave your friends behind/because your friends don't dance/and if they don't dance/then they're no friends of mine"), and I so desperately wanted to bolt, but I didn't. I guess I was pissed at Tamara for ditching me, for whatever reason. And then there was Sorrel. I wanted to impress her. I wanted to show her I could hang. But why? My mantra against her wasn't working! They asked me all these questions about our music, and what I was majoring in at the university. Sorrel and Frieda both knew I had a fake ID that said I was 22, but they knew I was 15. Or at least I thought they did. Still, they didn't stop me as I played along and made out like I was undecided, but then this Amy impulse took over, and I made this long, bullshit speech about how I was probably going into medicine. I really laid it on thick, with all this "I want to be a humanitarian" stuff. All the while, we passed the pipe, and I got really fucked up. I'd only been buzzed before, but now I was gone. They talked about Indie films, real art house stuff, so I kept bringing up two of my favorites: "Shakes the Clown" and "The Breakfast Club." I got on a Molly Ringwald kick, and I drove almost everyone away by working in a reference to her in nearly every sentence. My standard reply to anything began, "Well, as Molly Ringwald would say..." or, "When Molly Ringwald was in 'Stephen King's The Stand'..." They were getting pissed and trying to cut me out of the talk now. It was so obvious. After all, I was being a real obnoxious little bitch, and through it all, I understood Sorrel was loving every second of it. I was her prize pet on display, or something. Every asshole thing I said made Sorrel laugh. I felt like if Janeane Garafolo and Jon Stewart had a fucked-up Japanese daughter, it would have been me. Even Frieda couldn't take it anymore, and she was good friends with the writer-guy, so they decided to go downstairs. Alone in the room, Sorrel and I just looked at each other for a moment, then burst into hysterical laughter at our shared joke. Then we kissed. Okay, at that point, my heart went off like a roman candle just THUD THUD THUD and I knew I should go downstairs and brave Troy and really find Sarah and the rest and get out of there. But I didn't. I'd lost the energy to fight this anymore, and I knew no matter what lies I'd told myself, deep inside I wanted it to happen. Grinning helplessly and breathing really fast and shallowly as my body totally took over from my mind, I let Sorrel take me by the hand and lead me to her bedroom, the one she shared with Frieda. My mouth was so dry at that point, my lips stuck to my teeth. I had to pee. At least, I thought I did. It may have been the excitement. Sorrel sat me on the bed, and helped me pull off my top. I wasn't wearing a bra, and she smiled when she saw my little breasts. As small as they were, she would have to have been blind not to see them thanks to the blatant tan lines outline. They were there in pale cream, brownish and pebbled areolae and nipples, surrounded by my deep skater's tan. A draft brought out goosebumps all over me, and I shivered (I'd like to think there was a draft). For a moment I thought Sorrel was going to say something about them, but she just pushed me down into the softness of her mattress so that I was lying there with my feet over the side; only they were no longer touching the floor. Then her lips and warm hands went all over me up there. She kept finding a trail down my tummy almost to my waistline and I shook harder all over with aching desire for her to really do something to me. "Can I tell you something?" Sorrel whispered. "I guess..." "I wanted you the first time I laid eyes on you. That Halloween show at El Banditos? When you were dressed like Mia Wallace?" "Yeah." Holy jesus fuck, lady, that was a million years ago, and you pick NOW to start having a conversation with me? More tonguing and less tongue, please! "I've been wondering. That tall girl you're with a lot?" "Tam?" "Is that her name? Long black hair?" "Oh. Emily." "I thought maybe you were seeing her, but I guess not." I stifled a giggle despite my physical state. "Emily is my sister, dude." "Sister?" "Sister." "You don't look anything alike." "No, we wouldn't. I'm... kinda... adopted." "Oh. I didn't mean to go there. I mean, if that's a problem-" "Well, it's definitely a sad story. We're... we're like cousins, I guess. Biologically. It's hard to explain. I don't think about it much." That, of course, wasn't completely true. But the way I thought about it had more to do with having once been a guy and even though I'd left that behind and any thoughts of reclaiming it or even wanting to, it was true I didn't give my current relationship to Emily the kind of conscious thought I figured Sorrel would take it I meant. And that's how she took it. "Oh. I'm sorry, I didn't mean to pry..." "It's cool. It's just I take it for granted she's my sister. I mean, to me she is. Like if we'd been born from the same mom. Do you understand?" "Yeah." And that part was definitely true. Emily was my real sister. So I told Sorrel that. She said, "Thanks for being so open with me about it. If it hurts, we can totally change the topic." "I kind of like that other topic we were into," I said, thinking how sly I must be. Sorrel grinned. "I have to admit that's something else I've been curious about. To be completely honest with you, I've been interested in you." "What about your girlfriend?" "Frieda. We're poly." "Who is Polly?" "We are. Well, I am." "I... don't get it. Is Polly like your name for each other or something? Like you named your relationship after a parrot?" I felt so stupid when Sorrel laughed. She couldn't help it, I understood afterwards, but it was obvious she was laughing at me. "No, I mean I'm poly. Polyamorous. Right now I'm with Frieda, but I'm open to more. Anyways, this seems like it would be a good time to tell you that our relationship isn't monogamous. Frieda's free to pursue whatever or whoever she wants. And so am I." "Oh..." I knew what those words meant, of course. Well, monogamous. Polyamorous was a completely new concept but I sort of grasped the implication of the two words used together and kind of aimed at me in this situation. I made a mental note to ask Dall about it later. She was my go-to girl on that kind of knowledge. She knew more about shit like that than I could imagine. Well, duh. Sorrel felt she owed me a little more explanation. "It's just... well... we have a certain kind of..." I stopped her with, "I get it." Sorrel smiled. "That fast, huh?" Now I felt like she was making fun of me. I didn't like it. "I'm a fast learner." God, was she ever going to get down to business? I was thinking, I don't want to share life stories. I want to share spit, dude. If you're going to fuck me, you'd better get it over with fast because... She went back down and kissed my tummy but this time I wasn't feeling it at all. My body was. But my brain had opted out. I just had to get my tongue to agree to spread the message before my brain decided it wanted back in. "Yes," I said. Then I quickly added, "I mean... No." It took all the effort I could muster to say it. No. My body burned for her still, the magic ghost feelings of her mouth left fading imprints all over my breasts and stomach. Oh, and plus saliva cooling my skin but slowly drying there. She'd slobbered on me. It was unavoidable. At first it was erotic, not it was annoying. And I couldn't let my hormones rule me. The wanting to fuck Sorrel had been almost more than I could stand, while Confusion and Guilt fought Fun and Lust inside me for the tagteam title, and I felt the pain. But now I was coming back into myself, a little pissed at both me and at Sorrel. Sorrel stopped petting me, and sat up abruptly, so I got out from under her and grabbed my shirt. Once I motivated myself not to do this, I had to follow through quickly, and that's when I had an emotional reaction to the near miss. "Look, Sorrel," I told her, with a stammer. "I can't. I... oh fuck. I don't want this to mess up what you're doing for our band, but I'm... I'm with someone, I'm in love with someone, and I can't do this. I mean, I totally fucking want to, but my relationship? It's kinda supposed to be monogamous. I'll quit Silly Monkey if you want me to so it's not fucked up for everyone else, but I can't do this." By the time I finished that brave little speech, I heroically started crying. Guilt had won, against all odds, and that was her price as Champion of Amy's Emotions. I felt ashamed, more so than ever. I didn't deserve Tamara, I didn't deserve anyone. Sorrel helped me put my shirt back on and kept telling me not to worry, that everything was cool. "No, it's not," I told her. "I'm not cool. I can't believe I almost did this." "Who is it? That boy I saw you talking to?" That was the perfect thing for Sorrel to say. Even as I brushed tears from my eyes, I laughed the wild laughter of the emotionally naked. Troy? That geek? Wow, she had no fucking clue it turned out. That humanized her and then I could deal with things and I felt more in control of myself. I told her fuck no, that wasn't who it was at all. Then she told me she had been kidding, that she pretty much knew it was Tamara. She even stroked my silly, pony-tailed hair in a totally non-sexual way. Finding out she was actually very clued in didn't have the opposite effect on me. I didn't start worshipping her again or anything. She stayed safely human. But the best thing was, Sorrel then stammeringly made it clear that this had nothing to do with Silly Monkey, that everything was still on, and she still wanted to give our demo to her friend with the all-girl label, and that I shouldn't feel guilty because I was actually amazingly cool to have stopped when I did, at the point of maximum desire. I wasn't sure I believed all of it, because I was pretty sure she had kind of hinted at an exchange of favors in a way, but I wanted to believe her. I really wanted to. Chapter Three: You're Fired, So Yeah, You Win Sorrel and I had to sneak down the steps separately so it wouldn't look so much like we'd been together, but the rest of the party was uneventful, although Gina got mad with me for not telling her I was getting stoned. I wasn't back to normal by any stretch of the imagination, and I kept waiting for Tamara to show up and accuse me of cheating. She'd been next door of all places, hanging with the people who lived there, this group of friends. She knew a "friend-of-a-friend," one of those kinds of deals, and so she'd gone and she'd made a lot of new friends for herself. She was kind of cool that way. And the way she told us was all so casual. Not out to impress anyone. Okay, maybe for some people just ditching one party for a house of virtual strangers would be no big deal. Tam was one of those people. But for me and my friends, it was a big deal. We didn't do stuff like that. It never would have even occurred to any of us. Fuck, half the time whenever I met a new person it almost immediately turned into an ordeal. So I couldn't help but stare at her lovingly as a result. I mean, of course I loved her and all of that. But as huge as she was for me just knowing she'd done something I thought of as super-ballsy like that really made me admire her. Like as a person, not simply as my girlfriend. Friend girl. Sorrel invited us all back upstairs to burn some more weed, and that took care of Gina. Who then ruthlessly started giving me shit because she'd seen the whole Troy scene earlier. Suddenly, he was my boyfriend, then my fiance. Both Tamara and Sorrel seemed to enjoy that more than anyone. A hell of a lot more than I did, but I felt like I deserved it at that point. Yeah, I stayed pretty subdued for the rest of the evening. A near-death experience tends to do that to you. If Tamara thought anything about it, she didn't let on. That night, she looked like a serene sphinx, but she did remark once or twice over the next week how much extra attention I'd started giving her. Frieda sure as hell knew something had happened, though. I figured one of these days, she'd crumple me up like a chewing gum wrapper, and I had it coming. No doubt. After that, Sorrel was always around, like our manager or something. She even brought Frieda to one of our practices. And never once touched me on the ass, or lingered in a hug. She also got us a show, just like she'd said she would. She asked us if we wanted to, and we were all in, even Sarah, who didn't say anything, only nodded and looked distressed. It happened so fast, too. A week after that conversation, Sorrel showed up and handed out the proofs of the ad that would be running in the next couple of days in the local music scene paper. It was like we'd suddenly become a real band instead of just high school kids pretending. This was what we'd wanted. Well, I'd wanted it. I just assumed everyone else did. Lena was practically drooling over it. You could see in her eyes she was really fired up. "Just to kinda make things up to you," Sorrel told me in private during a rest break that practice. "Make up what?" "Some of the things I said when we first met," she said. She smiled. "I put you on the spot." "No, it's casual," I lied. "I'm trying to be a better person." "Me, too." So while she was still nice to me in a more laid-back way that was slowly and gently putting me more and more at ease, mostly, Sorrel focused her attention on Sarah, and kept her nerves soothed. I mean, we weren't opening, but this wasn't a crappy holiday weekend show when all the students were gone, either. This was the big time: a prime weekend show at the Mixer. In a blaze of weed and lower-than-average pop quiz grades (and higher- than-average absenteeism), it came. Show night. We punked out big time. Tamara and I braided my hair into tiny pigtails that flopped all over, and I got into a little black strappy tank, these super giant Dickies girl pants that I'd bought for skating but were still all covered in new and these mary janes with big silver buckles. Oh man, they fucking gleamed. They had big ass treads that were actually anarchy symbols. Probably in my fast life I'd have said something super sneering about that and I hadn't even been all that sneering a guy the way I saw it now. In my current configuration, leaving anarchy symbols everywhere seemed like a revolutionary act of defiance. I delighted in the possibility. Someone will see my footprint and know what real anarchy is! I also put on my signature beaded bracelets. I did it in a dreamy, thoughtful way, like fully aware of who I was and what I was doing. I thought I looked like Mitsuyo's younger sister, if she had one. Gooseflesh stood the very fine hairs on my arms on end. I totally liked myself at that moment. I totally liked being a girl. Being this kind of girl. It passed and I laughed at myself. Sarah once again transformed herself into a silvery faerie queen. If she'd only known how amazingly beautiful she was. But she got all squeaky, and couldn't keep her hands in her lap. Gina and Lena wore fitted tees and jeans, but Gina'd bleached her hair and dyed it blue. We spent almost all day at the Mixer, drinking water and peeing a lot. The main band, Float, had been in town since the previous day, and we'd even gone out to eat with them the night before. They looked like regular girls, dressed pretty much the way we did. Except Cameron, who played bass and wrote all the songs. She was sort of bitchy and distant, and had this whole fragile, baby doll aura about her, like she thought she was Courtney Love. I wanted to slap her, and she made little sarcastic, challenging remarks about us all night. The rest of the girls seemed especially to dig me, because I was the shortest and loudest, and I'd been wisecracking up a storm lately because of course I had. And to cover up any residual guilt from my near-miss with Sorrel. But come show night, they looked totally awesome, so much cooler than we did. I guessed that was part of the difference between a wannabe act like Silly Monkey, and a real touring band. They acted like they didn't give a shit, but under pressure, they kicked it up a notch. We were going to be outclassed, for sure... unless we did something stupid. And we were just the girls to do it. "I love those shoes, Amy!" Melora, their lead guitarist, chirped when she saw me. She looked like a fucking goddess, in a black silk shirt opened at her navel, and these low-slung black velvet pants. "Thanks," I said, lamely. Nerves, and all. Suddenly, I didn't feel so much like an anarchist. Plus, I thought I looked like a little girl pretending to be a rock star next to Melora and the rest. Cameron barely noticed me, but I sure as fuck noticed her. Tons of mascara streaming down her face, this short satin dress, lots of tattoos. I guess she was supposed to look like the forlorn, heroin- addicted prom queen. Mission accomplished, you pretentious bitch. It took forever for us to get started, and when we did, the place was packed. And hot. But man, it fuckin' rocked. Sarah and Lena more than made up for any little mistakes Gina and I made. But I put on a show, all for Tamara. I jumped off my amp, I played lying down on the stage, I threw my bass up and caught it. Actually, that was kind of a dumb thing to have done. For one thing, Green Destiny came pretty close to clipping my chin or coming down right on my mouth. That might have been interesting, I was sure, but not having that happen after my recent run of injuries was a relief. As was actually catching the bass. It was heavy on my best days but hurtling down into my hands it almost pulled my shoulders out of their sockets. I managed to spring back into the song without too many missed notes, which was another minor miracle. And then, right at the end of our set, while the sounds were still sustaining and people were starting to clap, I caught this strange white blur from the corner of my eye. At first I thought someone had released a dove or something bizarre and biblical like that. Instead, it was the Apocalypse. Lena smashed her guitar. She'd torn off her Strat, and when I turned to avoid being hit by bird feathers or something, what I saw was her body poised tightly, all her muscles clenched as she raised her guitar over her head in a classic lumberjack pose. Then she swung it down and it flashed in the blue and red stage lights, and then blurred. CRACK! The body struck the stage with this sharp sound and Sarah let out a little yelp, her eyes fluttering shut as she stepped back. Lena brought the guitar up in an arc and down it went again the same way. Another CRACK! This time the strings popped and the neck broke, and the little black knobs flew off into the crowd. Mayhem erupted. These really drunk skinny guys jumped on the stage and grabbed for my bass. I managed to unplug and hand it to Gina, who made a break with it to the side. One of the drunk guys had his shirt off, all skinny muscles and sweat and I leaped from the stage like someone going over the side from the Titanic. With nothing now to smash and no one to pummel, the drunks kind of fell on each other and the mic stand flew away like a silver javelin. Unfortunately my desperate escape put me in the mosh pit, and being barely over five feet and about a buck o'nothin', that was no place for me. Not at that moment, anyways. A fucking mosh pit at a Silly Monkey show? No time for wonder as six-footers weighing 200 pounds knocked the shit out of me, I was being battered around like a fucking black-haired shuttlecock at a full-contact badminton event on ESPN or something, and then someone's arm went around my shoulders and pulled me clear before I got seriously hurt. Daniel, steroidal Dave Grohl himself, completely drunk. I thanked him, and looked back to see the scene. Gina tried to insert her drumsticks into someone's nose, and the burly bouncers whisked Sarah and Lena off, and some of the cooler guys in the crowd separated moshers. Then the house lights came on. Chaos. I loved it. Our best show so far! But I heard Daniel jawing at me. "What?" I shouted. "This!" he shouted back, and pulled me close and fucking kissed me. His tongue battled my lips as it tried to get through. It wasn't easy, but I pushed his face away. He grabbed hold of the front of my pants and since they were several sizes too big, they opened up for him and he took that as an invitation to jam one of his hands down there. Holy fuck, he was molesting me right there on the dance floor. Shit like that was fun to sing about when it was Frank Black in a parking lot and in the abstract, but the reality of it was... I was about as terrified as I had ever been in my life. Except maybe that one time what seemed like decades before outside someone in particular's window when Emily and I hightailed it and I peed myself. This was documentary-style, real and in my face or just couple of feet below it. "You fucking asshole!" I shouted. "Get the fuck off me!" Gina flew up from fuck knows where, and just as quickly, Tamara pulled me from Daniel's grip. Daniel had unbuckled my belt and it came away in his hand, right through the loops and I had presence of mind to grab my pants before they dropped to the floor. Gina screamed at Daniel, shrieked at him, really. She called him a fucking asshole and a lot of other things that kind of rolled together and almost sounded like a different language. Daniel, all seventy five feet of him, actually looked scared. You could kind of see him shrinking and Gina just kept it up. "Holy fuck," Tam said, looking at me with this huge eyes. It was almost worth the terror to see Gina in action. In fact, fear turned into total amazement. My mouth moved in unvoiced words, and I took it all in with ultra-wide eyes while adrenaline freely pumped through me and made me shake like I was Queen Popsicle of the North Pole. "Holy fuck," Sarah whispered, but it was at least loud enough to hear. "That's love," Tam said. "Gina's in love with that guy? But he kissed Amy," Sarah said. I had to admit I was right there with her in confusion. "No," Tam said gently. "She loves her!" And she pointed at me, while grinning a huge toothy grin that made her eyes narrow and twinkle and sparkle and glitter and glint. My already overactive heart skipped a beat. Found out! But no, Tam meant friendship love. Gina beat Daniel over the head verbally with great force and friendship love for me. Did I deserve it? I wasn't sure. I didn't care. I just knew I felt a sudden warmth wash over me. It was warmness, cookies from the oven warm. It radiated from Gina's own heart to mine. It encompassed her, me, Sarah, Lena, my sister Emily, all of us together. And Tam. And Tam. I was safe from harm, at least for the moment. When Gina finished killing him, Daniel kind of poofed like a ghost out the front door and then my freckle-faced hero was taking me by the arm, handing my back my belt (which I quickly started threading back though the loops on my pants) and Tam, too, and sweeping us together with Sarah and Lena in our wake back to the ready room that housed the manga-styled graffiti done by none other than the Greatest Heroine the World Has Ever Known, Mitsuyo of Happy Monkey Do. Tamara and I followed, and left Daniel on the floor. "Oh fuck, Gina," I told her when we got back there. "That was amazing!" My teeth were chattering, my hands finished hooking up my belt, now moving all over, fingers flexing and flying. She told me she knew it wasn't. "I'm sorry," she added. "Fucking asshole." "Why are you sorry? You destroyed that guy." "I thought he was cool. I invited him to our space. You were right and I was wrong, so I'm sorry." I shook my head. I'd survived. She'd saved me. I was okay. All I had to do was calm down now, and that was happening in the flood of love feelings for my friends and family. "Dude, if we had to do it all over again, I wouldn't change anything just to see you go off like that on him one more time." Gina laughed. She brushed her hands over my little braids. "They tickle," she reported. Float went on thirty minutes later, and dedicated their first song to our Guitar Goddess, Lena, who stood in the same spot where Gina had opened up her whip-ass on Daniel (forever after known as "The Place Where Gina Killed Daniel"), and looked gorgeous, but in a mournful way because she'd also murdered her prized guitar and set off that whole fucked up scene. "Why did I do it?" she asked me when I came over and put an arm around her shoulders. "After all the shit I gave you about dinging my bass?" "Don't be sorry," I finally told her. "It's rock and or roll, baby, and it fuckin' freaked me out!" After that, I felt so elated. I was never so proud to be a girl. And not just any girl. A girl among these particular girls. They were my world and I loved them and depended on them more than anything. And also my mom and Emily, who were there only in spirit. I could hear Float playing through the walls. Despite the muffled effect, they sounded awesome, even Cameron. I slipped out to listen. I don't know what Cameron's deal was, but on-stage she ruled, and I could've easily fallen in love with her if I wasn't with Tamara. Then I fled because about a dozen guys wanted to buy me drinks. And half of them looked like Daniel. I shuddered at the thought, and then went to the bathroom to wash my lips with soap and water. Things are going to be really interesting from here on out, I told my reflection in the mirror. Then I put it out of my mind and went back to join my friends and enemies. The End