The Book of Love (12 page)

L
ucy lay there, breathing in the canvas-scented air, eyes closed but so far from sleep. When the three of them had arrived back at Tent City an hour before, Lucy had expected Liza to declare that the night wasn’t over yet—to suggest finding guys, more drinks, a better party. Instead
she had simply stripped to her underwear and bra right there in the field, climbed through the door of the tent, curled up in a sleeping bag, and started to snore. Olivia had followed and a few minutes later, she was sleeping too. And now there was Lucy, dressed in a pair of pajama pants and a T-shirt, cheek pressed against someone’s balled-up sweatshirt. She’d been trying to will herself to sleep, but every time she closed her eyes, she saw flashes of images she wasn’t sure she wanted to see—Colin’s face as he walked away, Liza’s mother on the bed, her own mother sitting in that chair in the living room, Beacon’s hopeful smile, Tristan’s expression when she broke his heart, Tristan and Phee laughing.

Lucy tried to focus on other things, to force the images out. What was Gil doing at that very moment? But it was impossible for her to imagine. The Gil in the trailer with Beacon was not a Gil Lucy had ever met before.

There were sounds coming from outside the tent—the patter of footsteps in the grass, quiet words, hushed laughter.

Lucy pulled herself out of the sleeping bag and shoved her feet into a pair of flip-flops, and then she reached up, unzipped the tent, and crawled through.

Outside, a dozen people were sitting on blankets, cuddled up together like kids at a sleepover party, watching one of the giant movie screens. Lucy stood off to the side. The film projected onto the screen was in a language she did not recognize, and she could barely read the dusty yellow subtitles.

Off in the distance, tents were lighting up and going dark like big fireflies sending secret messages.

The movie watchers laughed in unison.

It was cold out now, and Lucy pulled the sweatshirt more tightly around her. She wished she had her bike with her and could ride off somewhere, or even just around and around. Her muscles itched. She needed to move. She started to walk, weaving her way between tents and sleeping bags. She went slowly at first, then faster and faster until her legs burned and her heart pumped hard. And when the images tried to invade her brain, she walked so fast she left them behind her.

Boom.

Lucy didn’t know how long she’d been out walking when the fireworks started.

Boom.

Lucy’s heart lurched as light streaked across the sky.

Boom, boom, boom.
Pink showered down. Orange and green sea creatures spread out their legs. Then the embers faded to their ghosts in smoke.

People were coming out of their tents now, flipping on flashlights as the sky lit up gold.

And there was Lucy, leaning back against the fence at the far edge of the field, watching it all. She was alone. And then someone was next to her.

“No matter how many times you see them,” a girl’s voice said, “they’re never any less magical.”

Lucy turned. Purple lit up the sky and the face of the long-haired Heartbreaker from the bonfire.

“Hey,” said the girl. “I think we met earlier, right?”

Lucy nodded as yellow exploded overhead. “So I guess you guys are also here for Beacon,” she said. There was no reason not to talk about it now, she supposed. Not since Gil was already with him.

“Sure, but everyone else too. This whole thing, actually.” A swirl of rainbow sparks shot through the sky. “You sure as hell don’t get shows like this in Bridgewater.” The girl shook her head. She grinned as the fireworks lit up her face again. She brought her hands up, cupped her mouth, and let out a
woo
of sheer wonder and pure delight.

How strange this other Heartbreaker was, how unlike Liza or Olivia, or even Gil now.

Lucy could make out the silhouettes of dozens of people standing outside their tents, heads back, arms pointed up toward the sky. Out in Tent City someone
woo-
ed back, then someone else, their joyous cries echoing through the crowd. The girl cheered one more time. And Lucy felt an odd surge of jealousy toward this girl, toward all of them.

“Your tattoo,” Lucy said. “How . . .” She wanted to ask this girl how she was a Heartbreaker but could still somehow be connected to all of these people.

There was another flash of light, a swirl of pink and red and crimson. Only when Lucy turned toward the girl and looked again, she realized the mark over the girl’s heart wasn’t a locked Heartbreaker heart at all. The tattoo was a purple flower, with heart-shaped petals opened wide, vines and leaves curling underneath. She was just a regular girl after all, and yet there was something about her. . . .

“What about it?” said the girl.

“It’s pretty,” said Lucy.

“Thank you.”

“Does it mean something?” said Lucy.

The girl smiled. “More than you could ever imagine.”

And they stood there together until the fireworks ended, but neither of them said anything after that.

Eighteen

T
he first thing Lucy saw when she woke up was the empty spot in the tent where Gil wasn’t. And the second thing she saw was the blinking light on her phone. She had a text from Gil: a little winky face all on its own.

“Did you guys get . . . ?” Lucy started to say.

Olivia and Liza were already awake. Liza was still in her sleeping bag, facedown in her pillow, letting out periodic miserable groans. Olivia was sitting cross-legged, finger-combing her hair.

“We saw,” said Liza, her voice muffled. “We got it too.”

“It’s good news,” Olivia said simply. “I can’t imagine it will be long before she’s done.”

“So what do we do now?” said Lucy. She sat up. Her head hurt and her mouth was dry. It was morning, only a few hours after Lucy had gone to bed, but somehow she was wide-awake.

“Nothing,” Olivia said. She reached for a pair of dark jeans and a charcoal gray sweater. “We just enjoy the day. Your show is in a few hours.”

Somehow with everything else going on, Lucy had barely even thought about it.

“Are you still doing that?” Liza said, rolling over.

“I don’t know . . . ,” Lucy said slowly.

“Well, what would be the point?” Liza sat up. There were pillow creases on her face and dried drool crust in the corners of her mouth. She was stunning as ever. “Gil’s already with Beacon.”

Olivia pulled her hair up into a bun. “But, of course, you could,” Olivia said. “If you wanted to. Do you?”

Olivia turned toward Lucy. A show at SoundWave—did Lucy want to perform?

How strange that Lucy didn’t really know, or care about, the answer.

An hour later, they stood out in the field with the food trucks, sipping coffees with two Heartbreakers Liza and Olivia knew.

“So that’s it,” Liza finished. “She’s still with him. And I think we can pretty much guess where all this is going.”

One of the Heartbreakers shrugged. “That’s nice, I suppose.”

Liza smirked and turned to Lucy. “They’re pretending they don’t care that we’re winning.”

The other Heartbreaker rolled her eyes. “We’re just here for fun,” she said. “What could anyone give us that we don’t already have?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” Liza said. She tossed her coffee cup toward a big metal trash can. It swooped right in. “Victory?”

“Oh, right,” said the first Heartbreaker. “That.” And they all laughed.

Back in Tent City, Lucy wandered. The bands had started playing a couple of hours before, and most everyone was off watching them. But there was Lucy, alone with her camera looking for something to photograph.

When she’d first started taking pictures the summer before, something funny had happened—she started seeing the world ever-so-slightly differently whether her eye was behind a lens or not. It was like she was always on high alert, and without even consciously thinking about it, she was constantly finding things that would give her that
ping-
y feeling in her gut, a feeling that could only be relieved by the click of a shutter.

Only now she could barely remember the last time she’d really
needed
to take a picture. She wanted to feel that again, that sense of urgency, that deep inner itch. But as she walked through Tent City, all she saw were blandly pretty things—a bird in the air, a pile of flowers. She looked inside for the
ping
, for the pull, but there was just nothing there.

The New Voices stage was set under a miniature circus tent of red and white stripes.

Lucy stood down the stairs to the side, hair teased, rock chick outfit on, squeezing the neck of her brand-new guitar. Why was she doing this again? Why was she bothering? Even she wasn’t entirely sure. Maybe she just needed to prove to herself she could do it—she could still feel that rush of connection she used to feel when she sang. Then again, maybe she was just bored. And had already put on all that eyeliner . . .

Up onstage a guy was whistling and playing a small set of drums. It didn’t sound like much to Lucy, but when he finished, the crowd gave the closest thing to a standing ovation you could get from a bunch of people who were already standing. They must be an easy audience, Lucy decided. Which was good, because she was finally starting to get nervous. And it was her turn to go.

Lucy climbed the stairs and walked out onstage. She could feel a couple hundred people staring up at her. She unfocused her eyes a bit so she wouldn’t have to see them.

“Hello,” she said into the microphone. “My name’s Lucy, and this is a song I wrote for . . .” She paused. She’d written it for Alex, but it was her song now. “Someone I cared about a lot, back when I was really stupid.” She heard a few people laugh. She inhaled one last time, then opened her mouth and let out a note, high and clear.

Oooooooooo

I see you here when you’re not

I . . .

Lucy felt a sudden coldness deep in her chest, like someone had thrust her heart into a freezer. She took a breath as the coldness spread out through her torso, down her arms, to the tips of her fingers, carrying with it a buzzing energy. What was happening? She couldn’t think about that now. She’d only sung one line. And the crowd would be expecting a next one.

I feel you here when you’re not

I see your face in the sky when you’re not here

She cringed as she heard herself.

You’re always here, you’re always here

You are you are you are

How had she ever written such corny lyrics? And sang them like she really meant them? And how had a crowd ever loved it?

She looked out into the audience.
Well, this one certainly didn’t.
They looked bored. A girl whispered something to her friend. A guy was staring down at his phone. A couple linked arms and strolled away.

Lucy tried to ignore the crowd, to look away. But it didn’t matter because she could imagine what they were thinking—here was just another girl with a kind of pretty voice singing about nothing that meant anything. Not to them and certainly not to her. She couldn’t understand how it ever had.

She raced through the rest of the song, and finally it was over. There was a smattering of polite claps, and on top of
them the sound of two people cheering like crazy. Lucy looked down at the crowd again, and there right up at the front were Tristan and Phee screaming their heads off. Olivia and Liza were nowhere in sight. Lucy left the stage.

Back on the ground Phee flung herself at Lucy and squeezed her tight.

“That was amazing!” Phee said. And Lucy thought for a moment what a kind person this girl must be to say that, to try to make Lucy believe it. Behind her Tristan was nodding. He held his hand out for a high five.

“Yeah, bud,” he said. “That was really great!” But Lucy could see from the look in his eyes that he didn’t really mean it.

“Well,” said Lucy. “At least that’s over.” And she forced a smile.

Up onstage, the next act had started. The crowd was clapping and stomping, Lucy’s crap performance entirely forgotten as though it never happened at all.

Phee reached into her pocket and took out her phone. She stared down at the screen. “I just got an alert from the SoundWave boards.” She began to read. “‘With great apologies to his fans, Beacon Drew has pulled out of the concert, citing personal reasons and dehydration.’”

“Personal reasons
and
dehydration,” Tristan said. “Hmmm.”

“According to the world of internet tabloids, I believe that is always code for something else,” Phee said. “Probably went on too big a bender last night.”

Lucy pressed her hand to her chest, where she could still feel the last bit of coldness lodged in her heart. And with a
sudden fierce clarity she realized exactly what had happened.

They’d won.

Nineteen