The Fifteenth Minute Page 7

  Shit.

  I lower the hot dog, and the lens falls.

  I raise the hot dog, and it rises.

  “God damn it!”

  “What’s the matter?” Bella yelps.

  “Fricking paparazzo. The one from History of Art—he’s back.”

  “Where?”

  I groan. “How could you miss him? And every time I try to take a bite, he takes a picture.”

  Bella’s fair brow wrinkles. “Why?”

  Sigh. “Because anyone looks like a pig with a bite of food in her mouth. When a photographer wants to make you look ridiculous, they catch you eating.”

  My friend’s eyes widen. “That’s a thing?”

  “It is.” A few minutes ago I was having a great time. Now I feel exposed.

  Bella’s face is full of concern. “Shit. I’m sorry, babe. Do you think we should call security?”

  “No.” I spent enough time in their offices filling out my incident report. “The hockey rink is a public place, so that asshole isn’t even breaking any laws.” But if I try to sneak out, he’ll just follow me. And then I’d be alone out there with him. It’s not like I want to ask Bella to walk me home in the middle of the game, either.

  “You didn’t even get to eat your food. That’s just wrong.” She slaps her thighs, then turns to glance around the rink. “I have an idea. Follow me.” She stands and begins edging past the other spectators, toward the aisle.

  Clutching my hot dog, I trail after her. “Where are we going?”

  She doesn’t answer me. She just waves me up the stairs, then disappears behind a wall. I round the corner to see her opening a door signed PRESS BOX. She waves me over.

  Inside the little room, which is sheltered on three sides but open to the rink at its front, I spot her friend Graham tapping on his laptop. “Psst,” Bella says, and he turns his head. “Lianne needs to be out of sight for a little while.” Graham nods, beckoning to me quickly before turning his attention back to the game.

  Bella gives me a little shove into the room. Then she closes the door behind me.

  The little room is long and skinny, with a desk spanning the front. Five heads are bent over computers, all in a row. At one end, an older gentleman wears headphones, and speaks into a microphone. Graham sits next to him. In the center are two guys wearing Saint B's jackets—obviously from the visiting team. Then the fifth guy…My heart trips over itself. Because DJ stands in the corner, his eyes on the ice, his hand on a computer mouse.

  He hasn’t noticed me yet. All his attention is funneled onto the game. As I watch, he clicks something on his screen. And then I hear a Green Day song begin to jam from the stadium speakers. DJ’s hand moves to a lever on a sound mixing board, while his eyes stay trained on the action on the ice.

  Below me, the players line up for another faceoff. “When I Come Around,” thunders off the walls. But at the moment the ref drops the puck, the song quickly fades out while the skaters chase the puck toward Saint B’s goal.

  DJ’s eyes drop to his computer screen while he taps furiously on a keyboard.

  He still hasn’t noticed me.

  With my back against the press box wall, I feel handily invisible. I finish my hot dog in three bites. Then I dig some mints out of my purse and pop one in my mouth. Then? A fresh coating of cherry lip gloss.

  Because hope springs eternal. And you just never know.

  8

  Surprisingly Competent Falsetto

  DJ

  My awareness of Lianne is a gradual thing.

  I hear the press box door open and shut, but I’m too busy to look. As I cue up my next couple of song ideas, I feel eyes on me. In my peripheral vision, I see a pair of shapely legs in skinny jeans, and a delicate hand, its thumb hooked into the pocket of a tailored wool jacket. Her fingernails are shiny and pink, like candies.

  Below me, a whistle blows. I’m smiling—and then scrambling—because Saint B’s is getting called for hooking. I hit “play” on Inner Circle’s “Bad Boys.”

  This is good. We need the power play, and I fucking love this song. It’s Friday night, we’re winning the game and I’m in the zone, doing my job, thinking only positive thoughts.

  And in spite of the fact that I let her down, the most amazing girl at Harkness is watching every move I make.

  With one hand I beckon to Lianne, but I can’t look at her yet because I have to pay attention to the action on the rink. It takes a few seconds for the penalized player to make his way over to the sin bin and for the opposing team to send out their penalty-killer shift. So the rasta beat plays on.

  This is my moment of greatness, of course. Nobody knows it’s me, and maybe only half the audience will even get the joke. (“Bad Boys” is perfect for when the other team gets a penalty.) But five-thousand people are nodding in time to the groove I’ve chosen for them, and it’s a beautiful thing.

  Not only does Lianne appear at my side, she peers over my screen to see what I’m doing. “Quite the setup you’ve got here.”

  I step back to make room for her, putting a hand on her shoulder to guide her past my body where she can see the soundboard. At even this small contact, my pulse kicks up a notch. She smells like flowers and mint.

  The ref skates up to the centers, and the players lean in for the faceoff.

  Lianne is bent over my sound board, examining it. So I take her hand and move it onto the master lever. “Ready?” I whisper.

  She nods, and we’re very close together now. Her hand is warm underneath mine. On the ice, the puck drops. I close my fingers over hers and together we slide the master down to zero, ending the sound clip.

  “Oh, the power!” Lianne whispers. “Are you ever tempted to accidentally blast an airhorn when the other team is about to shoot for a goal?”

  “All the time,” I tease.

  She drops into my chair, which I never sit in anyway. “What are you going to play next?”

  “It depends what happens.” I lean in closer to her, because I can’t help myself. The pull I feel when she’s nearby is so strong. “If we score again, I’ll play something obnoxious.”

  “What if they tie it up? Wait…” She points at the list of songs on my screen. “You could play ‘Are You Gonna Go My Way,’ by Lenny Kravitz?”

  “Now you’re getting it,” I say, giving her ponytail a playful tug. I need to stop touching her, but it’s difficult. “How did you end up in here, anyway?” I know better than to think she was looking for me.

  Lianne makes a face. “I needed to drop out of sight for a few minutes. I’m kind of hiding behind your computer screen right now.”

  “From who?”

  She shakes her head. “Just…a jerk with nothing better to do on a Friday night than hassle me.”

  I do not like the sound of that. But for the moment, Lianne is perfectly safe right in front of me, and I need to keep my eyes on the game. The ref makes a weird call. He stops play on Harkness for icing, but the crowd saw the puck ricochet off a Saint B's stick. There is widespread unhappiness. Half the student section gets to its feet. They’re yelling at the ref. Across the rink I see guys pounding on the plexi in their displeasure.

  The music at a hockey game isn’t just for fun. At tense moments like this, its job is to soothe the crowd. To remind the spectators that they’re there to have fun and not to riot. And to express their emotional state in a lighthearted way.

  I lean over Lianne and play “It’s Tricky” by Run DMC.

  “That’s an oldie,” she says, swiveling around to look up at me.

  “True.” I agree, making a quick adjustment to the bass output. “When a song is older than high school, that means we have to dance to it.” Giving Lianne a nudge, I start to move my hips and wave my hands.

  Lianne spins my rotating chair until she’s facing me. But for a moment, she just lifts her chin and pins me with a look. Meanwhile, I’m dancing alone like a crazy man. We watch each other, and I can see her trying to decide whether she’s going to
play along, or let me twist for standing her up last night.

  I deserve it. But I don’t give up. Instead, I stick my ass out a little farther and shimmy. I’m the only one dancing in the press box, and I probably look ridiculous. But I’ll look ridiculous for Lianne any day of the week.

  A slow smile takes over her face, and then she caves. She lifts her hands to frame her face and begins to vogue, her slender arms posing and diving in time to the music. We’re both going for it, as if the team’s success tonight rests on our performance.

  Six seconds later I’m sliding the master back down to zero as the team skates on, my chest grazing the top of Lianne’s head. I get a whiff of her shampoo, and it’s tempting to drop my face into her neck for a kiss.

  Down, boy.

  The buzzer rings, signaling the end of the second period. I lean over Lianne, my hand on her slender shoulder. “Double click on ‘Brown Eyed Girl,’ will you?”

  She grabs the mouse and does as I ask, her movements swift and precise. “I like your job, Daniel.”

  Daniel. Nobody calls me by my real name, and I like the way it sounds on her lips. “It’s a good time, right? Can’t believe they pay me for this.” For now, my subconscious jabs me. The ax that’s hovering over my neck never quite goes away. Not even when I’m having fun.

  Lianne tips her head back so she can look up at me. “Why did you stand me up last night?”

  Oh, hell. I’ve never owed anyone an explanation as much as I owe her one. But that doesn’t mean I know what to say. “This year isn’t going so well for me. There are complications, and sometimes they have really bad timing. I’m really sorry. You have no idea.”

  Her eyes fall shut and she stands up. My gut plummets, because it seems like she’s about to walk out. But instead she simply turns her back on the rink and folds her arms. “That’s not the most articulate excuse I’ve ever heard. But since you sound sincere I’m inclined to let it slide.”

  “Okay,” I whisper, feeling my sadness lift by a few ounces. Her forgiveness is an unexpected gift.

  “You’re not the only one having a shitty year, by the way.” The words are challenging, but her expression is vulnerable. Her eyes shift to the side, as if she didn’t intend to say that.

  “No? I’m sorry.” I am, too. So fucking sorry for being an asshole last night. Though I’m really not sure how I might have avoided it. Oh yeah—by staying away from her in the first place. I can’t help but ask, “What goes wrong for you?”

  She gives her pretty head a little irritated shake. “Harkness hasn’t been easy. It’s not the school work, though. That part is fine. It’s just everything else.”

  Tell me about it. Somehow it feels natural to tuck her into a hug. So I pull her small body into my chest, and wrap my arms around her back. And it feels so fucking good to hold her. “Can we still be friends?” She nods into my shoulder. “Good,” I rumble, trying not to notice how perfectly we fit together. We just stand there for a minute, and my mind is quiet again. She has that effect on me.

  “Daniel?”

  “Hmm?”

  Lianne lifts her head. “Your song is ending.”

  Fuck. I release her and grab the computer mouse, executing a sloppy fade into “Sweet Child o’ Mine” that’s only a second or two off the mark. Nobody will notice except for me. And Lianne, of course. What kind of DJ almost leaves dead air?

  Her eyes twinkle with humor, but she doesn’t call me on it like I expect her to. “I do a mean Axl Rose,” she says instead, as the opening guitar riff of the song bounces brightly through the stadium.

  “No way,” I challenge. “This I have to see.”

  She removes her baseball cap and flips it around in her hands. “You have to air guitar Slash’s part. I’m not feeling it yet.” The corners of her mouth twitch.

  “Fine,” I say a little huffily. As if I haven’t spent months of my life on my air guitar technique. I mentally pick up a nice Telecaster, brace it against my body and begin pick out the riff.

  The drums and the bass come in while Lianne shakes her head, tipping her face downward so that her hair falls forward. Then she puts the baseball cap on backwards and low on her forehead. As the music builds toward Axl’s first line, she slowly lifts her chin, eyes closed, moves her shoulders and claps her hands once over her head. With a serious, pinched expression, my miniature Axl begins to sing the first line about a smile…

  And Jesus Christ, she is Axl Rose. The way she holds her shoulders. The tense grip she has on an imaginary microphone. The way her hair swings when she moves. It’s hilarious. My air-guitar accompaniment breaks down when I start to laugh.

  She doesn’t even complain when I quit my part of our act. She just carries on. I hear a snort from further down the press box, and now Michael Graham is clapping from his seat.

  “Holy shit, do you see who that is…”

  My gaze swings in the direction of the two guys from the visiting team. They’re staring at Lianne with a mixture of surprise and amusement on their faces. Just as I realize what’s happening, one of them aims his phone at Lianne.

  She stops instantly, whipping the hat off her head and fixing him with a glare. “No pictures.”

  “Come on,” the Saint B’s guy urges. “That was awesome.”

  “Hey,” I argue a little louder than necessary. “She said no pictures.” Lianne must be so fucking tired of being everybody’s celeb sighting. Their most-loved Instagram upload or their most-liked Facebook status update.

  The asshole lets the moment linger, his eyes locking with mine. They say, What are you going to do about it?

  “Put the phone away, pal,” Michael Graham says quietly.

  After one more arrogant beat of disobedience—just because he can—the Saint B’s guy shoves his phone in his pocket again.

  But the moment is ruined. Lianne is sitting in my seat again, scrolling through the list of songs on my screen, trying to look like she doesn’t care. I’m starting to understand just how good an actress this girl really is. And it depresses the hell out of me. Who wants to be good at ignoring everyone?

  She leans in, reading my playlists.

  “You have everything arranged by mood!” She claps her hands, delighted by this idea. “Of course that makes sense, though.”

  It’s true—I couldn’t do my job without sorting the songs into emotions. There are songs under the headings “victory lap” and “time for a rally” and “penalty box.”

  “I don’t get this choice,” she says, her face quizzical. “Pat Benatar’s ‘Heartbreaker’?”

  Ah. I give her a grin and then sing the line that makes the song perfect. I have to use a comically high voice for Patty B’s line about the right kind of sinner. It’s perfect for when one of our guys catches two minutes in the sin bin.

  Watching me, Lianne’s eyes go wide. “Holy shit, DJ. You have a surprisingly competent falsetto.”

  “Girls tell me that all the time,” I deadpan, and she giggles.

  I’m so tempted to kiss that smile off her face right now, but I can’t. When I’d asked her if we could still be friends, I’d meant it. That’s all I can offer her.

  My heart didn’t get the memo, though. I cue up the next song, but all I want to do is admire her smile and pull her into my arms again. I want to tell her some more silly jokes, and put on another song so old that we’re required by my dorky little rules to dance to it. I could stand here all night talking to her, but the game will soon be over.

  Happy moments like this are as rare as hat tricks. So all I can do is make the most of it.

  “You pick the song we’ll play when Harkness scores again,” I offer. “Anything you want,” I add.

  “Yessss,” she says, rubbing her hands together, as if I’ve offered her more than just the choice of a song.

  That’s all I’ve got to give her, though. And probably all I’ll ever have.

  9

  I'm Not Over

  Lianne

  It’s official. I’
m having a blast tonight.

  I’ve forgotten all about my paparazzo nemesis. I was supposed to be hiding from him in the press box, but I’m just here to have fun. DJ doesn’t seem to mind, either.

  A few minutes into the third period, the crowd makes an unhappy noise as Saint B’s ties up the game. DJ’s response is to play “I’m Not Over” by Carolina Liar.

  “Good pick,” I say as he hovers over the sound board. His smile is only inches from me, and the proximity makes me feel warm everywhere.

  God, I like this boy. I mean—it isn’t just anyone who gets to see my Axl Rose imitation.

  While Harkness fights to break the tie, we play songs of encouragement at every opportunity. “How about ‘Bust a Move.’”

  “Cue it up!” he encourages me. So I do. And for the next break in play, he picks “Fight for your Right” by the Beastie Boys. They’re both old, so we dance both times.

  “We’ve got quite the classic rap thing going here,” I say, sitting down afterwards. I’ve totally stolen his chair, but DJ doesn’t care.

  He gives my shoulder a squeeze. “That’s right. Taste this good should come at a premium price.” But then I lose his attention when his face tenses.

  I scrutinize the play down on the rink, but I can’t find the puck. “What’s happening?”

  “My brother is trying to… YEAH!”

  Several thousand people roar as Harkness scores again. The student section goes crazy, and everyone in the press box leans over their computer screens, tweeting or recording or announcing the play. I hear the announcer credit Leo Trevi for the assist and John Rikker for another goal.

  When I glance over at Michael Graham, he’s typing and grinning at the same time. Rikker is his boyfriend, and Graham is the sports editor for the newspaper. They’re both having a good night.

  “Play your song, lady,” DJ prompts me.

  Ack! I’d been so distracted by the goal that I’d forgotten. But a half second later, Springsteen’s “Glory Days” is blasting through the rink.