\u201cYo, Mara, what should we close with?\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Parth\u2019s words shook her out of a trance Mara hadn\u2019t realized she\u2019d fallen in, staring at a flier for tonight\u2019s opening band, an all-women group called White Men With Katanas. She was in the green room with Crystal Lake Counselors. WMWK was midway through a fuzzed-out yellfest of a set. Mara had taken two hits off of the blunt Gareth had brought and now was wrapped in her red jacket, appreciating the bass pumping through the floor. \u201cAre there choices?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWell, Nick says \u2018Donut-Eating Piggie,\u2019 I say \u2018Cry More White Boy.\u2019 Gareth doesn\u2019t care. So you gotta break the tie.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cGoddamn those are two great songs. If I pick one, are you not playing the other?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWhichever you don\u2019t pick goes second-to-last.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Mara thought, with a viciousness that felt like self-defense, about all those lonely old men in that bar that weirdo Tommy had taken her to a few nights ago. Jimmy\u2019s Pub. \u201c\u2018Cry More White Boy,\u2019 definitely,\u201d she said. She noticed herself exhaling.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Something had been restless within her, restless to her bones, since that conversation with Tommy. There must be something wrong with her. She\u2019d had fun, or at least a fine time. Until the very end, when Tommy had told that story about the regular with the gross burger. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Mimed what looked like a killing blow. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Something had happened, and it had to have been in Mara\u2019s head. She couldn\u2019t stop picturing Tommy killing someone. It wasn\u2019t hard to picture him working a knife, it wasn\u2019t hard to picture him sweaty. Then her brain would graft crime scene pictures under where a prep table or the grill would be. Tommy concentrating over a chopped-up Jane Doe from the San Francisco Chronicle<\/em> in the 70s, Tommy nearly dripping over a dead guy in an alley from a 90s Sun-Times<\/em>, Tommy plating pieces of The Black Dahlia in the pass-through.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Mara felt like she could smell light. Her nerves were fork twines wanting for an electrical outlet. Her eyes wandered around the way Parth\u2019s black jeans hugged his legs while leaned over his pedalboard, tuning his bass. His left arm flexing while he ran through a couple warm-up scales. His shirt rising above his waistline when he took his bass off, revealing smooth brown skin underneath. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cYou\u2019re not staying back here while we play, right?\u201d Parth asked.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cYeah no, I\u2019m meeting Melissa out there,\u201d Mara said. \u201cI just like being back here with you.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIs that right? Number one fan, kicking it in the green room.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Mara gave him a lip smile. \u201cHey, hang out with me after the show tonight.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cYeah?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cYeah, like. Let\u2019s get tacos. Or walk on the beach. I don\u2019t know. Feels like a while since we\u2019ve had, you know. Best friend time.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Out of the corner of her eye, Mara saw Nick get up and walk towards them. Something in his hand\u2014drumsticks. He tapped Parth on the shoulder with his sticks and gave a what\u2019s up<\/em> to Mara. It was time for them to set up. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cTotally,\u201d Parth said. He slapped at Nick, who was still tapping sticks on his shoulder. \u201cLet\u2019s do it. Either one of those things.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2014<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Outside, she found a breathless Melissa with a White Men With Katanas SO GOOD<\/em> on her lips. The two of them zig-zagged through pockets of people yelling in each other\u2019s ringing ears, found a spot slightly off center on the bass side, watched as Nick and Gareth and Parth plugged up pedal boards and tuned drums and checked levels, let the thundering first chord and cymbal crash splash all over their souls, grooved their shoulders and shook their hips, sang and yelled along, felt the distorted noise enter their bloodstreams, let their brains glaze over during the droning, trance-y part, picked the energy back up when the band came back in with a guitar scream that threatened to blow the walls off, setting up a blistering run on the last three songs, including plenty of audience participation gang vocals in \u201cDonut-Eating Piggie.\u201d After the last chord finished ringing on \u201cCry More White Boy\u201d\u2014another one that garnered some cathartic screamalongs from the crowd, especially the white boys\u2014Mara and Melissa wandered back to the merch table to wait for the guys. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2014<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Melissa, Nick, and Gareth wanted to stay for the last band. After Nick volunteered to unload the van at the practice space himself, saying he wanted to work some stuff out<\/em> through the night, Parth hit Mara with a you wanna go? We can go<\/em>. <\/em>She took the out without thinking twice. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cSo what\u2019s up, you hungry?\u201d she asked him. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cNot yet,\u201d he said. \u201cCan\u2019t eat too soon after performing. Butterflies, you know?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n They walked down the block, letting city noises\u2014hydraulics of buses, chatter of outdoor diners, jazz music spilling out the door of this bar and dancepop flooding out of that one\u2014meld into an ambient soundtrack. Mara bumped Parth with her shoulder. He smiled and nudged her back. A man walking past tried to hand them a flier for some show. They had to shift into single-file to get through some racks of clothes extended from storefront to sidewalk. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWhy aren\u2019t you talking?\u201d Mara asked. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Parth laughed. \u201cDon\u2019t do that, no no. You\u2019re the one who wanted to take a walk, you\u2019re the one who\u2019s all head-on-a-swivel lately. Why am I not talking? I\u2019m waiting on you<\/em>, girl.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n She was laughing, he always had her laughing. \u201cYou\u2019re right. I\u2019m all kinds of fucked up lately.\u201d Without meaning to, she reached for his hand, fingers entwining. <\/p>\n\n\n\n His hand eased into hers, he gently tugged her shoulder into his. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Mara\u2019s whole body felt like the hum of a switched-on amp. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cHey, what if we went to your apartment?\u201d Mara said. \u201cLike, ordered food? But in like an hour?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cYeah? What\u2019re we gonna do for an hour?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI mean,\u201d Mara said, and pulled Parth in for a kiss. He kissed her back, wrapping his other arm around her, as hungry for her as she was for him. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cYeah, let\u2019s get back to my apartment,\u201d Parth said, pulling up but still holding her hand. The night had been hit with some new sensualism, like a buttery grilled cheese dropped sizzling onto a flat top. They couldn\u2019t walk the six blocks fast enough. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Across the street, Mara could swear she saw him. Sweaty, lanky, eyes always a little too intense, carrying a knife bag out on the street. Was that Tommy? No way. It was in her head. No way he was standing there, across the street, stalk-still like a serial killer in an old movie. <\/p>\n\n\n\n No, whoever it was had a friend stumble out of the bar, clap them on the back, and offer them a cigarette. Turned out of profile, the guy looked nothing like Tommy. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Melissa would say that\u2019s the universe. Warning you. Don\u2019t let your guard down. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n That\u2019s what Melissa would say.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2014<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Sex with Parth was the first swim in Lake Michigan when the water finally stopped freezing, it was a sharing a joint with your best friends on a roof on a cloudless night, it was scoring free tickets to your favorite band, it was a grilled cheese and soup on a sick day, it was a weighted blanket on a winter evening. They did everything she wanted and nothing she didn\u2019t. After, they lay in the sheets, taking in windows-open summer air. <\/p>\n\n\n\n As time passed, as Parth dozed off and Mara got up to pee, as she tried sleeping on her side and then her back, as she looked at her phone and saw it was only 11:30, Mara wrote off her lingering unease as hunger. She nudged Parth awake. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cOrder pizza and watch a movie with me?\u201d she asked. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cMost definitely,\u201d he said. He pulled a pre-rolled blunt out his nightstand, massaged the leaves loose. Stood up and retrieved his laptop and a bluetooth speaker from his desk. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cVeggie lovers okay?\u201d she asked.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe best.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n He ordered a thin crust from Michael\u2019s, fired up the blunt and the bluetooth speaker, and pulled up the HBO app. They settled on a new slasher they\u2019d both missed in theaters. Mara figured it would either be cathartic\u2014 safe, external expression of her own paranoia\u2014or it would ratchet her feelings of being watched back up to 11, and she wouldn\u2019t sleep that night. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Either way, she had weed, she had Parth, and she had a pizza coming. \u201cYo, Mara, what should we close with?\u201d Parth\u2019s words shook her out of a trance Mara hadn\u2019t realized she\u2019d fallen in, staring at a flier for tonight\u2019s opening band, an […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":162657656,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[168],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-162657713","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-behind-with-knife"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/162657713","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=162657713"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/162657713\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":162657714,"href":"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/162657713\/revisions\/162657714"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/162657656"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=162657713"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=162657713"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=162657713"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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