Page 73 of The Summer List

I tell her I’m not sorry, and we both laugh again. I’d like to spend the whole night kissing her, but the sight of my laptop on the kitchen island reminds me I still have a couple hours of data entry to finish before bed. Andrea groans when I tell her but says she’ll respect the sanctity of my work by not staying in the kitchen to distract me.

I sit down on one of the chairs at the island, but I only get a couple minutes of work done before the temptation to search for a poem becomes too strong to ignore.

I open up a blank document on my screen to type out a list of options. I should probably go with something modern, the kind of Instagram poet thing I imagine people read at open mics full of art school students, but after listing a few of those off the top of my head, I know they’re not right.

Priya’s never going to let me hear the end of it, but if I’m going to read something in front of a crowd for the first time in my life, it’s going to be by Yeats.

I spend the next couple hours alternating between data entry and browsing through lists of his poems online, but it’s only once I’m tucked into bed with my worn out copy of Selected Works by W.B. Yeats that I find it.

I should probably pick something longer, but as soon as I trace my fingers over the smooth page with the musty scent of old paper filling my nose, I know it’s what I need to read.

I also know what I need to say to Andrea.

CHAPTER 19

Naomi

Iwhoop and clap for longer than anyone else in the room when Priya climbs down off the stage with her clarinet in hand. She beams as she wades through the crowd to rejoin us.

A rumble of chatter takes over the bar as the applause fades. We’re half an hour into the open mic night, and the crowd is way bigger than I expected. Despite the air conditioning, the room is warm enough to have my t-shirt sticking to my back and condensation forming rings around our drinks on the table. The air smells like beer tinged with the lingering scent of coffee from when this place is a café during the day.

I’m still counting it as my first time at a real bar. Andrea is the only one of us without a bright orange ‘under nineteen’ wristband on, but she ordered a ginger ale in solidarity.

Priya squints, probably still blinded by the lights pointed at the tiny raised platform serving as a stage. The guy she met at music school steps forward to flag her down.

I’ve since learned his name is Bill. If I had any worries left about things between me and Priya, they disappeared when neither of us managed to keep a straight face after she told me the cute guy she’s ‘kinda, sorta dating’ is named Bill.

“You were amazing!” I say once Priya has reclaimed her chair at our table.

“Everyone loved it,” Andrea adds from beside me.

“It was beautiful,” Bill says as he slides his arm around the back of Priya’s chair. He turns to her with a look on his face that almost makes me feel like we should give them a moment.

I glance at Andrea to see if she agrees, but she’s not even looking at them. Her gaze is pinned to the mostly empty glass of ginger ale on the table in front of her.

She’s been quiet all night, so quiet my stomach started tying itself in knots as I hypothesized about a hundred different things that might be wrong, all of them involving me. I did my therapist proud, though, and fought those thoughts off with a healthy dose of reality when I pulled her aside to ask if she was okay.

She told me she’s just nervous about performing, and I chose to believe her. I’m nervous enough myself that the copy of the poem I brought feels as heavy as a brick in my pocket.

“Wait, where’s Shal?” Priya asks. “Did she miss my song?”

She starts craning her neck around to look for her sister as disappointment wipes the smile off her face.

“She said she’d watch from the back,” I answer. “She didn’t want anyone to see whatever outfit she changed into yet. I think—”

The boom of the MC’s voice cuts me off. We all turn to watch the beanie-clad guy scan the clipboard in his hands up on stage.

“I think that’s the first time we’ve ever had a clarinet on this stage,” he says into the microphone as another smattering of applause breaks out. “Great stuff. Now, please welcome Shal!”

He leaves the stage, and a few seconds of strained silence pass before the murmurs start. Our whole table is looking around for any sign of Shal. She refused to tell anybody what she’s performing and disappeared halfway through the act right before Priya’s so she could change into a mysterious outfit she brought in a duffel bag.

What feels like a full minute goes by. Priya starts to pull her phone out of her purse with a worried look on her face, but then a jingling sound followed by a few murmured ‘ooh’s and ‘ahh’s turns everyone’s attention to the vary back of the bar.

My jaw drops so fast I’m surprised it doesn’t bash into the table. Shal sweeps into the room in a cobalt blue sari paired with piles of gold jewelry that flash like a treasure chest. Combined with the dramatic makeup she already had on earlier tonight, she looks like powerful enough to split the ocean in half instead of just clearing a path through the bar.

Her gaze is pinned to the stage, and even though she’s walking with the poise and grace of a seasoned movie star, I can see the way her chest is heaving with nervous breaths. When she’s only a few feet away from the glow of the spotlights, I manage to pry my eyes off her and look at Priya.

Her mouth is hanging open as wide as mine. She keeps gawking as Shal steps onto the stage and grabs the microphone.

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