Page 35 of Never Been Shipped

“Like it’s embarrassing if they know who you are,” she said. “And it’s embarrassing if they don’t.”

John ran his hand through his hair. “Exactly. There’s a pause, after I introduce myself, where I can’t decide which outcome will be worse.”

“So why did you do it? It couldn’t have been for the money.”

John laughed, thinking of the fifty-dollar share of the door he was lucky to get for most shows, the free beers he was offered and turned down that were the more common mode of payment. “Definitely not the money. I just really wanted to play music, and not alone in my room. I wanted to play with other people again.”

“Why not start another band of your own?” Micah asked. “Like Ryder did. Or even advertise yourself as a session or touring musician, like Frankie.”

John had never fully put into words why he hadn’t gone those routes, even to himself. It felt like pushing on something sensitive, like he had a tooth pain he could ignore if he just didn’t press on it.

“I don’t know,” he said. “Didn’t feel right, I guess.”

She shivered, tucking her knees up to her chest and pulling her whole shirt around them. It struck John as such a middle school move, so reminiscent of the way she used to hug her arms to her chest inside her sweatshirt in science, which always ran about ten degrees colder than any other classroom. It gave him that ache in his stomach again, when he thought about who they’d been then, how far they’d come since to gethere, two people ona cruise ship who hadn’t talked in over a decade. But at least who were talking now.

“You’re cold,” he said. “Let’s head back inside.”

He grabbed his plate and then hers, too, stacking them on top of one another to set them back on the room service tray. He was planning to turn to her then, to thank her again for dinner but make some comment about how he really should be going (to do what?) or he was tired (he was wide awake). But she’d already followed him inside, closing the sliding glass door to the balcony behind her, and he saw that his shoes and socks were still out there. It would’ve taken ten seconds for him to go and retrieve them, but for some reason those ten seconds made him decide to stay.

“I read some of your private messages once,” he said. “When we were in maybe ninth grade? I always felt guilty about it, so I thought I’d tell you while we’re clearing the air.”

Her face brightened, like this was the most delightful bit of news he could’ve possibly told her. “What do you mean, you read my messages?”

He felt the tips of his ears heat. “We were hanging out in your room, and you had to go do some chore your parents were nagging you about…and I went to pause the music we were listening to, and your inbox was up, and…yeah, I skimmed through and then I opened one.”

“Such a little hacker,” she chided. “Anything good?”

It had been the mention of his own name that had gotten him to click on one. It had turned out to be a fairly innocuous mention—she was telling someone about a group project they’d worked on for school. And then he’d realized, what exactly hadhe been hoping she’d been saying? And how easy would it have been to stumble upon something hewouldn’thave wanted to see, like if she’d been complaining about him or listing his most annoying traits?

“Not really,” he said. “It was mostly about school.”

She sat cross-legged on her bed, looking up at him. “What was the song?”

“ ‘Lonely Nights.’ ”

“One of my favorites.”

He knew that. It was the reason why he’d paused it, so she wouldn’t miss it when it came on.

The way she was looking at him, it made him wonder if she’d put that together. “I still feel like I’m getting away with something if I listen to that whole album without turning down the chorus of the fourth track.”

It was actually one of the records that John had a hard time going back and listening to now, because it made him too nostalgic and sad. “Your dadhatedthe cursing.”

“But it was like, how do you think I knowexactlywhen to turn it down and back up? I’m just singing the words in my head.”

“I guess at least he didn’t have to hear them,” John pointed out. “It’s a respect thing. I get it.”

“I used to cheat off you in science,” Micah said. “While we’re clearing the air.”

John blinked. “Oh, I knew that.”

“Stop, you did not.”

“Micah, how do you think you could see my paper so well? I pushed it over toward you and made sure my arm wasn’t covering it. Of course I knew.”

She gave an incredulous little laugh, grasping her knees and rocking forward on the bed. “Oh my god,” she said. “I thought I was being so slick.”

“You knew I would’ve let you if you’d asked, anyway.”

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