Page 2 of With a Little Luck

“Whoa, whoa, not that one,” he says, snatching the record from my hand. “I’ve got something special picked out for our inaugural open mic night.”

I step back and let Dad take over, especially since choosing our music selection on any given day is one of his greatest joys.

It’s not actually our inaugural open mic night. Ari had the idea last summer, and with Dad’s okay, she officially started hosting them sometime around Thanksgiving. But thisisthe first open mic night since my parents finished signing the paperwork to officially buy Ventures Vinyl. The business itself was always theirs, but as of six days ago, they are now also the proud owners of the building, too. A twelve-hundred-square-foot brick structure in the heart of Fortuna Beach, with old plumbing, old wiring, oldeverything, and an exorbitantly high mortgage payment.

Proof that dreams do come true.

“Should be a good crowd tonight,” Dad says. He says this every time, and while we’ve progressively become more popular over the months, it’s considered a “good crowd” if we top more than twenty people.

It’s been pretty fun, though, and Ari loves it. She and I both started working here last summer, but we were friends for years before that, and5she used to spend so much of her free time here that Dad often refers to her as his sixth child. I think she would work here even if he wasn’t paying her, especially on open mic nights.

Ari tells people these shindigs are a team effort, but no. It’s all her. Her passion, her planning, her effort. I just drew some flyers and helped assemble the platform in the corner of the store. I guess itwasmy idea to frame our makeshift stage with floor-to-ceiling curtains and paint a mural on the wall behind it to look like a night sky. Dad says it’s the best-looking part of the store, and he might be right. It certainly has the freshest coat of paint.

“Here we go,” says Dad, flipping through the bin of records beneath the counter. The special or sentimental ones that he keeps for the store but aren’t really for sale. He pulls out a record with a black-and-white image of two men and a woman standing in front of the London Bridge. It takes me a second to recognize Paul McCartney from his post-Beatles days. “All we need is love,” Dad goes on, pulling out the album and flipping it to side B before setting it tenderly on the turntable, “and a little luck.”

“Don’t let Mom hear you say that,” I say quietly. Dad has always been the superstitious one, and Mom loves to tease him about it. We’ve all heard it from her a million times, and I parrot now: “Luck is all about perspective …”

“And what you do with the opportunities you’re given,” Dad says. “Yes, yes, fine. But you know what? Even your mom believes in luck when Sir Paul is singing about it.”

He lowers the needle. The record pops a few times before some deep, mechanical-sounding notes start to play over the store speakers.

I cringe. “Really, Dad?”

“Watch it,” he says, jutting a finger in my direction. “We love Wings in this family. Don’t criticize.”

“You don’t like Wings?” Ari says, shooting me a surprised look as her feet kick against the side of the counter.

“I don’t like …” I consider for a moment. In my family, we’re pretty6much required to have a healthy respect for the Beatles, and that includes the Fab Four’s solo careers. I think my parents mightactuallydisown me or my sisters if we were to ever say something outright critical of John, Paul, George, or Ringo. “I don’t like synthesizers,” I finally say. “But to each their own.”

“I’m going to start setting up the chairs,” says Dad. “Let me know if you need help with anything else.” He wanders toward the front of the store, humming along with the music.

I glance at Ari. She has one ear tilted toward the closest speaker as she plays along to the song. I can’t tell if this is a song she already knows, or if she’s figuring out the chords by ear. It wouldn’t surprise me if it’s the latter. Pretty much all I remember from my brief stint taking guitar lessons years ago is how to make an A major chord, and how much my fingers used to hurt after pressing on those brutal strings for an hour. But Ari speaks the language of notes and chords as fluently as the Spanish she speaks with her family at home.

“So,” I say, folding my arms on the counter, “are you going to start the night off with an Ari original?”

“Not tonight,” she says dreamily. “There’s a really beautiful cover song I want to do first.”

“But you will play at least one of your songs, right? That’s kind of the point of open mic night. To play original stuff while your captive audience can’t escape.”

“That’s rather a pessimistic view. Here I thought the point was to support artists in our community.”

“That’s what I said.” My grin widens. “I like it when you do originals. I stan you, Ari. You know that.”

She starts to smile, but then diverts her attention back down to her guitar strings. “You don’t even like music that much.”

“Hey, only psychopaths and Pru don’t like music. You can’t put me in that group.”

Ari gives me a side-eye, but it’s true. I like music as much as the next guy. My appreciation just pales in comparison to the absolute obsession7my parents have—and Ari, too, for that matter. My fourteen-year-old sister, Lucy, has pretty eclectic tastes and has been to more concerts than I have. My ten-year-old sister, Penny, practices her violin for forty-five minutes every night without fail. And my littlest sister, Eleanor—a.k.a. Ellie—sings a mean rendition of “Baby Shark.”

Only Prudence, my twin sister, missed the music gene. She does like the Beatles, though. Like, really, really likes the Beatles. Though again, this could just be her attempt to not get disowned. See Exhibit A, above.

“Okay,” says Ari, “then tell me your favorite song of all time.”

“‘Hey Jude,’” I say, no hesitation. “Obviously. It’s, like, the song that made me famous.”

She shakes her head. “I’m serious. What’s your favorite song?”

I tap my fingers against the countertop glass, under which is sandwiched an assortment of collected memorabilia. Ticket stubs. Guitar picks. The first dollar this store ever made.

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