Page 73 of With a Little Luck

“Just try to have a good time today. And be careful driving,” says Mom, giving me a hug, too.

“Iwon’t be driving,” I say. I’m intimidated as hell by manual transmissions. Ari has offered to teach both me and Pru since we got our licenses, even though she herself isn’t, like, the greatest at it. She still kills the engine on a regular basis and is terrified of going up hills.

“I’m tellingallof you to be careful,” Mom says. “Call us if you need anything.”188

She pulls away, then Ezra surprises her by going in for a hug, too. Mom complies, even though I think she’s only met Ezra one other time, and I can tell she hasn’t made up her mind about him yet. Makes two of us, I guess.

We head out to the car, and I toss my bag onto the back seat. I glance into the back of the wagon and see Ari’s guitar case and a small metal toolbox, which I assume is Ezra’s.

We wave to my parents on the porch. Ari turns the engine and pops the clutch. The second we pull away from the curb, Ezra raises his arms over his head and whoops. “Road trip!”

_______________

We pick up Maya and hear a lot of the same admonishments from her parents as we heard from mine. But within ten minutes of pulling out of her driveway, we’re on the freeway, music blasting from Ari’s Bluetooth speaker as Ezra scrolls through the music on her phone. “These are some bizarre playlists,” he says, feet kicked up on the dashboard. “Taylor Swift, Aretha Franklin, Blondie, and … Larkin Poe?”

“They’re a sister singer/songwriter duo,” says Ari. “They’re amazing. You must be looking at my girl power sing-along playlist.”

“Yeah, because I didn’t recognize any of the artists on yourDreary Daysplaylist.” He scrolls to a different screen. “Julieta Venegas, Eurielle, Taska Black, Metaxas, Ximena Sari … er …”

“Sariñana,” says Ari.

“Ximena Sariñana,” says Ezra, looking mildly impressed. “Her name is almost as great as yours. Also, here’s a song by …elbow? That can’t be real a real band.”

“It is. Just pick something and play it,” says Ari.

Ezra turns to her. “Do you just, like, scour Spotify for the most obscure tunes, or what?”

“Just because a musician isn’t well-known in the States doesn’t make them obscure,” says Ari. “And some of the singers on that playlist have189been my biggest inspirations. Besides, we work in a record store. We’re always being introduced to new music.”

It’s thoughtful of her to include me in that statement, given that when I’m working I pretty much just rotate between the same three Led Zeppelin albums. (Robert Plant was a big Tolkien fan, and there are a bunch ofLord of the Ringsreferences in his lyrics. I like what I like.) Although once someone sold us the soundtrack to the original Super Mario Bros. game, and I played it for six hours straight until my dad put it out on the sale rack for twenty-five cents and I never saw it again.

“Oh yeah, this is the one,” says Ezra.

Ari meets my eye in the rearview mirror, and I can tell she’s wondering if she should be scared—the answer is yes. Whenever Ezra is excited about something, we should all be scared.

She grins, as if she’s read my mind.

A horn section blares over the speaker, followed by Sadashiv singing “One for My Baby (And One More for the Road).”

Maya laughs. “EZ! Are you a Sadashiv fan?”

“Um, whoisn’t?” he says, turning to face us from the front. “I was devastated when Jude took you to that concert instead of me.Devastated.”

“Hold on,” I say. “Is this song on one of Ari’s playlists?”

“Of course,” says Ari. “There’s a reason he sings the old standards, you know. Something about them is universal—themes that relate to us even eighty years after they were written. I figure I can learn something from that.”

Ezra scoffs. “Songwriting genius, blah blah blah. You know you just like his velvety-smooth voice. That’s some sexy shit, right there.” He makes a purring noise in his throat.

“He isn’t wrong,” says Maya.

Ari shrugs, then puts on her blinker to switch lanes. “Hedoeshave a nice voice.”

“And hair,” Maya adds. “You should have seen him up close and personal. It’s hard to believe he’s even real.”

“Now you’re just rubbing it in,” says Ezra.190

“Just imagine,” I say, staring out the window at the Pacific Ocean, blue and shimmering. “Someday a group of teens could be heading off to a music festival, scrolling through their playlists, and they’ll put on ‘Downpour’ by Araceli Escalante.”

---