Page 48 of One More Time
‘Oh, God. Y-you know?’ Lucy stuttered.
‘I’m like the smartest person you know, so …’ Kim said, shrugging.
Oh, God. Sheknewknew. About the song. About Nicky Broome.
‘I should have told you,’ Lucy burbled.
‘No. You didn’t have to. I love you like a sister. You are the most important person in my life. Mywholelife. Butthat doesn’t mean you have to tell me everything. I don’t tell you everything.’
‘You don’t?’
Kim’s slightly glassy eyes scanned the table, squinting in thought. ‘Well, okay. I actually do. But I don’thaveto.’
Lucy sucked on the unreasonably delicious green penis, then said, ‘The first time I heard it, I was on the street. Listening to the radio on my way to class. On my Walkman. Remember the Walkman?’
‘Yep,’ Kim replied dryly.
Lucy exhaled a sigh. ‘I knew from the first note that it was him. I knew from the first chorus it was about me. I started sobbing. Like uncontrollable sobbing. On the sidewalk. I mean, it was New York so people mostly tried to ignore me and give me a wide berth but …’ Lucy could remember that day perfectly. It was firmly imprinted in her psyche. ‘Never made it to class.’
‘The Breathing Room’ ended up becoming the undisputed heavyweight song of the year. A breakout hit by a little band no one had heard of called Super, featuring a dynamic and beautiful lead singer named Nick Broome.
The song was everywhere.Hewas everywhere. TV, the radio, posters in the Virgin Records down the block from her dorm. In the background at every party.
From the very start, people theorized who the song was about. It was a luscious secret, like the subject of ‘You’re So Vain,’ only fueled by a burgeoning internet and fans whose every drunken two-a.m. musing could be shared with the whole fucking world in an instant. Over the years,‘The Breathing Room Girl’ had stamped itself on American culture, become a shorthand phrase for an enticing and unknowable mystery.
Nicky never told anyone. If he’d only said publicly that the song was just fantasy, or that it was about some girl he knew once, the whole mess might have blown over. But he didn’t, and the mystery of the thing made it tantalizing. Compelling. Made it last. Well, the song did that too, Lucy supposed. Because it was amazing. Beautiful and powerful. A love song you could dance to, rock out in the car and scream at the top of your lungs.
When Super’s first album was rereleased for the ten-year anniversary, the fervor really ticked up. The lyrics, reprinted in the CD liner notes (because that was still a thing) included new punctuation. A question mark, of all things. Websites popped up, dedicated to pondering the addition of a fucking question mark. (Was it always supposed to be there? Was it added now for a reason? What did it mean?) A few tiny pixels of difference between the original lyrics printed in the late 1990s and the ones from the 2000s made the subject relevant again.
At the twenty-year anniversary, there was a call from a music magazine willing to pay a million dollars – one million actual American dollars – for the answer to the mystery.
‘Who Is the Breathing Room Girl?’ was a funny human-interest blurb onThe Today Show, the local news, in the damnWall Street Journal.You too could be a millionaire if you just speak up, people!
Lucy didn’t. Even though a million dollars would have vastly improved her net worth.
‘Jesus,’ Lucy exclaimed to Kim. ‘You could have made a million bucks off that info.’
Kim shook her head, pink penises swaying dramatically from side to side. ‘I don’t need a million dollars as much as I need you.’
Lucy’s eyes went all misty. She felt a lump of emotion forming in her throat.Damn, margaritas and memories are a terrible combo.‘I love you,’ she told Kim.
‘I love you, too,’ replied Kim, slinging her arm across Lucy’s shoulders. ‘There is one thing, though.’ The statement came with a grimace, and a look of contrition Lucy could never remember seeing on her best friend’s ever-confident face.
‘What?’ Lucy prodded.
‘The question mark.’
‘Not you, too!’
‘Well, come on! It’s a fucking national mystery. It changes the whole meaning of the song, dammit! Have you asked him about it? Do you understand it?’
Lucy’s body curled in on itself. A teensy bit of shame washed over her. ‘I’ve been avoiding the subject.’
‘You haven’t mentioned the song?’ Kim asked, clearly floored.
‘No.’
‘At all?’
