Drew by T Cooper

Author:T Cooper
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: ebook, book
Publisher: Akashic Books
Published: 2013-12-12T05:00:00+00:00

CHANGE 1–DAY 91

“Dudes—sorry. Um, dudes and dudette,” Gen starts saying as we’re setting up for practice. “I got word from the venue, and we’re only allowed to perform two of my songs at the gig.”

“It’s the Veterans of Foreign Wars community room,” Chase says, “not a venue.” He makes air quotes when he says “venue.”

“Whatever. A sweet sixteen at the VFW today . . . headlining the House of Blues tomorrow. Anyhow, they’ve asked that we limit original material to two numbers. One’s going to be ‘Siri,’ of course, and the other, well, I’m trying to decide between ‘My Personal Petting Zoo’ and ‘Soft Serv.’ Drew, this is going to be a lot for you to learn, but the rest of the lineup is pretty simple four-four pop stuff, so you’ll be fine.”

“Such as?” Chase asks, smiling wide, like he knows this is going to be good. Ray-Ray’s expression is inscrutable; he’s just sitting there behind sunglasses with his arms crossed, waiting for something to happen.

“Well, ‘Baby,’ of course,” Gen says, then starts digging around in his pockets. He fishes out a crushed-up piece of notebook paper, reads from it quickly and quietly like ticking off items on a to-do list. “‘Miss Independent’ by Ne-Yo. ‘Sweet Sixteen,’ Hilary Duff. Britney’s ‘I’m Not a Girl, Not Yet a Woman’ . . .”

Chase shoots a look at me, and we burst out laughing.

“What?” Gen asks, thinking we’re mocking him.

“Nothing!” Chase and I sing—literally in chorus.

Gen shrugs, continues, “Kanye’s ‘Good Life,’ 50 Cent’s ‘In da Club.’ Uh, ‘We Are Never Ever Ever Getting Back Together’—”

“I think it’s just one Ever,” Chase interrupts.

“Okaaay,” Gen says, taking a pen from behind his ear and crossing out one of the Evers. He’s taking his job totally seriously. “Anyway, I ripped CDs for y’all to take home, but I figure we can knock out a few of these today.”

“How much are we getting paid for this again?” Chase asks. Which garners a mild snort from Ray-Ray, who punctuates the sentiment with an electric pop while plugging in his amp.

“Five hundred bucks, smart-ass. Plus gas. That’s one twenty-five apiece.”

“I guess this recession’s way worse than I thought,” Chase says to me.

“Yeah,” I chime in, “this poor girl’s dad obviously doesn’t love her enough to pay for the real Kelly Clarkson to perform.”

“You two should really think about giving up music and taking this little comedy routine on the road,” Gen says, sliding a CD into a busted-up boom box.

He presses play, and suddenly the garage is filled with the mad beats and dulcet tones of Fiddy murmuring, “Go shawty, it’s your birthday, we gonna party like it’s your birthday, we gon’ sip Bacardi like it’s your birthday . . .” and I start banging along, and Chase comes in too, just riffing over the track, and we are really feeling it and suddenly all about those one (and a quarter) Benjamins.

* * *

Practice went late, this time with my dad coming in at the end and catching the last song, eyeing Chase pretty much exclusively.

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