WHEN ELIZA SAID IT WAS A COSPLAY BAND, THAT was no joke.
Her friend is the lead guitarist of an all-female band that dresses as male Marvel superheroes. She’s tricked out her guitar so it has a Captain America shield on it. It’s pretty impressive. Eliza watches the set from the front of the crowd, center stage. I stand in the corner and watch her, glad to be doing at least one really cool thing on New Year’s Eve. That was part of what I loved about being with Eliza. She gave me experiences I never would have found on my own, because I’m me.
We’ve struck a deal: we’ll stay for one set, then meet up with our friends at Emerson’s party. That’s another cool place I want to be, at the stroke of midnight. This feels important.
The other reason to join them, which I didn’t share with Eliza: I have to talk to Camden and Jamie. In person. To figure out what to do about this thirty-year-old guy. Camden will know what to do. He volunteers at a teen crisis helpline, for fuck’s sake.
Problem is, I already know what to do. I don’t need someone with Camden’s training. It’s really very simple.
We tell her parents.
That’s it.
Four words. It shouldn’t be complicated. Except it totally is.
Making these four words happen means possibly saying good-bye to my relationship with Eliza.
When the first set ends, I find Eliza in the crowd and tap her on the shoulder. She turns, sees me, then vigorously shakes her head.
“No!” she says, like a little kid. She actually stamps her foot.
“We had a deal,” I remind her.
“How about halfway through the second set?”
I give her a long look. She thinks I’m giving in. I can tell because she’s smiling. Then I just say, “Bye and Happy New Year,” and turn away. Walk toward the exit. She thinks I’m bluffing.
I’m not bluffing. I absolutely refuse to be bluffing.
Now I’m out on the street and the cold hits me like a wave of relief. I’m surprised by how glad I am to feel it. How pure and clean it is.
Thirty seconds pass. I’ll give her thirty more.
I take a few deep breaths, watching the fog I make with them appear, then dissolve. When the door to the club opens and slams shut, I don’t turn toward it.
“Fine,” says Eliza as she steps up beside me.
No, nothing is fine. But I’m happy to let her believe otherwise for now.
As we walk toward Kendall’s brother’s new address, I play out a sequence of events in my head:
I call her parents. Eliza hates me. She never speaks to me again. I am free.
I’m okay with how that plays out. I’ll call tomorrow.
But wait. What if I chicken out tomorrow? That sounds like something I would do.
So I’ll call them tonight and ask them not to talk to her about it until tomorrow. After we’ve both come home. That buys me some time and doesn’t ruin tonight.
I look at her now. She already seems over the fact that I made her leave the show. That’s because I didn’t.
Eliza is never anywhere she doesn’t want to be.
At the warehouse-looking building that matches the address Kendall gave me, someone buzzes us up without even asking who we are.
“Let me guess,” says the young guy who opens the apartment door. “Max and Eliza?”
“Let me guess,” says Eliza. “Someone described us as a really tall guy and tiny girl.”
The guy laughs. “Well, yeah. I’m Taj. Come on in.”
He leads us into a space with brick walls and posts and beams. Huge windows line one side of the room. The wooden floors are dark and ruddy, like someone singed them with a flame. Aside from one huge sectional sofa, there’s nothing else in the apartment.
“I just moved in,” explains Taj. “Furniture delivery got held up by the blizzard. More room for partying, I guess.”
A handful of people are gathered in the kitchen, eating food from takeout containers. There’s Jamie, showing some guy his Holga.
And there’s Kendall, leaning against the kitchen counter, writing in her notebook.
I’m trying to figure out what to say to her when she looks up at me. For a moment, I can’t read her expression. I wonder if she’s still disappointed and disgusted. Then she smiles wide and her eyes change shape and it’s possible that her skin lights up, too. I feel like I’ve come home.
“Hey!” she says.
Before I can react, Jamie calls, “Max!” and comes over. “Sorry I couldn’t talk earlier. Kendall and I were in the subway. We schlepped out to Brooklyn to return some woman’s lost bag and you know who it turned out to be? The Tangy Ranch Crispo-Chips girl, from that commercial!”
I know exactly what commercial he’s talking about. But I’m more interested in the rest of the story.
“You returned a lost bag?”
“Yeah, with a wallet. We found it in a bakery and Kendall insisted on bringing it to the owner in person.”
I can’t help but smile.
So, she scored one. I scored one. We have one final kindness left.
I look at Kendall again. She’s writing furiously in her notebook. I think it’s awesome that she can do this here. At an unfamiliar loft in New York City on New Year’s Eve.
I really want to talk to Kendall about Brooklyn. And about Kerstin. And about Eliza. And everything, really, beginning with the dawn of creation and ending with the second that just passed.
But I have a bigger issue to deal with first. I pull Jamie into a corner.
“We didn’t get to finish our conversation from earlier,” I say.
Jamie glances at Eliza, who’s already chatting up a bunch of strangers.
“Now?” asks Jamie. “Can’t we figure it out tomorrow or any of the other days that aren’t New Year’s Eve?”
“Figure what out?” says Kendall, appearing out of nowhere.
“Nothing,” says Jamie curtly. Dismissively. I find myself enraged by this.
Kendall looks hard at me with those eyes of hers that are always so, so clear. The rush of what we discovered together comes over me.
I take her hand and lead her away from the others. To where, I’m not sure. Are there any rooms in this loft?
I find a door, open it, pull her in. The only thing in here is a mattress on the floor, and a sleeping bag on the mattress. I close the door before Jamie or anyone else can follow.
“What the F is going on?” asks Kendall.
“It’s Eliza.”
She sighs. “Oh my God. It’s always Eliza.”
“She’s dating a thirty-year-old guy.”
Kendall raises her eyebrows, but then scrutinizes my face.
“That sounds like you just being jealous.”
“I’m not jealous. I’m concerned.”
“Don’t you think Eliza can take care of herself? I’ll bet she’s capable of bossing around a boyfriend twice her age.”
“It’s not okay, Kendall. She’s not even eighteen. He wants to get her a fake ID and sounds like a total creep.” Then I pause. “And it makes me think of Luna and that dude.”
“That’s not fair,” says Kendall. “Playing the Luna card.”
“Sorry,” I say. “But I have a bad gut feeling about this. Right now I’m standing on that street corner and everyone else is afraid to do something.”
I hope Kendall gets it. She must. She’s the only one who can.
And she does. I watch her face change.
“Jamie doesn’t want to deal with it right now,” I continue. “Camden would, but I can’t get ahold of him and I’m not sure when he’s going to show up. I need to do this before midnight. I can’t explain it, it’s just important to me.”
Kendall simply nods. “We do need one more, for the dare.”
“Forget the dare! Besides, Eliza’s not a stranger.”
“Okay,” she says. “So call her parents right now. I’ll stay here and make sure you do it.”
I didn’t realize I wanted her to offer exactly that, until she did.
There’s a knock on the door.
“Hello?” says Kendall.
“Oh, good.” It’s Jamie’s voice. “I was wondering where you went. You okay?”
“Yes,” she says. “Just have to make a call.”
“Do you know where Max is?”
She pauses. “I think he went looking for the bathroom.”
Footsteps move away.
“Take out your phone,” Kendall says with a chin-nudge. “Call them.”
I do as I’m told.
Dial Eliza’s home number.
It rings once.
I hang up.
“What was that?” asks Kendall.
“I don’t know. My fingers panicked.”
“Your fingers.”
“I need a moment.”
“I’m not getting this. You desperately need to call, but you desperately need more time, too.”
“That’s exactly right.”
“Explain.”
How to do that?
“Making the call means letting her go,” I say.
Kendall’s quiet for a second, then simply nods. “It might not mean that.”
“I like to be prepared for the worst-case scenario.”
I hold out my phone again, hover over the words Eliza Home on the screen.
Then I put my phone down again.
“Oh, for Christ’s sake,” says Kendall. “If you don’t, I will.”
I don’t know why I didn’t think of this before.
Kendall can call. Kendall has nothing to lose. Kendall and Eliza already hate each other.
“Would you?” I ask.
And I hold the phone out to her.