I am a terrible person. I let two strangers take off with my sistah-girl. For all I know, Thom and Scot are the power couple of serial killers, the Ted Bundy and Aileen Wuornos of the garage-band New Jersey punk-rock scene. What if Caroline has woken up and is looking for me, like after her mom died and her dad checked out for a younger model, and Caroline would wake up in the middle of the night, scared and alone, and creep over the fence to my house? No, I shouldn’t worry. My instinct may have been wrong that Nick was attracted to me, but it wasn’t wrong that his friends were good guys. They’ll get her home.

I answer. “Thom? Is Caroline okay?”

“Finally!” he says. “Yes, she’s still asleep. Seems happy. Keeps mumbling something about cartoons and Krispy Kremes in the morning. But I’ve been trying to call Nick for the past hour. Didn’t you guys hear the phone? Scot and I got lost coming off the parkway and then, er, we got distracted at the rest stop and the directions on my hand kinda got rubbed off. We’re sitting in the parking lot of a 7-Eleven. I have no idea where we are or how to get to your house.”

I try to talk Thom through it, figure out where he is, but he confuses me more, and I’m lost all over again. The taxi driver slams on his brakes again. I think we’re near St. Marks Place now. “Give me that,” the driver says, pointing to the phone. I like that he is law-abiding and does not try to use Nick’s cell phone while the vehicle is motion.

I hand him the phone and the driver talks to Thom, figures out where he is and how to get him home to my place in Englewood Cliffs, then hands the phone back to me. “Here, Thom wants to talk to you again.”

“Hi again,” I say into the phone.

I hear Thom’s giggle. “So how is it going? How was the date with Nick? You love him, right?”

“It’s been great. We’re getting married.”

“Really? Can I talk to him?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“I have no idea where he is.” I click off the cell.

We’re at the restaurant. “You coming in?” I ask the driver. “Borscht and pierogies are on me.”

He smiles at me. His daughters must have some really nice family portraits from Sears hanging in their house. “Thanks, but I’m a working man. Got to keep working. You keep the Kleenex, though.”

I take the box of Kleenex out of the car and give the driver my hundred-dollar bill, the whole of my emergency cab money Dad placed in the secret crevice of my wallet. I only have enough money left in my wallet for something to eat and to take the bus back to Englewood Cliffs, so I’ll have to hang out at the restaurant for a couple hours until the bus service is running again.

A crazy lady stands at the restaurant entrance, holding a Chock full o’Nuts tin can, the Wicked Witch of the Stank. She eyeballs me, zeroing in on my chest area. Maybe she knows something about those vitamin supplements. She tells me, “Salvatore is looking for you.”

I reach back into the jacket pocket for the crumpled ten-dollar bill. I donate Nick’s tunnel money into the witch’s can.

“No, he’s not,” I assure her.

13. NICK

Life fails. Songs don’t always.

I’m on the curb. Taking it all in, including the nothing. Where I am, how I am, who I am, what I’m not.

It starts to come to me.

on Ludlow

the world goes so slow

all the things I don’t know

closing in

on Ludlow

the sidewalk shadow

keeps pleading don’t go

but you won’t hear

Alright, Nick. Louder.

WHO WILL APOLOGIZE FOR HOW

WE ARE?

WHO WILL NAVIGATE WHEN WE’VE

GONE THIS FAR?

ANSWER ME

ANSWER THIS

ANSWER ALL THE QUESTIONS THAT

I’M TOO AFRAID TO ASK

ON LUDLOW

YOU LET ME KNOW

AND I LET YOU GO

AND WE WERE WRONG WRONG

WRONG

ON LUDLOW

THERE’S A SHADOW

THAT LETS THE TRUTH SHOW

AND WE WERE WRONG WRONG

WRONG

NEVER AGAIN

IS WHAT I ALWAYS SAY

NEVER AGAIN

IS WHAT I ALWAYS SAY

NEVER AGAIN

IS WHAT I ALWAYS SAY

Take it back down.

on Ludlow

it’s just a stone’s throw

from where we could go

to where we are

on Ludlow

find me on Ludlow

on Ludlow

find me here…

“Dude! That’s pretty kickass!”

Dev slaps me on the back and sits next to me, his hair a ball of dance-induced sweat, the moisture making his shirt fit even tighter than when it began the night.

“You’re not in there for Where’s Fluffy?”

“Nah. Needed to take a break. You think it’s easy being the cutest damn underage lead singer on the queercore scene? I can’t work it all the time, man.”

“Where’s Randy?”

“Who?”

“Randy.”

“Huh?”

“From Are You Randy? You were, uh, with him before?”

“Oh! You mean Ted! He’ll be out in a few. Wanted to dance off the last song. Isn’t he high voltage?”

Dev’s got his mischievous, smitten gleam in his eye, so I nod in agreement. Sometimes Dev only has the mischievousness, and none of the smittenosity—that’s when I usually worry about the other guy’s heart. But when Dev gets bitten by the swoony bug, I know it isn’t just sex that he’s after.