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  There was absolutely no justice in this world.

  Jeffrey stopped, looked down. “Shirin, is that you? Are you okay?”

  No. She was not okay. “Jeffrey. What are you doing here?”

  Behind him stood Francesca, her eyebrows raised so high they met her hairline. The bouncer, with his STAFF tee and his surly expression, just stared. Shirin pushed the road case upright.

  “You know you’re the only one who calls me Jeffrey? Everyone else says Jeff.”

  As if Shirin needed another reminder that she was different from everyone. “No kidding.”

  They had drawn a small crowd. Sure, roadies backstage were pretending like they were going about their business. But they lingered as they wrapped up cords. They checked their mics in slow motion. They shuffled precariously close to the case Shirin hid behind.

  Wonderful.

  Shirin stood. “How did you get back here? And what are you doing here, at this concert?”

  “I hoped I’d find you.” Jeffrey stared, his eyes wide and honest.

  I hoped I’d find you. That was worse than anything. The possibility of him only made Shirin wish she could be an adventurer like Francesca. Someone who enjoyed making history, didn’t mind being observed. Shirin took a step back. She didn’t know how to watch and be brave at the same time. She didn’t know how to stay independent and be attached to Jeffrey.

  Shirin could have cried. She was going to have to tell him how she felt. It was the only way he’d understand. She couldn’t easily live her life under a microscope, not the way he did. She couldn’t take that risk.

  She took a deep breath. There was no going back from this. “Jeffrey. I’ve been in love with you since forever.”

  Nobody was even pretending to wrap cords anymore. And Francesca, who was shocked by nothing, gasped.

  Shirin’s voice shook, but she barged on. She had to make him understand. She was retreating. “I thought if I got to know you in homeroom, I would like you less. I thought we would be too different. But turns out, I like hearing how different you are from me. I’ve made it so much worse. You’re not for me. You’re not for girls like me. I’d rather see than be seen.”

  Jeffrey looked ready to take a step forward, but then he didn’t. He nearly reached out for Shirin. But the woman with the boots tutted. Shirin looked over to her—she wore cherry-red lips and her raven hair in big, natural curls under a beanie. She reminded Shirin of a particle collider—power and precision.

  “Uh-uh, kiddo,” said the woman, her voice deep and rich. “You heard the man. No scenes, no trouble. I don’t care how handsome you are.”

  Jeffrey groaned but stayed, miraculously, in place.

  Shirin stepped closer to him, so he knew where she stood. “I’m going to leave and you’re not going to follow me, could you do that?”

  Shirin watched as Jeffrey opened his mouth again. His beautiful, stupid mouth. He closed it, clamping his lips shut. Jeffrey nodded.

  “Thanks.” Shirin didn’t turn around as she left, because she didn’t think she could bear it.

  * * *

  • • •

  Above Shirin and Francesca, the Thousand Day Queens played like there was no tomorrow. There was only now, only this. It was the balm that Shirin needed to soothe her desperate heart. The lead singer and guitarist, Maria Antonio, had a voice of smokeless fire that melted into the sound of her wailing guitar. Everything about bassist Rana Jhan was steady and dependable. Rana was all hard work, absolutely no flash. Except for her pink hair that matched her instrument. Shirin had to admit, that was some flash. But it was the kind you expect from a band.

  Francesca was in the same state of amped-up bliss—arms in the air, eyes half-shut, feet thumping against the theater floor. They moved as a mass. A shifting, undulating beat across bodies. A particle and a wave. Shirin was sweating by now—Francesca’s face glistened and her shirt was darkened in spots—but Shirin didn’t feel the heat anymore. She shut out everything that wasn’t rhythm and sound. The Queens played on and Jeffrey Tanaka ought to have been washed clean from Shirin’s mind.

  But under the beat of the drum Shirin could feel the thump of her heart. And in the twang of the bass, her memory reminded her of the squeak of Jeffrey’s shoes. Shirin closed her eyes. If she couldn’t conquer this now, she would at least pretend to. She did her best to give in to the music.

  A full set and two encores later, Shirin could feel the scratches down her throat from screaming. She could sense the cramps in her calves that she would have tomorrow from jumping up and down tonight. She relished the feeling of her body being spent, of having left all of herself in the pit. Then she thought of Jeffrey trying to kiss his elbow and her euphoria did an unfortunate loop through her stomach.

  “That was magic. Even knowing we were upcharged by a million percent.” Francesca tugged at Shirin’s arm, pulling her along toward the doors.

  But Shirin caught sight of the exit and snatched her arm from Francesca’s grip. Ahead, Jeffrey leaned on the wall beside the only open exit. There was no avoiding him.

  “Oh no. I’ve really got to figure out which of the Twelve Imams I pissed off so I can beg forgiveness.”

  Francesca looked between them. “Hell no. I am not hanging around for this. Meet me outside when you’re done.”

  “Outside?” croaked Shirin.

  Francesca gave Shirin a quick kiss on the forehead. “I told the girls we’d get shawarma on Grand after the show. Obviously you’re coming with. The ridiculous athlete is also welcome.”

  “The girls, as in the Thousand Day Queens?” Shirin shook her head. “Who are you?”

  Francesca shrugged and began walking away. “Your best friend.”

  “And I’m not asking him,” shouted Shirin, but Francesca was already outside. Francesca and her tough love. She would pay for this. Someday soon.

  Shirin approached Jeffrey and the inevitable. But she didn’t know what to say. She’d used up all her words backstage. She stopped and stared, feet from him, thinking about elbows, and Chap Stick, and tuna fish sandwiches.

  Jeffrey ran his hands through his hair. “You’re infuriating.”

  “Me?” breathed Shirin. “How?”

  “You convinced your parents to let you go to concerts when you were fourteen with research and a PowerPoint. Immigrant parents. I mean, I only have immigrant grandparents. You don’t give a damn what anyone thinks of you. Like, you always say what’s on your mind. And, one day out of nowhere, you asked me for a pencil. Then a ruler. You don’t just talk to anyone. So I kept ordering random school supplies in case you needed an orange highlighter or a protractor or a drafting ruler. I wanted to make sure I had it, if you asked.” Jeffrey stubbed his toe on the floor. “And you even like me. So. Why—why do I have to stay away? Why are you staring at me like I’m contagious or something?”

  Shirin took off her glasses and cleaned them on her shirt. She put them back on. “Because you’re impossible. You have to be.”

  Jeffrey stared. “Why?”

  Because she didn’t know how to be an observer and an explorer. Because she didn’t know how to be brave and be herself. “I didn’t want to want you.”

  He laughed. It was hollow. “That bad, huh?”

  “Worse,” she said. And it was true.

  Jeffrey turned to leave. He took one step. Then another. He wasn’t going to turn back around, like at the end of a stupid car-chase movie. He’d probably get over this eventually. Shirin might, too. But maybe, if she was being honest with herself, she didn’t want to. Maybe she hadn’t started talking to him to prove he was uninteresting. Maybe she’d been taking a risk. Maybe all hypotheses were risk and all experiments were bets. Because maybe, just maybe, astronauts weren’t only space explorers—they were scientists, too.

  “I have my own protractor,” she called out.

  He turned around, his face blank. “Then why—?”

  “Bullshit, asshole. No one likes the tuna here,” she said. She hoped sh
e was quoting the right line. She wasn’t sure if that also made her the Paul Walker of this potential relationship, though. Better than being Anne Boleyn, to be honest.

  “You watched it.” He stepped closer. “You watched a pointless movie about car chases.”

  “You came to see a band you’d never heard.” She shortened the distance between them to centimeters, then millimeters.

  Shirin was close enough to run her fingers through his hair. She didn’t, though, not at first. She just stood there, with next to nothing and all of infinity between them. Then she reached up—for his hair, for the stars—and for once didn’t think about the consequences. It was as prickly as she’d imagined. He leaned into her hand, as though the touch were wanted. Then Shirin held his face and pulled his lips to hers. For a moment, he stood so still that Shirin thought she’d made a terrible mistake. And then he was kissing her back. Jeffrey Tanaka—with the sex god hair and the never-ending school supplies—was kissing her back. He tasted like spearmint. The hazy scent of the venue lingered on his skin.

  When they broke apart, they were both short of breath. Jeffrey smiled from ear to ear. Shirin returned the grin. She took his hand and pulled him outside, knowing she’d have another fight with her parents ahead of her. This would definitely make for an interesting PowerPoint.

  “Come on,” she said. “We’ve got a date with a band.”

  They were still holding hands when Francesca waved them over. She was whispering something to Rana, like they’d already become the best of friends. Shirin laughed. If Francesca couldn’t stumble on adventure, she made it happen through sheer will. Shirin was pulling Jeffrey along, nearly to Francesca and the band, when a shout stopped them both in their tracks.

  “Jeffrey Tanaka, you get your butt in this car right now.” Shirin and Jeffrey jumped, releasing hands. At the curb, Jeffrey’s mom was leaning out the driver’s side window of a champagne SUV. Shirin sighed.

  If only her life could be cool, for once.

  Players

  “BIG EDDIE” JONES, 17…“SMOKE”

  WILLIE JIMENEZ, 16…“2-SOON/121”

  D’MARIO THOMPSON, 16…“DATRUF”

  FRANK WATKINS, 17…“J-BOY”

  We are in the present time. The play opens on a dingy urban hallway in some dingy urban city. There is a door at stage right. To the left of the hallway, next to stairs that go up at a steep angle, we see BIG EDDIE, a young African American male, writing his tag on the wall. From somewhere a radio is playing, and we hear an ANNOUNCER talking about the wonders of the “oldies.”

  The light flickers occasionally, giving the set an eerie feeling. The radio gets randomly louder, then softer. BIG EDDIE works hard at his tag, which is the letters spelling out “smoke” sitting on a bed of flames. Throughout the play, the teenagers work on their tags.

  The door at stage right opens and WILLIE appears. He looks around and is momentarily startled by BIG EDDIE.

  WILLIE

  Yo, what’s happening?

  BIG EDDIE

  Same old, same old. Ain’t nobody much in this building.

  WILLIE

  Do it count?

  BIG EDDIE

  Yeah, we still tagging, man. We still tagging. You got more paint?

  WILLIE

  Enough. (He starts putting his tag on the wall. His tag reads 2-SOON/121.)

  BIG EDDIE

  Where did you say you lived? East side, right? Over near Marcus Garvey Park?

  WILLIE

  Yeah. This your first wall tonight?

  BIG EDDIE

  First wall. Hey, man, you scared?

  WILLIE

  No, I ain’t scared. You know some dudes just give up, but I ain’t stopping, man. I got to hold on. How about you?

  BIG EDDIE

  When that old dude told me you could still be in the world as long as people kept you in their minds, I knew what I had to do. They see these tags and they remember. I felt stronger when they had the candles and a picture of me in the park. But the sanitation department took all that stuff away.

  WILLIE

  That’s where you went down?

  BIG EDDIE

  Yeah. I thought I had a get over, man. Some Puerto Ricans said they wanted to cop some heavy weed. Five pounds of Jamaican. I told this dude to meet me in the park and he said okay. When he showed with the money, I tried to take him off, and he flashed a badge on me.

  WILLIE

  A cop.

  BIG EDDIE

  Yeah. I had my piece out and was about to hit the dude, when his partner shot me.

  WILLIE

  Damn!

  BIG EDDIE

  I knew I was gone. I could feel my heart, like, fluttering. Then there was people all around. I could make some of them out. Then it was over.

  WILLIE

  It’s a funny feeling when you know you…you know.

  BIG EDDIE

  Man, I wasn’t accepting it—you know, like I was looking the other way until they started putting flowers and some of my personal stuff around. They put out shit for you, too?

  WILLIE

  Yeah. Somebody made a sign—REST IN PEACE. That’s a trip, right?

  BIG EDDIE

  How you like my tag?

  WILLIE

  (goes over and inspects BIG EDDIE’s tag) It’s okay, but you should get some color in it. You got a fire, but it don’t have any colors. If it’s just black and white, people think about cleaning it off faster.

  BIG EDDIE

  Yeah, yeah. What you mean, “that’s a trip”?

  WILLIE

  (returning to his own section of the wall) What?

  BIG EDDIE

  You said they put out REST IN PEACE and then you said it was a trip. Why you say that?

  WILLIE

  We resting? We ain’t resting. Them old dudes said that as long as people remember us, we can still deal. We got our tags on the wall and people can see we were real, and they’re thinking about us. But we ain’t resting because we got to stay ahead of people cleaning the walls.

  BIG EDDIE

  I’m running from wall to wall to get my tag up. I’m getting tired. That’s what happens to the old dudes. They get tired. They give up.

  WILLIE

  I ain’t giving up. I’ll tag for fucking ever.

  The door opens again and D’MARIO enters. He steps inside, then stops and looks at the others without speaking. For a moment they are frozen in place.

  BIG EDDIE

  He’s dead. He can see us, so he’s dead. Yo, this hallway ain’t big enough for everybody! Go someplace else.

  D’MARIO

  No place is big enough for everybody.

  BIG EDDIE

  So why don’t you find another wall?

  D’MARIO

  You hear they cleaned up Malcolm X Boulevard from 120th Street all the way up to 135th?

  WILLIE

  Some guy is doing a documentary on Harlem. That same dude who did a thing on baseball. After they finish the shooting, they’ll stop cleaning.

  BIG EDDIE

  They got a chemical now—you just spray it on and wait for a minute and then wipe it right off.

  WILLIE

  If he got an interesting tag, maybe they’ll leave it up. People like art. What’s your tag?

  D’MARIO

  DATRUF.

  WILLIE

  Yeah, yeah, I seen your tag. It’s nice, man.

  The door opens again and FRANK “J-BOY” enters. The recognition scene is repeated and they all see that they are deceased.

  WILLIE

  This place is getting to be like some kind of ghetto. How many tags going to go on one wall?

  J-BOY

  I ain’t leaving. You got no power over me, sucker.

  D’MARIO

  Fool’s dead and still talking smack! And tagging with a spray can. That’s old. You can’t tag with no spray can.

  J-BOY

  I can. I’m the best.

  WILLIE
/>   Yeah, everybody’s the best, but we all went down.

  D’MARIO

  How you go down?

  WILLIE

  On a humble! I went into this bodega to get some cigarettes, and the owner—this old fucking dude—is eyeing me like I’m fixing to steal something. So just out of spite, I put my gun in his face. He panicked and started saying something in Spanish and English about “just take the money.” But he grabs hold of my nine and he’s afraid to let it go.

  D’MARIO

  ’Fraid you going to do him!

  WILLIE

  Yeah, and all I want to do is get some cigarettes, let the fool know I could have robbed him, and walk out the damned door! But now I’m struggling with this old man and he’s holding on to my gun and crying and begging and carrying on. I ain’t letting the gun go and he ain’t letting the gun go. Then two sisters come in and see what’s going on and duck right back out. I think they might be calling the cops or something, so I let go of the gun with one hand to punch the old man, and it goes off and hits me in the neck.

  D’MARIO

  You killed yourself!

  WILLIE

  No! The old man had his finger on the trigger! The shot broke something in my neck and I didn’t feel nothing. I knew I was on the ground and…

  (WILLIE is breathing heavily as he remembers the moment.)

  I thought I was just hurt bad. When the ambulance guys got there and looked me over, right away they started making nice-nice to the dude who shot me, trying to make him feel better. Then they put me in a bag and started…(WILLIE can’t continue.)

  WILLIE

  (to D’MARIO) How you go?

  D’MARIO

  Why we got to go through all this? Ain’t no use to it.

  WILLIE

  What else you got to do? You giving a lecture down at the college? You talking at the UN? Maybe you going to be on television!

  D’MARIO

  I was with my cousin Pedro and his little sister on his stoop. We were just chilling. We were talking about this and that, you know, light stuff. Then a car pulls up. Two guys get out of the car, and one of them asks where Hamilton Heights is. Pedro stands up and is going to give the guy directions, when I see he’s flashing signs. One guy pulls down his cap and he’s covering his face, so I knew some shit was about to go down! Then blam! Blam! Blam! Pedro ducks into the building, pulling his sister, and I’m right behind him. A bullet hits the wall next to my head, but I’m halfway up the first flight of stairs, so I think I’m cool. We get up the stairs, and I know they ain’t about to follow us into the building, so I’m breathing light. I think I got a stitch in my side from running so hard, but when I look down, I see I’m bleeding. All kinds of crazy thoughts are going through my mind. You know what I’m thinking? I’ve been shot, but I’m still walking, dig? I’m like Fifty Cent and Tupac and all those guys who been through the battles. I wasn’t even going to say nothing to Pedro until later. Some people are out in the hall ’cause they heard us running up the stairs, and a little boy points at me and tells his mama I’ve been shot. Then I look down again and my whole side is covered with blood. I sit on the stairs and they call 911 and the cops come and an ambulance. After that, all I remember is lying on a table and some doctor telling me to count backward from ten to one. I come to and I’m all by myself and there are guys like y’all standing around sucking on hurt and looking miserable.