dancergirl

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My stomach growls so loud Jacy laughs. “And you call me a beast!”

The crowd follows the asphalt path around the ranger station. The white band shell sits at the bottom of a natural amphitheatre. A Celebrate Brooklyn! banner spans the lighting rig. People are everywhere; blankets laid out end to end create a giant chessboard. The spicy scent of weed drifts on the breeze.

“Jacy!” Sonya shouts. “Over here!”

I spot her first. She and Clarissa have staked out a prime spot under a tree. Jacy and I thread our way up the hill.

Sonya’s soft, pillowy skin reminds me of the Pillsbury Doughboy. She counters that with some major body piercing: nose, tongue, belly and, at last count, seven earrings on each lobe. Her eyes, lined with dark makeup, are huge.

But not as huge as her appetite. “What did you bring?”

Jacy sets the grocery bag on the blanket and removes a dozen doughnuts, six-pack of Coke and the grapes I insisted we buy at the corner market.

“Awesome,” Sonya says. “Clarissa and I got hummus, pita and cucumber salad from that Middle Eastern place on Fourth. And a box of Mrs. B’s cookies.”

A true-blue fashionista, Clarissa is doing a Guatemalan-peasant thing: white embroidered blouse tied to bare her midriff, low-slung jeans. She has a deal with a stylist in the Village and gets free haircuts if she lets the guy experiment. This time, her hair is a mixture of lengths—real short on the right side, longer on the left. Not one of the better cuts, but not as bad as the one where her scalp looked like it got caught in a blender.

Someone jumps Jacy from behind. “Strode!”

Josh Tomlin, who was Banquo in the school’s hip-hop version of Macbeth, does the WiHi handshake: palm slide, fist smack. Not quite the pretty boy he thinks he is—his jaw is way too square—he might actually have some acting talent underneath all that ego. Charlie Liu, on the other hand, is skinny and hyperactive, with square-framed glasses that are a little too big for his face. Video camera in one hand, he rattles a bucket of Kentucky Fried with the other.

“Jace the Ace,” Charlie says. “Join the fiesta?”

Clarissa, Sonya and I make room on the blanket.

“You didn’t tell me it was a party!” I whisper to Jacy.

He gives me a wicked grin. “Didn’t know who would show.”

Now I really wish I’d showered—but as soon as the band begins to play, I forget all about it. Sinewy bass, syncopated drums. By the time I finish eating, Clarissa moves to the groove.

“Dance with me,” she cries.

She doesn’t have to ask twice. I start small to allow reggae’s seductive rhythm to settle into my bones, and then let my body go where it wants. Doesn’t take long before the world melts away. Just me, the music and—

It.

Back of the neck prickle, goose bumps on my arms. I swivel around. Everywhere, people are mellow. Lying on blankets. Getting high. Batting a beach ball through the crowd.

My friends are occupied, too. Sonya, still sitting by the food, laughs at something Josh says. Jacy leans against the base of the tree, talking to Laura Hernandez. She came to the concert with Luke Sorezzi’s stoner crowd.

At last, I notice Charlie farther up the hill, channeling Spike Lee, Minicam trained on me.

It’s exactly like my dream, only this time someone really is staring. It totally weirds me. Performing onstage is one thing; being secretly observed, like I’m some kind of zoo animal, is something else.

Busted!

Charlie sees me staring, hands on hips. Immediately, he turns the camera toward the stage. My groove broken, I walk over to Jacy and Laura Hernandez.

“Yo!”

“Grab the cookies,” Jacy tells me.

I toss the box into his hands. Laura gives me a “Get lost!” stare. She’s got raven hair and flashing eyes, but I don’t like the way she’s practically sitting in his lap. Way too pushy.

When I don’t move, she stretches in a way designed to show off her considerable rack. She’s wearing a spaghetti-strap tank that she’s practically busting out of. “Guess I’ll bring that record over tomorrow.”

Jacy nods. “Sounds good.”

She gives me a triumphant glare and waltzes back to Sorezzi.

I nibble a pecan sandie. “Score a hot date?”

Jacy shrugs. “Whatever. Are you having fun?”

“Yeah. This was a good idea.”

“Told you.” He gropes the cookie box and surfaces with the last one. “Want to hear my news?”

“You have news?”

“You are now looking at the Voice’s fall intern,” he announces.

“No way.”

Jacy was a finalist for the summer one but lost out at the last moment, which explains his slacker vacation.

He grins so wide, his dimples look as if they’re chiseled into his cheeks. “Let’s dance.”

Now that’s almost as amazing as the internship. I’ve never seen Jacy volunteer to dance with anyone. The band segues into a Marley song and the crowd begins to sway as one, so sweet it’s like floating in a bowl of caramel syrup. Jacy catches the mood. He leans forward, an odd gleam in his eye.

Omigod! Is he going to kiss me?

Just as the question forms, a beach ball comes at us from the left. Instinctively, I move back. The ball smashes Jacy’s nose.

“Ooof,” he breathes, more surprised than hurt.

“Why didn’t you duck?”

With a laugh, I bat the ball down the slope. By the time I turn around, Jacy’s back against the tree, looking extraordinarily pissed off. At the ball? Himself? Me?

I shouldn’t have laughed. Immediately, however, my mind skips from shouldn’t to couldn’t. As in: he couldn’t have been about to kiss me. I know he’s happy about the internship but nobody, and I mean nobody, kisses their best friend, for the very first time, in public.