“I’m not sure this is working for me anymore.”

“Dude,” Stefan says. “Don’t be such a drama queen.”

Gage turns to Stefan like he’s going to say something. Then he stalks out of the garage to his car. He slams his door and peels out.

“Was it something I said?” Stefan wonders.

Watching band practice is usually fun. These four guys all started out at the same level, practicing in Ethan’s garage three days a week after school. The thing is, they’re not going to be at the same level for much longer. Especially now that Zeke is in the picture.

Zeke Goldstein is a beast.

Ethan met him at a show they played in New Haven. Zeke wasn’t even there scoping out talent. He was on a blind date his friend set up. As soon as Ethan sang his first note, Zeke knew he was destined for greatness. He was determined to sign Ethan right away. Zeke is on the grind 24/7. He just started working on building Ethan’s career and Ethan already has thousands of followers. He says Ethan is about to go places beyond his wildest dreams. And that boy’s dreams are pretty wild.

Zeke will be the first one to tell you that he discovered Ethan and that he deserves to take credit for Ethan’s future success. Which comes off as arrogant to me. The way Zeke sees it, he’s confident in his ability to build an artist’s career. And he believes in Ethan more than anyone he’s ever represented. He even dropped a few clients to make more room for Ethan on his list. Zeke insists Ethan’s career is about to blow up.

“I guess we’re done here,” Ethan says.

Drew packs his bass. Stefan riffs on the drums.

Ethan comes over and scrunches against me on the couch. “Sorry about the drama,” he says.

“Honey badger don’t care.”

“It just takes what it wants.”

“And of course what does the honey badger have to eat for the next two weeks?”

“Cobra!” we both yell.

We were on the floor the first time we saw that video. I don’t know what’s so hysterical about it. But we were dying. We were also dying over that video of the race car. The race car isn’t even moving. It’s just a picture of a race car. Some guy is making race-car sound effects over it like, “Rinnnng neee neee nee nee neeeee!” Again, way more hysterical than it should be.

Ethan scrunches even closer to me. He holds me tight.

“I have to get up,” he says. “But I don’t want to get up.”

“I don’t want you to stop hugging me.”

“They need to invent a tool to pry us apart.”

He’s right. It’s like we have to touch each other all the time or we’ll die or something. “They should call it the peeler-offer.”

“OXO should make one.”

“I was just going to say that!” OXO is one of my favorite brands of kitchen tools. They’re into form plus function. Which is the best combo for cooking supplies.

Drew and Stefan shuffle over to talk to Ethan before they leave. I go inside. The last thing I want to be is the lead singer’s clingy girlfriend.

3

[18,736 FOLLOWERS]


Being a culinary geek means that no shiny new kitchen appliance fails to catch my eye. Or shiny new utensil. Or shiny new tableware. Which is why Crate & Barrel is my mecca.

I’m meeting my best friend, Georgia, for brunch in twenty minutes. The brunch place is across the street. There’s no way I could resist coming here first. Not to get anything. There’s just something about walking around the kitchen section, admiring how the dazzling light glints off every single glass surface and which spatula colors are the hot trend this season and seeing what new cupcake sprinkles they have, that is incredibly soothing. It makes me happy. And it makes me excited for my future self, who will own most of this stuff.

“May I help you find something?” an employee asks. She has bright red lipstick, a sky-high, gold-streaked ponytail; and enough perky energy to power the entire store.

“No, thanks. I’m just looking.”

“For anything in particular?”

“Not really.” It’s hard to explain what I’m doing here. It’s actually kind of embarrassing to try explaining my obsession out loud.

“Let me know if you need anything. I’ll be right over there.” She points to an island of registers.

“Okay. Thanks.” Something sparkly catches my eye behind the registers. I dart over to find out what is so sparkly. Snow-cone cups with neon stripes are stacked in glittering containers. A super profesh snow-cone machine sits next to them along with an array of syrups. The summery display makes me smile. School just ended. I have the whole summer to chill. Cooking and reading are definitely on the agenda. I’ve recently gotten back into yoga, working on being present in the moment. I want to be more focused, less preoccupied. There will be lots of time to hang out with Georgia and Miles and our other friends. And there will be lots of late nights with Ethan. . . .

A typed sign hanging behind one of the registers says:


DO NOT CLOSE THIS DRAWER. HINGE IS LOSE.

See, that’s just depressing. A typo anywhere is insulting. But a typo at Crate & Barrel is personally offensive. I rely on Crate & Barrel to dispense information in their signature smooth, bold font that is both accurate and charmingly lyrical. True, this sign was done by an employee, not corporate. But that’s no excuse for ignorance. To bother going to the trouble of typing the sign? And then hanging it where everyone can see?

Ms. Perky swings around behind a register. “Ready to check out?” she asks.

“No, sorry. I was just . . .” There’s really no way to explain myself. First with the Crate & Barrel obsession. Now with the typo obsession. I know I’m not normal. But I can’t help who I am.

It all started with a vegetable.

My cooking class went to New Haven last year for Restaurant Week. There was a tasting menu at a restaurant where our teacher knew the executive chef. We got to see how they prepped for the dinner rush. When we were walking around earlier that day, we went into a deli for drinks. The deli had an awning that looked brand-new. The awning was green. The awning was huge. And this is what the awning said right across the front:


DELI, GROCERIES, BEER, SNACKS, VEGETABLE

Dude. They only had one vegetable.

I pointed out the typo to a girl from my class. She was like, “We better run in quick and snatch that vegetable up before someone else gets it!”

After the vegetable debacle, I started noticing typos everywhere. On handwritten signs in store windows. At school. Even on billboards that people had paid a lot of money for. One time when my mom and I were at the grocery store, I saw a handwritten sign on an employees only door that said OPEN “SLOWLY.” Those stupid quotation marks annoyed me the whole time I was pushing our cart around. I almost ran over an old lady, I was so annoyed. While Mom was checking out, I went up to the customer service desk.

“How can I help you?” the smiling guy behind the counter said.

“You can actually help everybody. See that sign?” I pointed at the crooked piece of paper on the door.

“Yes?”

“Notice anything strange about it?”

His smile vanished. He looked again.

“What are you getting at?” he accused.

“See those quotation marks around slowly?”

“Yes?”

“Why are they there?”

“We’ve been having problems with the door. People are opening it too fast and slamming into people.”

“You don’t need those quotation marks,” I explained. “The sign should just read ‘open slowly.’”

“You serious?” He laughed. “Why are you wasting my time with this?”

I was two seconds away from grabbing the black marker from his desk, marching over to the sign, and scribbling out the quotation marks. But I restrained myself from looking like a lunatic at ShopRite.

“You should correct the sign,” I said. Then I walked away.

Walking away is not my thing.

For a while after the Open “Slowly” Incident, I corrected any typo I saw on a sign. No sign was safe. I did it on the DL so I wouldn’t offend anyone directly. It was my way of trying to make the world a smarter place. But whipping out a marker to change “their” to “there” in “Their are two lanes open” wasn’t enough. Not even close.

That’s why I want to be a book publisher. The decline of our society’s collective intelligence is sad. I mean, really, is this the best we can do? Not that I should talk. I didn’t take school seriously up until last year. School was just something I had to endure until I could graduate and focus on real life. But now that I have a career goal I feel passionate about, I’m putting a lot more energy into my classes. I want to show other people that knowledge is a good thing. As a publisher, I’ll have the power to share quality work that can change the world. I can make a much greater impact by publishing books that advance our collective intelligence than I can correcting a few random signs three people might notice. My mom is in full support of my career goal. She has a severe dislike for pop culture and what it’s doing to our society. She loves that I want to help preserve the English language.

When I see the ridiculous comments posted on Ethan’s pages with their typos and misspellings, I want to comment back how stupid they sound. But of course I would never do that. Restraint is just one way I support Ethan’s big dream.

4

[103,204 FOLLOWERS]


“Look at this,” Ethan says.

Something about being in Ethan’s room puts me in a warm, fuzzy trance. Maybe it’s how everything is so familiar. Or how it smells like him, a mix of Gucci Guilty and vanilla. I always feel so comfortable here. This is where Ethan grew up. His room knows all his secrets. His true feelings. His desires. I could stay on his bed reading for days. But I pry myself up and go over to his desk. What he’s pointing at on the huge computer screen is incredible.

He has 103,204 followers.

“That’s over five hundred more than yesterday,” he says.

“Of course it is. You’re amazing.”

Ethan reaches up and pulls me down on his lap. He slides his fingers through my wet hair.

“You’re amazing,” he says.

We just came in from Ethan’s pool out back. It’s one of the many reasons I love coming over to his house. His house is so massive, you wouldn’t even know his parents and little sister live here, too. I’ve come over lots of times without seeing any of them, even when they’re all home.

We read the comments on the new video he posted today. Or Ethan reads while I watch our reflection in the mirror above his desk. I love how good we look together. Ethan is athletic lean with big blue eyes and dark brown hair. He has the kind of look that makes girls melty. I’ve melted in many locations just because he looked at me in that intense boyfriend way. His eyes are almost the same shade of dark blue as mine. It’s weird seeing my hair so dark in the mirror. I changed my hair right before summer vacay. I’m still getting used to it being black with a jade streak.

Ethan pulls me closer. Right when he’s about to kiss me, his computer pings with new comments.


How can you look so sexy without even trying? You gangsta now :D


Hot video. Scorching. En fuego.


OMG!!!!!! we luv u in richmond, Ethan! Do a show hre pleeeeeze???

The very first comments Ethan got when he started posting videos two years ago were exciting. He told me he used to write everyone back. That was before I knew him. It’s so weird how I didn’t even talk to him back then. Ethan still reads and appreciates every comment, but now there are way too many for him to write back to everyone. He would if he could, though. The boy has serious love for his fans.

This new video is getting more views and comments than ever. Ethan’s mom hired a professional filmmaker to do his last three videos. Then Ethan hooked up with Red Bedroom Records, an indie label that’s all about discovering stellar new talent. He recorded his first album with them. Forever is about to drop. Red Bedroom only wanted Ethan, so he recorded Forever without The Invincibles. He’s hoping that attention for the album will inspire attention for the band. Ethan’s stoked that Zeke signed him in the spring. That gave Zeke time to hustle enough to make sure Forever will be huge.