JANUARY
AMY
I’VE BEEN STANDING outside my favorite record store, Spirits, for half an hour.
More accurately, I’ve been standing across the street from Spirits, leaning against the front window of the tutoring center, listening to Spirits run through my favorite Flaming Lips album over the outdoor speaker system, and deciding whether or not to go inside.
I came here to get a job at the tutoring center because when my mother asked me what I had planned for today, and I told her my only plan was to turn in my application to Stanford, she told me that I needed to get a job.
Actually, what she said was, “Carlos got laid off last week, and we need you to get a job. Go downtown. And put a load of clothes in the washer before you go.”
There wasn’t even a moment for argument, and what would my argument even be? If they need help, I have to help. Carlos has been working as a mechanic for as long as my parents have been married, and now he’s being laid off?
And of course, the most selfish part of me thought, What about Stanford? Because no matter how hard I work for the Keller Scholarship, if I get it, it isn’t going to pay for clothes and extra-long sheets.
So I came to the tutoring center to get a job. But instead of actually going inside, I’ve been staring at the HELP WANTED sign in the window of Spirits. The bright red SPIRITS sign over the door isn’t lit up, but it shines in the sun nevertheless. Maybe a job won’t be so bad. For just a second, I close my eyes and remember the first time I ever heard this particular Flaming Lips song. I was thirteen, walking through a carnival with Mama, the lights flashing and swirling while this played so loud from one of the game booths that it was almost deafening.
My phone buzzes, and I open my eyes. It’s Jackson, my boyfriend, who’s currently looking for new track shoes at REI, and who just texted me to Go for it! What are you waiting for?
What am I waiting for? I have zero extra time for a job.
But it’s not like this is a choice. It’s not like we can’t afford to eat, but we’re not nearly as well off as some of the people I know, including Jackson, so if Mama says she needs me to get a job, then I have to get a job, even if I feel like I might explode from the overwhelming prospect.
So, it’s between Spirits and the tutoring center. The tutoring center would look good on my application for the Keller Scholarship, but working at Spirits would be like living in a daydream. Besides, everyone I know will be trying to get a job at the tutoring center because people are still trying to pad their applications, but absolutely nobody I know works at Spirits, which is an argument in favor of, not against, working there.
My feet take me across the street. When I step into Spirits and walk down the first aisle of records, grazing my fingertips across the cardboard sleeves as I go, I feel like I can breathe for the first time in months. Between SAT scores, getting my Stanford application ready, and trying to prove that I deserve the Keller Scholarship, I haven’t stopped to smell the vinyl.
There’s a boy behind the counter, and I sneak a look at him as he goes through a tall stack of records. He examines each one, his face giving away no emotion, and then promptly files them into one of two stacks. As I pick up a Nick Drake album and scan the back of it, my eyes pop up to the boy again. He’s easily more than six feet, has red hair, pale skin, eyes that are just a little too wide-set, and is wearing a faded maroon T-shirt with a breast pocket. I’ve seen him before, standing behind that counter when I came in to look for new music, but I’ve skimmed over him the way I skim over most people.
As I’m watching, a girl comes out of a back room. I recognize her, too, from my frequent visits. She looks like she might be in her mid-twenties, but I can see from where I’m standing, right at the end of the aisle, that she has a badge pinned to her clothes that says MANAGER. Half her head is buzzed close to her scalp, and the other half is slicked back. She walks straight over to the boy, slaps a stack of papers on the counter beside him, and sighs.
“I have got to stop hiring college kids,” she says. “I can’t take going through this stupid process every time a new semester starts.” She rifles through the papers in front of her. “I know I’m not supposed to be judging them on their musical taste, but dear God, the last girl couldn’t name all four Beatles.”
The boy laughs. He has a nice smile. And then his eyes flicker up to me, and I look away quick. I don’t want him to know that I’m eavesdropping.
“I have to get someone in here on the weekends,” the manager goes on, and something strums in my chest. “It’s getting too hard for just you and Morgan to be running cash wrap. Don’t you have music-savvy friends who want to work here?”
The boy snorts. “Maybe you should lower your standards.”
I open my mouth. “Excuse me?” I haven’t even realized I’ve walked up to them until there’s nothing but the counter between us. They both look up at me. “Um, you’re hiring?”
The boy taps his fingers on the counter and regards me. I don’t miss the way his eyes slide down my body in a completely stoic way, like he’s just sizing me up.
His manager is regarding me, too, but her eyes are wary. “You want a job?”
I nod.
She bites her lip. “Any experience?”
I have tons of experience. I’ve spent years tutoring and volunteering, picking up trash on the side of the road, reading to children, and taking handmade blankets to the nursing home. But running a register? Not so much. I’ve always been too busy making sure my college applications are perfect to even think about a job. “Um. Not exactly. But I’m a fast learner.”
The guy smiles, but he looks away when he does it. Is he laughing at me?
The girl reaches across the counter, holding a hand out to me. “I’m Brooke.” She nudges the boy with her elbow. “This is Oliver.”
I shake her hand, but Oliver doesn’t offer his. He just nods at me in greeting.
Brooke puts her hands on her hips. She’s curvy and pretty, and she nods her cleft chin in my direction. “The shirt. You listen to the Lumineers or you thought the design was nice?”
I can see in her eyes that my answer is going to tip the scales on her judgment of me. I look down at my shirt. I tug nervously at the hem. “They’re my favorite band. I’m going to their show this summer.”
Brooke reaches across the counter and slaps an application in front of me. “Fill this out for our records, but you’re hired. You in college?”
I reach into my purse for the pen that I keep in there. “Senior in high school.”
“Nights and weekends?”
“Sure.” Something creeps into the back of my mind. How am I going to fit a part-time job into my schedule? My hand pauses, my pen sliding to a halt.
“Something wrong?” Brooke asks.
“Um. No.” I go back to the form and scribble the rest of my information down.
Brooke glances down at the application when I slide it back to her. “Can you start Monday night? Five o’clock? It’ll be slow, so we can train you.”
I nod, but I’m thinking about Monday already. It’s my first day back at school after winter break, and I’ll probably have a load of homework. But I can stay up late. Or do it before my shift. I’ll find the time. I have to.