Cirrus looked at the guitars again, as if they had changed. “Very cool.”
I heard none of this, because my lie was still busy pinging around the inside of my big empty head like a stray shot. Shocking, how easily the lie had slipped out.
“You’re more than cool,” continued Cirrus. “You’re brave. Most people barely have hobbies, if they bother to try anything at all. Most people let the dream starve and die in the kill-basement of their soul and only visit the rotting corpse when they themselves are finally on death’s door wondering, What was I so afraid of this whole time?”
“Jesus, you’re cynical,” I whispered.
Cirrus spotted something behind my guitars Gray’s guitars: the torn Mortals flyer. “Is that you?”
I cleared my throat, which was already clear. “That’s, uh, my old band,” I said. “We split up. I’m working on a new thing.”
“Cool-cool,” said Cirrus, nodding blankly.
Then she flashed me a look.
Not just any look.
The Look.
I recognized the Look from when Gray was still at school. The Look was a particular type of glance Gray got often—a combination of burning curiosity barely masked by bogus nonchalance. Everyone badly wanted to know Gray; everyone pretended they didn’t.
The Look was the expression people gave to someone doing something well, and with passion. It was an instinctive attraction to creativity—the highest form of human endeavor—expressed by emitting little hearts out of our eyes. It was falling a little bit in love with people who were fashioning something new with their hands and their imaginations.
I had always wondered what it would feel like to get the Look, and now I realized I had just found out.
The Look was pure deadly sweet terror, and it felt incredible.
I instantly wanted another.
Cirrus moved on, her face neutral again. She nodded at something on Gray’s old guitar amp. “What’s that?”
“My ring?” I said.
It was slightly easier this time, calling it my ring, as if lying were a thing that became easier with practice.
I let her hold the Goat of Satan ring. She leaned forward, accepted it, put it on.
“It’s heavy,” she said, amazed.
“It’s the Goat of Satan,” I said. The goat’s name was Barthomat, Birtalmont, Baccarat—
“And then you make a fist and say ‘To metal,’” I growled.
“To metal,” she growled back. Then she studied the ring with a pensive eye, as if it reminded her of something sad. She took it off, handed it back. I put the ring on with a deftness that implied I’d been wearing the thing for years. My finger absorbed her lingering warmth. For an idiotic moment I felt like we had just somehow kissed.
“So what’s your new band called?” said Cirrus.
She threw me the Look again before turning to gaze at nothing in particular. I realized what she was doing. She was wanting for something from me, while pretending her question was no big deal.
My mind seized up. I fiddled with my fingers at my belly, which had gone a little sour. I shoved my hands into my pockets, only to find it was too hot for pockets. So I took them out again and just kind of rested my fingertips on my ribs. Many people sat like this all the time, except those who didn’t, which was everybody.
“Our working band name,” I said, “is the Immortals.”
Immediately I wished I could take it back.
Cirrus smiled. “So you were the Mortals. And now you are the Immortals.”
“Okay, shut up.”
“And I thought I was lazy,” she said with a chuckle.
“I know, I know,” I said, with a wild marionette’s shrug. “We wanted to maintain brand recognition?”
“No, I like it,” said Cirrus. “Also it’s got this dorky Dungeons & Dragons vibe, like Fools, you cannot defeat the immortals!”
“You’re just being nice,” I said, openly knitting my fingers now. Dorky, she said. Dungeons & Dragons, she said.
“I am,” said Cirrus, then laughed until she had to place a hand on my shoulder for support, at which moment I decided she could laugh however long she wanted. All night would be fine by me.
“Seriously, though,” she said. “I could never put myself out there like that. I’d love to see you guys at your next gig.”
All I could do was shrug and turn the ring around and around. Baphomet. The goat was called Baphomet.
“Ffshhhffshssh,” I said, nodding and nodding.
Cirrus grew quiet. She seemed to be considering something, and gave a wan little chuckle to whatever thought was in her head. She opened her mouth to speak.
My gut quivered. I felt I was about to learn something deep and interesting and extraordinarily personal from this new girl. And only fifteen minutes into our very first conversation! The first conversation of many!
But her lips drew a thin tight line, and nothing came out.
Cirrus’s eyes had reset. It was as if a Topic of Conversation dial selector had just been switched to OFF by an unseen hand. Her phone blooped again—more AlloAllos—but she didn’t seem to hear it at all.
I blanched. Had I just inadvertently disappointed her in some opaque way? It was entirely possible—ask my parents—but at the moment I could not fathom what that way could be.
“I should head back,” she said, and stood.
“Cool,” I said, blinking. But this was not cool. She was here, she was about to speak, and now she was suddenly leaving.
“See you tomorrow at school?” she said.
“Uh, sure,” I said. I wanted to kick myself, but I did not know why, or if I even needed to.
So I just watched as Cirrus Soh floated away down the stairs to let herself out without a sound.
Research
Name: Cirrus Soh
Ethnic background: Korean-American
Language skills: unknown (traces of British accent)
Social media footprint: apparently immense, must delve into AlloAllo
Other details: unknown, so many questions
Mamba
I woke up with a yell:
“Uhh!”
I had had a dream. I sat in a beautiful green field full of five-leafed clovers. Cirrus sat by my side. A curtain of hair blew into her amber eyes, and she drew it back, and a flying football glanced off her temple.