It was mom this time who drove me and Abby to the seventh grade dance Friday evening. Mom had been pretty good about not asking or saying embarrassing stuff, just asking us when she should come back to pick us up. The one embarrassing thing she did do was say how much she LOVED dancing and how just hearing a good song with “that beat” would make it hard for her not to just start moving her feet, wherever she was, whether it was “appropriate” or not.

And when we got to the driveway by the side of the school, because there were other kids around who knew us and we didn’t want to see us together, Abby thanked mom for the ride but got out of the car before I did, closed the car door and walked towards the entrance to the school. I waited in the backseat.

Mom looked at me surprised and asked, “Aren’t you going to walk in together?”

I shook my head, waited for a few more seconds until Abby was way ahead, then I got out.

Mom said, “Okay. Whatever. Have a great time. I’ll pick you two up at nine o’clock unless you call me and tell me otherwise.” I nodded, closed the car door, and she drove off. It was still light out but I couldn’t see the sun behind the tall trees across the driveway to the west of the building, but their tops were all lit up by that glow, what mom called “the golden hour”.

I still had my “tea shades” in my shirt pocket. There was no way I was going to wear them around mom because she might say something like, “You look so cute in those sunglasses”, which would totally ruin them for me. It had been a while since I’d had a haircut, so I figured my hair was long enough that I could at least rub my hands through it and make it look messy. I’d worn my paisley shirt like last time. Even though it was my dress-up shirt it was also the only shirt I had that was kind of hippie-like. I wore my blue jeans this time instead of my black dress-up pants, though they weren’t like those real hippie bellbottom ones that some college students were wearing, and they sold at that Middle Earth place. I wore my black Keds instead of my shiny black dress-up shoes.

I saw Teddy and Gill up ahead. They saw me, and Teddy waved and they came over and walked next to me as we walked towards the entrance to the building by the cafeteria. They both were wearing blue jeans and sneakers like me, but they both had on t-shirts and leather jackets. They also both had sunglasses on. Teddy’s were big and round like my mom’s. Gills were those mirror ones. Gill looked pretty strange in a leather jacket and mirror sunglasses.

“Paisley shirt. Nice touch”, said Teddy, “Gill’s dad had these old leather jackets in the attic, and that pair of sunglasses. I had to wear my mom’s. I hope I don’t look like a girl. No sunglasses for you?”

I nodded and pulled out my purple tea shades and put them on.

“You look like one of those guys in the Turtles”, he said, “Remember when they were on the Smothers Brothers? My mom doesn’t want me to watch that show, but I saw it over at Gill’s.”

“‘Happy Together’“, Gill said, “That’s my favorite song!”

“I tried to convince Billy to come this time”, Teddy said, “But he said he doesn’t dance, his feet are much too wide.” He rolled his eyes and said, “Billy sometimes.” Yeah, I thought, Billy ALL the time.

We went into the doors by the cafeteria, and my old Art teacher, Mr Beenhouser, was there and said, “Just follow the signs on the wall down to the multi-function room”, like we couldn’t have figured that out for ourselves.

Then he asked, “So what’s the deal with the sunglasses and the clothes? I’ve seen a bunch of students dressed like you guys.” He sounded like he wasn’t happy about it.

“The band wanted us to dress like hippies”, I said. He shook his head slowly and looked up at the ceiling.

“Geez Louise”, he said, “What? Are you all a bunch of lemmings?”

“What are lemmings?” Gill asked him. Mr Beenhower rolled his eyes and waved his hand in front of his face.

“Just follow the signs and try to have fun”, he said, still shaking his head.

As we walked by him down the hall Teddy said to Gill, “I think lemmings are these rodents that always follow their leader, even if their leader jumps off a cliff or something.”

The multi-function room was on the ground floor way down at the other end of the school. I’d only been in it a few times when we did tumbling in Phys Ed. It was a lot bigger than a regular classroom but way smaller than the gym, and it had a regular ceiling like a classroom and not the super high one in the Gym. When Teddy, Gill and I walked up to the open double doors it was Miss Hulot, the French teacher, who was guarding the door.

She saw us coming and made fists with her hands and put them on either side of her waist with her elbows out and said in a kind of pretend serious voice, “You three look too old to be seventh-graders!”

“Ha ha”, said Teddy, “A joke, right?”

She smiled and said, “Of course. But the three of you seem MUCH older than you were at the start of the year. And look at your costumes and the sunglasses. Just like a lot of the others.” She seemed like the youngest of all of our teachers though she usually acted like a regular grownup.

There were lots of kids there already. Many of them I guess had gotten the word to dress like hippies. Most of the boys were wearing jeans and all kinds of different strange shirts or jackets, some wearing headbands too. I noticed Grant and Todd wearing what looked like purple band jackets with white shirts under them with ruffles down the middle, plus headbands around their heads, looking like guys in the Association or the Mamas and the Papas. And there was Alice with her tea shades on and and that same long green skirt she had worn that day I ran into her at the Blue Front and we had ridden to Middle Earth to buy our tea shades, except she was wearing one of those white t-shirts with no sleeves that someone, maybe her, had written “Peace Love Joy” on the front with black ink. She had flowers in her hair. Of course, she and her parents were way closer to being real hippies than the rest of us.

Over in another part of the room were Myrna, Abby and Beth, and a bunch of other girls. Most of them had long skirts on and all kinds of strange stuff on the top part of their bodies – shirts with all kinds of colors, stripes or polkadots, t-shirts, vests, or like little blankets wrapped over their shoulders. Most of them were wearing tea shades, like the ones Alice and I had bought at Middle Earth. I couldn’t see anyone that looked like Rose, and I started to worry that maybe she didn’t come for some reason.

Over in the corner of the room the band was setting up. There was Mr Balfort and the Orchestra teacher, Mr Denisov. Also there were my friends Arthur, Frankie and Stuart, all dressed in blue jeans and shirts with lots of colors. Arthur was wearing some sort of vest and Frankie was wearing a big what looked like fur hat. They all had sunglasses on but not the tea shades like a lot of the girls. I realized that I hadn’t told any of the other boys about the tea shades at Middle Earth, but Alice must have told Abby who probably told Myrna and then Myrna told a bunch of other girls.

One of the girls by Myrna looked at me across the room and waved, just like Rose always waved to me. Rose’s hair was always straight down, but this girl was wearing a headband and all her hair was all curly and sticking out above her headband instead of below it. She was wearing purple tea shades like mine. I wondered if that could be Rose, even though from across the room I couldn’t tell if it was her. She said something to Myrna who looked in my direction and saw me too. Then Myrna waved at me to come over.

I looked at Teddy and Gill. They were looking around the room and talking about their friends that they saw, and whether they were going to ask any girls to dance or not. I told them I had to talk to Stuart and started walking across the room through all the kids standing and talking to each other, but instead of going over to Stuart by the band, I turned and headed over to where Myrna was.

“So guess who this is”, said Myrna, pointing at the girl with the headband and the crazy hair next to her, “She got all dressed up and her hair done up just for you!”

“Myrna!” Rose said, sounding kind of mad, “My sister made me wear my hair like this!” Rose sure looked different.

“Whatever”, Myrna said, then looking at me, “So are you going to ask her to dance?” I nodded.

“So ask her”, Myrna said, looking me fiercely in the eyes.

“MYRNA!”. Rose said, louder and sounding even more mad this time. I’d never seen her be angry before, it was kind of cool.

Rose looked at me and asked, “We’re gonna dance, right?” I nodded again.

I wasn’t sure why I was having so much trouble saying those words, asking her to dance. Maybe because Myrna and some other girls that were friends of Myrna’s were now watching me. When I asked Rose to dance at the Sock Hop last November, she was more by herself. It was bad enough asking her to dance when she was by herself, but it would have been completely impossible when other people were around and might be watching me. And just asking her to dance felt like saying something like I was saying “will you be mine” and people would somehow see that I really wanted to pull down my pants for her, like what I told Joey in third grade about Mary in our class, that he blabbed to everybody else in class before recess.

“I want to welcome all of you to our spring seventh grade dance”, it was Mr Balfort speaking into one of the microphones where the band was setting up, “And I want to thank all the teachers on the spring dance committee for helping make this event possible. Please give them a round of applause.” He started clapping and the other grownup teachers and most of us kids did too.

Then he talked about which bathrooms were open and where snacks and stuff to drink were in the cafeteria. Finally he said, “So without further ado”, whatever that meant, “Back by popular demand… Goon Squid.”

Jason, the band’s bass player, went to one of the other microphones and said, “Thanks Mr B… Though it’s ‘THE Goon Squid’, like THE Beatles or THE Kinks.”

“Or THE Monkees”, some kid yelled out. Jason dropped his head and then looked at Leon, the guitar player, who shook his head slowly.

I knew all the names of the band members because Arthur had told us several times, including Mitch, the drummer, who was his sister’s boyfriend and always wanted to feel her up. I also remembered that they didn’t like the Monkees, because they said they weren’t a real band, but just four guys hired to do a TV show about a pretend band. I mean I KIND OF liked the Monkees, I watched their TV show and I liked a lot of their songs, especially “I’m a Believer” and “Last Train to Clarksville”.

Mr Balfort looked at Jason like he thought that having the “the” before “Goon Squid” was pretty stupid, and said, “Fine… take it away”, and walked away from the microphone over to where the Orchestra teacher, Mr Denisov, was standing and looked at him and shook his head.

Leon, the band’s guitarist and lead singer, stepped up to the mic stand and said, “So thank you Mr Balfort and all the other folks on the Tappan Spring Dance Committee for letting us come back and play for you all again. I guess you’re all seventh graders tonight, right?”

“Seventh Graders RULE!” some kid yelled out, and I looked and it was Lance. And then Danny, Ben and the other boys around him all said, “YEAH”, really loud.

Leon looked over at him and said, “Well I guess they rule tonight. Anyway… our first set tonight is an homage to our local musical roots here in the greater A-Squared Detroit area. This first one is a nod to Scott Morgan, and his great local Ann Arbor High band, the Rationals. And of course, Otis Redding, who wrote the song.” He looked back and nodded at Mitch, the drummer and Arthur’s sister’s boyfriend, who held up and tapped his drumsticks together four times, then Leon played one chord four times on his guitar then another one and Jason and Seebastian sang “Ahh” into their microphones together followed by Leon singing the verse…

(Ahh) What you want, honey, you got it
And (Ahh) what you need, honey, you got it
(Ahh) All I want is a little respect when I come home
Hey, hey, (Hey, hey, hey)
Alright, baby, yeah

We all knew the song because first it was on CKLW when Otis Redding sang it, then Ann Arbor radio stations sung by the Rationals, but was now a really big hit for Aretha Franklin, again on CKLW, though Stuart had said that though she was from Detroit she wasn’t Motown.

Rose was standing next to me and started moving to the music and I did too, though we were both facing towards the band instead of each other. Myrna was next to Rose and moving too. Rose turned towards me so I did towards her, so I guess we were dancing together now. Myrna was still dancing facing the band. Some of the girls who had been around Myrna were dancing with boys and some were dancing by themselves or with, or at least next to another girl. Abby and Henry were dancing. Beth was dancing with some guy I didn’t recognize.

Like the Sock Hop last November, none of the boys danced by themselves or with each other, though some of them moved their bodies a little bit to the music if they weren’t dancing with a girl. I noticed Lance was dancing with some girl I didn’t know, but BEN was dancing with RAMONA, but she was looking at Lance a lot even though she was dancing with Ben.

Leon kind of moved his body around, tilting his head and making fists with his hands as he sang, like he was feeling all the feelings of the words in the song…

Hey, little girl, you’re so sweet, little honey
And I’m about to give you all my money
All I want is just a little respect when I come home

Just like with the Beatles songs, when older boys liked older girls, they called them “little girls”, even though they were really older girls, because calling them “little” I guess was more romantic. And I guess the deal was that you gave all your money to your girlfriend and she gave you “respect”, which I figured meant she wouldn’t like or kiss or do sex stuff with other guys. Or maybe you only did that if you got married, I wasn’t sure. But I couldn’t imagine calling any girl I knew, “my little girl”. Not Rose or Abby or even Molly.

Rose and I just kind of took steps and turned and moved our bodies back and forth to the music. We weren’t doing any of those actual dances that had names like the “Twist”, the “Frug”, the “Shake” or the “Watusi”. And both of us were just mostly looking around the room at everyone else while we danced, to see if other kids were dancing and to make sure no one was looking at us very much. Since Myrna was behind Rose, I could see her dancing, at least a little, by herself. And Abby was there too but she was dancing with that Henry guy she danced with at the Sock Hop.

When the song finished everyone clapped and cheered. Rose even looked at me while she was clapping and cheering, almost like she was clapping and cheering for ME, which felt really cool. Leon, the main guy of the band, came to the mic and said “thanks”.

He continued, “Okay guys and girls. Some Motown for you, a little Stevie Wonder.” He looked at Sebastian standing in front of the organ and asked, “You ready?”

Sebastian shook his head and held up a finger for Leon to wait. He flipped or moved several switches on his organ and then tapped at the keys and squeaky notes came out. He frowned and moved those switches around some more and tapped the keys again and the notes were sharper and not quite as squeaky. Then he nodded.

Leon nodded back and said, “You lead man.”

With his left hand Sebastian played the lower notes that started the song, the drummer and bass player joining in. I recognized the musical phrase but couldn’t place the song until he played the really high whistling notes with his right hand. It was that Stevie Wonder song, “I Was Made to Love Her”.

Not playing his guitar, which was just hanging upside down on his back, Leon stepped up to the microphone, grabbed the pole it was on, leaned it forward and sang into it…

I was born in Lil’ Rock
Had a childhood sweetheart
We were always hand in hand

Leon looked at Sebastian, smiled and sang…

I wore high top shoes and shirt tails
Suzy was in pigtails
I know I loved her even then

Sebastian nodded back at him to the music, his fingers all over the keys of his organ. I thought of Molly, who had been my best friend when I was younger. But even though we got naked together once when we were five, I never felt her up or even kissed her on the lips really, except for that one time in Saugatuck, but that was like an experiment and not a kissyface thing.

So as the song started I had started doing the regular dancing again, but Rose came right up to me like we should slow dance to this one, putting her right hand on my shoulder and her left on the side of my waist. Her touching me sent shivers through my whole body, and I did the same with my hands, my right on her shoulder and my left on her waist. Her hair was all curled up and sticking out above the headband around her forehead, and I smelled a kind of smell in her hair like my mom’s oil paints or gasoline, or like my mom’s hair when she got all dressed up for a party. I felt Rose’s body under her dress and the feelings I felt were strange and even scary. Wanting, even maybe, feeling up feelings.

I know that my baby loves me
My baby needs me
That’s why we made it through the years

Even though I was dancing with Rose I thought about Molly again. I mean she and I never held hands and I never thought of her as my girlfriend or “childhood sweetheart”, but was she anyway?

My baby loves me
My baby needs me
And I know I ain’t going nowhere

Then I thought of Rose who was dancing next to me. Was she really my “sweetheart”? Did she want to be my “sweetheart”? There was a lot to think about there! Maybe it was just as well she wasn’t a girl in my neighborhood like Abby or Myrna. She wouldn’t be around or in the park always wanting to hang out with me, hold my hand or even kiss me.

A lot of other boys and girls dancing together were slow dancing too, like Abby and Henry. Others were still doing the regular, just moving around in front of the other person, dancing, including the girls that were dancing with other girls, and like Myrna, who was next to Rose and me. I saw Alice dancing with Grant, even though she was white and he was black. On American Bandstand or Where the Action is, I’d only seen white people dancing together or black people dancing together. I think the two of them looked the most like true hippies.

The song was finally over and everybody clapped, but nobody cheered, because it was a slow dance one I guess.

Leon, with his guitar still slung around on his back, turned to look back at Mitch on the drums and then pointed at him. Mitch started banging out notes on his snare drum. I knew from Band class that those were triplets, two sets of them before Sebastian and Jason joined in on the organ and bass, and they joined Leon all singing…

Jimmy, Jimmy, oh Jimmy Mack, when are you coming back?
Jimmy, Jimmy, oh Jimmy Mack, when are you coming back?

As soon as we heard those first two “Jimmy”s, we all knew it was the Vandella’s big new song, that had been on the radio and jukeboxes everywhere all spring, and most kids cheered and those of us dancing started the regular dancing. Then it was just Leon for the verse, putting a sad look on his face and trying to sound lonely…

My arms are missing you
My lips feel the same way too
I tried so hard to be true
Like I promised I’d do
But this boy keeps coming around
He’s trying to wear my resistance down

Just hearing those words again for the hundredth time I had so many thoughts. When I had my hand on Rose’s waist before, and feeling her body underneath her dress, I had that wanting to hold her in my arms feeling, like in that first line. And then the “tried so hard to be true like I promised you” made me think of dad having sex with that other woman, and then he and mom getting divorced. And that boy trying to wear her resistance down made me think of Lance and how he always teased Ramona to try to get her to do what he wanted. Girlfriends, boyfriends and love were so complicated!

Then the second time they all sang the chorus, some of us kids there were joining the singing too. And by the third time, JUST ABOUT EVERYBODY was singing it, and also the last time. We were like one big group all singing the same thing at the same time, and when the song finally ended we all yelled and cheered and Ramona, who was now dancing with Danny, did that whistle with her two fingers in her mouth.

The next song was one that Leon said was written and sung by this guy Bob Seger, who actually went to TAPPAN and the high school, but I didn’t know any of his songs. So the band played his song about “Persecution Smith”, which I kind of recognized, and Leon did the guitar solos and kind of talk-sang the words like Bob Dylan did. It was a faster song but not very easy to dance to.

When it was over Leon said, “Yeah well… kind of hard to dance to, I know. But we just had to play that one for obvious reasons. Seger’s a local hero, and if he can come out of Ann Arbor and make a record that good, there’s hope for the rest of us.” That made sense.

The next song was a really big Motown one that everyone there had probably heard a hundred times in the last couple months, because you couldn’t go anywhere without hearing it. It was “Bernadette” by the Four Tops, another slow dance one, and Rose grabbed my waist and pressed her body against mine, turned her head and rested it against my shoulder as we danced. It felt good to have her pressed against me, but also kind of weird, because I wasn’t sure what if anything to say to her. If I said something like “feels good”, that would be like getting to second base and feeling her up, because her chest was touching mine. So I just didn’t say ANYTHING and she didn’t either.

Leon had his guitar back on his back for this one because he just did the singing part, taking the mic out of its stand and holding it in his hand as he walked back and forth and sang lines to different kids that were dancing near him. Seemed like Sebastian and Jason did most of the music part, though they did lots of singing too, all the “ah”s and every once in a while a few words that the main singer DIDN’T sing, like in some other Motown songs.

And then there was that part near the end of the song that I think everybody knew about when you think it’s over but it’s not. Leon sang…

Keep on loving me (Bernadette)
Bernadette, keep on needing me
Bernadette

Sebastian and Jason sang a long “ahhh” and then everyone in the band stopped playing and singing and Leon dropped his head and closed his eyes. Everyone stopped dancing. I mean we didn’t let go of each other, but we just kind of froze in place and turned to look at Leon who tilted his head up enough to see everyone frozen and he grinned and then called out loud, “BERNADETTE!”

And the rest of the band went back to playing and doing their singing parts until the end of the song. Everyone really cheered for that one.

Leon nodded his head and grinned at all the cheering like he really liked it and said, “Thanks guys! Now the last one for this first set was originally done by an Irish band… Them.”

When he said that, someone cheered and said, “Yeah… Them!” It was Arthur. He knew and liked all those British bands and I guess Irish too because it was a big island next to the British island. Leon saw that it was Arthur, chuckled, and pointed at him.

“Yeah”, Leon said, “This one’s for you… and your sister.” Then he looked back at Mitch on the drums as he went back to where the amplifiers were behind them and got on his knees in front of one of them and turned some knobs. Then he flipped a switch on his guitar, turned a couple nobs and played a couple notes that were loud and screechy.

Mr Balfort looked worried and said something to him that I couldn’t hear and Leon waved him away with his hand and said, “Yeah, yeah, yeah. I know!” He went back to the amplifier and turned some more knobs and played a couple more notes. They were still loud and kind of howling, but not screechy anymore.

He turned a knob on his guitar and played a bunch of notes quietly then stopped, and nodded. He looked at all his other band members and they each gave him a thumbs up and walked back up to his mic stand. “Okay”, he said, “Here goes nothing”, and he turned the knob again on his guitar.

He looked at all of us and made his eyes open wide, like pretending he was scared, then looked down at his guitar and played a single loud howling note. He pushed on the handle thing on the front of his guitar and the note kind of wobbled in and out of tune, and finally it stopped. He looked up at all of us like he was pretending to be surprised.

Then he started playing again. It was a series of notes that went up and down the scale, loud and howling like some of those guitar solos in the middle of a lot of those hardrock songs. Then he stopped again and looked up at all of us like he was pretending to think “what is going on here?”. Then he played another one of those series of notes up and down the scale but ending on a higher note. He stopped again and looked at us again and grinned, then glanced back at Mitch on the drums who started hitting one of his symbols to the beat, and Jason playing bass was doing a single low note to the beat too.

Then Leon started back in, sounding more like the beginning of a regular hardrock song, played a couple lines and stepped to the mic stand and sang…

Baby please don’t go
Baby please don’t go
Please don’t go down to New Orleans
You know I love you so, baby please don’t go
… Alright

He played some more and then sang…

I’ll be your dog
I’ll be your dog
Be your dog, get you way down here
I make you walk alone, baby please don’t go

I wondered if “being your dog” was like a makeout or sex thing, and the words got weirder from there. But Rose and I danced like we were into it. My mind kept thinking about what it would mean to be Rose’s “dog”. With the hard rock and the weird lyrics, this seemed like real older kid stuff that was way above what kids my age were doing or talking about, even the most advanced ones like Mike, Lance or Ramona.

They ended the song and everyone cheered and applauded. Rose smiled at me and said, “That was fun”. I nodded, but that didn’t seem big kid enough.

“It WAS fun”, I said, trying to think up something more older kid to say, “You’re a really good dancer.” She looked embarrassed.

“No”, she said, “Not really. You’re a better dancer than I am.” I knew THAT wasn’t true, so I just laughed through my nose and then she did too.

Mr Balfort went to the mic and said there would be a half hour break before the second set, which was the one a lot of us were waiting for. We walked down the hallways of the ground floor of the building to the cafeteria where we could buy something to drink and a snack and sit down.

***

I knew how guys were supposed to do this with girls. When we got our sodas and candy bars I paid for them. Rose said I didn’t have to do that and I said “I know”. Then she said thank you. I guess we both were doing what you’re supposed to do. I was glad all THAT was done with and maybe we could just sit and talk.

“They’re really good”, she said, sipping her Canada Dry ginger ale as I gulped down my Coke, “But I can’t wait for their second set.” I nodded. I liked the way she looked with her crazy hair, headband, her own tea shades and her hippieish clothes.

I realized again that just nodding all the time wasn’t enough, not for a big kid at least. I had to actually TALK about stuff.

“Yeah”, I said, “They are. You know, my friend Arthur’s older sister is the girlfriend of their drummer, Mitch.”

“Oh”, she said, “That’s interesting. My older brother Bennett is in high school and he has a girlfriend too.” I wanted to tell her that Mitch and Arthur’s sister made out, but I didn’t dare.

But I did get my courage up to ask, “Do they do stuff together?”

“Do stuff like what?” she asked. I realized I was getting myself into things I wasn’t comfortable talking about. I should have known she would ask that after my question.

“I don’t know”, I said, “Boyfriend girlfriend stuff.” Her eyes looked like she was thinking, then she nodded.

“I guess so”, she said, “I saw him kiss her once, on the mouth.” She blushed. “That was pretty weird”, she said.

“Why was it weird?” I asked. I felt okay making her do all the talking about that kind of stuff instead of me. She blushed again. I could tell she wanted to answer but she was having trouble figuring out what to say.

“I don’t know”, she said, “I think they ‘French kissed’, whatever that is.” I had heard about that. When you kiss and stick your tongue in the other person’s mouth. But I was afraid to even TELL her I knew about that so I just nodded.

“Did you ever have a girlfriend?” she asked. Now that question caught me by surprise and freaked me out. I wasn’t sure how to answer. Did Molly used to be my girlfriend? I mean she was definitely my BEST friend when we lived across the street on Prescott, but because she was a girl, did that make her my GIRLFRIEND too?

“I don’t know”, I said, “There was this girl Molly that lived across the street at my old house that was kind of my best friend, I guess.” I felt uncomfortable even saying THAT, but then kind of good actually, after I said it.

“That’s interesting”, she said again and I could tell she was thinking really hard, “I’ve never had a BOY be my best friend.” She looked worried as she kept thinking. She was about to say something when Myrna walked up.

“There you two are!” Myrna said, sitting in a chair next to Rose at the table we’d been sitting at alone together. Rose and I both looked at her.

“The band is pretty good”, Myrna said, looking at each of us, “Don’t you think?”

“They are”, Rose said, “Jimmy Mack is one of the best songs ever. EVER!”

“You’re a Vandellas girl”, Myrna said, “I like the Supremes!” She put her hand on Rose’s shoulder like she was trying to get her attention and kind of pretended she was Diana Ross and began to sing to her…

Now I see life
For what it is

Then she looked at me, wagged her finger back and forth in front of her, and sang…

It’s not a dream
Ooh, it’s not all bliss

And then she pointed that finger at me and sang…

It happened to me and it can happen to you

I was really surprised that Myrna was talking and singing like this, but I realized that in all the two and a half years I had known her, and heard other people talking about her, and most of the boys in my class hating her, I’d NEVER really talked to her before. At least not like this, just her and me and Rose, and not in the middle of crazy Homeroom with Lance always giving her a hard time or her asking me questions like she was the police or something. She was a “real character”, like mom would say.

I looked at Rose sitting next to me and she looked back at me and rolled her eyes.

Then Rose looked at Myrna and asked, “So did you dance with anyone?”

“Nah”, Myrna said, wrinkling her nose, “I’m not much for dancing. Save that for you two lovebirds.” Rose blushed. I think I probably did too. Neither of us could look at each other in the eyes.

Did Myrna think we were IN LOVE with each other? Did ROSE think that TOO? I could feel my stomach tightening up.

Miss Hulot walked into the cafeteria and announced that the band would be starting their second set in about ten minutes.

Hoping to stop talking about this stuff I said, “We should head back.” Rose nodded her head really fast like that was a good idea. I don’t think SHE wanted to talk about this anymore either, though I still wasn’t sure that she might have a crush on me. But back in the room with the band playing and dancing I figured was more safe from what Myrna might say or ask.

While I had been talking to the two of them I had noticed some of the guys I knew from my Burns Park class in various places in the cafeteria, some talking to each other and a couple other ones talking to girls. Mike was with that Arlene girl he danced with at the Sock Hop, they were both talking and laughing. Teddy and Craig were talking to girls who I didn’t know. Stuart, Frankie, Arthur and Gill were all talking to each other. I don’t think I saw any of them earlier dancing with a girl.

***

When we got back to the multi-function room there was a ladder set up in one corner of the room and Jason, the Goon Squid’s bass player, was up on it working with this big light that was hung off of a tall metal pole. Arthur and Stuart were helping him and Mr Balfort was there too, holding the ladder and looking kind of worried. The pole and the light hadn’t been there before for the first set.

“Okay Arthur”, Jason said, “Turn it on again.” The light shined at this ball hanging from the ceiling in the middle of the room with what looked like shiny metal squares all over it which lit up and made dots of light all over the walls on that side of the room.

“Okay”, Jason said, “I think that will work fine. Now turn it off and we can do the other one across the room.”

“Is all this really necessary?” Mr Balfort asked.

Jason nodded and said, “Oh yeah. We want to give you guys your money’s worth.”

“I’m afraid somebody doing all your crazy dancing is going to bump into that light stand”, Mr Balfort said, “And it will topple over and kill somebody.”

“We’ll put chairs around it”, Jason said. Mr Balfort shook his head slowly.

“I’m going to stand guard over here and shoo students away”, he said, “And I’ll have Mr Denisov do the same over at the other one.

“Great idea Mr B”, said Jason, “I’ll cue you and Mr D to turn on the spotlights.

Then he looked at Arthur and said, “Then I’ll cue you to turn off the regular lights.” Arthur nodded.

“It’s gonna be great”, Stuart said.

After pointing the light on the other side of the room, they moved the ladder to the middle of the room and Jason climbed up it to that ball thing hanging from the ceiling and flipped a switch and it started spinning slowly, all the little shiny metal squares sparkling reflecting light.

“Okay”, said Jason, “I think we’re ready.” He closed the ladder and put it in the corner of the room by the band.

Rose, Myrna and I watched all this but then walked across the room to the place we had been for the first set. The room filled with all us kids, at least half of us in our hippie clothes and our sun glasses, tea shades or otherwise. I could tell all the kids were really excited. I certainly was.

After getting those lights and that ball thing sorted out, Jason and the rest of the band took a couple minutes to turn on their amps and play notes on their instruments to make sure they sounded right. Finally Leon went up to his mic stand.

“You ready, guys and girls?” he asked. Kids clapped and cheered. Ramona did her special whistle. He gave the signal for Mr Balfort and Mr Dennison to turn on the spotlights, then Arthur to turn off the regular lights. The spotlights lit up that ball thing hanging from the ceiling and turning, and it flashed and glittered with a hundred little lights that were now circling around all over us and the walls of the room. It was pretty cool.

Leon went to his mic stand, his voice came out loud through the speakers, but he spoke softly and said, “You’re traveling through another dimension, a dimension not only of sight and sound but of mind. A journey into a wondrous land whose boundaries are that of imagination. That’s the signpost up ahead—your next stop, the Goon Squid!”

That was what that Twilight Zone guy said at the beginning of each show on TV, except for the very end part that Leon changed. The room was quiet. Then we heard Mitch click his drumsticks together three times and Leon began to sing into the mic, his voice was clear and sharp out of the speakers and filled the room…

When the truth is found… to be… lies
And all the joy within you… dies

He’d only sung the first two words when all the bands’ instruments crashed in hard and loud behind his voice, pounding, Mitch beating on drums with both sticks, Sebastian mashing both hands into his keyboard and Jason and Leon slashing at their guitars. It was that “Somebody to Love” song by the Jefferson Airplane I’d heard everywhere on the radio, in stores and on jukeboxes. Those first words of the song always gave me goosebumps and made me excited and worried at the same time. That older girl singing the real song, I think Stuart said her name was Grace Slick, was just turning everything upside down with her words, like the grownups crazy world was being blown to smithereens. Could that really be happening?

Rose and I had been turned toward the band to hear Leon speak, but now we started to move our bodies and turned toward each other. I guess you’d say we were dancing, but at least to me it felt different than that. We were like pulsing and vibrating to the beat and the words like all the other kids close around us, and as Rose and I looked at each other, kind of pretending to ask each other the questions in the song words, at least with our eyes, Leon sang the questions, and Sebastian and Jason sang them too in kind of a spooky higher harmony…

Don’t you want somebody to love?
Don’t you need somebody to love?
Wouldn’t you love somebody to love?
You better find somebody to love

I guess that was what it was all about, at least to those older kids that were hippies, finding somebody to love. Or else you were in trouble I guess, alone. I remembered seeing on the news about that “love-in” thing in Detroit on that island place, and all those older kids there with their hippie clothes, like REAL hippie clothes, not what most of us were wearing to the dance. If everybody was in love together, like on the same team, they would take on the grownups and the grownups wars and other bad stuff they were doing.

Myrna was there moving her body around next to us, like we were three points of a triangle, Rose and I pointed toward each other, and Myrna kind of pointed between us so she wasn’t QUITE dancing with either one of us, but more part of our little “team”. It seemed a little weird to me, dancing with two girls, but Rose seemed okay with it, and she and I were the ones pointed at each other as we moved our feet and the rest of our bodies.

In the middle part of the song all the other instruments stopped and the drum just kept the beat as Leon looked out at all of us and sang…

Your eyes, I say your eyes may look like his

Then the other instruments crashed in again as he sang the rest of that verse…

Yeah, but in your head, baby
I’m afraid you don’t know where it is

Rose looked at me and shook her head at me to those words as we moved our bodies. Leon sang the last verse…

Tears are running
They’re all running down your breast
And your friends, baby
They treat you like a guest

Then one last time with the chorus and the spooky harmony…

Don’t you want somebody to love?
Don’t you need somebody to love?
Wouldn’t you love somebody to love?
You better find somebody to love

Finally, Leon stepped in front of the mic stand, looked down at his guitar showing his curly hair longer than mine, and began to play the guitar solo, which wailed out of the speakers and hurt my ears. I saw Mr Balfort, sitting by and protecting the light stand in one corner of the room, grimace and hold his hands over his ears and shake his head. But just like that, the song was over. All us kids mostly cheered or yelled out “yeah”.

“Too loud!” Mr Balfort called out.

Leon looked at Jason and raised his eyebrows, then turned his head to look at Mr Balfort across the room.

“Sorry, Mr B”, he called out, “I’ll dial it down a bit.” He looked at Jason again who smiled and nodded. Leon walked over to his amp and turned a dial a little bit. While he was back at the amp he looked at Mitch at the drums, who kind of wrinkled his nose and nodded.

Leon came back to the mic stand, looked across at Mr Balfort and said, “This next one’s a slow one… not so loud. You’ll love it, Mr B.”

Leon looked back at Mitch, who nodded, and then over at Sebastian and gave him a nod. Raising his left hand slowly in the air with one finger pointing and then down to the keyboard of his organ he played a single high note, the sound kind of wobbling out of the speaker, as the drums, bass and Leon’s guitar started playing softly behind it. Now with his right hand raised in the air like the left before, Sebastian played another even higher note that made that same wobbling noise coming out of the speakers.

Leon went up to the mic stand and looked again across at Mr Balfort and asked, “Better, Mr B?” Mr Balfort nodded and gave a thumbs up as Sebastian repeated those two notes a couple more times as the rest of the band continued to play quietly behind him. “Okay then…” he said as he started to sing…

There’s something happening here
What it is ain’t exactly clear
There’s a man with a gun over there
Telling me I got to beware

That was one of Mike’s favorite songs, and was a total hippie one about being against the war in Vietnam. I looked to where Mike was on the other side of the room, and he was smiling and nodding. He was standing next to Arlene and they were holding hands.

Sebastian and Jason joined Leon for the chorus, the two of them singing harmony…

I think it’s time we stop
Children, what’s that sound?
Everybody look what’s going down

It was interesting that when the song words said “children”, they didn’t mean little kids, but all us older kids who needed to be on the team to challenge the grownups. I never liked it when grownups called me a “child” or us “children”, I figured most kids didn’t like it either. But I figured the older kid who wrote this song wanted to remind us that the grownups thought we were just “children”, you know, nothing important, and we had to instead join together as a strong team and look at all the bad stuff like the war that was going on that we had to fight against. That was pretty funny actually… fighting AGAINST a war instead of fighting IN the war.

Back in our little triangle, Rose AND Myrna were both looking at me, and Myrna was smiling and lifting her eyebrows, but I suddenly felt Rose’s hand on my waist, and I turned toward her and she came up to me and put her other hand on my right shoulder. I put my hands on her waist and shoulder and we started to slow dance. Myrna nodded and wrinkled her nose and walked away.

As Leon sang the second verse, Rose pulled herself up real close to me so her cheek was next to mine and her mouth was right there by my ear, as she whispered, “I think Myrna wanted to slow dance with you.” Leon sang…

There’s battle lines being drawn
Nobody’s right if everybody’s wrong
Young people speaking their minds
Are getting so much resistance from behind

I guess I kind of nodded, but I couldn’t figure what to say because I was overwhelmed by the gasoline smell of her hair right there next to my face and her whole body so close to mine. I couldn’t keep myself from imagining what it would be like to get to second base, you know, feel her up, touch her breast. Would she actually LIKE IT, or would she just let me do it because she liked ME. I realized my hand on her waist was now kind of squeezing her and I felt her wriggle her waist away so I stopped squeezing and got my hand back to the regular way.

“That’s better”, she whispered in my ear, but I felt like a pervert, and like now SHE knew I was one too. But she kept dancing so I did too, though part of me was worrying about that now. Sebastian and Jason again joined Leon for the chorus, the two of them singing harmony…

I think it’s time we stop
Children, what’s that sound?
Everybody look what’s going down

When the song finally ended, I think I let go of her shoulder and waist first, so she didn’t have any MORE reason to think I was a pervert, but then she did too and stepped back from me.

“That was nice”, she said, smiling. It seemed like it was what she really felt, but I still worried, because of the way she wriggled away when I accidentally squeezed her waist.

But there wasn’t time to worry about that anymore. The band started playing again, fast and hard with lots of drums, organ and bass, playing the same four notes over and over again. Leon was turned away from us, facing the other guys in his band, snapping his fingers to the beat as they played those notes over and over and Mitch pounded away on his drums. I think you’d call it what Stuart said was a “vamp”.

Still facing the band, Leon finally turned his head toward us and winked and then grabbed his mic stand and leaned it over toward him so the mic was close to his mouth and snarled out the words…

I walk forty seven miles of barb wire
Use a cobra snake for a necktie
Got a brand new house on the roadside
I said it’s made out of rattlesnake hide

Brand new chimney, baby, built on top
I said it’s made out of human skulls
Come on, take a little walk with me
Yeah, tell me, who do you love?

I had heard the song a few times but I didn’t know who did it. All us kids were moving to the beat but not really dancing with each other because we were all still turned towards the band to try to figure out WHAT they were doing.

Then when they got to the chorus all the other band members sang loud and rough and more like yelling but still kind of like different singing notes…

Who do you love?
Who do you love?

Still snapping his fingers in one hand to the beat he cupped his other hand to his ear like he couldn’t hear them and the other three sang-yelled even louder…

Who do you love?
Who do you love?

It seemed like all us kids figured that we shouldn’t turn away from the band and dance with each other but all kind of dance next to each other FACING the band. Leon, still with his back to us, still snapping his fingers, continued his snarly singing…

I got a graveyard head, I got a tombstone mind
Yeah, I’m just 17 and I don’t mind dying

And then the rest of the band, as they continued to play their instruments, called out the chorus…

Who do you love?
Who do you love?

Because all us kids weren’t dancing FACING each other, we all kind of figured out to move side to side with our shoulders, and since we were packed in pretty close together, shoulders bumped other shoulders, and it felt like we were all dancing TOGETHER. My shoulder bumped into Rose’s and then hers bumped into mine back. On the other side of me my shoulder and Myrna’s were doing the same thing. I mean, until just now, none of us ever even touched each other, except when you slow danced. But our shoulders were all touching now and it felt strange, but good strange, but still strange enough that we couldn’t even LOOK at each other because then your look would give away that you liked rubbing up against each other.

And then in the middle of that side to side bumping into each other stuff, Leon spun around to face us and started playing the guitar solo. While the other three guys in the band played their regular parts, his guitar sounded all fuzzy and clangy at the same time, like it was kind of broken but he was still trying to play it.

Then as soon as he finished he let go of his guitar, grabbed the mic stand and still facing us, sang the next verse…

Yeah, the night was dark, I said the sky was blue
Down the alley, the ice-wagon flew
Hit a bump, yeah, someone screamed
You should have heard just what I seen

As he sang those last words he grinned, turned his head to the side and cupped his hand again on his ear like he couldn’t hear us but wanted to hear all of us sing the chorus that I think most of us knew was next.

Some of us kids sang that first time of the chorus line, including me, because I was totally into it, not super loud but I sang it…

Who do you love?

Though I was looking at Leon and the band as I moved my body back and forth, I could see Rose and Myrna look at me as I sang, and by the second time I could hear them joining in…

Who do you love?

By the third time just about everybody sang it…

Who do you love?

And by the fourth time we were all really loud…

Who do you love?

Just after we sang that last one I could hear Mr Balfort say, “Jesus!” Leon sang the last verse and the song was done. All us kids yelled and howled and shouted out “YEAH”, even Rose and Myrna and a lot of the other girls. I felt like I had been teleported into some strange new world where there were no grownups, only us kids. I wanted to be Leon. I was so jealous that he could sing and play guitar and do stuff like this!

Leon smiled and even laughed a little and said “thank you” to all of us. His bandmates Sebastian and Jason shook their heads and laughed through their noses. Mitch on the drums just grinned and then clicked his drumsticks together four times to start the next song. Leon played three loud notes, sounding more like a horn than a regular guitar sound. The second time he played them, Sebastian played them too on the organ but like whole cords. Then the drums and bass joined in. Both Rose and Myrna turned towards me and started to dance. I wasn’t sure what to do so I just stepped back so we were more of a triangle again and danced pointed between both of them. Rose seemed to be okay with that cuz she kind of danced pointing between Myrna and me too.

And while the three notes continued, Leon stepped up to his mic stand and snarled out the words…

I can’t give you more than what I’ve got
I can’t expect to give what I have not
I… can only give ya lovin’ til the sun goes down
And… when every leaves of summer turn their shades to brown

Dancing with a girl while the singer sang those words, if you looked at each other while you were, it felt like you were saying them to the girl you were dancing with, or maybe letting the singer say them for you. It felt totally like that when Rose and my eyes caught each other’s. But these sounded like older kids’ make out words, feel you up words, or even SEX words. Was just looking at each other while we heard them like we wanted to do sex stuff with each other? THAT was pretty scary, so I tried mostly to not look at Rose and no way was I going to look at Myrna. Leon sang…

I try… and I try
But baby… you know that I
Can only give you everything

Was that what sex was like, I wondered. Giving the other person EVERYTHING? I mean what was that everything, anyway? I had NO idea! Leon sang the words like he knew what they meant. I couldn’t even imagine knowing all that stuff.

By the end of the song Leon was crying as much as he was singing and he made his guitar kind of cry too…

Everything, baby
Everything, baby
That’s all my love
All my life
Everything
Everything
Everything

When he finally finished some kids yelled and cheered, but I was too trapped in my thinking to do anything, or even LOOK at Rose or Myrna, because they might somehow figure out what I was thinking about.

“Whew!” said Leon into the microphone, “Need a breather after that one.” All the little dots of light from the reflecting squares on that ball spinning in the center of the ceiling continued to swirl around the room. Arthur said something to Leon that I couldn’t hear.

Leon nodded at Arthur and said, “Yeah. That’s another Them song, but we were doing it like the MC5 does it… you know, harder.” I hadn’t heard the song before. There was SO much stuff out there that I hadn’t heard before.

Now Mr Balfort had come up and was talking quietly with Leon and Jason, who were both nodding and looking worried. I could barely make out Leon saying to him, “Yeah, I know… sorry… we’re just trying to give your students a good show. They seem to like it!”

Balfort said one more thing wagging his finger at them and Leon and Jason both nodded and looked at each other. Balfort went back to his corner by the lightstand and Leon approached the microphone, the little dots of light sliding across his face.

“So Mr B said we can do two more”, he said.

“I’m a Believer”, some kid shouted out, but I couldn’t tell who it was. A couple other kids cheered or said “yeah” and Ramona whistled. Leon pushed his eyes closed, wrinkled his nose and slowly shook his head, then he opened up his eyes and looked at all us kids.

“First of all”, he said, holding up one finger, “We’re not taking requests”, then holding up two, “And second… The Monkees are NOT a real band guys, they’re the cast of some network TV show, some TV exec’s idea of a rock band. Yeah Mike Nesmith, he’s a good folk musician and I respect him.”

Leon continued, “Some of you might know me or at least seen me before. I work for Jeep at Discount Records.” When he said that, both Arthur and Stuart clapped and cheered.

Leon looked over at them, grinned, and said, “Thanks, you two”, wagging a finger at them, “Stuart’s going to be quite the sax player someday if he keeps at it, and Arthur, well he probably knows more about UK imports and the London music scene than any other kid here at Tappan.”

Then he looked at all of us again and said, “So speaking of the London scene, there’s this guy I work with at Discount, Jim, Jeep calls him ‘Iguana’, who’s a really talented drummer and is putting together a new band. Jim turned me on to these two new groups there in the UK. They aren’t a thing yet in the States, but I’m pretty sure they will be. So theirs will be our last two songs for our show for you guys and girls tonight.”

He continued, “So you all ready for another slow dance song?” There were cheers and yeahs and Ramona whistled again. Then he looked at Sebastian at the organ like he was trying to figure something out.

“So are you good?” Leon asked him. Sebastian nodded.

Then Leon said, “This first one is a brand new song by Procol Harum, which hasn’t even charted yet. We only first heard it maybe a week or so ago. But Sebastian figured it out and it’s perfect for this second set… you know, for the theme I guess.”

“I’m still learning the words”, Leon continued, waving a piece of notebook paper in his hand, “So I’m taping them to the mic stand so I don’t mess them up.”

Leon looked at Jason then Mitch, both nodding at him, and then over across the organ at Sebastian.

“You ready, my man?” he asked.

Sebastian nodded and put an unfolded piece of sheet music on the little rack on the top of his organ. He puffed his cheeks and blew air out of his mouth and started to play, chords and melody, slow and sad, Mitch playing soft drums and Jason just a note here and there on the bass. Rose looked at me and then at Myrna, tilting her head like she was asking a question without saying any words. Girls seemed to be better at that than boys.

Myrna looked like she was thinking, worried even, but then shook her head and said, “He’s your guy. You dance with him!” Then she was thinking again as Rose moved her body in front of me.

So I stepped toward Rose and put one hand on her waist and the other on her shoulder as she followed me doing the same. I felt more comfortable now, touching her like that, though I was careful not to squeeze either her waist or shoulder with my hands. I was getting the hang of the slow dancing, kind of taking a bigger step with each new measure of the music, Rose somehow following my feet with hers as we danced. The little spots of light spinning in the room all around us.

When Sebastian finished the beginning part, Leon walked up to his mic stand, his guitar on his back, and sang…

We skipped the light fandango
Turned cartwheels ‘cross the floor
I was feeling kinda seasick
But the crowd called out for more
The room was humming harder
As the ceiling flew away
When we called out for another drink
The waiter brought a tray

As Rose and I danced through the song, she kept bringing herself closer to me until we were right up against each other again, like in the last slow dance, her cheek touching mine.

She whispered in my ear, “You dance really good.” I couldn’t believe that was really true, but I guess that’s what you said to your dance partner, and it WAS nice hearing her whisper that in my ear.

So I figured I should say something like that to her, though I couldn’t think of anything different than what she had said to me, so I whispered back, “You dance really good too”, as Leon sang…

And so it was later
As the miller told his tale
That her face at first just ghostly
Turned a whiter shade of pale

The words of the song made no sense at all, but that really wasn’t very important at this point. My mind was too busy spinning with all those little dots of light on the walls and ceiling of the room. I was imagining Rose and I alone, our bodies together like this. I guess the next thing she’d expect us to do is kiss each other on the lips and even touch our tongues. I felt her hand on the side of my waist slide around to my back, and before I could stop myself I did the same thing with my hand on her waist. There was part of me that wanted to pull her against me, my thigh between hers, but I figured that was the pervert part of me.

I was relieved when the song finally ended, because it was all getting too much for me. We stepped away from each other and took our hands off each other’s bodies and clapped, but I couldn’t look her in the eyes. She’d see too much. Leon was at his mic talking again, so I looked at him instead.

“Our last song”, Leon said, “Is by this guy, Jimi Hendrix, who’s friggin amazing. I don’t think he’s done any shows or TV in the States and we’ve only heard two of his records. And I’ve read that he’s left-handed and plays his Stratocaster UPSIDE DOWN, which is of course friggin insane, and WAY out of my league. I can only give you my… well our… humble homage to this awesome song of his. Just give us a minute here.”

They all did a “tuning up” of a few notes and chords on their instruments or back by their amps behind them, walking over to quietly talk to each other. You could hear their amps kind of humming now. Leon got down on his knees by his mic stand and turned a knob on a little silver metal thing on the floor in front of him, and Stuart and Arthur got down on their knees too to look at it with him. Then Leon clicked the other button on the thing and played a note on his guitar that yowled like our cat Midnight when you accidentally stepped on one of his paws. I looked over at Mr Balfort and he was shaking his head but still sitting there. The band did some more tuning, and testing, and talking to each other.

As I watched them get ready for their last song, Myrna’s shoulder touched mine and she asked quietly in my ear, “Do you know what they’re gonna play?” I raised my eyebrows and shook my head. I figured Arthur probably did, but he hadn’t said anything to me. I noticed Rose touch my other shoulder with hers just after that, like reminding me that she was the one I was going to dance with.

“You guys ready?” Leon asked as he turned his head to look at all three of his other band members. Jason nodded quickly and laughed through his nose. Mitch held up both his drumsticks and then pointed them at Leon. Sebastian smiled and played those four notes on his organ that you always heard at the beginning of the “Twilight Zone” show. Stuart laughed nervously and Leon looked at him and he got quiet again.

Leon walked up to his mic stand and said quietly into the mic, “So this one’s called ‘Purple Haze’, by the Jimi Hendrix Experience.”

He turned his head to look back at Mitch again and nodded. Mitch raised his arms up, one drumstick in each hand and clicked them together four times to the beat. After that last click, Sebastian flung his left hand up in the air and hit the keyboard of his organ with his right. He played two notes four times to the slow beat, super loud, the second didn’t sound like it should go after the first.

After those eight notes, Mitch started pounding on his drums with sticks in both hands, Leon stomped his foot on that little silver box on the floor in front of him and he and Jason on bass played what I guess you’d call the “melody”, Leon’s guitar howling while Jason played the same notes but way lower on his bass. The whole room vibrated and the sound didn’t just come from their amps, but seemed to come from the walls and floor too. I’d never heard or FELT anything like it.

None of us kids danced, we just stared at the band, wondering if this was a regular song, or something… else. Leon stepped to the mic, rolled his eyes and sang, more wailed really…

Purple haze all in my brain
Lately things, they don’t seem the same
Acting funny, but I don’t know why

Those first three lines made total sense, like he was almost talking about me. Then the whole band stopped playing, and hardly moved at all, and I wasn’t sure what was going on. Finally Leon sang…

‘Scuse me while I kiss the sky

And THAT last line sounded crazy, made no sense, though there was SO much I didn’t know about… about everything. Sebastian’s organ and Jason’s bass pounded out three low notes down the scale, then Leon’s guitar joined in with three higher notes back up, twice. Rose and I finally started to face each other and dance again, like other kids around us. And then Leon sang the next verse…

Purple haze all around
Don’t know if I’m coming up or down
Am I happy or in misery?

Not sure how it happened this way, but at that moment when the band just stopped playing again, my eyes and Rose’s locked on to each other like we were frozen in time. It was like I could tell what she was thinking, like I used to with Molly, and it seemed she could tell what I was thinking too. Her eyes were all fierce, but friendly, sharing, like they wanted something, something FROM me, something that she saw in me that it looked like she thought I wanted to give her, but I didn’t know what it was. Finally, Leon’s voice added the last line of the verse to all of it…

Whatever it is, that girl put a spell on me

When he sang that I was still looking at Rose’s eyes and they kind of opened more like she was excited about something, maybe excited about me. That freaked me out. Did she suddenly want me to kiss her, make out with her, even do sex stuff with her? It wasn’t like it was a “spell”, like Leon was singing, like they sang in other songs, like Beatles songs, about some girl that you wanted so much that you couldn’t control yourself. It wasn’t like that. We both wanted something, but I wasn’t ready to give my part of it.

Leon’s guitar screeched as he kind of cried into the mic…

Help me
Help me
Oh no!

… as he started his wailing guitar solo with the rest of the band “vamping” behind him. Still looking in Rose’s eyes my stomach tightened up and it all was feeling like it was all too much. Rose suddenly looked worried, like she saw ME suddenly looking worried, and I didn’t know what to do, how to be. Then the band started vamping again, though after one musical phrase they all went “ooo” into their mics, and after the next they went “ahh”. Then Leon finally started the last verse…

Purple haze all in my eyes
Don’t know if it’s day or night
You got me blowing, blowing my mind

And again, the band stopped playing. I felt my heart beating hard. I sucked air into my lungs but it wasn’t enough. Then Leon’s voice again on the mic finishing the last verse…

Is it tomorrow, or just the end of time?

That last question stuck in my mind. If I could get out of here in one piece and get home, would I wake up tomorrow and everything would be okay? Or was everything turned upside down? On Tuesday when I went back to school, after Memorial Day, in Homeroom, could I even LOOK at Rose, or Myrna?

The band went on vamping and Leon’s guitar wailed into another solo and eventually they all stopped playing and the song was finally over. We all clapped and cheered. I was relieved that Rose turned to look at the band as she clapped and cheered, so I did too. All of a sudden, the regular lights turned on and my eyes hurt and could barely see. Mr Balfort was up at the mic stand that Leon had been singing into saying that the dance was done.

I noticed Rose look towards me, but when she saw I was looking towards her she looked worried and looked away, and Myrna came up and started talking to her quietly. I saw Abby across the room and I waved to her. Arthur and Stuart came up to me, both smiling and excited.

“Isn’t Goon Squid great?” said Stuart. I nodded, not ready to talk because I was thinking so much.

Arthur sighed, “It’s THE Goon Squid”, he said to Stuart, then looking at me, “Who were you dancing with, Coop? Were you dancing with MYRNA? Who’s that other girl with the crazy hair?” I didn’t want to answer EITHER of those questions, my mind was still thinking about that look that Rose gave me when we stared at each other during “Purple Haze”.

It was the same thing when Teddy and Gill came up to join us. Teddy said, “Who was that girl with the wild hair you were dancing with and were you dancing with MYRNA too?”

Myrna and Rose were still talking to each other not too far away from all us guys. I suddenly got worried they could hear us and looked towards the two of them, and it definitely looked like Myrna had heard what Stuart and Teddy had asked me. She held a finger up to Rose and then came over to where the five of us guys were.

“So what if he was?” she said, her fists on her waist and her elbows out, “Didn’t you guys learn ANYTHING this year? We’re not in elementary school anymore, in case you didn’t notice!”

While I listened to Myrna defend me while I totally didn’t want her to, I glanced at Rose and she looked super worried and embarrassed. She saw me looking at her and looked down. When Myrna was done talking she looked at me like she was expecting me to say something to defend her back, but I couldn’t bring myself to say ANYTHING.

Then she kind of hissed through her nose, turned, and went back to Rose and I could hear her say, “C’mon… lets get out of here!”

“Bitch!” said Stuart, watching her walk out of the room with Rose, then to me, “So who’s that other girl you were dancing with? I LOVED her hair and getup.”

“Yeah”, I said, finally able to say something, “She’s just a girl in my Homeroom.” I felt bad that I said it that way, the “just” part, but I really didn’t want to talk about it.

Then we all started talking about the band and all the cool songs that they played, and Arthur and Stuart told us about all the stuff we didn’t know about the songs and the real bands that did them.