Lemonade Mouth Puckers Up (4 page)

“Looking good, Naomi. Any particular reason?”

“Shut up,” she says, but she smiles and blushes just a little, and that says it all.

She and I both know what’s going on here. She’s on her way to Lyle Dwarkin’s house to help set up for our usual afternoon recording session. She hasn’t officially admitted it yet, but it’s obvious she’s starting to have a thing for Lyle.

She starts back through the doorway again. “Hi, Mr. and Mrs. Banerjee!” she calls to my parents, who by then have both retreated into the storage room. “Well, call when you hear, okay?” she says to me. “I’ll see you in an hour.”

I promise I will, and then she’s gone.

It takes me another minute to finish stacking the ghee jars and put the boxes away. I’m listening to the soft Indian music my dad is playing through the stereo, when I remember that my parents are waiting for me. I wipe my hands on a cloth and head to the storage room. My mother is at her desk going through a pile of receipts with a calculator. My father is next to her, reading a letter.

“You said you have news?”

“We do,” he says. “Do you remember ever hearing Maa and me talk about the Kumars? Hemant and Bhavini?”

“Vaguely. They were neighbors of ours back in India, right?”

“Neighbors and very good friends. Both were students at Calcutta University back then, and you used to play in the sand with their son, Rajeev, before you could even walk. You don’t remember?”

I shrug. My family left India when I was two. Of course I don’t remember.

“The Kumars are moving to Lubbock, Texas,” my dad continues. “They both got teaching jobs at Texas Tech, so
they’ll be bringing their family out there later this summer. In the meantime, they’ve asked if Rajeev can stay with us for a few weeks before he joins his parents in Lubbock this August.”

A few quiet seconds pass.

“And? What did you tell them?”

“We said yes, of course.”

The moment feels weird. Okay, so we’re going to have a visitor this summer. Fine. Why are Baba and Maa watching me like they’re expecting me to start squawking like a chicken or something? There’s something else going on here, something they’re not saying. I’m not positive what it is, but looking at their expectant faces I have a sudden, sneaking suspicion—and it’s not good.

Maa leans forward and her next words leave me with little doubt. “Monu,” she says, “Rajeev is a lovely boy from a good family. He’s sixteen now. We’re told his grades are excellent.”

For a second I just stand there. I’ve always known that my parents’ marriage was prearranged. As conservative Hindus, their parents worked it all out for them when my mother and father were still in their early teens—years before the actual wedding took place. I respect that, of course, and I love my parents, but unlike them, I grew up here in the United States, where things are different—a fact that has been becoming more and more of a problem between us lately. Sure, I’ve always realized that I might have to navigate this minefield at some point or another, but I never dreamed it would be so soon.

After all, I only just turned fifteen.

“That’s nice,” I say, keeping my voice steady and my expression blank. “Too bad I won’t be around much this
summer, what with Lemonade Mouth and my volunteering job at the medical clinic and everything. Plus, Charlie and I have plans.”

There. That ought to send the message.

They glance at each other. “Oh, I’m sure you can work around those things,” Baba says with just a hint of a nervous smile. “You’re close to his age, so when he comes it will be nice for you to show him around. Introduce him to your friends. I’m sure he’ll enjoy meeting them.”

“That’s right,” Maa says. “You can help him transition into his new country. Make him feel comfortable.”

“When is he coming?”

“Next Friday. The start of the Fourth of July weekend.”

“Next week?”
I want to point out that they must have known about this for a while. I’m tempted to tell them how obvious it is that they put off mentioning it to me only because they knew what my reaction would be. It’s no secret that despite everything, they’re still uncomfortable that I’m going out with Charlie. I want to tell them that no matter what their plans are, they’re just going to have to accept the fact that I’ll never match their idea of the perfect Bengali daughter.

But I don’t say any of these things. It would be like admitting that I know what’s going on, and if I don’t say it and they don’t say it, then I can pretend it isn’t happening.

“Keep an open mind. You might find that you like him.”

“Yes, Baba,” I say. My voice is calm, but inside I’m burning. I spin on my heels and head back to the front counter. I can feel my face reddening. It’s not fair to have to share my world with a complete stranger against my will. It’s not fair that a boy I don’t even remember meeting can appear out of nowhere and shake up my life. I wonder how long
this has been in the works, whether this arrangement was something my parents and the Kumars talked about years ago, back when this Rajeev and I were still playing in the sand together.

… a lovely boy from a good family … his grades are excellent …

One thing I know: I’m not going to like him. He hasn’t even arrived yet, but I’m already certain of it. My whole summer was just shot to pieces in a single moment. It’s going to be a complete disaster—I can already tell.

The phone rings, but I’m too shaken to pick it up, so it transfers to the back room. A few seconds later Baba steps out.

“That was for you,” he says. “It was Stella. She said to tell you she finally heard from someone named Earl Decker. She says you and your friends have an appointment tomorrow in Boston.”

Okay, flashbacks are tricky and I haven’t read the chapter on how to do them right yet, so I’m just going to tell you how the summer started off for me.

I admit it. Up until the Decker and Smythe thing began, I was bored out of my skull.

Sure, making those new recordings with my friends was like a dream, but other than that my life was complete Dullsville. While everybody else had summer jobs and other stuff that kept them way busy all the time, all I had was a school paper I needed to finish typing to avoid a failing grade in English Comp. Nothing like summertime homework to start vacation off with a smile. After that I still didn’t have much else to do, so I spent a lot of the early part of the summer flopping around at home. I hung out in my room playing computer games. I watched a lot of TV. I made videos where I pretended to interview my mom’s plants. Stuff like that. Mostly, though, I waited around for Mo to finish her shift at the store or whatever. She always had something. On recording days I would wander over to Lyle’s house early and hang out with him and Naomi while they set up around Lyle’s laptop. It meant watching those two pretend not to flirt with each other, but it was better than staring at a screen.

What I’m saying is, nobody was gladder than me when Decker and Smythe added a jolt of excitement to the summer.

For weeks I’d been telling my friends that all Lemonade Mouth needed was one big break. An opening-act slot on a tour with a famous band, maybe. Some kind of national exposure. Anything that could have led to a real record contract. (Notice, Naomi, how I used “have” instead of “of.” See? I was listening to you and Mr. Levesque. Not that I plan on driving myself nuts trying to get everything perfect.
I don’t care what anyone says—there’s no point in losing sleep over a few commas.)

And then along came this meeting at Decker and Smythe like a lucky lightning bolt out of the sky. Here it was, our big chance! True, the lady who gave us the card never made any promises. She never said Earl Decker was for sure going to give us a contract or anything, but still, he wanted to talk with us, so it seemed at least
possible
, right? I figured all we had to do was avoid blowing this meeting.

By the time we got there the five of us were all so anxious that I wondered how we were even going to get through it. We had to wait in the squishy chairs in the Decker and Smythe lobby. It was a gigantic, echoing space. The walls were plastered with enormous posters, huge black-and-white images of rock-and-roll superstars looming over us like gods gazing at ants. As we looked up at them I noticed Olivia start curling into a ball in her chair, and Stella’s whole head looked like it might pop.

Fortunately Mr. Decker kept us waiting only a couple of minutes.

He came out to greet us personally. Now, I’d been expecting him to be this cranky, cigar-chomping bundle of energy, because that’s how everyone thinks of him, but when we actually met him he was the nicest, most relaxed guy. He had a big smiling face with silver hair and a short, scruffy beard. He was a little shorter than I imagined, maybe, and definitely older, but this was Earl Decker, the real deal. He had a diamond earring and an expensive-looking watch, but he wore them with sandals and faded jeans. It wasn’t hard to picture him hanging out with the world’s most famous hippie musicians back in the day. A moment later he was leading us down a hallway into his office.