Mel dropped Susan off in front of the club shortly before 3:00. She looped her purse around her neck, so the strap hung across her chest then she took the plate of cookies from him.
“Thanks,” she yelled over her shoulder as she headed down the side alley to the practice room door. “See you later for dinner! And, don’t forget I’m helping you make it, okay?”
“Sure thing,” Mel replied out the car window as he slowly pulled away.
Halfway down the alley, leaning up against the wall, she spotted two girls. As she got closer, one of them pushed away from the wall, moved directly into her path and stopped, arms crossed over her chest.
“Well, look here, Sara,” said Hilary, “If it ain’t the little American bird Jimmie’s been messing around with…”
Sara pushed off the wall to stand beside Hilary, totally blocking Susan’s path. “Pretty little thing,” said Sara sarcastically.
“Yeah, maybe I could mess up that pretty little face a bit,” said Hilary, revealing a razor knife gripped in her right hand.
Sara drew back. “Hilary! You didn’t say anything about cutting her up. I thought we were just going to mess with her head a bit, scare her, ya know.”
“I think I’m gonna enjoy messing her up a whole lot more with this,” Hilary said, waving the blade in the air and circling around to the other side of Susan, so she was on one side and Sara on the other. “See if Jimmie wants her then with her face all messed up…”
Susan dropped the plate of cookies and backed against the wall of the club. The plate shattered and cookies rolled in every direction.
“Why, how sweet...bringing cookies to the boys…too bad they’re all ruined now.” Hilary advanced toward Susan.
Susan screamed and dodged to the right just as Hilary slashed forward towards her face with the blade.
Sara grabbed Hilary’s arm. “Stop it, Hil!” she yelled. “This is going too far! I don’t want no part of this!”
“Why you traitor!” Hilary screamed, turning to wave the blade at Sara. “Ain’t you my friend or what?”
“Not if you’re gonna be stupid and do something like this!”
“Let go my arm! I only gots the one, you know!”
“No! I’m not going to let you do this! I just felt sorry for you, getting your heart broken and all.”
Hilary wrenched her arm free from Sara’s grasp and went to slash her blade at Sara, but missed as Sara ducked out of the way, surprised outrage on her face.
“You’ve gone daft!” she yelled at Hilary.
“Think so, do ya?” Hilary screamed, rushing at Sara again.
Susan pushed away from the wall, grabbing Hilary’s arm that held the blade. She spun her around. Hilary tripped and fell to the ground. This time Sara screamed. The door to the practice room burst open, and James came running out, followed by Ian and Lynn.
Hilary was on her knees, pushing herself up, the razor knife still clutched in her fist. “I’ll mess up you both!” she yelled.
James and Ian ran forward, James grabbing one of Hilary’s arms and Ian the other, which was just a stump from the elbow up. The razor knife clattered to the ground as James twisted her wrist.
“I hate you, you bastard!” she screamed, spitting at him. “Go tell Derek to call the bobbies,” Ian yelled to Lynn.
Ian pulled both of Hilary’s upper arms behind her back and pinned her face first against the wall. She continued to scream obscenities. Susan rushed into James’s arms, her heart beating wildly. He crushed her to him.
“It’s all right now…It’ll be all right…” he whispered into her hair.
She was still trembling as she looked up at him. “I can’t believe she could hate me so much. I never did anything to her…She was going to cut up my face…!”
Sara overheard. “Don’t matter…she had it in for you from the first. I just never thought she’d get so extreme like.”
“You’re supposed to be my friend!” Hilary screamed when she heard Sara’s words.
“Not no more,” said Sara. “You crossed the line, you did...and you lied to me and tricked me...”
At that moment, Susan looked over James’s shoulder and saw Lynn coming out of the door to the practice room, her eyes as big as saucers. “Lynn?” she exclaimed. “Lynn, is that you?”
Susan flew out of James’s arms and ran to Lynn, enveloping her in a giant bear hug.
“Oh, Lynn! Lynn! What are you doing here?! How did you get here?! How long have you been here?!”
“Hey, slow down. Let’s go inside, and I’ll tell you all about it.”
James came up to both of them. “Well, I know who’s important now, don’t I?” he quipped.
“Oh, James! You wouldn’t know,” said Susan contritely. “This is my very best friend in the whole world, Lynn. Lynn, this is…well…I guess you know who this is…I mean, maybe you don’t…this is him!”
Lynn started laughing and everyone except Ian, who was still holding Hilary against the wall, and Sara still standing next to Hilary, went down the alley and into the practice room. The police arrived shortly after that, taking Hilary away. Sara had offered more apologies to Ian while they were waiting then left to go home. Ian came back into the practice room.
“Well, that’s all taken care of then,” he said to the whole room in general.
“In that case, let’s forget about it and start to play,” said Derek, putting the guitar strap over his head.
“The first one here is for the girls, especially my girl…” He winked at Mindy, who had settled herself cross-legged style on the floor in her jeans. Lynn and Susan sat down in similar fashion next to her with their legs tucked to the side due to wearing dresses, but they didn’t have a chance to say anything to each other as the song started.
“To see, touch and hold her…
Makes me know how much I love her…
Every time I see her grin…
Makes me feel I need to win …
To win her love for me…is what my life needs to be…
And it will…and it will…and it will…”
Mindy sighed as she listened to the lyrics, her and Derek having a silent conversation with no words as they looked at each other. James was looking at Susan, and she was looking intently back at him with her lips slightly parted. Lynn could almost feel Susan’s heart beating wildly in her chest just by looking at her. This was worse than she thought. Oh my, oh my!
The boys moved into the next song. Ian was singing, looking at Lynn. It was the same song he’d sang in the club the night before.
“Well, I saw her sitting on the bar stool...
A yellow ribbon in her ponytail...
Susan nudged her. “Ha, ha...looks like this one’s for you.”
“She caught my eye in an instant...
Well, how ‘bout that...
Whatcha think…I’m amazed…
Whoa! Sweet thing…oh my, such a sweet thing…
She’s such a, such a sweet thing…”
Lynn gave her “the look,” meaning “you’ve got to be kidding me,” and then laughed, remembering the silly yellow ribbon she’d had in her hair the night before when she had “materialized” into the Dusky Club.
Susan laughed, wondering what had happened between Lynn and Ian last night.
The boys played and sang several more songs then James motioned to Susan to come up next to him. “Sing with me, will you, Luv?”
“Me?” she asked, a startled expression on her face. “I can’t sing!”
“Oh yes you can!” yelled Lynn, elbowing Susan and saying under her breath, “Remember, you asked to be able to sing, so I’m sure you can sing.”
“Come on, Luv,” James beckoned to her. “You sang me that Once Upon a Dream song just last night, remember?”
She took a deep breath and stood up, then went to stand next to him by the microphone. Hopefully, she wouldn’t embarrass herself.
“What are we singing?” she asked nervously.
He pinned a paper with some lyrics to the music stand in front of him and pulled a tall stool over for her to sit on in front of the microphone.
“Just listen to me sing the first verse or two, then join in when I repeat it.”
She sat, her feet up on the rungs of the stool and he began singing, looking deeply into her eyes. She looked at the song pinned to the music stand. Oh yes! She knew this song so well. She had dreamed her whole life about him singing just these words to her.
“I saw stars in the sky, but I never saw them shining...
No, I didn’t see them before...
Not before you...”
Tears welled in her eyes, but she didn’t break hers away from him as she joined in.
“And there was sunshine...and beautiful sweet peas...
That sent out fragrance reminding of you…
There were birds all around…
But I never heard their chirping…
No, I didn’t hear them before…not before you…
Not before you…”
***
As the song reached the final notes, Susan stood up and executed a perfect triple pirouette, smirking at Lynn as she landed in a solid fourth position.
James leaned over to kiss Susan, pulling her forcefully into his arms. It quickly turned into a rather long kiss until Ian and Derek cleared their throats rather loudly.
“Enough already...” Derek muttered.
Susan blushed, then went and sat back down next to Lynn and Mindy. The boys broke into the last song for the practice.
“What in hell are you doing here?” Susan asked Lynn, finally having the opportunity to talk to her.
“What are you doing, period?!” Lynn asked. “You’re getting in way too deep. We need to get out of here and now! You don’t belong here! You shouldn’t be with him and doing all those things you’re doing…”
She pulled out her iPhone. Mindy looked over at them curiously.
“So what’s that then?” she asked.
“Oh...just an American transistor radio,” Lynn said, tucking it back into her purse. “Battery just went dead.”
She turned back to Susan. “Really, Suz, this is ridiculous! You’ve got to know that. You can’t stay here, so what are you doing fooling around with him like this? You just wanted to meet him, and now you’re probably having sex with him every five minutes like some kind of bunny rabbit all in love and everything!”
Mindy looked back and forth between the two of them. “So what’s so wrong about having sex every five minutes and being in love?” she asked pointedly. She gave a big, huge grin to Susan. “So, you let him have his way with you, did you? Good for you!”
Lynn looked at Mindy. “No! Not good for her at all! She wasn’t supposed to fall in love. We have to leave on Friday no matter what, and I think it would be better to leave now before things get complicated or worse.”
“Worse? What’s so bad about having sex and being in love?”
“Nothing is wrong with being in love, as long as you’re in love with the right person...and at the right time,” Lynn said, turning to scowl at Susan. Lynn wasn’t very good at scowling, making Susan want to laugh.
“You can’t always pick the right time, you know...it just happens,” said Mindy.
“Oh, I know that, but this is different. She shouldn’t be sleeping with him, and she shouldn’t be in love! Once we leave, we can never come back...and that’s the problem here.”
Mindy sat back and contemplated what Lynn had said.
“Well, of course, you have to come back after your history tour!” said Mindy, turning towards Susan. “It’ll break his heart in million pieces if you don’t come back.”
Susan looked down. “I’d like to come back...” she muttered to herself.
“Well, you know darn well you can’t! You know there’s no history tour! You know you made it all up!” Lynn said.
Mindy looked stunned. “What’s this all about then? No such thing as a history tour?”
Susan looked angrily at Lynn. “Stop it, Lynn!” She turned to Mindy. “She’s just saying that because she’s not interested in history like I am, and her parents made her come; she didn’t want to.”
“Stop with the lies, Suz...really...this is just going to end badly, and we both know it! Plus, it’s wrong, wrong, wrong!”
“Well, before you start lecturing me, why don’t you tell me what you’ve been up to with Ian? I heard he was missing today when the boys were supposed to go to an audition. Well?”
Lynn blushed.
“Ah, ha! I know what that blush means! You got here last night, right? You haven’t been doing something like a ‘tumble in the sheets’ as they say here, have you?”
Lynn’s face turned even pinker. “Now, Suz...I couldn’t find you...and the, um, the opportunity just presented itself...” Her voice faded.
Susan smiled, triumphantly. “So, then...Here you are, probably having sex every five minutes too...and you’re lecturing me?!”
“But I’m not in love! I’m just...well...”
Mindy was looking back and forth between them, not understanding fully what they were talking about.
The song ended, and Susan saw James take off his guitar. She leaped up and ran over to him.
“Can we leave now, please? I told your dad we’d be back for dinner and I’d help him.”
“Dinner? We’re having dinner with my dad?”
“Yes; it’s supposed to be a surprise for you.”
He looked at her and smiled. “That’s nice of you. I think my dad is becoming very fond of you.”
She turned around and saw Lynn talking to Mindy, waving her arms around in the air. She saw her take her iPhone out of her purse and show it to Mindy. Mindy had a puzzled look on her face. Susan had a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach.
“Can we leave now, please?” she asked. “Right now, please? I can talk to Lynn more tonight.”
He looked at her oddly, then said, “Sure, if that’s what you want.” He wondered what had made her so agitated.
When they were both in his car, he turned to her and again asked her what was wrong. She assured him she was fine, just still a little shook up over the attack in the alley and a little anxious over the dinner and wanting to make sure it was perfect for him.
“Well, that’s as it should be...” he thought. “Making things perfect for me…”
Susan would have been annoyed if she’d known what he was thinking. Male chauvinist...