Tasha and I followed them down the plaza toward the concrete band shell at the far end. A crowd was already forming. A big banner that read SAN FRANCISCO QUEER MUSIC FEST 2013 hung over the stage, and when she saw it, Tasha took my arm and dragged me to a halt.

“Queer music fest?” she whispered. “You didn’t tell me.”

“Is it okay? The band that Steph’s in is—they’re all queer.”

Tasha narrowed her eyes. “Yeah, it’s fine.” She glanced at Mel and Lisa, who had gone ahead without us toward the front of the crowd. “They’re queer, too?”

“Yeah.” I hesitated. “Lisa is Steph’s girlfriend. Steph is Joan’s gardener.”

Tasha gave me a sharp look. “Somehow you’ve been spending your summer with all these lesbians and you didn’t mention it to me?”

I tried to shrug it off. “It didn’t seem relevant. It’s not like I knew about you and Haley.”

Tasha relented. “True. Okay, let’s go to a queer music festival.”

—

Roxy and Steph were magnetic onstage. Roxy was wearing a white ribbed tank top and a stretchy black miniskirt over hot-pink fishnets and her boots, and as she sang she kept sliding her eyes toward Steph, who was circling her like a tiger. There was an unmistakable connection between them, and the way Roxy looked at Steph, that hungry glint in her eyes, would make anyone think they were together—or were about to be. Steph was in jeans and scuffed boots and a black muscle shirt, the white electric guitar glossy in her hands as she played toward the sway of Roxy’s hips. Every so often Steph would step up to her own mic to sing backup, but when they got to “Twenty-One,” I realized it was a duet. By the end of the song, Roxy and Steph were singing into the same microphone, their faces so close together they’d barely have to move to be kissing.

At the beginning of Madchen’s set, we were on the side of the crowd, but soon we were all surging into the pit in front of the stage to yell and dance to the music. I was mesmerized by the chemistry between Steph and Roxy. It felt like a luxury to be able to look at Steph in public, because everyone else was looking, too. Once, I glanced at Lisa and saw her watching Steph and Roxy’s performance with an increasingly frosty expression, and even though I had no right to feel sorry for her, I did. I could understand why Lisa would be jealous of Roxy, but to me jealousy seemed pointless here. Roxy and Steph were putting on a show, and it was a good one. I remembered the picture of my mother dressed up as Carmen, the look in her eye like the one in Roxy’s. It was more than permission to watch, it was an invitation.

—