Next the girls played a bunch of new songs for me to hear and comment on, including “Dear Future Crush.” I took notes in my notebook as they performed, thinking of Ms. Gallo and how she liked a compliment to balance out each critique or “tip.” Just like in class, I made sure to even things out and to be as specific as possible. When I read it all out loud in the end, I was very diplomatic but honest in my comments. I could tell that they all appreciated it.

Sierra had upped her game with the “Dear Future Crush” lyrics, but they still needed work. The chorus was great, but she didn’t know what to talk about in the verses. I reminded her about our funny conversation with Tamiko, where we all imagined what our future crushes were doing right then and there. This got everyone inspired, and we all started floating ideas. Pretty soon we were laughing hysterically as our future crushes’ lives got more and more elaborate and silly. I took notes and made sure to write down every idea that came out of everyone’s mouths. You never could know what would be useful in the song or what might become the inspiration for a new song down the road.

After a while we took a break from working on Sierra’s song to chat.

“Lyrics are really tough for us, except for Tessa,” said Kasey, the keyboard player. “We all get great ideas and can come up with one or two verses, but then we have a hard time making a whole song out of them.”

“I know what you mean,” I answered. “Sometimes I start to write a poem or a short story and I feel like I don’t have enough material. It can be really hard when you’re trying to rhyme something. You have to kind of squeeze in the words that sound alike, and then build the poem around that. It rarely works out well, unless you’re Shakespeare—”

“Or Dr. Seuss!” added Sierra.

“Yeah, but he made up a lot of his words,” I said.

“It’s so hard!” said Reagan with a sigh.

“Do you guys ever use a rhyming dictionary?” I asked. We’d used them in Ms. Healy’s class a lot the previous year.

“No. What’s that?” asked Reagan.

“You can find them online—or they even publish book versions. You just look up a word you’re trying to rhyme, and it lists all the possibilities. Plus, if you use the online version, you can check the meanings of the words it suggests too. Then you can be sure your lyrics are making sense.”

Tessa was typing on her phone. “Cool! I’ve got a website here. This is awesome! Thanks, Allie.” She grinned at me.

“No prob!” I grinned back.