And about what happened after.

About what he told me.

About his fear.

Maybe you should come to Echo with me next time, Becks, I say, flooded with guilt.

The words are out and I can’t take them back.

Gabriel isn’t at the club.

It feels like a different place without him now.

I dance with Becky, who is wearing an angled, belted, hot-pink jacket she got from Connor that makes her looks a bit like an alien and a ribbon on her head as big as a watermelon that she got from a dollar store in Queens that makes her look like a birthday present. Somehow she manages to make them look as if the two things belong together.

Danni plays Madonna’s “Burning Up” for like, the thousandth time, and the air must be out because the club is so hot the mirrors in the bathroom are fogged up.

I stare at my watch, wondering if I said something wrong on the phone when Gabriel called. If I should have said more. If I wasn’t interesting enough, effusive enough. If I was supposed to flirt. Was that it? Does he think I didn’t like kissing him? Does he think I regret leaving him a message? Does he still think I’m mad at him? Did he say he’d be here this week or did I imagine that? Had I reacted differently, would Gabriel be here now? Would I want him to be here, talking to Becky about school and my parents and all that run-of-the-mill, daily life stuff?

Someone bumps into me, and I turn to see Vampire Boy. He stares at Becky, then at me, and smirks as if my rejection has anything to do with her.

You suck, I say to him. And then laugh at my own stupid joke.

Becky stops. Shocked, I think, at my uncharacteristic nastiness.

The boy looks at me, bares his pointy teeth, and smiles before he walks away.

I guess I can see why you like it here, Becky says. I mean, the boys are mostly cute, and the music’s mostly good, and it’s close to the subway, and I like that smoke machine they have, and the lights, and…

I let her talk, lost in my self-doubt, until she says, I don’t understand why James likes it, though, and then waits for me to explain it to her.

Huh. Why not?

Well, it doesn’t exactly give him a place to show off.

Well, really, he doesn’t even dance when he comes with me, I explain.

Sounds like he’s found a way to stand out, then. Just by doing the opposite of everyone else.

As usual, she has a point.

As usual, I’m not sure why it really matters.

Half an hour till curfew and I’m still at the all-night diner with Becky.

She says, If I can hold it together through senior year, I think I might move in with my dad’s cousin in Michigan and go to community college there. If I stay with my mom…