Take a Bow Read Free Page A

hands together. “This is more like it. A brotherhood — no offense.” He winked at me. “Red here will be the hot-chick lead singer.”
    “Oh, I don’t sing. But my friend Sophie —” I said it so quietly that Jack moved right on to the next band member.
    “What do you play, Ethan?”
    Ethan hesitated. “Guitar, piano, sax, drums …”
    “Okay, we get it. Genius. Emme, how about you?”
    “Oh, I play piano and guitar mostly. I played flute when I was little, but …”
    “Yeah, we don’t need a flutist for our awesome rock band.”
    Ben interrupted. “Why do you automatically assume we’re a rock band?”
    “Oh, is this our first fight as a band? And things were going so well!” Jack’s large belly laugh echoed through the cafeteria. “I can already see the documentary on us now: ‘When CPA Cliché started off —’”
    “What’s CPA Cliché ?” Ben asked.
    “Our band name. What’s the most cliché thing to do at CPA? I’ll answer that for you: Form a rock band! And we’re doing it on the first day. I wonder if we can get extra credit?”
    “We are not naming our band CPA Cliché,” Ben protested.
    “So you agree we’re in a band, then?” Jack looked around the table. Ethan shrugged and looked at me. All I could think to do was shrug back. I was just happy to have people talking to me.
    Ben took a notebook from his bag. “All right, someone needs to be serious about this. Ethan, guitar. Ben, bass. Emme, keyboard-slash-guitar. Jack, drums.”
    “Oh, so you assume I play drums because I’m a brother?” Jack asks.
    “No, I assume you play drums because you’ve been knocking out a beat with your silverware since we sat down.” Ben nodded toward Jack’s hands, which were indeed wrapped around a spoon and fork as if they were drumsticks.
    “Fair enough.” Jack dropped his silverware and took a bite of his chip.
    The back-and-forth between Jack and Ben continued for the rest of the period as they plotted our rise and subsequent fall from stardom. I was upset to hear that I was going to have a drug problem and Jack was going to bravely lead an intervention to save me. Which would be all for naught when, on the night before our big comeback tour, Ethan would tragically die in a car accident.
    Jack shook his head sadly. “So much promise …”
    As we all got up from our seats, Ethan finally spoke up. “What exactly happened just now?” he asked.
    I shook my head. “I’m not entirely sure, but I believe we’re in a band with Jack and Ben. Although you need to be sure to always wear a seat belt.”
    He smiled. “Oh, okay. You should stay away from the smack.”
    “I’ll try.”
    “Cool.”
     
    Now, three years later, we’re still talking about the future of our band.
    “So nobody wants to hear what lies in store for us?” Jack pretends to be hurt. “You all want to throw away something we’ve worked so hard on?” He scrunches his face up like he’s about to cry. “That’s fine, that’s fine.”
    Ben sighs. “Oh, you are such the martyr.”
    “Well, at least you understand my role.” Jack wipes off his pretend tears with a napkin.
    “Yeah, but if it wasn’t for me, we’d still be called CPA Cliché.”
    Everybody at the table groans. For weeks we couldn’t come up with a name for our band, and Jack had plenty. After we all vetoed CPA Cliché, we swiftly turned down Jack’s other suggestions: Jack and the Irish (since the rest of us have Irish last names: Connelly, Quinn, and McWilliams), Black and the Irish (Jack’s warped sense of humor), and his personal favorite, Jack and the Not-So-All-Star Band.
    Ethan came up with Dissonance Youth, which we didn’t think any non-music people would get. Ben and I were trying to come up with similarly obscure references, then suggested we just call the band Obscure Reference. Jack vetoed that. He didn’t want there to be anything obscure about our band; he isn’t into obscurity … or subtlety.
    Then, as with everything