Love Songs & Other Lies(80)

Folded up neatly on top is a purple Future X shirt, and I pull it out, wondering why on earth I need another one of these. As I begin to fold it to shove it back into the box I notice something on the back of it and hold it up to see THE ORIGINAL written in white lettering across the back. I’m the original Girl in the Purple Shirt. Embracing the fact that it feels like Christmas, and I’m a complete dork, I pull the T-shirt on right over my dress.

I reach into the box again, and pull out another layer of tissue paper, revealing a pile of … change? There are hundreds of quarters and nickels and dimes, like someone has dumped their loose change jar into the box. I look at it all, confused, and notice there are also small plastic cards mixed in. Blue and white and black; they’re bus cards and train cards. As I pull a few out, completely bewildered, a guy in a white shirt approaches the stage and hands me an envelope. The music has stopped and I wonder if Cam is here. Where is he? I scan the crowd and don’t see him. But against the back wall, hiding behind a camera, I see Tad. Cam has got to be here somewhere. I smile, and Tad nods back, his usual grin still in place.

“Open this,” the man standing in front of the stage says, before taking his place in the crowd again. Every eye is fixed on me as people lean forward and look around each other for the best view. Everyone seems to be just as curious as I am about what is going on.

I pull out the card, which is scribbled on in a handwriting I recognize from a million napkins and scraps of paper that have littered the tour bus, adorned with lyrics.

Vee,

I fell in love with you years ago. I made you a promise then and I’m finally keeping it. I promise to ride the trains with you, and make sure crazy taxis don’t run you down in the street, and to refill your Metro card so you don’t get kicked off the bus.

I Love You,

Cam

Tears fall onto the card as I choke back a sob, and as I finally look back out to the crowd, Cam is standing in front of me at the edge of the stage, his guitar in one hand. He’s wearing a white shirt too, and when he turns his back to me it says PROPERTY OF CHICAGO in big black letters.

“I don’t—” I can barely talk through the tears. “—What are you doing here?”

Cam sets his guitar on the edge of the stage and pulls a red, white, and blue Cubs ball cap on. “I live here.” He takes a step up onto the stage, standing between the crowd and me.

“In Chicago?”

He nods.

“Since when?”

He squats down in front of me so his face is level with mine, and his eyes bore into me. “Since the girl I love moved back here.” The crowd erupts in muffled gasps. “Since I realized that you are the only future I’ve ever seen for myself. I’m going to do whatever it takes to make sure you’re the only—” Flashes are erupting throughout the crowd and muffled whispers fill the air.

Someone in the back of the club yells, “Marry him or I will!”

Cam freezes in place. “Shit.” He swallows and bites his lip. “Vee, I’m not—” He shakes his head frantically and I choke back a laugh. “Shit. I mean … not that I wouldn’t. But I wasn’t—I just—” He starts to stand up and I grab him by the elbow, holding him in place.

“Settle down. I know.” Strangely, the idea of being with Cam—even forever with Cam—hasn’t sent me into a tailspin. There’s no way I’m ready, but it doesn’t plunge me into a complete panic. I smile and lean forward, pressing my lips to his as he grabs my hands and pulls me toward him. My guitar is wedged between us and the crowd breaks into applause as we fumble with the instrument keeping us apart, shoving it to my back to get closer. Cam’s hands are snaking up the back of my shirt and wrapping around my ribs when whistling pulls me back to reality. We are onstage. In front of a very interested crowd.

I lean into his ear, “Sing with me?”

He kisses me on the forehead, and a giant grin spreads across his face. “Always.” I raise the mic stand and we take our places around it.

“You guys want to hear a song?” I ask the crowd. “Or did you all just come here to help embarrass me?”

The crowd erupts in cheers and whistling and I begin to play “This Girl,” feeling for the first time like the words are a declaration and not a wish.

There’s this boy, oh this boy, who’s got me all tied up

in the best kind of knots.

There’s this look you’ve gotta see, when he’s starin’ at me, it’s his hands on my hips,

and in the way that we kiss.

I can’t help but smile

’cause he’s lookin’ at me,

oh he’s lookin’ at me.

There’s this boy, oh this boy— I think he’s the boy for me.





EPILOGUE





CAM


As I step through the giant automatic doors of Lake Terrace with Vee, I consider—for maybe the hundredth time—how I’m going to handle this. Vee hadn’t given me a choice when she said, “You’re going to meet Nonni on Sunday.” There was no question asked. I had known it wasn’t optional by the way she scrunched her eyebrows together and squeezed her lips into a thin little smile, daring me to argue with her.

That was two days ago, as we sat in standstill traffic on the interstate, trying to make our way to Riverton. To spend the weekend with Vee’s parents. Back in the day, Vee’s mom took me in with open arms. Fast-forward, after I ran off with no notice, broke their daughter’s heart, then inadvertently made her look like a cheater on national television—and I don’t quite know what to expect. I’ve basically been covered in a cold sweat the last forty-eight hours. Since the moment she told me we’d be making this trip. She told me that if “whatever this was” between us was going to work, I would have to face her family eventually. Face her family. The way she said it hadn’t exactly done wonders in assuring me that I wasn’t being driven straight to the firing squad.