Free Redemption by Veronique Launier

me one; drinking is so overrated. He also knows better than to drink too much during band practice—I’ve walked off before.
    I grab a Coke and plop down on the comfortable but nasty-looking garage-sale couch, where I lay back and close my eyes.
    “So are you satisfied that we aren’t neglecting Lucid Pill? We practiced all afternoon yesterday so you wouldn’t be pissed off with us this time.”
    “I wasn’t pissed off last time, but I kind of am right now,” I protest.
    Lucy scrunches up her face at me.
    “Why didn’t you call me to practice with you? Lucid Pill is about the three of us.”
    “Trick and I were going to hang out, you know. Then we decided to jam. It’s not like we purposely excluded you.”
    “What’s happening to us?”
    “Nothing. We’re still friends. We’re still a band. You need to stop worrying about it. Instead, well, tell me you’re all right?”
    “I’m fine.”
    “Right, well, you could have fooled me.” Lucy’s tone is mocking, so I stick out my tongue at them like a five-year-old. We all laugh.
    “Seriously, Aude, there was something more, wasn’t there? Something you didn’t want to talk about in the coffee shop?” This nurturing Lucy is a new side of her that’s been coming out little by little the past few months. I don’t like it. It’s not the Lucy I know.
    “I don’t know exactly. I heard stuff, and I’m seeing things, and I’m scared I’m going mental.”
    “Oh Aude!” She lets out a laugh. “You’ve been mental for a long time, has nobody told you this?” We laugh again and it reminds me of the laugh I had at Rochelle’s expense at work today and I tell them about how Guillaume completely humiliated her by ignoring her advances. Of course, Lucy reads way too much into it.
    “He’s crushing on you so bad.” She draws out the word bad with her teasing tone.
    I fight a smile. I don’t know if she is right, but either way, I shouldn’t care. I have more important concerns.
    After our break is over, we go back to the set list, practicing a few new songs with which we still have problems. Trick insists on driving me home again while Lucy stays at his house, hanging out with his parents. She spends more time there than at her own house.
    During the ride home, Trick and I talk about band stuff and school stuff. You know, the normal non-awkward stuff people like to talk about. But he screws it up, and decides to bring up stuff that neither of us really wants to talk about.
    “Lucy and I … I mean, it doesn’t make you feel weird or anything? I mean because of us ?”
    “Um, Trick, I didn’t know you to be the delusional type. You realize there’s never been an us , right?”
    “You know what I mean.” One of his hands is still on the steering wheel while he’s scratching the back of his neck with the other.
    “No, I’m not sure I do. I also don’t think I want to know what you mean.”
    “There’s just this strange tension between you and Lucy these days … ”
    “Well, I guess it does have to do with you and her … but not because of us. I just hate how it doesn’t feel like it’s the three of us together now, but you and her together, and poor little Aude, the tag-along. I worry about what it will do to Lucid Pill.”
    “Has anyone ever told you, you overthink things, Odd?”

12
    Guillaume
    The sky was still dark when I reached her home on Monday morning. I buttoned my wool jacket and wished for some gloves. My breath made plumes of vapor in the frigid morning. All around me the city began to wake up.
    Her front door opened and I watched her walk down the stairs. She was better dressed for the weather than I was. A scarf wrapped her neck and knit gloves kept her hands warm. I considered saying hello, but then realized she would think I was following her—which was exactly what I was doing—but it struck me that she wouldn’t appreciate it if she knew. I trailed her on to the subway, and sat a few seats away from her. From there