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“No. No way. Absolutely not.” Awsten passes the phone back in a huff.
“What the fuck, why?”
“She’s literally wearing a choker, like what is that? This chick looks like a total scene queen. All the super-high camera angles and that flat ironed hair? Nuh-uh. I bet she’s a huge bitch.”
Gage scoffs and sets his phone on the table. “Okay, first of all, pot and kettle, you have scene hair right now and you make duckfaces in your MySpace photos.”
“Ironically!” Awsten points out indignantly.
“Whatever,” Gage waves her off. “Second, you can’t judge a book by its cover. Something you should know especially well, seeing as you’re a girl in the local punk scene.”
Awsten curls her lip, but she can’t really argue with that.
“And lastly, G is super nice, okay? She’s like the sweetest girl ever, plus she’s good on guitar. You’ll like her! At least give her a chance.” Gage spreads his hands beseechingly.
Awsten glances at the Facebook page pulled up on his phone again. She flips through the pictures. She passes it back across the table and busies herself picking a flake of purple polish from her ring finger.
“No,” she says without looking up. “Don’t bring her to my house.”
---
Gage brings her to Awsten’s house.
“Gage,” Awsten says, forcing a tight smile as she opens the door. “How lovely of you to show up. With company.”
“Thanks for having us,” Gage replies smarmily, oozing past Awsten and into the house. She’s left standing alone at the door with this girl that she really doesn’t want here at all, but her mom didn’t raise her to be a jackass, so she holds her hand out.
“Hey,” she says with as much friendliness as she can muster. “I’m Awsten. Thanks for, um, coming all the way out here.”
The girl shifts her guitar case from her right arm to her left so she can shake Awsten’s hand.
“Thanks so much for having me!” she says warmly. She’s got bright blue eyes and bushy eyebrows that make her look a little dopey, and she’s a couple inches taller than Awsten. Her bangs sweep airily across her forehead. “I’m Geoff.”
“Geoff?” Awsten asks, furrowing her brow in confusion.
“Yeah, ah, it’s a nickname,” Geoff laughs sheepishly, scratching the back of her head.
Before she can explain further, though, Gage shouts from the practice room. “Y’all coming?”
“Yeah, hang on,” Awsten calls back. She motions for Geoff to come inside, grabbing her amp for her and leading her to the practice space. Otto’s already set up behind her kit. Gage is texting, his bass still in its gig bag.
“Otto, this is Geoff. Geoff, this is Otto, our drummer,” Awsten says, setting the amp down.
“Howdy,” Otto greets, raising a hand.
“Hiya.” Geoff waves. She makes her way carefully through the maze of cables, pedals, and mic stands lining the carpet to where Awsten’s plugging in her amp. Getting her guitar out of its case, she shrugs it on in a practiced motion, but then fiddles needlessly with the tuning pegs like maybe she’s nervous.
Awsten can’t help but notice it’s pretty beaten up, scratches all over the body, and not even anything brand name to begin with.
Huh. Maybe this chick isn’t just a scene queen in it for the optics, after all.
---
Geoff has clearly listened to the EP and practiced the songs a nontrivial amount, because she’s ready to jump right in when Awsten suggests they play through “Silver.”
And she’s decent, too. Awsten hates to admit it because she hates to be wrong, but Geoff’s solid with her technique, and she seems totally at ease once she falls into the groove. “Bones of ‘92” has some weird rhythms going on, but Geoff catches on quickly, which isn’t lost on Awsten.
Well, damn, she thinks. She could still be a bitch, though.
But it very quickly becomes apparent that Geoff is, as Gage said, one of the nicest people ever.
They run through a couple of songs, Awsten begrudgingly impressed with Geoff’s skills, before calling a break.
“Alright, that was really good,” Awsten says, clapping her hands. “Let’s call it for now. Geoff, do you wanna come here and talk chord progressions?” Out of the corner of her eye, she sees Gage stalk off to the porch, no doubt to smoke. Ugh.
But Geoff is already making her way over, beaming.
“That was so fun! You guys have a great sound, I really love how it’s layered and poppy. And the lyrics aren’t like cliché band dude stuff at all.” The excitement in her voice is obviously sincere. “I know it’s just the first EP, but these sound like songs I would hear on the radio!”
Awsten blinks, startled but pleased by the praise. “I—Thanks, I’m glad you like it. I take the lyrics pretty seriously, so… Um, anyway, this part in ‘I Was Hiding Under Your Porch…’”
While Geoff copies the chords Awsten shows her, Awsten catches Otto’s eye over the guitarist’s shoulder. She glances over to Geoff, then silently raises her eyebrows. What do you think?
Otto tends to be somewhat lukewarm about people she’s just met, so Awsten’s expecting a hand wiggle or a shrug. But instead Otto flashes her a thumbs up, tilting her head contemplatively. I like her, she mouths.
Awsten’s inclined to agree.
---
Gage stays outside fucking around for longer than is polite, but it gives them the opportunity to chat, so it’s not as annoying as it could be.
“So, Geoff,” Awsten starts. “You said your name was a nickname, right? What’s it short for?”
Geoff makes a sound somewhere between a groan and a laugh. “Oh, it’s. So my full name is Gertrude Francine, right?”
Awsten bursts into laughter. “What? That’s such an old lady name,” she blurts before instantly realizing how rude that sounds. “Oh shit I’m sorry, I totally didn’t mean that—”
But Geoff just giggles. “No, it is! It makes me sound, like, geriatric! Like I’m ninety-five years old and I knit doilies. So I started going by my initials, G.F., when I was a kid. If you say it quickly, though, it sounds like ‘Geoff.’” She shrugs. “Somewhere along the line, it just stuck.”
“Woah, you’re just like Otto!” Awsten whips around to look at Otto, who nods, turning to address Geoff.
“My real name is Charlotte,” Otto says with a wrinkle of her nose. “But I’ve always hated it. So I go by Otto.”
“I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone call you Charlotte, actually,” Awsten muses.
“Only my mom, and only when she’s super pissed.”
Geoff laughs. “Me too! When I used to hear my dad go ‘Gertrude Franciiiine…’ that’s when I knew I was fucked.”
Otto snickers along with her. “Right? There’s something so sinister about someone saying your full name.”
It’s not lost on Awsten how slow Otto is to warm to strangers, but here she is, goofing around with Geoff not two hours after they’ve met. Maybe Geoff really is something special.
“Wait, you know what this means?” Awsten blurts out. “This would make Waterparks a band full of chicks with dude names!”
“Oh my god,” Otto snorts, “they’ll see us on the gig registration form and think we’re a band of hardcore guys.”
“Wouldn’t that be kind of awesome, though? We get there and bam, it’s three girls,” Awsten counters. “Like, ‘hah, gotcha bitch!’”
“They might see the spelling of your name and think you’re just making stuff up,” Geoff teases without bite.
Awsten grins mischievously, already plotting. “D’you think we should all wear fake mustaches on stage?”
It doesn’t occur to her until later that she’d already started thinking of Geoff as a part of the band.
---
Gage ends up being a terrible bassist, which Awsten wishes she were more surprised about than she is, but it still kinda sucks having to kick him out.
They keep Geoff, though.
“Do you think we’ll be okay without a bassist?” Geoff asks, worry in her voice, at their first band practice as a trio.
Awsten considers this. “Mmm, well, we have the tracks. I think we’ll be fine. I can get Jawn to fill in on bass for shows if we really need it, since he knows all the parts on Airplane Conversations already.”
“Shouldn’t we start looking for a new bassist?” Otto asks, idly twirling a drumstick between her fingers. “If we start searching right now, we could maybe even find one before the first show.”
Awsten thinks about this. Otto’s right, of course.
But then she thinks about the easy peace Geoff brings when she walks into a room. She remembers how Otto let loose her unrestrained, honking laugh when Geoff made a joke over Chipotle the other day. She considers how sweet Geoff always is when she comes over, even when she has to drive an hour and a half from The Woodlands after working a full shift.
“Nah,” Awsten says. “We can’t ruin the chicks with dude names theme, now can we? We’re a gimmick band now. ‘God’s Favorite Boy Band.’” She splays her hands out, miming a marquee.
Otto shakes her head hopelessly. “I guess it won’t make harcore dudes take us any less seriously.”
“What about Jawn? He’s a guy,” Geoff notes.
Awsten waves her hand dismissively. “I can get him in a dress if I ask him, don’t worry about it.”
“Really?”
She pauses to consider. “If I’m annoying enough, yeah.”
Lacing her fingers, she stretches her arms over her head until her shoulders pop, then turns to face her two new bandmates. “Alright, let’s start brainstorming as many opening acts as we can to take up space on the flier. The more made-up and stupid, the better.”
“What if we stuck a pizza in front of the mic and acted like it was a DJ?” Geoff asks with a giggle.
Awsten grins. This band is going places.