La Bamba

He doesn’t say a word when he opens the trunk for you. He just stands there with his lips slightly parted like he’s trying to smile but he can’t. You drop in your bag next to his and then you put your guitar next to his in the backseat, and as the car doors slam behind you, you still can’t take your eyes off that face that still looks so much like yours. If you were paler and blonder and had blue eyes, you’d look just like him. You wouldn’t even need to change your hairstyle.

“You haven’t changed,” you remark, and the smile finally breaks out on his lips.

“Oh, I have,” he says, his gaze leaving your face and turning to the road. “But you have, too.”

And the next time you get out of the car, you don’t even notice how his movements mirror yours. At a gas station you get a coffee in the setting sun and a hug that almost lifts you off the ground, and the knot that has been there in your stomach since you set off dissolves slowly. In the car you’re back to joking and laughing like you always have, and you try hard to ignore that you want him the same way you wanted him last summer and the summer before that.

It’s a long drive so you offer to take his place at the wheel for the rest of the night. You hum along with the radio, your mouth still tasting like coffee and plastic. He’s sleeping in the passenger seat with his head tipped to the side, and sometimes your hand brushes against his knee when you change gears.



The hotel is swarming with young musicians like you two, many of them here “just to give it a shot” and then a few dead set on winning. At least you have a cool roommate, you smile to yourself before falling asleep fully clothed on the clean, white sheets.

Later, when you decide to take a look, walk around a bit, a girl asks you if you two are brothers.

“Most of the time,” he replies, grinning, and you laugh and throw an arm around his shoulder.

“God forbid,” you say, and the girl laughs along. Later she turns out to be a great friend, along with the next three or four you meet, and you don’t even mind that they whisper behind your back sometimes. And the next few days, they are brilliant. They are all about new people, smoking on the grass, smuggling in alcohol under your jacket and lots of music (which means finding your voice next to his again, not that you mind that much.)

You get used to being the center of attention. The girls want to hear all about you two and your music and your life.

“He loves Elvis,” you say, pushing his shoulder gently. “He wants to be Elvis when he grows up.”

He smiles at you, making you suddenly unsure of what to do with your hands. Still, you’ve got plenty to talk about and plenty you just don’t mention, like kissing him in the park when the streetlights went out or the days you spent at his house when his parents were on vacation, or the time you fell in love with the same girl.

“We used to play in the same band,” he says, smiling. “Then he kicked me out.”

Your eyes widen in disbelief.

“You left,” you say, incredulous. “You got a girlfriend and you left. I certainly didn’t kick you out.”

His smile fades, he purses his lips.

“Yeah, possibly. It was long ago.”

“Four years,” you say, ripping out a fistful of grass from the ground.

“We were still kids,” he laughs, a bit embarrassed. Like you’re so grown up at twenty-one...

The girls share a worried look as an awkward silence settles. He offers you a cigarette and you take it without a word.



Later, in the room, you still don’t feel like talking to him so you turn to your guitar for comfort. You can feel his eyes on you, though, and your fingers slip off the chords far too often. You try not to look up when he sits down on your bed.

“Are you mad at me?” he asks, his voice hoarse and deep, and your head sinks further.

“No,” you lie, but it just comes out anyway, “yes. Why were you trying to make me look like the bad guy?”

He gives you a long look that you can’t really resist anymore, and when he says “I’m sorry,” your body tenses up.

And then his lips are on yours before you can blink, and when you try to push him away, you end up pulling him closer instead, your fist curling into his flannel shirt as his fingers tangle in your hair. Then he pulls away almost as abruptly as he started the kiss, his cheeks flushed and his hair slightly tousled, and you feel like he’s kissed every bit of common sense right out of you, because you lean in and press your lips together again.



It’s not like you can’t sing, you just catch yourself zoning out sometimes while you do and the mistakes you make are small, but noticeable. And deep down, you have a feeling that you’ll be going home tomorrow night.

He tackles you in the room, quite literally, and as you lie tangled up on his bed, he suddenly asks,

“If I get sent home tomorrow, will you have enough money to take the train home later?”

You run your fingers through his hair because your hand doesn’t have space to move anywhere else.

“Listen, silly,” you say. “There’s no way they’ll send you home. Besides, I’ve been thinking about going home anyway. There’s not much going on here in the next two weeks.”

“Right,” he hums, and the kiss that follows is soft and so short it’s barely there, but it’s painfully honest.



The next night, when you stand there waiting to hear your name and you don’t, you’re not at all surprised. He steps forward though, and glances over his shoulder to see your face, and he can’t read anything from it because there’s nothing there.

It’s well past 2 AM when you get to your room to pack your things. You’re a bit dizzy and barely sad at all, and when he comes back after ten or so minutes, you don’t even need to look at him because his presence fills up the room anyway.

“Will you walk me to the train station tomorrow?” you ask, not looking up from the t-shirt you’re folding.

“I’m taking you home,” he answers without thinking. You don’t say anything, you can’t really, so he continues. “Like you said, there’s not much to do here for two weeks. And I’d rather celebrate my birthday at home.”

You have no idea what to do, so you just turn to him.

“I’m really proud of you,” you say, and you even attempt to smile. He shrugs.

“I’ve been thinking.” His gaze is absent and you can’t tell if he’s looking at you or at something behind you. “Maybe if we’d both gotten in tonight, they would’ve paired us up and made us continue together.”

“Yeah,” you sigh. “We’ve been there. It’s better off this way.”



On the way home you watch the fields and the towns and you can’t help but feel jealous. Maybe he will fall in love with these fields and towns and a couple of girls, too, tying him here. And that will be it.

You can feel his eyes on you, and you’d prefer if he kept them on the road instead. Still, you don’t say anything, so he turns up the volume on the radio until it’s so loud you can’t possibly ignore it. You reach out, brush his hand away from the buttons and turn it back down. While you’re at it, you decide to find another channel, and you only realize that might have been a mistake when the familiar notes of La Bamba fill the car.

“Remember?” It slips out of your mouth, but you regret it that instant. And he does remember dancing to this song with you in a place where you weren’t supposed to be, and he also remembers everything that strange night did to both of you.

And he proceeds to ruin the song further for you as he pulls over and, after unbuckling his seatbelt, leans in so close that nothing is real except his breath. The kiss leaves you breathless, and when you manage to push him away, you pant,

“Get off... not allowed here.”

But he just pulls you closer with his hand on the nape of your neck and kisses you again, insistently, making sure you’ll never forget.

Oh, how you wish you could.