Flannery by Lisa Moore Page A

they’re heading up to the Southside Hills.
    The siren is very loud and high-pitched and it fades away. I stand there waiting, but there’s nothing else to see.
    The Snow Queen glares down at me from across the street. She’s all haughty jaw and smolder. Sharp angles. She manages to look malevolent and smug, even though she still has the one-nostril problem.
    All of Tyrone’s Snow Queens are voluptuous and this is a comfort to me. If I’m not mistaken, Tyrone’s queen wears a double-D.

10
    A text from Amber! She wants me to walk to the Arts and Culture Centre with her after school. She has received permission to borrow from the costume bank for Gary’s music video. They’re only open until five and she really has to pick out a lot of stuff.
    She really, really needs my help.
    They’re thinking ten female dancers in the video and fifteen male dancers and of course the whole band. And, most important, Gary, because he’s the lead singer.
    I have to meet her on the front steps of the school as soon as the buzzer goes. Melody can’t make it. She has detention. Gary has basketball practice but he’ll show up as soon as he can.
    Oh thank God, Amber says when she sees me coming down the stairs.
    We really have to hurry, she says.
    I have to work hard to keep up with her all the way down the sidewalk, past Brother Rice and the Lions Club and the university residences on Allandale Road and across the lawn of the Arts and Culture Centre which is covered in orange and yellow leaves.
    Amber talks the whole way, hardly stopping to breathe.
    Gary says this. Gary says that.
    Gary’s mom brings them down a tray with two glasses of lime crush and a bowl of barbecue chips every day and they have to listen for the door to the basement opening at the top of the stairs if they’re making out.
    Gary’s basement is renovated and he lives down there and there’s a little bar and flatscreen TV and Gary’s little brother is really cute and Gary’s Pomeranian is just like a little mop.
    Monique, Gary’s Pomeranian, really loves Amber. Monique licks her ankle and her little tongue is like sandpaper.
    Gary’s Pomeranian tickles. Amber tells Gary, Your dog is tickling my ankle, but what can Gary do about it?
    And it’s hypoallergenic and doesn’t shed and Gary wants them to get matching tattoos (Gary and Amber, not Gary and the Pomeranian), and Gary’s band is playing an all-ages show on the weekend. Gary can’t see her on Tuesdays or Thursdays or Fridays, because of the band.
    And the video for their unit is going to be really wicked, Flannery. They’re renting a limousine and the band is going to climb out of the limo and there are fireworks all around it, except for Gary, who stays in the limo but his window goes down and there he is with a cigar and a fedora and sunglasses and then the window goes back up. Gary thought of that part.
    Amber is going to shoot it with Gary’s new GoPro camera. Gary put the GoPro camera on Monique and got some really deadly shots. Gary rode his mountain bike down the Signal Hill trail and some old grandmother got mad because he was coming down the stairs and her grandkid was going up and Gary knew he wasn’t going to hit the kid but they ruined his GoPro shot. And the grandmother was yelling and shaking her fist and Gary said it was really funny, this little old lady, her bifocals crooked, her gums flapping. You should see Gary on that mountain bike though, he can really go.
    Gary says Amber could lose a pound or two, like, just here, on her hips? And she would look, you know, skinnier . It wouldn’t surprise Amber if Gary’s band gets really big. Gary says that there’s a label that’s been in touch because they saw an all-ages Gary and the band did and the guy was really nice. The guy said Gary really has something. The guy wants to see the video when it’s finished, which is part of the reason