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a dig at his recent troubles, if the kid was being cocky. It was hard to tell because the voice was so damn sweet . “It’s a mixed bag,” he said carefully. “Some stuff I’m proud of, some not so much.”
    “I don’t want to rock the boat. I happen to like what’s happening right now.”
    Sure, all of the perks but none of the freedom. But what was freedom, anyway? Oliver had nothing but time now, but he also didn’t have enough money to do anything. Some tradeoff . “ Enjoy it,” he said.
    “I'm trying.”
    “You're from around here?”
    “Katy. I live in LA now, but it's my mom's birthday this weekend, too. And Breathe Music gave me my big break. I was one of these kids a few years ago. Can't believe I was invited as a mentor this early. I’m just nineteen, but it already feels like so much has happened. Are you in this room? We're neighbors.”
    There was a time warp, when it came to the industry, that Oliver barely understood himself. When someone was as ubiquitous as Trey, it was almost as if you knew him forever. When you found out that he was a person who aged every year like you did, it was almost jarring; like they lived on a different plane and did more with the same number of hours.
    Trey seemed like he was older than nineteen despite looking like a kid. Oliver remembered being nineteen. It had been awesome. Envy closed his throat for a second.
    “See you around then,” Oliver managed to say. “Happy birthday to your mom.”
    “You're nicer than they said you would be,” Trey said as he went to the elevator.
    Damn right he was. He watched the kid get in, then he knocked on Haley's door.
    “You know what I really want right now?” he said to her surprised face three seconds later. “Fajitas. You think we can borrow Roger for a bit?”

Chapter 7

    Oliver didn't care where he got the Tex-Mex, as long as he got it now , so Haley suggested a place. It was a bit cute how he was totally and irrationally needing his fajita fix.
    Roger agreed to take them but couldn't stay because his shift at his actual job (bouncer at a club downtown) was starting. Roger was another volunteer, because Victoria knew how to round up people for this cause and make them feel good about it.
    “Everywhere I eat, it's crap,” Oliver was saying as they waited for their food. “I tell you, it's crap.”
    It had been years—too long—since Haley had been to El Cantina, and her mouth started to water from him reminiscing about it the whole car ride. She hadn’t been back in years because, well, she thought she shouldn’t stuff her face with tortillas and steak that often. But this was turning out to be a weekend of weirdness; might as well temporarily drop the diet.
    “I should have been coming back here every year,” Haley said, closing her eyes for a second and taking a deep breath.
    “Do you smell it?” Oliver demanded.
    She did. It smelled of Sunday afternoons, and Thursday nights after games, and those rare Saturday mornings when everyone was up and super hungry. “It’s El Cantina. Like it's always been.”
    “It doesn't smell like this elsewhere. I've tried places. I've been everywhere.”
    “You can't have tried smelling every Tex-Mex restaurant on the East Coast.”
    “I'm not kidding.”
    Haley closed her eyes and took a deep breath and was reminded of yet another thing. This place was a time machine. “It’s like my dad’s birthday.”
    “Excuse me?”
    “There was…maybe a period of five years? My dad wanted his birthday dinner here, every year. I was in middle school. It stopped because he eventually moved on to Chinese food, but this still does remind me of his birthday.”
    “That’s it,” Oliver said triumphantly. “That’s how I feel. Except I remember arrival days—when my parents came back from a trip, and if I wasn’t with them, they’d pick me up from my grandmother’s house and we’d come here.”
    A server placed a chip bowl between them and Oliver lunged for it,