They were talking. They were also boys.

And what they were discussing gained the entirety of my attention.

“You totally looked through Amber like she wasn’t even there,” a boy said.

I blinked as I watched Taylor’s eyes get very wide.

“She looks good tonight. Real good. Somethin’ different about her face,” another boy mumbled.

“You done with her?” a further one asked.

“Bitch has got to toe the line,” a fourth one with a very deep voice declared. “Don’t dig teases. Amber Spear is a total tease. All that hair. Short skirts. But I got my hands on her and she won’t let me get one up that skirt? Fuck that.”

My back went straight and I watched Taylor’s face pale.

“And her dad’s a pain in my ass,” the fourth one with the deep voice concluded.

“You’re just shit scared of him ‘cause Spear could kick your ass, even if he’s an old guy,” one of the other voices said.

Excuse me?

Jake was not old.

Actually, I had no idea of his age but I knew he wasn’t old. I knew this because I’d seen him work out.

“Whatever,” the deepest voice went on. “He won’t let her go to Boston to see Bounce with us. I mean seriously? What’s up with that? That’s fucked up. Chelsea and Brooke are goin’ and their parents don’t give a fuck.”

The concert Amber wanted to see was Bounce.

At that point, I wished she’d informed me of that.

And two second later, after the one with the deep voice said what he said next, I made a split-second decision and, rather foolishly, sallied forth acting on it.

“Thought I’d get in there, pop that. She’s hot but if Amber likes her cherry that much, she can keep it.”

I saw Taylor snap his mouth closed and his jaw get tight but that was all I saw before I whirled.

Behind me, there were four boys. All tall. All relatively good-looking. The tallest and far best looking one was an African-American young man.

I knew instinctively he was Noah.

I could see Amber wanting him.

But she wasn’t going to get him.

Or, more aptly, he was not going to get her.

“Are you Noah?” I asked.

He smiled slowly; an appealing white smile and I knew he thought I’d heard of him as he was a high school big man basketball player.

Upon his smile, he replied, “Yeah. I’m Noah Young.”

I nodded. “Well, Noah Young, you should know that Amber is not going to the concert with you because she and the Taylors are going with me. Lavon doesn’t like an extortionate amount of people backstage and Amber preferred to give the backstage passes I could acquire for her to her bestest besties. And apparently, you aren’t one of them,” I lied.

Or, more aptly, I lied right then.

I’d need to speak with Lavon’s people to make it a truth.

Lavon Burkett was the front man for Bounce. Henry had directed four videos for the band. Lavon thought the world of Henry and, by extension, me. He’d give me as many backstage passes as I wanted, even if it was true that he didn’t like to socialize with a vast amount of people after a show. He liked me enough to do whatever I asked as he was very generous with his friends. I knew this when he sent me a fabulous flower arrangement after I’d set up the arrangements of his first video, a magnum of champagne after the second, the original sheet framed of lyrics he’s jotted down to my favorite Bounce song the third and a pair of diamond stud earrings the last.

Noah Young was blinking at me but I was far from done.

“As for your assertion that Amber is a tease, she isn’t. She just isn’t that into you.”

This was, of course, an outright lie and I heard a gurgling noise come from Taylor behind me perhaps exposing my perfidy.

Nevertheless, I persevered.

“Although she recognizes you’re quite good-looking, she also doesn’t feel you respect her very much and is having issues with that, wondering if you will eventually toe the line. But alas, from your comments tonight, it seems you won’t.”

I held his eyes and lowered my voice.

“You see, a woman who knows herself and her worth knows that her time is valuable and her heart is precious. She doesn’t give either to a man who can’t respect the gifts he’s being offered.”

Noah kept blinking and I raised my voice slightly as I finished.

“And anyway, she’s been Skypeing Julian. I introduced them online. He’s French Canadian and I believe he’s doing a fashion shoot in Fiji at the moment but he’ll be back in New York next week. He’s quite the outdoors type, even if he’s a model, and he’s keen to come and meet Amber as well as see Maine. I’m sure Amber will enjoy showing her home state to him when he arrives.”

This was all a lie too, of course, but that didn’t stop me from lowering the boom as a finale.

“He’s nineteen and her father quite likes him even though Julian’s a bit older than her. This is because Julian spends a fair amount of time around very beautiful women and thus he knows how to treat them but more, he knows a quality individual when he meets one. Even if only online. So please do totally look through Amber,” I invited. “It will only save you frustration and perhaps heartbreak when she eventually understands how shallow you are, finds you tedious and cuts you loose.”

“Holy shit,” one of his compatriots muttered and that reminded me I wasn’t done.

“Just one final thing,” I began. “There are men who can carry off foul language. But they are men. When you use it, you sound absurd, like you’re desperately trying to be something you’re not. Furthermore, badmouthing a young woman when all and sundry can hear is just bad manners. Extremely bad manners. It says nothing about the young woman you’re referring to and everything about your own character. And just to say, none of that everything is good.”

On that, I turned my back to him and looked to Taylor.

“You may wish to move forward, young Taylor,” I stated. “The line has advanced.”

He tore his incredulous eyes from me and shuffled forward the twelve centimeters the line had moved.

“C’mon, let’s get out of here.” I heard mumbled from behind me and I felt the boys’ presence leave as the line behind them closed in and Taylor again caught my eye.

“That…was…epic,” he breathed.

Although I found “epic” an overdramatized word, I was still pleased he thought so. But now that the deed was done, I was beginning to get anxious.

For Taylor might think so but I had grave concerns Amber would not.

“Do you have your phone?” I asked.

“Yeah,” he answered.

“Hurry and text Amber. Tell her to come here straight away. We need to warn her that event just occurred.”

“You got it,” he muttered and dug his phone out of his back pocket.

I continued, “After you get in touch with her, you may wish to get in touch with your parents and ask them if you can attend the Bounce concert with me. Please assure them I’ll provide transport and accommodation and act as your chaperone.”

His thumbs stopped flying over the screen of his phone and he looked up at me like I was an angel fallen to earth.

He went back to his phone as I tried to breathe normally, becoming more and more worried that my intervention in Amber’s romantic life would not be well received. I continued worrying even as the line shuffled forward.

Amber finally joined us as Taylor stood beside me and I took the two hot cocoas in one hand that were in a brown cardboard holder.

Amber also had a young woman with her and I momentarily forgot my fears as I took her in.

She was very tall, at least two inches taller than Amber and I, putting her to my expert eye at five ten. She was also very slender. Her hair was a shining black sheath. Her clothing, like Taylor’s, was not suited to Magdalene High but instead suited to waltzing along the sidewalk in Manhattan on her way to meet friends for a salad even if she was in a pair of jeans, boots and an extremely well-cut leather jacket.