Out for the Night (Browerton University #4)(13)
"So two rappers go on stage and try to out-rap each other?" Matty asked.
"Pretty much. It's all improvised. They try to one-up the other, like throw the other off his game with a mad lyric or sick burn."
"What does the winner get?"
"A brand new car!" Coop said in a game-show announcer voice. "Acclaim. The love of the audience. The knowledge that they are the better rapper. A lot of rappers use this space as a place to try out new material, and the competition helps them get better."
The rapper on the left mocked the other rapper's Converse sneakers. Coop heard many words that rhymed with Chucks. One in particular. He wondered how accustomed Matty was to profanity. The crowd roared with approval for the insults. Both rappers tore into the words with passion and ferocity.
"Do you do this?" Matty asked.
"This isn't all that happens," Coop said. He hopped up on a stack of boxes marked CDs and Books. "Squadron is only half the night. They have an open mic section. I've seen some amazing rappers."
The audience let out an OOOOH at what was probably a truly epic taunt by one of the rappers.
"Have you performed?"
"I'm still new to this crowd. I still need to pay my dues."
"You pay dues for an open mic night?"
"You have to listen first before you can be listened to."
"So do you want to record an album?"
Matty sounded like a parent, asking about Coop's post-college plans. He didn't like when people asked him about his rapping. It was personal. Matty was the only person who knew he came to these shows. He let Matty in. He supposed the least he could do was give him some answers.
"I want to go to the International Songwriters Conference eventually. The connections you can make are priceless and can be your ticket to playing sell-out concerts and winning Grammys." Coop thought of his poor Copenhagen sock, less bulky than it should be. His family came first for him, but he still held out hope of attending in the future. Being an artist was all about having impossible dreams. "It's probably prudent of you to get my autograph now."
Matty cocked an eyebrow. "So you're working on something good?"
"I'm getting there. I don't like talking about it too much." Not to mention that none of my ideas are worth talking about. Coop still cringed at "discussion section in my bed" and other horrible lines that'd come out of his supposedly functional brain.
"The more I talk about an idea, the less special it becomes."
"And the more expectations you have," Matty said, like he pulled the words right out of Coop's brain. "I don't like to tell people about the projects I'm working on until I know they can work."
"Me, too. I believe in minimizing all potential embarrassment." Coop had more fun watching Matty sway to the beat than the battle itself.
"Man, I'd love to go to Europe," Matty said. "It's expensive, though."
"I'm saving up." With a side hustle I definitely can't tell you about.
The music stopped. A man in a white undershirt and baggy jeans hopped onto the stage and held both rappers' hands, about to crown a winner. He asked the audience to make some noise for their favorite. The Chuck insulter won in a landslide.
A new pair of rappers came on stage. One wore suspenders, with one unhooked. The beat started, and it was impossible not to bob your head to it. The first rapper started. He was finding his words, pulling them out of thin air. It was freaking art, not silly rhymes about freshman year and Settlers of Catan. Maybe it was fate that he probably wouldn't go to Copenhagen this year. He would've just wound up embarrassing himself.
Denise, who ran Squadron and first met Coop when he wandered in last fall, came over with a clipboard in her hand. "It's your time, Coop," she said. "I'm putting you on the list."
Coop snapped out of his headspace. "I don't have anything prepared."
"I have a slot open during open mic. Don't worry. I'm not throwing you into battle."
"I'm still new here, Denise. I'm sure there has to be another rapper who would do this slot better service." Coop turned on his charm, but it was coiled in a desperate tone.
"Coop, you've been here enough. You can't keep being a spectator. You're ready." She wrote down his name on her clipboard. She smacked his chest. "You'll do great."
"You will," Matty said. "If you can create the sunshine bomb off the top of your head, you can rap."
Making up a drink and freestyle rapping were in totally different arenas. The people at Squadron would eat him alive.
"This is an experiment," Matty said. "I do experiments all the time. Whatever the outcome is, I always learn from it for next time. Some engineers will conduct an experiment, knowing it will fail, just to see how bad it fails and how they can fix it for next time."
"So you're telling me to fail my heart out?" Coop looked at the stage with trepidation. Matty waved a hand in his face.
"You have this."
The two rappers had sweat soaking through their shirts. The man in the white shirt jumped on stage, with the clipboard in his hand. He asked people to make noise.
Coop didn't make a sound. His thumping heart counted down the seconds until his humiliation. His leg rattled against the box, putting a dent in the cardboard.
The suspenders rapper won a narrow victory of applause.
"And now for our next performer." The man in the white shirt picked up the clipboard. "Make some noise for DJ Coop."
Fight or flight was activated, turned on like a light switch.
"Let's go." Coop jumped off the box, grabbed Matty's hand, and pulled him to the stairs.
"Coop, where you at?" The man asked the crowd.
In seconds, they were upstairs. In nanoseconds, they were outside under the cloudless sky.
Coop charged down the sidewalk, trusting that Matty would be behind him. He couldn't stop to check. He had to keep walking, had to keep moving away from that space. From that moment.
He peeled around a corner and hid in the opening of a Whole Foods, next to a long row of shopping carts.
He was hiding.
Footsteps slapped against the sidewalk. They echoed on the walls around Coop. Matty ran past, frantically searching.
"Matty," Coop called out.
He spun around and joined Coop at the shopping carts.
"What happened?"
"I was ambushed." Coop was still catching his breath, still hearing his name being called in front of everyone.
Matty put a hand on his shoulder. "It's okay. It's over."
They breathed in and out together, deep breaths that rolled through Coop's lungs. Matty's eyes looked deep into his. He didn't ask for more explanation, but Coop owed him one. Just not yet. Not when he felt so fragile.
"Sorry," Coop said.
A smile quirked on Matty's lips. "So where to next?"
"What?"
"What's the expression? The night is young."
"You still want to be out?" Coop couldn't believe this was the same Matty counting down the minutes until he could leave a party. "You are one crazy motherfucker."
"Thank you."
A confident grin took over Coop's lips. "Follow me."
"Where are we going next?"
"You will just have to trust me," Coop said. They were so close that Coop could've slipped his arms around Matty's waist. And would have if he weren't being paid. The night was getting more dangerous, wearing down what little professionalism he had.
Coop led them back onto the sidewalk. He spun around and pointed his finger at Matty. "You're wearing underwear, right?"
Chapter 12
Matty
Matty followed Coop through the empty streets without a care in the world that he was just asked if he was wearing underwear. Hours ago, he would've been worried, but the night had taken hold of him. He had shown Coop so much of himself already that he was pretty much naked.
While the streets were quiet before, they were a ghost town now. Not a random passerby. Not a single car. To Matty, it felt like they owned this place. He had never trusted someone like this, and it happened without him realizing. Trust must've been a feeling rather than a fact, since it snuck up on you.
"We're almost there," Coop said.
"Good."
"Are you tired? It's way past your bedtime."
"No," Matty said, and it was the truth. His body was half helium balloon.
The Park Duncannon, the town's only high-rise, stretched up to the sky. Each apartment had floor-to-ceiling windows, the better to look down on the rest of the town. While the complex was mostly for the influx of yuppies moving into town, there were a few students who lived here. All thanks to Mom and Dad.
"Is there a party in here?"
"Not quite." Coop put his arm out to stop Matty from walking any further. The physical contact sent a spark shooting through Matty's chest.
Coop pointed at the security camera attached to the awning. He nodded for them to turn around, into the alley. They squeezed past dumpsters. Their feet crunched over crinkled cardboard.