Breakout by Kevin Emerson Page B

crowd watching a Jumbotron and groaning because Keenan and Skye were some kind of record. And really, even though they were super-annoying to be around as a third wheel, they also seemed to like being with each other and sometimes you felt like there was a Hollywood sound track around them or something, like they would stick together in high school and go to the same college and all that stuff.
    But whatever. Right now I know what a friend is supposed to do, and that’s say, “Well, forget about her. She’s annoying anyway. You’re better off without her. Just think of all the girls we’ll meet at shows.”
    “Yeah,” says Keenan halfheartedly.
    “Plus she always has all these opinions all the time and it’s impossible to deal with.”
    “Yeah,” Keenan says again.
    “Also,” I say, “she’s got a big nose,” except that’s barely true and I don’t really totally believe the other stuff either but right now I’m just trying to help.
    “Ha,” says Keenan. Finally he perks up. “So …”
    “What?”
    He makes a little chuckling sound. Suddenly he’s all mischievous.
    “What?” I ask. “The Hawks? The running game could have been better but a win is a win.”
    “You’re funny,” says Keenan. Now he sounds like he is grinning big.
    “What?!”
    “Come on,” says Keenan. “The
song
.”
One Hundred and Forty-Three New Comments
    “Huh?” I say.
    “Wait … you really don’t know?”
    “Don’t know … what?”
    “Did you ignore the hundred emails from BandSpace?”
    I’ve been on and off my email all weekend and haven’t really gotten anything. “What are you talking about?”
    “Okay …,” he says, kinda laughing like he thinks I’m joking. “Seriously?”
    I am starting to get nervous. “What emails from BandSpace?” I ask.
    “About the song!” says Keenan. “Comments and plays and downloads. You haven’t been getting those?”
    “No.” I am starting to decode at least some of what he is talking about. I set up the BandSpace page to send emails to our Rusty Soles email account but then never set up forwarding to my normal account. I used to check the band account a ton back in the spring and summer, but then we barely got any messages anymore and checking it was depressing and so I basically forgot about it. “What are the comments about?”
    Keenan makes a big exhaling sound. “You need to see for yourself.”
    “Okay, fine.” I start upstairs to look on my computer. “What happened?” I ask Keenan. “Did somebody find ‘Star People’ and like it?” I can’t imagine why people would suddenly be finding our song from last year’s Spring Arts Night. It hasn’t gotten a single play or download since August.
    “I’m not saying anything,” says Keenan.
    I get upstairs and I am feeling really nervous all of a sudden. We always hoped that more people would discover “Star People.” (By the way, that’s Sadie’s title,
not
mine.) I guess it’s cool if people have now. Better late than never.
    I log into the Rusty Soles account, and …
    Whoa
.
    There are all these messages in the inbox that either begin with “New Comment on Your BandSpace Profile!” or “Check it: A fan downloaded your music!”
    “No way,” I mumble to Keenan. I start to scroll down and … this is crazy. The whole first page of the inbox is full and that’s
fifty messages
, all from the last day and a half. I click Next and see the second page of the inbox and there are fifty more messages. I click again. Forty-three more. That’s 143 messages. I click on the first one. It’s a “comment” about the song and the comment reads:
    2:07pm 11/15: Maya42 says:
    Yeah!!!! love it!!! :)
    Okay …
    But then I notice the first line of the email:
    New Comment About Breakout!
    “Hey,” I say, “what is ‘Breakout’?” but the nerve fireworks are going off inside.
    Maybe I already know the answer.
Out There
    “Your new tune,” Keenan says. “The one you sent Friday