Poor car steering wheel, but by the time I get to Caleb’s, I’ve cooled off. Their house is small but cute, a mission style with pretty flowers out front.

Caleb’s mom lets me in. “Hi, I’m Charity,” she says brightly.

“Hi,” I say, “I’m—” I pause for a second, stuck between saying Catherine or Summer. Charity is dressed for the office, a portfolio under her arm, and this trips my Carlson Squared circuits. But then I hate myself for even debating this, and now I’m standing there like an idiot—

“Summer,” says Charity. “It’s so nice to meet you.” She sticks out her hand and we shake. “Caleb mentioned you the other day, and when I asked him about you he got all grumpy and said you were ‘cool.’ That’s how I could tell he’s really into you.”

“Oh.” I try not to blush, but there’s no holding it back.

“I think it’s so great that you manage the band,” says Charity. She shifts the stack of papers to the other side, and I catch a faint smell of cigarettes. “I loved hanging out with bands when I was your age, but I never graduated from groupie status.” She glances to the sky, like her past life is up there somewhere. Then she shrugs. “Well, except for two weeks as the drummer in an all-girl Zeppelin cover band.”

“Wow,” I say. “That sounds pretty awesome.”

“Awesomely terrible.”

“Well, my mom can’t utter a single sentence that cool.” I feel guilty immediately after saying this, even if it’s true.

“Bah.” Charity waves her hand, then checks her watch. “Gotta run. People to save, insurance companies to swear at. Here, I’ll show you downstairs.”

I find Caleb, Jon, and Matt sitting on the carpet around a coffee table.

“I’ll see you around dinner, Caleb,” says Charity.

“Okay, good luck,” Caleb replies. There’s something in their back and forth, so easy and understanding, more like they are partners than parent-kid, at least the version I know. Two people whose identities are not secrets from each other. I realize that while it sucks to have my parents want a different version of me, it’s just as bad that I want a different version of them.

“It was nice to meet you,” Charity says to me.

“You, too.”

Caleb, Jon, and Matt are playing one of those games with a giant map and the little die-cast armies. There are soldiers and monsters. They’re playing as if nothing happened last night. I try to go with that. “Wow, that’s the least rock ’n’ roll thing I’ve ever seen.” I snap a picture though, and post it. People love when artists appear doing nerdy things.

“League of Empires,” says Caleb. “Dragons, armies, dragon-armies.”

“And damsels,” says Jon in a faux British accent. “Damsel assassins. Want to play?”

“No thanks.” I look at Caleb, trying to ask with my eyes if everything is okay.

“We’re waiting for Randy and Val,” he says simply.

Matt hasn’t made eye contact with me yet. His hair is hanging down in his eyes, and he’s wearing a vintage AtoN concert shirt, the iconic one that says “Follow Your Allegiance” with an arrow pointing up. He probably doesn’t know yet the coincidence in his wardrobe choice. “Did things go okay with Maya?” I ask, figuring he won’t like my asking but doing it anyway.

“Fine,” he says grumpily, as predicted. “She’s okay.”

Jon glances at him sideways, then shares a look with Caleb, who rolls his eyes.

They keep playing, flipping cards and rolling dice, moving their little pieces around and erupting in swears now and then as one player’s band of orcs decapitates another’s cavalry, and so on.

Finally, a van engine rumbles outside and Randy bursts in, a tangled mass of technology cradled in his arms. “Found one that works, finally.” He hurries over to the entertainment center, yanks it from the wall, and begins fiddling with cables.

I glance at Caleb. His eyes have followed Randy. Fret Face is back.

“So, now are you going to tell us what this is?” Jon asks. The shadow of last night crosses his face.

Caleb shakes his head and rolls the dice. “When Val gets here.”

Randy curses at the web of cables behind the TV. “Why does your mom still have a VCR?”

The guys keep playing, but after half an hour, there’s still no Val.

“What time did you tell her to be here?” I ask Caleb.

He looks at the clock. “Eleven.” It’s nearly twelve.

Finally, there’s a knock at the door. Caleb heads up. I hear him talking in a low voice as he returns, with Val behind him. Not hiding his conversation, just one to one, and that of course is totally fine but the intimacy of it annoys me, and I tell myself not to stew, but then stew anyway.

Val is slouched in an oversized sweatshirt, her hair tied back and beneath an orange-brimmed hat that says “Reno” in script letters. Same jeans she’s worn most every day. I even recognize the lavender socks. Her skin is pale and dark circles ring her eyes. She looks like she’s barely slept. Her frown is apparently her default setting. I don’t say anything to her, but I expect that, assuming she has some sense of decency, she’ll offer me a hello or something. After all, she was the one all over Caleb when I’m pretty sure it was clear that he was spoken for. But no, she doesn’t even look at me, just drops to the couch and tucks into a ball.

“Hey, Val,” says Jon.

“Hey.”

“You got it?” Caleb asks Randy.

Randy falls back on his butt. “Yes, finally. Welcome to the last century.” He holds out his hand and Caleb passes him the tape.

“What’s that?” Jon asks.

“So . . .” Caleb shoves his hands in his pockets. “I have some things to tell you, and after, maybe last night will make at least some kind of sense . . .”

He does a good job with it, telling them everything about Eli, though he doesn’t read them the contents of the letter. And when he’s done, they react:

Jon: “Holleee . . . shitballs.”

Matt: “Wow.”

Val: “Did your mom say why she waited until now?”

“She did,” says Caleb, and then he doesn’t add anything else. I wonder if this is partly for my benefit, drawing a line between what I get to know and what Val gets to know. If it is, I appreciate it.

I also expect Val to have some snarky response to the shutdown, but she just mutters, “Okay, then.”

“So . . .” Caleb looks to Randy. “Let’s see it, I guess.”

“You haven’t watched it yet?” Jon asks.

Caleb’s eyes shift. “I . . . thought about watching it first but . . . I didn’t really want to. The whole thing is so weird.”

“We’re here for you, man,” says Matt.

Caleb joins me on the couch. Out of the corner of my eye, I see Val producing a Coke and a bottle of Tylenol from her bag.

“Here we go,” says Randy. The screen turns blue. Then the videotape starts to play.

There’s a wobbling view of a ceiling. Long fluorescent lights and then green walls. More shaking. A door comes into view. A hand reaches out and locks it.

Blur of movement. The camera slowly focuses. It’s been placed on a surface.

A green counter. In a bathroom. Stepping into frame is a tall, lanky guy. He sits on the edge of the counter, holding an acoustic guitar. He’s in a skinny Weezer T-shirt and gray polyester pants. His hair is lighter than Caleb’s and pressed this way and that with product. His eyes, though, the slope of his nose and the cleft of his chin . . . similar.

“Hey, Eli,” Randy says quietly.

I squeeze Caleb’s hand. He squeezes back weakly. I can’t even tell if he’s breathing.

“Okay, here we go,” Eli says, waving, and there’s something skewed about his movements, and I realize Eli isn’t taping himself, he’s taping the reflection of himself in the mirror. And the angle of the camera is just off center, which makes him strangely ethereal, ever so slightly disconnected from reality, and all the more like a ghost speaking from the beyond. It’s a cool visual choice, and yet, isn’t it strange to think about composition when you’re making a video for a son you never knew? It seems oddly theatrical. “Welcome to the secret recordings of Allegiance’s black sheep.” He smiles to himself, but it looks halfhearted.

There are distant sounds behind him: thumps and muffled voices, like how the other bands sound through the wall at the Hive.

Eli glances off camera, a shadow crossing his face. When he looks back he says, “Nobody knows what I’m doing in here. . . . Well, they think they know.” This makes him laugh again, but also shudder. He’s twitchy. His eyes rarely stay in one place, and his arms and shoulders are alive in constant, tiny movements. It seems likely that drugs have been on the menu, and will be again sooner than later.

“Those are the Hollywood Bowl bathrooms,” Randy says, adding, “the backstage ones.”

Eli takes a deep breath and steadies his gaze into into the camera. “Hey, far comet,” he says, looking through the screen and through time to his son. “Or whoever’s found this. Maybe you’re a worker at a city dump. Maybe you’re an alien. Woooo . . .” He bounces his hand around on the air like it’s a flying saucer. “Either way, welcome to my bathroom sessions.” He starts speaking in a slightly British accent: “In which we secretly complete the last three songs we will ever write.”

This makes Caleb release a tight exhale. I put my arm around him. This must be excruciating. As I do this, I hear a huff from beside me, but I’m not looking over at Val. She doesn’t get to be part of this.

“Okay . . .” Eli glances at the door again. “I gotta be quick. Let’s see . . .” His hands move over the strings, and he strums out a couple chords, not in any rhythm. “Yeah,” he says to himself, “there it is. This is a new song I’ve been calling ‘Exile.’”