Unlike any other boy their age on whom Ryan might have developed a crush, Neil changed everything. He took up space, encroaching on territory that had once solely belonged to Lia. Take, for example, the book for Exene.
One the eve of their second experience seeing X in concert, the girls had decided to make a book of drawings and poems for Exene. They planned to stand at the side of the stage, or at the door in the alley behind the theater at the end of the concert, waiting—begging, if necessary—for some roadie or bouncer to let them see her. Failing to secure an audience, they hoped then that some stranger would faithfully deliver their humble offering to their hero.
Yet Ryan had been lax in her responsibility to the project. The fact that the book for Exene, full of drawings and origin
