Edge: Of Seventeen

Marco turned up the volume. He didn't ask what was wrong. He just drove faster.

"You want to go to the lake?" Marco yelled over the music. Edge Of Seventeen

This is a fantastic request. "Edge of Seventeen" (the 1981 song by Stevie Nicks, famously covered by Lindsay Buckingham and Destiny’s Child) is a track defined by its raw, driving energy, a single-chord vamp, and a sense of frantic, grief-stricken power. Marco turned up the volume

Lena felt it in her ribs. That thing she couldn't name. It wasn't sadness about her father leaving. It wasn't the fight with her best friend. It was bigger. It was the feeling of standing at a cliff in the dark, not knowing if you wanted to jump or fly. "You want to go to the lake

You drive down a highway at midnight with the windows down. Your hair is a mess. Your heart is a clenched fist. You are not sad. You are powerful in your sadness. This song is not about getting over it. This song is about becoming the storm.

"I'm seventeen," she replied. It was the only explanation she ever gave.

Lena rolled down the window. The humid air slapped her face. She stuck her arm out, palm flat, and let the resistance push her hand up and down. She was a wing. She was a fist.