Excerpted from Long Island Girls
Susan wanders aimlessly down the alt rock aisle of Tower Records, one parking lot over from the Walt Whitman Mall, next to the TGI Fridays. She runs her fingers along the top edges of the CDs while a Fall Out Boy song plays through the store’s speakers, nails on a chalkboard with its high-pitched harmonies. She’s wearing her large headphones like a necklace, plugged into a Walkman in her black pleather messenger bag.
Katie sometimes likes to schlep Susan all the way down Sunrise Highway to the nearest independent record store, which is always an annoying journey because Katie is also too afraid to actually drive on Sunrise Highway, with its short merge lanes and frequent drag racers. This means Susan is the default driver while Katie gets to be the DJ and the passenger princess.
The truth is Susan likes Tower Records better, even if it is a chain. First, the size: this huge open space with endless possibility. Also, they always have everything she wants. And the best part is no one judges her. The people who work at Katie’s place don’t even say hi, they just sit at the front and read magazines until you decide you want to blow all your money on some out-of-print vinyl and then they judge you for the one you pick.
Susan looks at the flyers on the corkboard in the back. There’s one asking people to come to an Iraq war protest; people looking for roommates; guitar lessons with a guy named Dan Smith. Then she sees it: SUPER SICK ALL AGES ROCK SHOW.
“Katie!” she yells across the store. A few people glance up, and she blushes for calling so much attention to herself.
Katie walks over. “What are you screaming about?”
“What-What is playing the Masonic temple this weekend. Look.”
“Why in the world would they play Long Island?” Katie asks.
“No idea,” Susan says. “We should go.” She takes the flyer and shoves it in her bag.
***
The band is setting up onstage and soon Jonny Lakes walks out. Susan and Katie grab each other’s hands and begin to scream.
“Hi, we’re What-What,” Jonny says into the microphone. He’s got an easy smile, a warmth to him. He’s not too cool to enjoy this. “Thanks for coming out.”
They open with Susan’s new favorite: “Pink Days,” that sad love song she now knows from the first chord. Instantly forgetting about Eliza and the others who came with them, Susan and Katie push their way to the front until they’re standing directly in front of Jonny. He’s wearing a T-shirt that’s just slightly too short, showing the bottom inch of a flat, hairless stomach. Despite his slender figure, he’s larger-than-life. Susan has never seen someone who is so clearly a star.
I was born in the shadows under your eyes / In the salt of your sweat I was baptized, Jonny sings, his voice angelic and soft, like he means every word. Maybe it’s overly earnest, a little saccharine, but Susan doesn’t care.
Her heart aches with a kind of euphoric empathy. She feels like she’s lived this, though she definitely hasn’t. Jonny Lakes looks down at her as she sings every word. The next time the chorus comes, he holds the microphone in front of Katie and Susan. He lets them sing the first line together—I remember pink days, pit stains, heat waves—before pulling it back.
Katie hugs Susan.
“This is the best night of my life,” Susan says.
***
They’re getting back into Susan’s car to leave when Katie says, “You know what? I think Susan should go wait for Jonny.”
Susan slides into the driver’s seat. “Excuse me?”
“Yeah!” Jake shouts from the back, banging his hands on the headrest of Susan’s seat. “Go get his number.”
“No,” she says. “First of all, he’s old. Second of all, no.”
“Wait,” Eliza says. “Who? The lead singer?”
Katie nods vigorously. “He was totally into her.”
Eliza starts laughing.
“Is it funny that he would be into me?” Susan says, her face beginning to burn.
“No! Of course not,” Eliza says. “It’s just, that guy is gay. Like, obviously gay.”
They all turn toward her.
“What?” Eliza is still laughing. “Was it not obvious to you? ‘The world wasn’t ready for me and you’? ‘We were black-and-blue’? Give me a break. Even that song is about being gay.”
“Do gay people get baptized, though?” Susan asks. “That’s in the song, too.”
“No,” Katie says with certainty, shaking her head.
“You wanna make a bet?” Eliza says, deadpan.
Susan groans. “You’re going to make me go talk to him?”
“Someone needs to settle this,” Katie says.
“Fine,” Susan says, mostly just to make the debate end. “I’ll be a dumb groupie and hit on the musician.”
“Yesss!” Katie cheers. “Really? Oh my god, Susan, you’re so brave. We’ll wait here for you.”
“You have to wait for me, I’m your ride,” Susan says, rolling her eyes as she gets out of the car and heads back inside.
Susan savors the power of this moment; it’s out of character, and there’s some shock value. Rarely is everyone paying attention to her.
When she gets back inside the temple, she finds the lead singer of the band packing up his gear. Susan leans against the wall, waiting for him to walk by, and when he does, he looks right at her and grins, putting his guitar case down.
“Hey!” Jonny says. “Thanks so much for coming.”
She hadn’t anticipated he would actually stop to talk to her, and she immediately turns pink, but tries hard to seem relaxed. “Oh, yeah,” she says. “Uh, you’re welcome. You guys were great.”
“Thanks,” he says.
“Can I ask what made you want to play out here? You guys are way too big for a show like this.”
“I’m from here,” he says. “We like playing hometown shows. Keeps us humble.”
Susan laughs in surprise. “SPIN said you were from New York.”
“Long Island is in New York.” He smiles. “I don’t have to tell the press everything.”
The Masonic temple is emptying out, a few stragglers making out in the corners of the room. The lights come on, and Susan notices for the first time how dingy the carpeting is.
Another man appears. He’s shorter than Jonny, younger, too, with a delicate face that strikes Susan as almost elvish and hair that looks like it’s never been out of place. He loops an arm around Jonny’s waist as Susan realizes that Eliza called it.
Susan wonders if she should feel disappointed, but instead she feels something else: floaty. Lighter somehow. Like her heart is swelling as she watches the easy affection between these two men.
“Sorry, babe,” Jonny says, kissing the top of the man’s head. “I’m coming.”
The boyfriend turns to Susan, looking her up and down. “I know how you love to meet the local baby gays,” he says to Jonny.
“Oh,” Susan says, the floaty feeling replaced with panic, “I’m not . . .”
The boyfriend cuts her off. “A local?”
Susan stutters. “Why do you think that I’m . . .”
“I’m sorry,” Jonny says, with genuine kindness. “He didn’t mean to assume.”
“I just don’t know why you’d think that,” she says in a small voice.
“First of all, your hair.” Jonny gestures to her mullet. “But it’s more of an energy thing.”
She doesn’t know what to do with this. She’s never considered her own energy before.
“What’s your name, kid?” Jonny says.
“Susan,” she whispers.
The boyfriend says, “God, how old are you, Susan?”
“I’m seventeen,” she says.
“Well, you look twelve,” he replies.
“So do you,” Susan says, and he laughs.
“Thank you so much.” He winks. “Botox.”
Before she can think too deeply about any of this, Jonny puts both of his hands on Susan’s shoulders and looks into her eyes. She’s lost the ability to blink.
He says, “Susan, I promise, one day you’ll get out of this town and your life will become amazing. In ways you can’t even begin to imagine. Let me give you my number,” he says. “If you do move to Brooklyn to become a lesbian someday, we should hang out.” He writes his number on her arm with a black marker that he pulls from his pocket. His area code is 631, just like hers. “Seriously,” he says, and she can tell he means it. “Anything you need. It’s my sacred duty to help the queers escape Long Island.”
The other man pulls him by the hand and they walk away, waving.
Susan is trembling so hard that she takes a minute before going to the car.
I’m not gay.
It’s bad enough that she’s so alternative and has a reputation as a slut; she’d never fit in if she was a lesbian, too.
She picks at her bracelet, a pink leather wristband with silver pyramid studs. She counts the studs. She tries to breathe.
Susan is the last person left. It’s time to go, but it takes a few more moments for her to remember how to use her legs.
From LONG ISLAND GIRLS by Gabrielle Korn. Copyright © 2026 by the author and reprinted with permission of St. Martin’s Publishing Group.
Gabrielle Korn is the author of Yours for the Taking, The Shutouts, and Everybody (Else) Is Perfect, and the former editor in chief of Nylon. Her writing has been published across the internet since 2011, with bylines in Elle, McSweeney’s, The Millions, Literary Hub, InStyle, Domino, Oprah Daily, Refinery29, and more. Originally from New York, she now lives in Los Angeles with her wife, and together they run the Pink Door artist and writer residency.
