Nope, the world-famous rock star is so not flirting with me. He just wants to buy my hat. Dante's first offer is ridiculously high, though God knows I need the money—student loans, cat's surgery bills, sad nonprofit paycheck. In a downtown Chicago plaza, about a hundred people watch our face-off, and, in the end, we all know it's not about the hat anymore. Later, the memes dub me the #bratinthehat, and I'm OK with that. 

 

So this all started last month, when I wandered into a thrift shop on my lunch break. Not to sound all Frodo of the Shire-ish, but the vintage fedora did sorta pick me when it fell off a "Clearance" shelf and landed on my pink Crocs. The hat took me right back to my grandma's brick Southside bungalow, where she raised my sister and me. She'd pull a Frank Sinatra album from an old apple crate, maybe one that showed him in a rakish fedora, and the three of us would dance cheek to cheek. My grandma used to blast Frank's records so loudly that I could feel his baritone in my bones. She loved his swagger, the way a kid from a working-class family in Hoboken, New Jersey, could own any note he sang. She'd point out that both Frank and I were short, and whenever I defaulted to unassertiveness, she'd say, "You need more Frankness".

 

In the thrift shop, my phone rang.

"Oh, sorry," I told my boss at Housing4All. "I—" Oof. Trying not to apologize so much.

My boss talked right over me. Working on that, too.

I paid $9.99 for the fedora, plopped it on my head, and called my sister. "This hat is soooo Frank Sinatra," I told her.

 

The lightweight wool hat is faded midnight blue, apt to fly off in any breeze. It's the one cool thing I own in my Gap/just-out-of-college wardrobe. A hat can ignite something, right? Think Taylor Swift's 22 hat (joy), Michael Jackson's moonwalk hat (badassery). My hat slips me some Frank Sinatra OG, Great-American-Songbook-master verve.

 

On the hot, windy morning that Dante does not flirt with me, I jaywalk across Michigan Avenue from the bus stop to work, past swearing drivers and jackhammering construction workers, while my hat fends off a dive-bombing red-winged blackbird. I'm jostling my backpack and two homemade iced coffees, one of them for Amir, the street musician who sings Louis Armstrong songs outside my building. I have a big meeting today, and Amir has a big gig tonight, and we're both freaked out.

My lavender T-shirt dress is flecked with sweat. Lovely. The wind whips my long black hair across my face, but I spot Dante in the plaza ahead of me.

That's him, for sure, with those questionable Elvis sideburns, surrounded by beefy guys. He wears tight black jeans and a tie-dye peace symbol T-shirt.

Dante grins, trotting so close that I notice a tiny zit near his nose ring. His breath smells sour. Ugh, is that...whiskey? He towers over me and eyes my coffee tumblers. 

"Hey, is that coffee for me? Whoa, we're already having morning coffee together, and I don't even know your name." 

"E-Emi." My cheeks burn. OK, I had Dante's picture on my bedroom wall when I was a teenager, but no way am I letting on that I know who he is.

"Hey, E-Emi." His entourage chuckles. "You look great in that hat." 

"Thanks." Uh, why is he talking to me?

"Listen, Emi. I'd love to buy your hat. For my photo shoot in, like, 15 minutes. Say, five hundred dollars?"

Ohhhh. "No, thanks."

 

Onlookers train their phones on us. A skinny girl with pigtails, maybe six, sprints from her mom, shrieks "Dannnn-te!", and hugs his knees. Her pink T-shirt bears the name of Dante's hit song "Besitos", and is imprinted with tiny lipstick marks. 

"Not now," Dante snaps, wresting his legs away. The girl's face crumples, and she rushes back to her mom, who picks her up and stomps off.

My jaw drops. "Ummm, so you have time to buy a hat but not a second to spare for a child who—"

Dante steps toward me and tips my hat down over my eyes, faux playfully. I flip it back up and glare.

"I'll throw in two tickets to my Wembley concert with Ed Sheeran," he says, as if the knee-hugging girl didn't exist. "All expenses paid."

OMG, I love Ed Sheeran. Did he say "all expenses paid"?

"Seriously, no." I'm spitting my words now. Literally, the spittle is flying.

My phone buzzes. It's my sister. She's probably watching us on social media.

"Oooh, Emi," he says. "Little girl with big cojones. I like that. One grand." 

"It's co-ho-nes, not co-joe-nes. Still no." I'd rather eat instant ramen every day for the rest of my life than take his money and let my hat sit on his big head. 

"For fuck's sake." His tone turns impatient. "Five grand, with a matching donation to..." Dante glances at my backpack logo. "...Housing4All." 

The crowd murmurs in disbelief. A grizzled guy mutters, "Why don't she just give him the goddamned hat?"  

 

Holy crap. Five thousand dollars? That would pay off a good chunk of my student loans. Jeez, I don't do well under pressure from demigods. For sure, Housing4All could use the money, and you know my boss will see a clip of this.

Who else will see it, though? My little sister and other impressionable young women, powerless as a weather vane in the prevailing wind. And someday, that tiny knee-hugging girl who he totally blew off. My split-second wavering unwavers.

"Dude, not—" I say, my voice rising. More Frankness. 

"Jesus, Amy, you—"

We stare at each other. We both know what my answer will be.

"Not. For. Sale. At any price. And it's Emi." 

Near Dante, a twentysomething woman yells, "Girl on fire!"

Instead of skirting the crowd, I jostle my way through without apology, a mic-dropping moment, for sure. My heart settles down from a jitterbug-y whoo-whoo to a reasonable half-time swing. You know, ramen isn't half bad, when you spice it up with some sriracha and green onions.

"Nice fuckin' with ya, Amy," Dante yells.

                                                

 

At 5 p.m., I leave work,  exhausted from the post-Dante reverberations. My IG followers jump from five to two thousand forty-six, which is weird but kinda gratifying. #Bratinthehat is trending, alongside #slaygoliath. 

Outside my office, Amir plays his beat-up guitar for an audience of himself, singing "What a Wonderful World" like he means it. Dear Amir, with his gray beard and smiling eyes.

"Hey, Emi. How'd your big meeting go?"

"Hey, Amir. Good this time, thanks. You nervous for your big gig tonight?"

"More like terrified. Need me a shot of—hey, your Frank Sinatra hat!"

A stiff breeze whisks the hat off my head. I catch it mid-air and pause.

Hat in hand, the wind at my back, a simple question pops into my head: Do I need the hat anymore?

Bits of cottonwood fluff float around Amir and me. I feel a rush of tenderness for the hat and Amir. In my head, Frank Sinatra serenades them both, crooning my grandma's favorite song, "You Make Me Feel So Young."

"You make me feel there are songs to be sung..."

I reach up and nestle the hat on Amir's head.