Instead, I leaned forward, elbows on the table, all my attention on Cathy as she answered.
I could feel Mark beside me, silent and patient, waiting. I knew he had questions. I knew this wasn’t over.
Just not right now. Not yet.
7
ZACK
The music shop was quiet in that mid-afternoon lull.
Behind the counter, I was restringing a battered acoustic when my phone buzzed. I wiped my hands on my jeans and glanced down.
Cathy:Congrats. You’re in!! You guys are part of the New Year’s Eve main stage lineup. Not sure about the exact schedule yet. I’ll get back to you. Sending you the full lineup now.
For a second,I just stared at the screen. Then it hit me.
I sucked in a sharp breath. We were in.We actually made it.
My grip tightened around the phone, knuckles whitening as a grin spread across my face before I could stop it.
I wanted, needed, to tell Mark. Immediately.
He was supposed to swing by later for practice, and the thought of dropping the news in person made the excitement fizz even harder under my skin.
But then, just as quickly, a familiar knot twisted in my stomach: Theo.
My thumb hovered over the screen as I refreshed my messages, then my email, then my messages again, like that might somehow change what I was about to see.
Cathy’s follow-up came through almost instantly, a file attachment with the lineup.
There were five names on the list. I recognized most of them: local acts I’d played with before, or at least heard about. Solid musicians. Deserved spots.
And then there was one name I didn’t recognize. I stared at it longer than the others. Figures. I wouldn’t have been surprised if it was Theo’s band.
He was good, irritatingly good, and New Year’s Eve was exactly the kind of stage he’d aim for. Big crowd. Big energy. Big moment.
I exhaled slowly and locked my phone, forcing the thought aside. It didn’t matter. What mattered was that we got in. Me and Mark.
I leaned back against the counter, letting my gaze drift around the shop as the adrenaline slowly settled. Once the initial rush faded, my brain jumped tracks and went straight into logistics. Outfits.
Cathy had mentioned it almost offhandedly after the audition. One of the judges had apparently been curious about our “brand,” which made sense.
We’d shown up in our everyday clothes, no band name, just our names scribbled on the sign-up sheet.
Names were fine for now. Cathy had waved that off. The look, though, still needed work. And soon.
New Year’s Eve was close enough that finding something decent might be a nightmare.
Mark, of course, had been completely unfazed during the conversation. He’d shrugged and said he was fine with anything.
Then, somewhere between Cathy getting animated and me internally screaming, he’d started tossing out suggestions.
“Sequinned suits,” he’d said casually, like it wasn’t the most unhinged idea I’d ever heard.
The worst part was Cathy hadlit up.
From there, they’d spiraled into sequinned lapels, metallic accents, even tinsel woven into guitar straps. Cathy went quiet for a moment, her eyes narrowing in that dangerous way that meant she was seriously considering something ridiculous.
