If I Could Escape, Now Wouldn’t That Be Sweet?
HARMONY
Playtwokeysrightnext to each other on a piano and you’ll get the gist of how I’m feeling in this moment. Everything grates on my senses—the harsh lights, the bass that thumps through the resort walls, the expectation that I mingle and make small talk.
“Harmony Sonora,” my manager says sharply from the other side of the full-length bathroom-stall door that separates us. “I know you’re in there, and if you don’t come out right now I swear I’ll make you do a collab with Kid Konan.”
I shudder.
I’d rather peel off my fresh acrylic nails than be trapped in a studio with a white rapper who calls himself “the Shakespeare of modern music.” Stefanie knows how to hit me where it hurts.
She can’t actually force me to do anything; her job is to go to bat for me and keep me up to speed on what I’m doing next. But if she can talk the label into an idea, I’ll have to comply.
I can see my reflection in the sheen of whatever this two-inch-thick door is made of—so shiny that the custodial staff probably has to polish it on the hour to keep it from accumulatingfingerprints. The Pinkfeather Resort in Palm Springs is not the type of place to have fingerprintsanywhere, or to have evidence of human use in general. There must be more than a million dollars worth of pink marble in the bathroom alone.
Sighing, I open up to find Stefanie standing with her arms folded, eyes narrowed.
“What do you think you’re doing?” she demands. “There are multiple artists out there that would be perfect for a feature onH.Soand you don’t even care.”
“We’re not calling the albumH.So,” I tell her.
The last time we used a working title with this amount of regularity, it stuck, and I don’t need anotherThe Harmony Project(which sounds like some non-profit organization to teach music to underprivileged children). And although I often pay tribute to late 90s and early 2000s Latina musicians like Selena and J.Lo, the nameH.Somakes me seem a little too cringe for my liking.
“We can argue about that later. I just saw Daisy Malloy eating a bulgogi slider and telling her manager she’d ‘love to do something cross-genre.’ That’s exactly what you need to expand your fanbase.”
With a huff, I adjust the ornate little mask that goes around my eyes—a requirement for tonight’s theme, since the K-pop girl group FANTASIE just released their second album,The Maskerade—and fluff up the dark waves of my hair that graze my shoulders. “How is that babydoll country-pop princess supposed to help expand my fanbase?”
I’ve built a discography based on big emotions and angst; her last two hits were called “Sweet Talkin’” and “Boy Toy.”
“I’m sure she’s not like that in person,” Stefanie argues with a swat of her hand. “It’s just her brand. I bet she’d completely surprise you. Besides, not all your songs can be heartfelt brooding memoirs of lost love.”
“They’re not. Many of them are scathing uptempo tell-alls about the men who have wronged me—or commentaries on a pervasive double standard.”
“Which doesn’t exactly appeal to a male demographic. But Daisy does.”
“That’s because she performs in lingerie,” I say. “And more power to her, but the men who like that are probably the same ones leaving pig emojis in the comments on my socials. I don’t care to pander to them.”
Even at nineteen when I first started seriously performing, I was barely thin enough to avoid scrutiny. Now after a decade of physical development and the stress of trying to uphold all these beauty ideals, I’ve apparently “let myself go.” Every other tabloid has been wondering if I’m pregnant. Best-case scenario, I’m described as “still attractive but needs to hit the gym.” Now I’dkillto look the way I used to.
“Unfortunately it doesn’t matter what you do or don’t care to do, Harm. Crossovers are hot right now. You may be a star, but when you boil it down, you’re an employee of Glambam Records—and it’s time to get out there and do your job.”
Somehow, despite being a musician, I’ve ended up in a totally different line of work: sales and marketing. The worst part is, it’s not even just Glambam that makes money on what I do. My first label, FM Sound, which signed me after I got eliminated during the Final Four onLucky Stars, still owns the master recordings for my first two albums, and I’ve had the worst time trying to get them back. They refused to even put them up for sale for a long time, until I started blocking syncs (which means none of those songs would be allowed on movie soundtracks or in ads or promos, which means FM Sound lost out on their part of multiple six- to seven-figure deals). Then, to punish me, they finally put the masters up for sale—but at an insane price I can’t afford, and said if I block any more sync deals or refuseto perform songs from my old catalog, they’ll take them off the market again for good. Suffice it to say, I left that place for a reason. But promoting myself often results in streaming revenue forallmy past work, including the albums that got me started. Nothing to motivate me to succeed like knowing my enemies will keep getting a little piece of the pie “in perpetuity.”
I follow Stefanie out to the pink-carpeted corridors and back to the ballroom, where lights pulse along with the DJ’s beats and where industry professionals have to lean in close and shout to hear one another. A lot of people are dancing, all masked like me. Most but not all of the women are wearing gowns of some kind (some sleek and modern, others corseted or beaded) but I chose tight vegan-leather pants and a green velvet bustier top with a peplum-style ruffle that acts like a half skirt. I also don a matching cape—which I have silently dubbed my Emotional Support Cape, as it somewhat obscures the rounds of my body that are on display in this outfit. I’m trying to just “do it scared,” hence the reason I didn’t shy away from such fitted pieces, but also I’m only human and I’m not completely immune to the effects of internet trolls.
Yet another way in which my life is like dissonant notes.
Briefly, I wonder if there’s a song idea there, but then I spot some songpyeon shaped like flowers and I veer away from Stefanie to follow the scent.
I bite into one of the honey-filled rice desserts and collect three more in my hands before she catches me, takes my stash, and pushes me toward Daisy Malloy. I stumble up to the country singer and force a smile.
“Oh my goodness,” Daisy remarks in her Georgia drawl. “It’s Harmony Sonora! Hello!” She twirls a long, platinum-blonde curl around her finger. Her mask is brown leather with a pattern branded into it, framing her baby blues and her show-pony eyelashes. Her dress is made of pink silk with a sweetheartneckline. And she’s wearing matching pink cowgirl boots. “I have been dyin’ to meet you ever since I heard ‘If Your Car Could Talk.’ Very Carrie Underwood if you don’t mind me sayin’ so.”
“Thanks!” I raise my voice to combat the noise as I shake Daisy’s hand and remember the inspiration for that song.
I only dated Andy Gaccione for four months, but I sat through plenty of his baseball games, inspiring headlines like “Harmony Sonora hangs on boyfriend after the win” or “Singer-songwriter is famed shortstop’s biggest fan.” Only to find out he’d made a habit of taking other girls to his Stingray before training—for private “warmup” sessions that had nothing to do with sports.
Biting my lip, I return the compliment. “‘Boy Toy’ is really catchy.” Which it is.
