After he threw Knight Fury off the tour, Maple Records was under pressure from a contract with Universal to provide a new band. While they were shopping around new bands, Killian was on YouTube doing his own research.
That’s where Killian spotted our self-produced EP release in his recommended videos. He had a listen, dug our sound and vibe, and told his label he wanted us to fill Knight Fury’s spot. They’d tried to push Killian in the direction of a bigger band on their roster—one from Alberta with a massive fan following already—but he’d ignored their suggestions and insisted on us.
He liked our sound, our look, and the fact that we were fresh-faced and green—no scandals. He didn’t give a shit we were from some sleepy town in Nova Scotia, liked that even. Liked that we were unfamiliar and unmarked. He wanted us because we were good at what we did.
His label contacted Maple Records, and they had no choice but to send out their best agent to try and get us to sign, dangling the tour bit in front of us like a big juicy carrot.
Opening for Killian Barker was an opportunity of a lifetime. This tour would kick-start our career, launch us straight into the spotlight—and it had.
Calum’s grandfather, Frank Murphy, had been managing our band at the time—at least he was finding gigs for us at local festivals and in nearby communities. We were young and had no fucking clue how to go about that side of the coin, and Frank was our go-to. He knew the business and had the connections.
The meeting had taken place at one of Frank’s favourite restaurants in Mahone Bay, just after we played at the Harbour Folk Festival. We’d walked into our meeting with Paul Bodem, not knowing what to expect, and walked out with a signed contract and a new manager.
We didn’t get a chance to meet Killian until after we opened for him that first night, but he quickly became an industry friend, one we preferred to collaborate with.
In fact, we were about to embark on another tour with him. Our first show was in Detroit in three nights. We’d be on the road for another six weeks, playing at various venues across the United States. Then we’d head back, finishing up the tour with a few shows in Canada before returning to Toronto to record our next album.
Then we’d do it all over again with another tour.
This job hadn’t felt like work so much as it did a dream I was bound to wake up from at any moment. Too good to be true. Too many things hung in the balance that could destroy everything we’d built.
We might have slid into the spotlight through our experience on the East Coast music scene and our collaborations with Killian. We’d gotten a lot of attention due to his established influence, but we stayed there and kept rising due to our own talent.
It had been years of constant work. We’d released four albums, three of which had gone platinum. We wrote constantly, jamming with each other just like we used to in the old days. Only now, instead of my mom’s garage, we jammed in recording studios, tour buses, and on stages.
We did interviews while on the road, attended parties for single releases and album tours, and made appearances at movie premieres that featured our songs. That didn’t count the hours of studio time and months we spent writing and composing new albums.
We had to make an appearance at events and shit happening to other people in the industry too. It was a seen and be seen kind of deal, in order to stay relevant you had to stay out there and keep making great music.
The women who flocked to us wanted to be seen with us to boost their own albums or promote their movies. Everyone had an agenda, an expectation. All three of us had learned this the hard way, with various scandals over the years. Some mistakes garnering more media coverage than others.
“Mistakes made by young hormonal men on the cusp of greatness.”
Those words were taken fromThe Rolling Stonefeature they did on us our first year on the scene, after some shit went down in the gossip rags between Calum and Brighton, who’d hooked up after she starred in one of our music videos. They’d had a short-lived fling, and she got super pissed off that he never called her back after. She went for Evan, and when that didn’t entice a reaction from Calum, she’d sold her experience with both of them to the gossip rags, which had pissed the label off at first—until our ratings went up.
Since then, we’d experienced a few more dramas in the media. Mainly due to Calum and Evan’s escapades with high-profile women in the industry.
Brighton Wells was such a mistake, for more than a few of us at least. Calum, Evan, and Killian had had their encounters with her. Not me, but I wasn’t about to be added to that list.
Her fingers wrapped around my bicep, reminding me she was still waiting for a response. She wore a confident smirk, like it didn’t occur to her I could possibly refuse her, though I had before and would again. Dodging her advances had been a regular occurrence lately. The more rejection she faced, the hungrier she seemed to get.
“I’m good,” I replied, tugging my arm free from her grip. A flash of hurt crossed her pretty features before she collected herself and gave me a calculated smile.
“Your loss,” she said, stalking away. I didn’t care enough to watch her go. Even if my attention hadn’t been captivated elsewhere, Brighton wasn’t on my short list of women I’d spend the night with. I didn’t visit territory my friends had been to or sleep with women who’d likely snorted more than half their weight in cocaine minutes before.
Even if she wasn’t coked out of her mind, and hadn’t slept with two of my best friends, I wouldn’t have been interested. Brighton was too high maintenance and superficial.
I craved something more authentic. Something homegrown…something that had simmered beneath my flesh until it became such a part of me, I didn’t know how to pull it from me. Instead, all I could do was try to stifle it.
Besides, she had a boyfriend and an entire life back home. One I had no place in as anything other than her brother’s friend and bandmate. It’d be best if I retired for the evening, because stewing about not having her was putting me into a foul mood.
Knowing that prick would get to be with her later was making me seethe, and I had no right to be jealous. No right to her.
Before I could decide whether to give in and disappear, the music faded into silence, and the packed, expansive living room fell quiet just as quick, heads turning in sync to the DJ booth.
The DJ, Madd Maxi, had stopped mixing her tracks, and Calum—my best friend and the guitarist and lead vocalist of our band, The Forgotten Flounders—took the microphone and looped his arm around his little sister’s shoulders.
Connor smiled and shifted beneath his arm, looking only mildly uncomfortable by the attention suddenly thrust upon her when everyone in the room looked their way.
