But Elsa was already dimming the overhead lights slightly, and she’d turned down the background noise from whatever news channel had been playing on the TV above the bar. The room didn’t exactly go quiet, but there was a shift in attention. People were looking at me.
Great. No pressure.
I stepped onto the small stage, which was really just a slightly raised platform in the corner, and pulled the microphone from its stand. The karaoke machine hummed to life when I pressed the power button. I scrolled through the options, looking for something that might actually help—something warm and familiar. The kind of song that made people think of home.
I found it. Classic country. A song my grandmother used to sing to me when I was little, back when I thought I’d grow up to be a star someday.
The opening notes filled the room, and I closed my eyes for a second, finding the melody in my chest before I opened my mouth.
And then I sang.
I forgot about the cranky truckers and the crying baby and the woman who complained about the coffee. I forgot about the snow piled up outside and the roads that might not clear foranother day. I forgot about everything except the music, the way it moved through me like water, filling up all the empty spaces.
When I opened my eyes, the room had changed.
The toddler had stopped crying. The arguing truckers had gone quiet. The mother with the whining kid was swaying slightly, her daughter pressed against her side, both of them watching me with something like wonder.
And in the back corner, the firefighter had put down his phone.
He was looking at me. Really looking—not the distracted glance from before. His whole body had shifted toward the stage, his eyes locked on mine with an intensity that made my breath catch.
I should have looked away. Should have focused on the lyrics scrolling across the karaoke screen or the family in the corner or literally anywhere else. But I couldn’t. Something in his gaze held me there, like a hand pressed against my heart.
His phone buzzed on the table. I saw it light up as a notification flashed on the screen.
He didn’t look at it.
He didn’t look away from me.
I sang the last note, letting it hang in the air for a moment before the music faded out. The room erupted—not in applause, exactly, but in something warmer. People were smiling. The truckers were clapping. The little girl in the corner was bouncing on her toes, asking her mom if I could sing another one.
But all I could focus on was the man in the back corner, still watching me like I’d just rearranged something fundamental in his universe. Like he’d been asleep for a long time and I’d somehow woken him up.
His phone screen lit up again. And again.
He pushed back his chair and stood, shoving his phone in his back pocket. Then he started toward me.
2
KNOX
Holy shit.
Her voice hit me like a fist to the chest. Rich and warm and aching. The kind of voice that reached inside you and grabbed hold of something you didn’t even know was there. The room went quiet around me—the crying baby, the bickering truckers—all of it fading into nothing.
I set my phone down without thinking. For the first time in weeks, I didn’t care what my dad was saying in the family group chat or how my sister was responding or what fire I was supposed to be putting out. I was here, in this moment, watching this woman sing her soul out for a room full of strangers.
She had her eyes closed, lost in the music, and I couldn’t look away. Couldn’t breathe. Something was happening to me—something I didn’t have a name for. Like I’d been walking through fog for years and suddenly the sun had burned through.
Her eyes opened, and she looked right at me.
The breath I’d been holding came out in a rush. She kept singing, but her gaze held mine, and I felt it everywhere—in my chest, my gut, somewhere deeper that I didn’t want to examine too closely. This woman. This stranger I’d merely catalogued as“hot” when she walked in. Something about her felt like coming home.
My phone buzzed on the table. I saw the screen light up in my peripheral vision.
I didn’t look at it.
The song ended. The last note hung in the air, shimmering, and then the room erupted. People were clapping and smiling, the tension that had been building all day finally breaking. The little girl in the corner was bouncing on her toes, tugging at her mom’s sleeve.
