Sin
The next few days pass by in a blur. I lose myself in designing and spend a ton of time either watching the band practice or talking to the insane number of people involved in preparing for the gigs.
I never considered how much work went into something like this. But after hours and hours of video calls, talking to people from every area of the tour, my mind is bursting with information.
I spend hours in my little workshop with my notes spread out everywhere. I have a ton of ideas.
The tricky part is finding where my skills would fit in best. Back when I was working for the Herald and he had an Awakening, he wanted everyone to get a hit of pure joy whenever they came into the room.
Just enough to get his Devoted addicted to the feeling.
He’d also want them to be feeling buzzed and slightly reckless whenever he got to the part where he was asking for donations.
But this is a whole other ballgame. These are huge stadiums that are going to be filled with thousands of people who are ready to have the night of their lives.
When Iri first told me I’d have a month to prepare before they head off on tour, it sounded like a long time. But it’s been close to a week and I’m still at the ideas stage, then I’ll need to build or tweak whatever I come up with and test it out until it fails.
Let’s just say I’m feeling the pressure.
I’ve spent the past couple of hours watching another practice session, hoping for more inspiration, and both Cal and Micah are washing off after practice. Those guys get sweaty when they’re practicing.
Not that I’ve noticed how their t-shirts stick to their bodies or how Cal’s muscles bulge as he smacks the shit out of his drums, or how Micah sweats right through his outfits and then you can see everything.
Fine. Theremaybe some additional distractions getting in the way of me working and coming up with ideas. Maybe.
Hell, perhaps I need to take a cold shower after practice, too.
Dorian has spent the past week avoiding and ignoring me as much as he can, which hasn’t come as a surprise since we hardly hit it off in the elevator. It suits me just fine. Sure, it’s kind of awkward when we wind up in the kitchen at the same time. But it’s no major loss to skirt around each other and not speak.
It’s during another of these special moments together where Iri is who knows where and Dorian’s sitting at the breakfast bar, downing a bottle of orange juice when I walk in. He ignores me, as is usual, but today I actually want to engage with him.
“Here.” I lob him the bit of metal I’ve been fiddling with over the past couple of days. I needed something to do with my hands while I was watching them practice and I always think better when I’m already in the middle of something.
He catches it and peers down at the scrap of material I wrapped it up in. “What’s this?”
“Open it and see.” It’s a taunt and we both know it. We’ll see if he trusts me enough to actually do what I say.
He glances up at me and furrows his brow, then lets out a long-suffering sigh before carefully unraveling the material.
It doesn’t look like much. A little badge shaped like a pumpkin I found at the bottom of my bag.
“Okay, now put it in your hand and tell me what you feel.”
Quirking an eyebrow, he does what I say before letting out a brief hum of surprise. “Huh. You put your magic into it?”
I nod, shoving my hands into my pockets. “Figured I’d give your idea a go. It should make you feel calm and...”
“Clear headed.”
“Exactly.” Shit, I feel weirdly like a kid showing off my painting to my teacher or something, waiting for their approval. “I, er, can make a load of them. If you know of any centers that might find it useful if people are feeling overwhelmed or anything.”
I may have had it in my head that he was talking shit when he first brought this up. I figured he was probably trying to make me feel like a useless coward and he wouldn’t actually know what to do with something like this. But he surprises me by nodding.
“Yeah, no worries, I can make some calls.”
Well, then. I clear my throat. “Okay, thanks. Let me know how many you need. They’re pretty straightforward to put together.”
“How long should they last?”
