The set feels good. Loose in the right places, tight in others. The crowd’s energy hits like gasoline. Luc sounds better than he has in weeks. Lily’s somewhere in VIP, Larkin with Marie, Lily’s mom, on their bus. I catch glimpses between lights, her hands over her mouth every time Luc smiles her way.
I should be more focused on the music. But every time I turn toward the wings, she’s there. Framing shots. Moving quietly, blending into the shadows like she was made for them. She watches everything, seems to miss nothing. And every so often, her eyes land on me. I feel it every time.
Once, during a solo, she lifts her camera. I expect her to track Luc or Mikey or the crowd. But I can see her framing me. I should hate that. I should glare. I should look away. I shouldn’t give her the satisfaction of capturing a single piece of me.
But, I don’t. I look right back. And the flash of her eyes behind the lens punches heat through my chest. It makes me play harder, sharper. Like I’m proving something I don’t want to name.
After the show, the greenroom is a mess of sweat, laughter, adrenaline, and roadies trying to store delicate equipment, while Hayden flirts shamelessly with someone he’ll ghost within the hour.
I hang back in the doorway. Sadie’s in the corner, laptop open, hair damp, one leg curled under her. She’s reviewing photos, jaw set, mouth soft in concentration. This is her MO after every show. She is a professional, if nothing else I can admit that.
I move so I can see her screen. I shouldn’t look. I look anyway. She flicks through shots, crowd, band, Lily, Luc. Then, me. She stops flicking. It’s a frame from side-stage, me caught mid-play, a light across my face. And I’m looking straight at the camera, right at her.
Her finger hesitates on the delete key. She doesn’t press it. I watch as she slides the photo into a separate folder, like it’s dangerous. My chest goes tight.
Before I can think, before I can tell myself not to, I move to go sit beside her, but Lily slips in ahead of me and claims the spot on the sofa beside her before I can. They begin talking in low, soft tones that make Sadie’s lips lift. They laugh about something; Larkin’s bedtime, Luc’s terrible lullabies, who knows.
I stand there, unseen. Watching Sadie’s shoulders relax. Watching Lily glow. Watching them fit. And something hits me harder than jealousy. I realize what it is and frown. Want. Not the simple kind. Not the physical kind. The kind that scares the shit out of me. The kind I vowed never to feel again.
I back up before anyone notices. I disappear down the hallway, hood up, hands in pockets, heart beating too loud for a man who swears he’s made of stone. But even as I walk away, the truth sticks in my throat. She sees too much, and I’m starting to not hate it.
Chapter Eight
Sadie
Break the Rules
Charli xcx
Post-show, the hallway smells like sweat, spilled beer, and too many bad decisions. Crew shout over each other. Cases slam shut. Someone cranks music too loud in one of the dressing rooms and gets yelled at by security.
I wedge myself into a corner on one of the couches in the greenroom, laptop on my knees. My hair’s still damp from the heat of the show, the ends sticking to the back of my neck. I need a clean shirt, a dry bra, and a case of deodorant. Some of the not so fun perks associated with being on the road that no one bothers to share.
The first pass through the night’s shots are mechanical. I flag obvious keepers, dump the blurry ones, tag a handful for the magazine’s social team. It’s muscle memory by now.
Then I hit that sequence. The one I knew the moment I started taking the pictures that they would hit different. Side-stage. Dean in profile. The light through the haze forming a halo around him. And that look on his face. It’s sharp, searching, lit from within by something I’ve spent my whole career pretending I don’t want pointed at me. And it was definitely directed at me.
“Fuck,” I whisper so low no one can hear. It’s too loud in here anyway. My stomach flips. It’s not just the way he looks, it’s the way it feels. Like if I zoomed in far enough, I’d find my own stupid face reflected in his pupils.
I hover over the delete icon. This is where the old version of me, the glory-chasing stringer, would already be composing the caption in her head. Legendary guitarist, caught unguarded. Who’s he really playing for? But, I’m not that girl anymore. Not exactly.
I don’t hit delete. I also don’t drag them into the public folder. I flag the image, then tuck it into a separate folder with no label, just a date and a number. Hidden, but not gone.
Because this isn’t just his truth. It’s mine too, whether I like it or not.
“You always work through the afterglow?” Lily’s voice yanks me out of my spiral. I glance up to find her standing in the doorway, makeup smudged, still glowing from the show, a hoodie tied around her waist and her Chucks-clad feet silent on the dressing room carpet.
“Occupational hazard,” I say, closing the laptop halfway. “If I don’t get the first pass done now, it’ll be 4 a.m. and I’ll be hating myself.”
She pads over and drops onto the couch beside me. “Luc went to check on Larkin,” she explains. “He’s insisting on being the one to rock her. I think he missed bedtime more than she did.”
“That tracks.” My lips curve up in a smile, the image of Luc rocking a baby so opposite to the man so many think he is.
Her gaze dips to my computer, then back to my face. “Everything okay?”
“Yeah.” I shrug. “Just… cataloguing.”
“Is he being awful?” she asks, not bothering to specify which he. There’s only one whose name weighs that much.
