“There was a time when this was the only thing I wanted to do with my life.” The cadence hits me like a punch.Noah.
I freeze, thumb hovering over the remote, eyes locked on the screen as the camera zooms in on her face. She’s standing center stage, lights bathing her in gold. She looks… polished. Every line of makeup sharp, every curl inplace, every inch of her wrapped in glitter and stardust and expectation. But her voice is the same. Soft at the edges, steady in the middle, threaded with something she can’t quite hide.
“Hell,” she breathes, the faintest waver in her tone, “it was the only dream I ever had.” Her lips curve into a smile, but it’s too tight, too careful. Her breath shakes when she draws it in, cracking just enough for me to notice what the rest of the world won’t—she’s not as happy as she’s pretending to be. Not even close. “This… performing, singing songs to sold-out venues, I—” She swallows, throat working. “I put it above everything else.” Her hand lifts, palm up, like she’s holding that dream out for everyone to see. “I put it up here, on a pedestal. And while I am so grateful for the opportunity, the fans, and for being here tonight to receive this award, I lost sight of what’s truly important. So instead of singing my latest single, I want to take it right back to my roots and pay tribute to an artist who inspired me within this genre.”
She glances over her shoulder, speaking to the musicians behind her. The camera pulls wide, spanning the stage—the band shifts, the presenter blinks in confusion, making the teleprompter’s words useless now. Noah’s gone off script.
Typical Noah. Heart first, consequences later.
After a beat, the lights dim, washing the stage in sultry blues and purples. The first notes of “Church Bells” by Carrie Underwood pour out of the speakers, all steel and promise and warning, and right there—right in that opening chord—Noah changes.
Her shoulders roll back. Her chin lifts. Something fierce flares behind her eyes like a match being struck.
Once the bass drops, she stomps her boot, that sharp, commanding sound echoing through the speakers, and the roar of the crowd hits her like electricity. It lights a fire in her eyes that I know too well, the one I saw the first time she sang on a plywood stage in some shitty little bar, where the speakers buzzed and the air smelled like stale beer and second chances.
As soon as the first lyrics roll off her tongue in that signature twang, my entire body reacts like it remembers every inch of her without my permission. My chest tightens. My heart stutters. The air in the living room thins.
Just like every other time I’ve seen her perform, I’m instantly transfixed. Even if I tried, there is no looking away from Noah Lane when she’s in her element. She pulls you in, holds you there, and makes you feel like every line is meant for you and you alone.
I fall victim to every note, because she was born to command a crowd. It’s in the way she moves, the way she sells every word, the way she closes her eyes and lets the song crawl under her skin.
I sink forward, forearms braced on my thighs, glasshanging slack in my hand as the camera follows her across the stage. At first, I get swept up in it, the sheer force of her talent, the kind of pride I don’t deserve to feel anymore swelling right alongside the ache.
But then something starts to feel off.
It’s subtle at first. The way her steps don’t quite match the swagger in the song. The way her shoulders are tighter, movements sharper. The anger in the lyrics sits heavier on her tongue, and she leans into those lines like she’s carving them into someone.
It isn’t until she hits the chorus and the camera zooms in on her face that I see it.
There’s a burn in her eyes that isn’t just performance. A hardness hiding behind the glitter. Her jaw clenches just barely on certain words, and when the chorus turns violent in metaphors and justice, she almost spits the lyrics like she’s sending a message. Like she’s aiming it at someone specific.
She’s not singing this song for no reason.
Noah is doing what Noah does—turning whatever storm she’s walking through into something the world can consume, while she bleeds the truth between the lines. She’s externalizing her emotions through her art, like always, pouring them into the performance, eyes closing as she claws her way through whatever the hell she’s trying to work through.
What’s wrong, Starlet? What are you trying to tellme?
I shift closer to the edge of my seat, knuckles whitening around the glass as she struts across the stage, microphone in hand, her band in full swing behind her. The song builds, and she rides it all the way up, pushing her voice, pushing herself, until she’s standing dead center and belting with everything inside her.
When it finally crashes to a close, she’s left facing the crowd, chest hitching as she tries to catch her breath. Applause thunders. The lights flare. Confetti flutters from the rafters like sparkling snow.
The camera angle tightens, filling the screen with her face.
That’s when I see the tears gathered in her lash line. She tips her head back, eyes shut against the bright light, throat working around the emotion she didn’t mean to let slip out in front of millions.
She’s been crying.
My heart stutters, then pounds.
Before she can compose herself, before she can wipe it away and turn it into some tidy little moment for the press, her fiancé strides across the stage like he’s been waiting in the wings for the exact second she’s weakest.
Bradley. Mr. Golden Boy himself.
He moves like he owns the place. Like he owns the moment. Like he ownsher.
He slides up behind Noah and wraps his arm around her waist, turning them both toward the presenter, toward the cameras, toward the world. From here, on this couch in a dim living room hundreds of miles from the stadium, it looks like a picture-perfect scene.
If I didn’t know Noah—really know her—it would almost pass for romantic.
