“Jesus Christ! Let me get it out,” Violet complained. “Riot. Remember the number we talked about when we were drunk in Austin back in September? The number we hoped we would earn?”
Riot’s eyes widened. “I remember. We made that much? As a band?”
“Split four ways?” Milo asked excitedly.
“Nope.” Violet slowly shook her head. “We made that much…per person. For those of us who play the drums and are bad at math, that means we earnedfour timesas much as our dream amount.”
They all started cheering and hugging. Milo kissed Cash on the mouth, and the bassist only laughed rather than pushing him away. Violet and Riot embraced like they’d learned that they had won the lottery.
Which, in a way, they kind of had.
Then they all took turns hugging me. “I don’t want to share in your victory. I didn’t have anything to do with it.”
“Your custom band posters for each city helped,” Violet said. “They specifically mentioned all the engagement from those posts. They want to sell them on our merch site. With your permission, of course.”
“You’ll get a cut, obviously,” Cash said.
I smiled at all of them. “I guess I’ll agree to that. Idolike money.”
We all laughed and hugged again. Milo ran off to grab a bottle of champagne from the fridge to celebrate.
Violet took the opportunity to lean in and whisper, “I care deeply about my bandmates. Do you understand? Treat them well. Care for them as much as I do. Because if you hurt them, you’ll have to answer to me.” When she pulled back, she flashed a smile and then strode to the back of the bus.
“Dana’s not the only protective one in that relationship,” I said.
Riot threw an arm around me and said, “Ain’t that the truth.”
*
The next day, we drove the bus over to a recording studio on the east side of Miami, just a few blocks from the water. The equipment van was already parked out back, with roadies carrying instruments inside.
“Just to reiterate: we’re going to have some long days ahead of us,” Riot said.
“If you change your mind, you won’t hurt our feelings,” Cash added. “We have two weeks of time booked in one of the recording studios. Fourteen days.”
“Is that how long two weeks is?” I asked.
“Seriously, though,” Riot insisted. “You can go home and we’ll meet you after the album is done. It won’t hurt our feelings.”
I stepped close enough that my chest touched his, gazing up at his dark eyes. “I’m not going anywhere. Even if I only see you at night when you fall asleep, that’s enough for me. Besides, all the time alone during the day will allow me to catch up on my work. I have alotof freelance gigs piling up.”
“A good problem to have,” Cash said.
And that’s how the next two weeks went. I stayed on the bus and worked on my commissions while they toiled away in the studio. Sometimes I went to the sound booth and watched them record for a while. Other times I took my laptop to a coffee shop to work. There was a really cute cafe down by the water that I fell in love with during the second week.
I found myself gazing out at the water of an ocean I had never seen before this tour. So much had changed since I left Austin.Ihad changed. For the better, I decided.
I wondered if the others had changed, too. I liked to think they did.
On the last day of recording, I took my laptop into the sound booth to watch them finish the album. I only got a few minutes of work done; the rest of the time I was enamored by the sight of my three men—and Violet—on the other side of the glass, recording the same song over and over, making tweaks on the fly and then discussing the changes between takes.
Eventually, they took off their headphones and grinned at each other. “Are they done?” I asked the sound technician who was sitting at the equipment.
He pressed a button and spoke into a microphone: “You guys done, or what?”
“We’re done,” Riot confirmed. “You can head home.”
The technician looked bored, which annoyed me. This felt like an important moment, but for him it was just an extra hour of overtime.
