A tenderness in her voice shed light on a sense of protectiveness I’d not seen before. All the while, her gaze remained on Max. If looks could kill, the swarmy Swede would have been dead twice over.
4låt began with their newest single,Caroline, a single about a mean girl that had a great chorus. The crowd was into it.
“She’s slaying,” Clarice said.
“Ja! She’s got it!” A German added.
As much as Jason, her DJ counterpart, tried to upstage her, Alia was in her element. They played another upbeat song about a high school boyfriend. The crowd bounced along. An awkward pause took over as there was a shuffle on stage. Max raced out to hand a guitar to Alia. He whispered something that made her face drop. She argued—mic off—as Jason worked the crowd. Finally, as if she’d just lost a war, Alia nodded nervously and looked back at the crowd.
“Leave her alone, asshole,” Mary muttered in Swedish. Then, in English, “He’s about to ruin her set.”
Alia picked up her guitar and tried to play it off. “Uh… we have some friends backstage in the house!”
She turned, hand raised to us. “We have Astrospectre and the Zamboneys, who are playing later!”
The crowd erupted.
Alia looked more nervous, continuing. “And in tribute to a Swede backstage—as a Swede—I thought we would play a classic written by one of them.”
Her voice broke up.
“Don’t do it. Don’t do it,” Clarice said.
“Do what?” I asked.
A German muttered something. Their faces looked on in horror as the band began. “Aww!Denne Vibe.”
Confused, I furrowed my eyebrow. “From 4Tune?”
The song was a huge hit in Sweden when I was a child. I remember the girl power group’s vibrant outfits—a bunch of teen girls who felt aspirational to young women and lusted after by my bevy of brothers.
“So, obviously, we’re doing an ode to Swedish music history with this one. Do we have any Scandinavians in the audience?” Jason asked as Alia continued to strum the intro chords.
I shouted along with the impressive contingent of audience members.
“Well, represented,” Jaz noted.
I wasn’t surprised. And while I understood there were dozens of top-notch Swedes and Scandinavians everywhere, I had little knowledge of Swedish pop music history—something that was about to bite my ass.
I turned to a silent Mary whose eyes settled on Max.
“This is a tribute to Mary and 4Tune,” she said, nervously.
I turned to Mary, who squinted, as if about to cry. She walked off. I assumed she was leaving, but she inched closer. She waved at Alia who was melting down like a deer in headlights.
“What is she doing?” I whispered.
“Going to save her,” Clarice answered.
I finally put it all together in my memory. Mary was MJen, the teenage lead singer of 4Tune. This childhood song my brothers all loved, but I didn’t quite care for was the foundation of Mary’s careerandpain. And now, here was the baby popstar being forced to try and outplay Mary before she played her own set on the main stage. Alia didn’t want this badblood, and she was worried the crowd might crucify her. Mary was being fucked with by a man who only hurt her. Anger bubbled up at the puppet master smirking across the stage.
I watched Mary gesture, pointing at herself as she walked out.
“What is Mary doing?” I gasped.
“I don’t know. Mary does what she does. You know that,” Clarice whispered.
I grasped it. Alia was waving Mary on. Jason held out a mic, confused, and Mary took the stage. As she appeared, the crowd went crazy. If Mary were dying inside, she didn’t skip a beat and showed no sign of discomfort. Alia played them in and they sang—a sappy, comforting song of old I hadn’t heard in at least a decade.
