Page 73 of Play Me

“I will chill, when you tell me what the hell’s going on! Are you two married?”

“No, of course not, you psycho!” I yell back at him. “We just went away for a few days!”

Dennis takes a deep breath, almost dizzy with relief and sits down in the empty seat next to me. “Then where did the rumor come from?”

“Dude, are you NEW? How many times have they come up with all sorts of shit?”

“Yeah, but this one...I mean, they mentioned Cadence. Not some random celebrity.”

“Um, yeah, well, lucky guess.” I shrug, biting the inside of my cheek. If Dennis knew I was the source of the rumor, he’d castrate me with a rusty knife.

“So...you’re not married?” He confirms.

“No.”

“OK. Yeah, OK, great.”

“Wait, hang on why? What if we WERE married? It’s going to happen to one of us at some point, ya know.”

“Then I’d want the story broken my way.”

“Fine. But you should know, while we’re not married, we are...together.”

“Well, yeah,” his face utters the silent ‘duh’.

“What do you mean, ‘well, yeah’?”

“I mean, well, we had a freaking pool going, for fuck’s sake, to see how long it would take you two to get your acts together.”

“Who won?” Cadence finally speaks up.

“None of your business.”

“So, what are we going to do about these marriage rumors then?”

“What we always do, ignore them.” He gets up and goes over to his laptop, his shoulders relaxed.

“You sure?”

“I guess, there was some other weird shit in the article as well, some stuff about you having some operation and just marrying Cadence to take care of her unborn babies.”

“Er, yeah, that is bloody weird.” I say as I get up and sit down next to Cadence, throwing my arm around her shoulders.

The door flings open and the band walks in, carrying take-out and drinks.

“MR. and MRS. Dupont! You are back!!” Marius bellows, walking into the room with his arms outstretched. “Can’t wait to babysit your bastard kids!”

“Oh, for god’s sake. I’m outta here.” Dennis moves towards the doorway, then stops, “Guys, what do you think, our concert next Friday, if we get Cadence up on stage for a song? I mean, the concert is mainly to launch the new band name and to test out some of the new songs, but a teaser for the piano pieces might be good.”

Brad shrugs and balances his bow on top of his head, “Fine by me, get the audience excited for our new album.”

“Guys, I don’t want to be stepping on any toes. You, um, hired me for the album, not any concerts. Maybe you want to keep performances for yourselves and just put me on playback or something.” Cadence offers thoughtfully.

“Are you kidding? You’re going to be a hit.” Marius smiles at her, and I’m grateful that they love her almost as much as I do.

“What should we play?” Jez throws out for discussion.

“I’ve got just the song.”