AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Hey there,” Killian said, while I braced myself for another torturous audition. “I see you found the place okay?”
The response was muffled but had Killian grinning, and when he looked inside the door to me, I could see the message in his eyes loud and clear—play nice. Killian should’ve known better, though. We’d been friends for nearly thirty years now, and one thing about me he knew damn well was that when I played, I certainly wasn’t nice.
Two
Halo
AM I REALLY doing this? I thought, not for the first or even tenth time, as I stepped inside the front doors of Electric Sound Studio. I’d been pinching myself since I’d gotten the call from Killian Michaels himself, telling me he’d seen my audition tape, and could I come in for a face-to-face with him and the rest of TBD?
Uh, meet one of the biggest rock bands in the world? To audition as their lead singer? It was surreal.
But as I signed in with the receptionist and she pointed down the hall to studio 1B, the initial excitement I’d felt when Killian called twelve hours earlier started to morph into full-on anxiety. What the hell had I been thinking when I sent that video in? Then again, someone had to step into Trent Knox’s shoes. Why couldn’t that be me?
My steps faltered, and I almost dropped my guitar case as I turned the corner and stared down the long corridor. The walls were lined with what looked like rich black velvet, chandeliers shimmered overhead every few feet, and at the end of the hall, behind the door with “1B” etched in silver, would be the guys of TBD. A band I’d listened to for a decade, through all my formative years, and now here I stood, on the brink of something that could change my life.
But I couldn’t make myself move. If I turned around and walked out the door now, they wouldn’t have a chance to reject me, and then I could live the rest of my life without the soul-crushing anguish that snub would bring.
Or…I could man the hell up, walk into that room, and show them exactly why I was the perfect guy for the job. Life was about risks, right? If I didn’t try, I wouldn’t fail, but I’d also never get anywhere, and I wasn’t content playing covers at mostly empty dive bars for the rest of my life. Not when I knew what I was capable of.
With my decision made, I took a step forward just as the door to studio 1B opened and Killian Michaels appeared in the doorway, yelling out for four whiskeys. When he saw me, his eyes lit up and he waved me over.
“Hey there,” he said, smiling my way, and I almost looked behind me to make sure there wasn’t someone else he was calling out to. “I see you found the place okay?”
I forced my feet to keep moving as I nodded. “Yeah, hi.”
“Hi.” Killian glanced over his shoulder, back into the studio, and then faced me again as I came to a stop in front of him. He stood tall, about the same height as me, with a shock of dark hair that was longer on top and styled back in a way that screamed indifference, though it had probably taken him a half hour to perfect. It was so strange to see him standing there in regular jeans and a hoodie instead of the rocked-out persona he used onstage.
“I’m Killian,” he said, holding his hand out like everyone in the free world didn’t know who he was.
“Halo.” I switched the guitar to my other hand and gave him a firm handshake.
One of Killian’s eyebrows rose. “That your real name?”
“Is Killian yours?” It came out before I could stop it, but instead of being offended, Killian laughed and clapped me on the shoulder.
“I like a smartass. Come meet the guys.”
He led me inside, and immediately my senses were overwhelmed. The first thing I noticed were the thick crimson curtains that were artfully draped from floor to ceiling and took up an entire wall. The second thing that caught my attention was the massive chandelier in the middle of the room that made the ones in the hallway look like ants. Good God, this is how the other half lives.
“Hey, hey,” came a voice behind me, and with his hand still on my shoulder, Killian turned us around to where Jagger, the keyboardist for TBD, strolled inside. Dressed to the nines in a long-sleeved black collared shirt and matching slacks only a few shades darker than his skin, Jagger was the impeccably put-together charmer of the band, which was evident as he came to stand in front of us.
“You’re late,” Killian said.
Jagger ignored him and gave me a winning smile. “You must be Halo.”
