His stomach fluttered. “You knew? Really?”Am I that transparent?
She’d only seen them together in person a few times when she’d dropped by the house to bring large Tupperware containers of food for the whole band. And that was before he and Skyler had officially gotten together. He guessed he wasn’t as subtle in front of cameras as he tried to be. As he wassupposedto be.
“Like I said. I’m your mother and I know your heart. But boy, you never used to wear it on your sleeve until you met Skyler.”
That was probably true. And it should be scary, but it wasn’t. Because, well. “I love him.”
“And I’m assuming he loves you?” his mom asked.
“Yeah. He loves me. He really does.”
“Then that’s something special. Make sure you protect it.”
He wasn’t sure what she meant, but before he could ask, the door to the janitor’s closet flew open, flooding the small space with the harsh florescent light of the hallway.
Noah looked surprised to find Trevor sitting there on the floor. “Sorry. Lana’s ready for you, and Maggie’s pissed you weren’t around. I’ve been looking everywhere for you.”
“Sorry, I’m coming,” Trevor told him. Then to his mom, he said, “Hey, I’ve got to go. But thanks. For everything.”
“Have a great show,” she said. “I love you.”
“Love you too.”
Noah had already started to head back without him when Trevor stepped out of the closet. And well. It was a bit too on the nose, wasn’t it?
As he tried to remain still in the styling chair with Lana poking at him, he kept smiling, replaying the conversation with his mom. She was proud of him for what he’d accomplished so far with the band. And he was proud too. But it wasn’t all he wanted to accomplish in his life.
Trevor wanted to make sure that he loved Skyler in a way he was proud of, the way Skyler deserved to be loved. He wanted to do it well enough so that when he looked back someday when he was old, he'd be able to say that loving Skyler was truly his greatest accomplishment.
SKYLER
Skyler had been lookingforward to spending the night in a hotel room with Trevor. Tour was fun, but it was exhausting. They’d slept on the bus for the last two weeks, and tonight all he could think about was a real mattress, fluffy pillows, frigid air conditioning, and Trevor’s body cuddled up with his to keep him warm.
The other guys had different plans though, so he found himself in a hot tub with the whole band instead. They’d snuck out of their rooms and bribed the woman at the front desk to let them into the indoor pool room after hours. (They’d really only needed to let her take a picture of them for her daughter, so it was slightly less sleazy than giving her money.)
“This is sick,” Oli said, using his hand to block one of the jets so the bubbles went crazy around it. “It feels like we’re rock stars, living the life of luxury.”
Noah rolled his eyes. “Isn’t that what we are?”
“We’re a boy band more popular for our looks than our cheesy pop music,” Jermaine said. “We have choreographed dance moves. We’re not rock stars.”
“Just a few dance moves,” Skyler felt the need to add. He liked the dancing. It was a bit corny, but fun because none of them took it too seriously.
Skyler loved to sway his hips, feeling the music. He hadn’t realized it looked suggestive until Noah started coming up behind him, holding on to his waist, and swaying with him. This always got a huge cheer from the crowd, so they kept doing it, but whenever Trevor noticed, he’d send a quick warning glare Noah’s way, which hopefully no one else caught. Then he’d retaliate later bystealing Noah’s microphone right out of his hand while he was singing. Sometimes he’d give it back immediately. Other times it would lead to Noah chasing him around the stage and Trevor tossing the mic to Oli. Eventually someone, Maggie or Christian, would yell into their earpieces for them to cut it out.
But all this contributed to the boys-being-boys-and-having-the-time-of-their-lives image the label wanted to project for the band, so they didn’t get in trouble.
Trevor shifted beside him, and his thigh brushed Skyler’s under the water. Skyler tried to ignore it, rather than swinging his legs over Trevor’s lap like he wanted to. “What if for the next album,” Trevor said, “we see if the label will let us contribute to writing the songs and stuff.”
“That’d be awesome,” Noah said. “But we’re not songwriters.”
“Speak for yourself,” Skyler told him. He grabbed Trevor’s hand and held it up in the air. “This one here is an amazing songwriter.”
Trevor brought their arms down, but he didn’t let go of Skyler’s hand. “I wouldn’t say amazing.”
“I would,” he argued. As soon as he’d learned that Trevor wrote his own songs before joining the band, he’d insisted Trevor play them for him.
“I couldn’t get a label’s attention with my own stuff, could I?”
