But as the beat slows, the notes returning to a final iteration of the main melody, he comes slowly back down to earth.
He smiles to himself as he lets his hands drop to his sides and opens his eyes.
To his surprise, a few concertgoers have made their way to the aisle, their phones now trained not on Aria but on him.The young women giggle conspiratorially, and all Griffin can do is smile, wave, and shrug.
“You know what that means, dude?” Elliott drags his eyes pointedly to the women who have cut their recordings and since gathered into a clump to review whatever is on the screen.
Griffin lets out a breath and nods. “Fingers crossed it’s a big news day.”
Cassandra drops a hand on Griffin’s shoulder. “Hate to break it to you, Griff, but a big, burly football player like you singing your heart out to Aria Wilder can rise to the top of any news cycle nowadays.”
As the next chart topper kicks off, Griffin turns back to the stage. This time he’s more measured in his enthusiasm, no-nonsense claps or head bobs. Stuff the guys on the team would do if they were here with their girlfriends. Still, he’s no dummy. He knows it’ll only be a matter of hours—or minutes—before that footage is somewhere online.
Chapter 2
Aria
Aria’s home is spread out in a wooded area she lovingly calls “the country” despite its proximity to the city. You can take the girl out of a small town, but her heart will always be country. It’s a strange thing to imagine her hometown, the folks there who never would’ve fathomed the stardom and fame she’s achieved. She set them right, it would seem.
At the bottom of her basement stairs, Aria flips on the lights to her studio. Having her own recording studio at home has been one of the best things her success has afforded her. When she bought this house several years ago, she had the music industry’s top sound tech design and outfit it for her.
Despite it being her—and every other musician’s—dream to have this state-of-the-art equipment at her fingertips, today it falls flat. Aria crosses the room to the comfortable sofa—the spot where she brainstorms lyrics and plucks out melodiesand harmonies on her beat-up acoustic guitar. It was her very first one. She sets her coffee mug and phone on the small table in front of the sofa and pops open the guitar case. It’s not fancy, but it’s consistently the source of her inspiration. As she slumps onto the sofa, the awards that line the walls loom over her—Billboard charts, Grammys, music awards for best album year after year. They’re all reminders of the bind she’s in.
Aria picks up her guitar and strums, tuning the strings that went unused while she traveled for events last month. She owes her record label another album, and for the first time since she started on this journey, back when she blew up as a teen, she feels hollow inside.
At first it was exciting when her songs hit the top of the charts. In fact it was better than exciting; it was exhilarating, thrilling, otherworldly. But year after year, tour after tour, eventually it started to feel like copy and paste. It was supposed to be different this time. She was supposed to get to negotiate a new contract. She was supposed to make it clear that she wanted to take a new approach—to be real and honest, raw in her songwriting.
Instead, her label hid a clause in the existing contract requiring one more “commercial album,” and despite her agent, Monroe’s, fastidiousness, Aria owes them another copy-and-paste pop album or she will see them in court. For a while she considered that option—that’s how strongly she feels—but ultimately Monroe talked her out of it with her reasonable points: It would result in a massive gap in her album releases; she would be burning bridges with the most connected record label; and was it really worth it over an album she could create in her sleep?
Aria strums harder on the guitar, mentally noting how pinned down she feels, and at her roughness, a string breaks. It snaps back with aboing.
“Maybe they just don’t think I have what it takes to be anything else. Maybe I believe them,” she whispers to herself. “Maybethisis the only thing the fans want from me.”
The fans—her true heartbeat. If there’s one thing more important to Aria than following her own desires, it’s making the fans happy. They’re the only reason she’s come this far. She has to do things right by them.
Aria sets the guitar lovingly back in its case, making a note to replace the string once she’s gotten some work done. She closes the lid and pats it, as if tucking it in to sleep. Back when she was a kid, when she was new to the instrument, she slept beside the thing. Despite her mother’s protests, fretting that she’d roll over and break it, Aria curled up beside her guitar, and first thing every morning, she would wake, find it, and strum whatever her favorite song was that week.
Remembering her younger self, her pure passion for music, her heartfelt dedication, feels like remembering a different person entirely. Aria can’t pin down when exactly things changed. It probably happened gradually over time. That, as her fame and prominence grew, the pressure to be Aria Wilder, Pop Superstar and America’s Darling, mounted until who she was before—a small-town girl with a heart for song—was eclipsed.
Aria whirls around, unable to look at the guitar case and swim in her thoughts any longer. She owes Worldwide Records another album, and if she’s putting something out with her name on it, she’s going to make it exceptional—perfect, ideally.
Aria sits down at the piano and starts playing with a major chord, working out a new melody. Something new but also familiar. She remembers what the rep told her.
“We want ‘girl meets boy, boy meets girl.’ The listeners love that stuff. It needs to be easy-listening, turn-the-radio-up songs. There’s no need to mess with something that’s working.”
Despite her tinkering with the piano keys, Aria’s mind wanders back to her own desires for something new. A fresh take on her own music. Not an overhaul, just a makeover. What if the folks at Worldwide are right? What if the fans don’t want anything different from her? What if she’s trapped forever in the bubble she created as a young twentysomething almost a decade ago?
After a few minutes of messing around on the piano, a familiar rumble of footsteps comes from the stairs before Bailey, beaming wide, appears at the bottom step, eyes trained directly on Aria.
“Sis.” Bailey marches across the room in long, measured strides, phone in hand. “Youhaveto see this.”
“I’m guessing from the look on your face it’s something good?”
It comes with the territory of being a well-known pop star that all sorts of things are shared in the press and on social media about Aria. Some of those things are incredible—generous compliments from fans, their own creative work she’s inspired, teary statements about how a song brought them through a hard time. But just as often, if perhaps more frequently, less palatable stories are posted. Rumors about her being rude to waitstaff (false), rumors of her taking off with a married actor (false), articles picking apart her physical appearance (just plainmean), or “gotcha” photos of her sneaking to the grocery store in sweats looking worse for wear (true).
Bailey squeezes in beside Aria on the piano bench, and at the touch of her little sister’s shoulder to hers, Aria feels the tightness in her unwind. Bailey always has a calming influence on her. Even if she’s the younger sister, having Bailey at her side during tours or here at the house just living life grounds and calms Aria.
“This is from last night.” Bailey holds out the phone, and Aria takes it.
