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I watch as Josh fiddles with his phone, his face pale.
“You good?” I ask. Josh might act like an unfeeling robot, but he has the worst stage fright I’ve ever seen. Before our very first live show, he threw up before we went onstage. He’s gotten much better in the years since then, but right now, he looks like death warmed up.
“Fine,” he says, not looking at me.
“Scared?” Zack says with mock sympathy. “Seems to be an issue for you, huh?”
“Zack,” I interject. “Stop it.”
“Least I wasn’t too much of a damn coward to tell her how I felt,” Zack continues.
“At least I regret hurting her,” Josh shoots back. “Instead of acting like an absolute twat about it.”
“We all screwed up,” I point out, trying to calm them down. “All of us. Stop blaming each other.”
Zack’s scowl deepens. “I didn’t do anything wrong.”
Josh shakes his head, looking at him incredulously. “You seriously believe that, don’t you?”
“Yes!” Zack crosses his arms over his chest. “I told her going into this that it wouldn’t be for real. How is it my fault that she chose not to listen?”
“You literally dumped her three seconds after pulling out—”
I’m getting sick of this. I slam my hand onto the table, shutting them both up. “For God’s sake,” I snap. “You two need to get over this. You’ve been best friends since you were children. You’ve helped each other through every bad and good thing that’s ever happened in your lives.”
“Well, he’s never acted like this much of a git before,” Josh mutters.
“And you’ve never been this much of a goddamn prissy coward,” Zack shoots back.
I throw my hands in the air. “Yes, you both have! Josh has always been bad at expressing his emotions, and, Zack, you’ve always been a stubborn bastard. You’ve forgiven each other for it before, and you’ll do it again. Because like it or not, you love each other.”
Zack scoffs. “We don’t—”
“Yes. You. Do.” I emphasise. “And I’m sick of hearing you bickering. I’ve already lost her, I’m not losing both of you, as well. Now pull yourselves together.” I wave at the door. “The people out there paid money to come and see us. Money they could’ve spent on food, or bills, or rent. Some of them have travelled a long way to get here. So stop bloody moping. You’re behaving like children.”
Josh looks down at the floor, his expression frozen. Zack looks like he’s about to argue, but before he can, the door to the Green Room bangs open, and Katie bounds back in. Through the open doorway, I can hear the muffled chatter coming from the auditorium, and the beginning strains of our theme tune starting to play.
“They’re ready for youuuu!” She practically sings. “The crowd is so big today, oh my God, I’m so excited.”
“Great,” I say through gritted teeth, standing. “Let’s do it.”
Josh and Zack get up, and we make our way to the stage.
***
SIXTY-NINE
***
LUKE
The stage has been set up following our usual specifications; three chairs sit facing the audience behind a long table covered in our recording equipment, all tested and ready to go. Bottles of chilled water are placed under our chairs. A projector is shining our logo onto the screen behind us.
The room is full of people, seated in rows of plastic chairs. As we reach the table and sit down, I scan the crowd grimly. Clearly, the drama of the past few days hasn’t lost us any followers. The place is packed. There are even people sitting on the floor.
I tap gently on my mic, then lean forward to speak into it. Thanks to all of my years talking in front of classrooms of teenagers, I’m the best at presenting in front of a crowd, so I take the role of main host whenever we do live shows.
“Hello, London!” I call. The crowd whoops and shouts. “Thank you so much for joining us today. It’s wonderful to finally see you all in person, instead of talking to you through a microphone. My name is Luke—”
