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“Doors open soon.” Beckett flicks off his recorder with his spare hand and slides it back into his pocket, and his tone iscasual. Way too casual. “Then it’s the warm up act. Do you want to see it? Or would you like a backstage tour?”
Uh,duh.
“Tour,” I say, so quickly that Beckett’s frosty demeanor finally cracks. He smiles, warm and fleeting, his eyes crinkling at the corners, and I’d think I hallucinated it if it weren’t for the squirmy evidence in my belly.
This man!
Oh my god.
I’m in so much trouble.
Four
Beckett
This is a terrible idea. It’s the sort of thing I’d expect from these pop stars, not myself—but here I am, towing a giggling Resa behind me through the curving stadium corridors. If it were Crue or Mason sneaking a strange girl backstage, I’d be taking notes for the book, philosophizing about how fame makes men do stupid things.
Here I am instead, at the center of the drama, losing my mind over this bright, happy fan girl. I don’t even recognize myself.
“This is the home team’s locker room.” I push the door open, standing back in the corridor. This stadium hosts a lot of football games, and Resa ducks her head through the doorway before reeling back, gasping. Her eyes are watering, and she clutches at her throat.
“Ew, Beckett! It smells like feet!”
Yes, this isn’t the most romantic stop on our tour. But I couldn’t resist, and it’s all worth it when Resa punches my arm then drags me away, laughing. Our voices bounce around us as we chat, but the crowds are inside the venue now, their cheersbleeding through the walls, and there’s no risk of us disturbing anyone.
We’re on our own planet. Just the two of us, exploring this alien terrain.
When the warm up act strikes their first chord, the vibrations tickle through my shoes.
“That’s a lot of cases,” Resa says when I lead her to the loading bay: a cavernous room with a whole wall missing, the equipment trucks standing empty beyond. The silver flight cases are stacked in huge clumps around us, five or six deep, while three roadies sit out on the loading dock and smoke together.
“Yes, but a tour this huge needs a lot of equipment. The label spared no expense.”
It’s dark outside finally, with a star-speckled navy sky, and every time one of the roadies inhales, their cigarette lights up cherry-red in the darkness. The sounds of the warm-up gig are louder out here.
The air is warm and damp, and moths flutter around the loading bay floodlights high above, headbutting the glass bulbs. Nothing for the crew to do out here except wait until the show’s over.
“Huh.” Rena turns slowly on the spot, soaking it all in like she really is a tourist on vacation, seeing all the sights. Trying to commit it to memory before she goes back to her everyday life.
Meanwhile, I’m trying to commitherto memory—every last detail. Her short, ruffled brown hair. The way her lips part as she gazes up at the stars. Those round cheeks that get even rounder when she smiles.
All of it.
All ofher.
What the hell will I do once Resa’s gone? Go back to feeling dead inside? Go back to numbness, to boredom, to burying myself in my work?
“Come on.” Can’t stop touching her. Can’t stop holding her hand. Now that I’ve felt it, now that I’ve tasted having her close, I don’t want things any other way. If I could tie us together without seeming completely unhinged, I’d do it in a heartbeat. “There’s more to see.”
Like dressing rooms scattered with abandoned jackets, half-drunk water bottles, and open packets of M&Ms. I watch Resa out of the corner of my eye, but she doesn’t seem overly fascinated by the band members’ stuff, and she never once lets go of my hand. When I pull her away, she comes happily along.
We visit the merch stands next, set up ready near the exits, the tables stacked high with special ten-year reunion t-shirts. I let go of Resa briefly, but only to slide some money beneath the locked cash box and fish out a t-shirt in her size. She hugs it to her chest and gazes up at me like I’m her knight in shining armor.
Fuck.
“Make sure you cut this one in half too,” I tell her. Resa giggles as she strokes the lilac fabric, then tucks the t-shirt lovingly in her backpack.
This whole night is surreal.
