The fireworks of clapping, cheering, and screaming are gone. The crowd isn’t there. In the space where they’re supposed to be stands a single person. He’s staring at me, only me, and he sees me with such clarity, I may as well be naked on this stage, exposed to the world, exposed by that single set of pretty eyes.
I should’ve seen this coming, but somehow didn’t. I thought he would understand somehow, give up this conquest, and return to his life in Spruce. But that isn’t Timothy. He doesn’t give up.
Of course he’d come looking for me at one of the shows.
I just don’t think he was expecting to find me on the stage.
Especially judging from the look on his face right now.
A look that terrifies me.
Is he amazed? Angry? Betrayed? He’s looking at me the way you look at a spot in the night sky and being unsure if what you’re looking at is an airplane, twinkling star, or extraterrestrial entity.
Before I know it, the drums rush into the next song at full speed. Wily slaps his bass, threading in the deep, playful G notes. Fiona hangs back as she’s supposed to, waiting until the chorus to start her chords.
But to get to a chorus, you gotta sing the first verse.
And when it comes time for the first lyric, I’m not even there. I’m with Timothy in the middle of an audience I can’t see. And he’s with me. Is he seriously staying for the show? Am I supposed to keep on singing like this isn’t happening?
I hear Wily loop around seamlessly into the beginning again, though this time his eyes are on me, concerned. I pull my eyes off of Timothy to glance back at Raj and Fiona—both of whom are also looking at me, Raj with curiosity, Fiona with her brow furrowed.
Then I face the mic again. Everything rushes back in—crowd screaming, bass kicking, drums pushing, and Timothy right there in the middle of it, now with his eyebrows lifted, making evenhimlook puzzled by me. My eyes are only on Timothy when I finally thrust shaky fingers over strings, letting Glorious sing first, and then part my lips to join him.
It’s a miracle we make it through.
Every song on the setlist, too.
The lights that occasionally comb over the audience play with my eyes, causing me to lose sight of him now and then. Sometimes I lose sight of everything, giving myself to the music, eyes closed as I let the lyrics and chords flow through the vessel of my body. Even when I don’t see him, I feel him there.
But I don’t want to. What’s he here for? Answers I don’t have?
I wanted him far away from this. From me. Safe, back in his totally-not-as-bad-as-he-made-it-out-to-be hometown of Spruce.
Not standing in a crowd of potential maniacs who would eat him alive if they knew we kissed. If they knew we had something.
If they knew anything at all.
Why are you here, Timothy?
It feels both like ten hours later and the blink of an eye when the show’s over and I’ve gotten my phone from my dressing room to check for calls or texts from him, something I may have missed.
Nothing.
“Are you sure?” I ask Rob, who’s standing by the door leading to the lobby in all his arms-crossed muscular glory. “No one?”
“Chase … c’mon, man,” he groans.
“It won’t be a big deal,” I plead with him. “I just need to check something. I’m pretty sure I saw someone I know out there, and—”
“No can do. Sorry, man. Give me a description and I can send someone to look, but you can’t go out there and you know it.”
Of course I can’t give a description. No one can know about Timothy, let alone what he looks like. Also, I understand where Rob’s coming from. He was the head of security during our scary stalker era. His caution isn’t coming from nowhere. “Rob …”
“Hey, if you’re wanting to meet fans again,” he goes on with a shrug, misunderstanding what I want, “maybe talk it over with Ian and the others, see if we can set up an official meet-and-greet next show, but I can’t open these doors.”
Next show.
He may not be at the next show—or any show, ever again.