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She’s probably only agreed to tonight as a thank you for the studio, even though it’s unnecessary given the studio is my thanks to her. The thought that she’s only here for that is a little deflating, but it’s relieving too, because if this is only one night, it doesn’t matter what I say.

When I get to the table with our beers though, Reese smiles in a way that has me confused yet again. “I brought the chair over here so you could see the stage. Is that okay?”

Is that okay? She’s got me sitting right next to her, which is the only place I want to be. “I’ll manage,” I say, and she grins.

Okay, better.

The chair is one of those small cabaret-style ones that’s not super comfortable under my weight, but I’d sit on a pile of nails if it meant I got to sit next to Reese like this all night.

“So, Reese,” I say, after taking a fortifying swallow of lager. “I just want to let you know I don’t have any expectations about tonight, okay? No pressure.”

“You never did know how to go with the flow, Eli,” she laughs.

I relax more, feeling the knot of tension in my chest loosening further. “I just want to put the cards on the table.”

“I understand. Well, I have expectations.”

“You do?”

“Yeah. I expect to have fun. That’s what I’ve been missing, and that’s what I’ve felt faking things with you, pretending we’re together.”

She looks in my eyes when she says this, and something hot flickers through my chest. I take another swig of beer.

“I’m glad to hear you’re having fun, because I’ve been spending the past two weeks feeling like I’ve been dragging you into my hot fucking mess and I can’t ever make that up to you.”

“You already have,” she says softly. “Besides, I was the one who offered to go along with this craziness, remember?”

“Why did you do that again?”

“Fun?” She smiles and takes a sip of her beer. There’s a line of foam on the top of her lip, and she darts her tongue from her mouth to go over it, even giggling.

My dick jumps at that, and I don’t even mind.

Reese sets her beer down, and her expression shifts. She almost looks nervous. “So, I went to the studio.”

My heart lifts. “You did?” I try to arrange my expression into something that doesn’t make her regret telling me. But this news is as good as her saying yes to tonight.

“Yeah. It’s… well it’s incredible Eli. Both you doing that for me, and the studio itself. Where’d you get that table, anyway?”

“eBay,” I grin, allowing myself to be deeply pleased with that one. Stu had offered to find some models I should look into, but happened to stumble upon that one right away. “It’s criminally underpriced,” he’d said. “Bid to win.” I did, and I paid extra to have it shipped within the week. I open my mouth to tell her the story, but think better of it.

“Well, it’s amazing.”

She tells me about how she started with covers but worked up to her own stuff, and as she talks, I can’t stop staring at the way she lights up when she talks about music—her hands get more animated, and her eyes seem to sparkle. I didn’t know eyes could actually do that.

Then the already dim lights drop to darkness and the crowd cheers as the announcer comes over the speaker to welcome everyone to open mic night and provides instructions for how to grab a spot.

I look over at Reese. Even with only the light shimmer of stage lights reaching her, I can still see the happiness in her eyes. I don’t presume I had everything to do with that. She’s the one who walked brave as fuck back into that studio. Still, I’m flying high as the band shuffles on stage. Maybe one day it’ll be her up there.

There’s a flare of mic feedback as the guy on stage tries to speak. The band is a bunch of guys in their twenties, dressed in all black, decked out in an abundance of silver chain mail and hair gel.

The guy at the mic tries again. “Hey, so uh, we’re Stonefish Razorblade Queen Cheese.”

Reese spits out her beer, coughing slightly.

I clap her lightly on the back. “You okay?” I whisper.

Luckily we’re not the only ones in the room making noise.