Page 4 of Discordant Cultivation

Vale Rose.Producer.

The guy was actually real, not some elaborate prank or social experiment where they filmed homeless musicians’ reactions to fake opportunities.

Kieran Googled the name twelve times in the past hour, scrolling through Grammy nominations and platinum certifications that seemed endless. The Wikipedia article alone had more words than Kieran had spoken aloud in the past month. Rolling Stone interviews. Billboard features. A discography longer than Kieran’s entire music library.

This doesn’t happen to people like me.

People like him got evicted, not discovered, and got their guitars stolen, not invited to fancy dinners. Or got their medical alert bracelets yanked off by group home bullies who thought seizures were funny, not... whatever this was.

He tried calling twice, hanging up before it connected. He practiced conversations in the mirror of his tiny bathroom—the only mirror in the apartment that didn’t have a crack running through it, though that might have been an improvement. At least a cracked mirror would give him an excuse for looking broken. On the third attempt, he forced himself to stay on the line.

Vale’s voice had been warm on the phone. Interested. Like Kieran was somebody worth talking to instead of just another street performer cluttering up the sidewalk.

Now, three hours later, Kieran stood in his closet-sized bedroom—more closet than bedroom, really, which at least made the name accurate—staring at clothes spread across his unmade bed. One decent shirt—navy blue cotton from Goodwill that looked almost new if he ignored the loose threads at the cuffs. Jeans without holes. His only pair of shoes that weren’t falling apart. He considered drawing on the scuff marks with a Sharpie, but that seemed like the kind of thing that would be immediately obvious to someone who probably had a separate closet just for shoes.

What do you wear to dinner with a Grammy-nominated producer?

His phone buzzed.

Vale Rose – Producer

Car will be there at 7. Looking forward to hearing more about your music.

6:45 PM.

Kieran pulled on the shirt and fumbled with buttons that suddenly felt too small. He already showered twice, brushed his teeth until his gums bled, and had taken his evening seizure medication early because stress was a trigger, and his skull felt like it was buzzing with electricity.

His bracelet caught on his sleeve. He almost took it off. It looked cheap next to the business card, the red text screaming ‘damaged goods’ in a way he’d spent years trying to downplay. But seizures didn’t care about dinner meetings with important people.

Don’t have an episode. Not tonight. Not when something good might actually happen for once.

The car was everything he expected and nothing he was prepared for—a sleek black sedan that made his neighbors peek through curtains and whisper behind cracked doors. The driver got out to open his door like Kieran was somebody worth the effort.

“Good evening, Mr. Thorne.”

Nobody had ever called him Mr. Thorne. Throughout his entire life, he’d been Kieran, orkid, orhey you, or—in the memorably shitty placements—much worse. Mr. Thorne sounded like someone with a bank account and a future. Someone whose hands didn’t shake when strangers used his last name.

The restaurant itself was one he would have walked by without daring to read the menu posted behind glass. Aesthetic exposed brick and Edison bulbs, servers who moved like dancers between tables draped in white cloth. It was the kind of place where everyone else seemed to understand unspoken rules about which fork to use and how to pronounce French words without sounding like an idiot. Where Kieran’s entire existence felt like a neon sign blinking ‘FRAUD’ above his head.

Vale Rose sat at a corner table, and Kieran’s first thought wasfuck, he’s handsome.

Not obviously so. Clean-cut features that belonged on a college professor, wire-rim glasses that made him look intellectual rather than intimidating. But there was something magnetic about the way he held himself, controlled and confident, like he owned the space around him without needing to prove it.

Stop thinking about how good-looking he is. This is business. Professional. A potential career opportunity you’re absolutely going to ruin by being weird and anxious and possibly having a seizure into the expensive pasta.

“Kieran.” Vale stood to shake his hand. “Thank you for coming. Please, sit.”

“Thank you f-f-f—” Kieran’s mouth caught on the consonant, and he bit the inside of his lower lip to stop the sound. “For asking me.”

After sitting, Kieran’s eyes went straight to the right prices on the menu before him, hunting for numbers under twenty dollars while trying not to look like that’s what he was doing.

House salad. Twelve dollars for lettuce.

Pasta arrabbiata. Sixteen dollars.

His stomach cramped with hunger and anxiety. Twelve dollars could buy groceries for three days if he was careful. Sixteen dollars was his medication copay. But sure, spend it on fancy lettuce and noodles with a name he couldn’t pronounce without his stutter turning it into a three-act play.

“Order whatever looks good,” Vale said, like he could read minds. “The lamb is exceptional here. So is the duck.”