Page 19 of Heartbeat Highway (Love Along Route 14)
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She misses the first cue, but it doesn’t matter, because after the first verse, she’s killing it.
A few of the people in the crowd seem to be wondering where K is, but Dan put out the notice on all our socials earlier today, so most of our fans knew not to expect him. Lily’s winning them over, though. I can feel it. There’s an energy to a crowd, and this one is all in for our new sound.
It’s difficult to play the drums when she looks like that. All I want to do is unlace that bustier with my teeth, let her ass fill my palms as I taste her. I suppose we have time for that.
I love watching her come alive like this, the confidence making her cheeks flush and her smile infectious. With each cheer and successful song, her posture straightens. Law school and that fuckhead K tried to make my girl cower, but look at her now.
She is a curvy goddess, and I’m the luckiest man on earth to be able to witness it.
Toward the end of our set, Dan walks back to me on the pretext of getting water. “Do the duet with her,” he says, picking up his water bottle.
“I’m playing.” I gesture to the drum set.
Dan shakes his head. “We’ll do it with just the keyboard. It’ll be sexy and hot. It’ll make her a star, and you know it.”
I pause for a moment, and run a towel over my sweaty face. It’s true. If I get up there and sing with her—a duet with Bo Harley—Lily will be famous within seconds. She’ll have options, then. She won’t have to go back to law school unless she wants to, and if she does, she’ll have currency.
This whole thing with my dad has that feeling of an old feud, one that isn’t serving me any more. What does serve me is to make Lily happy. Fuck my dad. Who cares when he finds out? I haven’t played his game in ages. He isn’t here. He isn’t Howl. Dan, Maxim, Lily, and I are.
Besides, I’d love to sing with her again.
Maxim glances over at us, and I nod. A smile shoots across his face, and he starts playing the intro to his song, “In the Wings.”
I unclip the microphone from my drum set and stand. The crowd hasn’t realized yet what’s happening, and neither has Lily. She comes in on the downbeat, just like we practiced earlier today. Though we practiced it as a solo.
With her verse done, I lift the microphone and sing.
Holding your hair back
When he lets you down
If there were a contest for suckers
I’d surely wear the crown.
Lily turns to me, her eyes bright and alive. There’s unbridled joy in her expression. We come in together on the verse.
Too long I’ve waited in the wings
Hoping you’d see past the one
Who only makes you cry.
Too long I’ve wanted no one else but you.
But you see me. I know you see me.
Damn Maxim. Here I thought he’d been writing from his own experience. The asshole was writing about us the whole time.
But I don’t care about that. I don’t care that my dad will find out, or that we might go viral. I don’t care that I don’t know what will happen to the band or me and Lily after tonight. I’ll figure all that out later.
Right now the only thing that matters is me and Lily. This song. This stage. This moment.
We end the song with less than an inch between us. So I cradle her jaw in my palms, tell her I love her, and kiss her. She is my best friend and the love of my life.
Finally, we belong together.