Page 7 of Rhythm and Rapture (Behind the Lens #5)
Chapter Four
LAST NIGHT
Our studio apartment looks like a tornado hit a Guitar Center and decided to stay for dinner.
Empty energy drink cans form precarious towers on every surface, guitar picks are embedded in the couch cushions like musical confetti, and somewhere beneath the chaos of takeout containers and recording equipment, there might be actual furniture.
"Dude, are you really gonna watch The Hidden Chemist without me?" Ash demands, pointing dramatically at my laptop with a drumstick he's apparently been using as an eating utensil. "I feel betrayed. Wounded. My trust has been shattered like?—"
"Like your attention span when you're coming down from whatever pharmaceutical enhancement you've been experimenting with?" I interrupt, not looking up from my screen. "Her stream starts in ten minutes, and I wasn't gonna wait for you to emerge from your Adderall-fueled creative odyssey."
"It wasn't Adderall, it was... okay, it was totally Adderall," Ash admits, flopping onto the couch with the grace of a caffeinated giraffe. "But it was for artistic inspiration. I wrote three choruses and discovered the meaning of life."
Felix emerges from what generously passes for our kitchen, holding three beers and looking like the responsible adult he pretends to be.
"The meaning of life better be 'finish the damn album,' because our label is breathing down our necks harder than the car warranty sharks.
And stop abusing your damn medicine. There are people out there who can't even get it when they need it and you're popping them like Skittles. "
"Fuck the album," I say with the kind of intensity I usually reserve for arguing about chord progressions. "Do you realize The Hidden Chemist is about to explain thermodynamics while slowly removing laboratory safety equipment? This is educational and life-affirming."
"The fact that you just called watching a cam girl 'life-affirming' suggests we need to get you outside more," Felix points out, settling into the only chair that isn't being used as a clothing storage unit.
But even as he says it, Felix is already pulling up the stream on his phone.
Because the truth is, we're all completely fucking obsessed with The Hidden Chemist, and not in the way our friends would expect.
It isn't just the obvious appeal—though The Chemist is undeniably gorgeous in that effortless, natural way that makes me want to write songs about the curve of her smile.
It's everything else. The way she gets genuinely excited about molecular structures.
The casual brilliance of explaining complex biochemical processes while making it sound like pillow talk.
The moments when she forgets she's performing and just..
. exists, raw and authentic and more compelling than any manufactured fantasy.
"She's different," I say, and my bandmates recognize the tone. It's the same voice I use when I've stumbled onto a melody that might actually matter. "She's not trying to be anything other than exactly who she is."
Which is more than any of us can say. Fame—even our modest, indie-darling level of recognition—requires constant curation.
Every social media post, every interview, every fan interaction is carefully crafted to maintain our image as the charmingly disheveled musical prodigies who definitely don't spend most of our time eating cereal for dinner and arguing about reverb settings.
But watching The Hidden Chemist feels like glimpsing something real in a world built on performance.
Even with the mask, even with the carefully maintained anonymity, there's something authentic about her that cuts through all the manufactured bullshit of our industry.
It's the way her voice literally trembles with excitement when she discovers an elegant equation, how her hands dance through the air mapping invisible molecular structures like she's conducting a symphony only she can hear.
She doesn't just teach chemistry—she fucking worships it, and that raw passion bleeds through every carefully choreographed moment.
The mystery of her identity only makes her more compelling—we're drawn to her mind, her voice, her presence, without the usual distractions of conventional beauty standards or celebrity personas.
The notification chimes, drawing our attention to my laptop screen.
She appears on camera, and I feel that familiar kick in my chest—half attraction, half something deeper that I'm not quite ready to examine.
Tonight she looks different. Her hair is messier than usual, her cheeks flushed, her smile carrying a wine-warmed looseness that makes her seem more approachable somehow.
"Good evening, my curious little molecules," she begins, and I can hear the slight rasp in her voice that suggests she's been talking—or laughing—before the stream started.
"Welcome back to The Hidden Chemist, where we explore the intersection of rigorous scientific methodology and. .. less rigorous methodologies."
She reaches for what is clearly a wine glass just outside the camera frame, and Ash nearly falls off the couch. "Is she drinking on stream? That's so fucking hot."
"Everything is hot to you when you're chemically enhanced," Felix points out, but he's leaning closer to the screen.
"Tonight, instead of thermodynamics, we're discussing the neurochemistry of human attraction," The Chemist continues, taking a deliberate sip of wine.
"Specifically, the molecular mechanisms behind what we colloquially term 'sexual chemistry.
' But before we dive into the dopamine pathways.
.." She pauses, looking directly into the camera with an expression that seems almost vulnerable. "I have a confession to make."
The chat explodes, but I barely notice the stream of messages flying by. I'm too focused on the way The Chemist’s usual confident demeanor has shifted into something rawer, more uncertain.
"I'm twenty-two years old," she says, her voice carrying a slight tremor that makes me want to reach through the screen and tell her she's safe.
"I can explain the physiological processes of human sexual response in excruciating academic detail.
I understand the neurochemical cascades, the cardiovascular changes, the hormonal fluctuations.
But I've never actually experienced most of what I describe with another person. "
Felix makes a sound like he's been punched in the solar plexus.
"My friend asked me recently if I wanted to explore," She continues, gaining confidence as she speaks.
"To find someone and actually experience these reactions instead of just analyzing them from a theoretical standpoint.
And honestly? The idea terrifies me. Not the physical mechanics—I understand those perfectly.
But the emotional variables, the loss of experimental control, the vulnerability required for authentic intimacy.
.. those don't follow predictable models. "
I find myself leaning forward, completely absorbed.
This isn't performance—this is confession, and it's beautiful and terrifying and more intimate than anything I've ever seen on camera.
The mask can't hide the vulnerability in her voice, the slight tremor that makes me want to reach through the screen and tell her she's safe, that her anonymity doesn't make her any less worthy of genuine connection.
"There's this song that's been stuck in my head," she says, setting down her wine glass and looking thoughtful. "Something about how many people know the technical aspects of things but never learn to truly appreciate what they're creating."
She pauses, her voice dropping to something rawer, more vulnerable. "'Study all the parts, memorize the rules, build your life around a theory but you're too afraid to start... so what good is knowing all the calculations if we're scared to fall apart?'"
Her voice catches slightly on the last line. "I think that might apply to more than just the original context."
My breath stops. Those are our lyrics. Our fucking lyrics from "Theory and Practice," the song I wrote at 3 AM when I couldn't sleep, couldn't eat, couldn't do anything but think about how I'd studied music theory for years but forgotten what it felt like to actually create something that mattered.
"We should message her," Ash says suddenly, his voice unusually serious.
Felix immediately shakes his head. "Absolutely not. That's crossing every possible line. We're her biggest contributors, but sliding into her DMs? That's creepy fan behavior."
"Is it though?" I ask, already running through chord progressions in my head, hearing melodies that could capture what she just said.
"She just said she's curious about exploring with someone who might actually appreciate the complexity of what she's offering.
Maybe she'd be interested in talking to people who see her as more than just entertainment. "
"You want to what, volunteer as her sexual education committee?" Felix asks, but there's curiosity beneath the skepticism.
"I want to offer to be her friend," I say simply. "Someone who sees her as more than a fantasy."
Ash is already pulling out his phone. "Fuck it. Life's too short to wonder 'what if.' Besides, what's the worst that could happen? She says no and we go back to being anonymous admirers?"
"She could expose us publicly, ruin our reputation, make us look like predators who can't maintain appropriate boundaries with content creators," Felix points out.
"Or," I say, watching The Hidden Chemist continue her stream with that new vulnerability shining through her usual academic confidence, "she could say yes. And maybe we all find out what it means to live beyond our own broken realities."
Ash is already on his phone, fingers flying across the screen. I can see him typing, deleting, typing again, trying to find the right words. Something genuine rather than predatory.
Because despite Felix's concerns, despite the potential complications, despite every rational reason to maintain our distance, we all feel it—this woman gets our fucking music. She's just quoted our lyrics back to us while explaining why she's terrified to live her own life.
How do you ignore that? How do I ignore that?
We finish watching the stream in silence.
I keep thinking about the way her voice broke on "scared to fall apart.
" Felix is already pulling up her previous streams, trying to figure out if she's mentioned our band before.
And Ash? Ash is staring at his phone like it might spontaneously combust from the weight of what we've just done.
It might. Whether that's a good or bad thing, I have no idea.