Page 11 of What the Leos Burned (BLP Signs of Love #6)
Same Track, Different Beat
Zay sat at the mixing board inside the label’s Midtown-Atlanta studio, with his shoulders hunched, and stared blankly into space.
The artist in the booth had laid the same hook for the third time.
It was a decent track—club banger, heavy bass, catchy enough to get tossed on a playlist—but something about it didn’t sit right with him.
“Run it again,” he said into the mic.
The artist’s voice crackled through the headphones. “For real? That was the third take.”
Zay pressed the talkback. “Yeah. You rushed the last line.”
He wasn’t lying, but he also wasn’t present. His mind wondered back to that damn meeting a week ago. Her voice. The necklace. The way she looked at him like he was a ghost from a life she forgot to mourn.
The artist ran the track again, but once again, Zay didn’t even listen.
Seeing Princess, or Love T. as she called herself those days, had triggered thoughts he believed he placed in the back of his mind long ago. He had a sudden flashback about his stepfather, whom he hadn’t spoken to or seen since the day he knocked him the fuck out.
He recalled all the busted lips. Bruised ribs. How he finally stood up to the man and threw his first punch. Then the blood and not feeling sorry for it either.
The door creaked open, and Kam leaned in from the hallway.
“Yo,” he said, quiet but firm. “Maybe take a break, Zay. You told dude to run the hook three times, and you ain’t kept one. You not even nodding your head no more.”
Zay rubbed his temple. “I got this, bruh.”
Kam dropped his head and stepped in fully. He closed the door behind him, walked to Zay at the soundboard, and stood at his side.
“Look, I’m sayin’ this as your manager but also as your boy . . . The label already on edge.”
Zay dropped his head to the side and exhaled through his nose.
Kam kept going carefully. “Now you in here zoning out like you forgot we got a release schedule.”
“They can say what the fuck they want,” Zay snapped, pushing his chair back. “Tell ’em drop me if they feel that way. I built this shit on my name, not theirs.”
Kam sighed, leaned over the soundboard, and spoke into the talkback. “Aye, my mans, go ’head and take five.”
The artist seemingly felt similar because he wasted no time nodding his head and taking his headphones off. He placed them on a stool, gave one final look into the glass at them, shook his head, then walked out of the booth and into another room.
Kam lowered himself into the chair across from Zay. “Come on, bruh. You ain’t yourself. What’s going on wit’ chu’?”
Zay remained silent and looked away.
Kam leaned forward. “It’s ol’ girl from the new project we working on, ain’t it?”
He flinched. He didn’t exactly confirm or deny anything previously at the meeting and wasn’t too sure if he wanted to at that moment. He responded quickly, without a thought.
“Who?”
“Don’t play. That author, Love T. You didn’t say nothin’, but I saw how you froze in that meeting. I’ve never seen you freeze up like that before.”
Zay exhaled hard through his nose. He contemplated on holding back from speaking too much, careful not to mix business with pleasure, but in that moment, he needed to get it off his chest. “Yeah, man. We got history.”
Kam slowly nodded. “I already knew it, bruh. I knew it was something.”
“You ever realize you ain’t ever healed from something? Like, . . . you thought you were good, until you see the one person who could always see through your shit?”
Kam tilted his head but didn’t respond. There was a silence that fell between them, but not an awkward one. It felt more welcoming.
“I been movin’ my whole life like. . .” Zay tapped the console, then sat back. “If I keep working, keep grinding, I don’t gotta stop and think. Like I could outrun the shit that broke me.”
“You can’t outrun what lives in you, Zay,” Kam responded. “You either face it or it grows. Once it grows bigger than you can handle, that’s when shit gets out of control. And it’s hard to come back from that, baby boy.”
Suddenly, there was a buzz from Zay’s back pocket. He leaned forward, reached behind him, and pulled out his phone. The screen shined bright with a message.
Amora (off Hot Girlz Hit TV show):
You free tonight? You bring the weed I got the wine.
He stared at it for a moment, then two attachments followed. One, a picture with her in a jacuzzi with a yellow bikini top, the next, without one.
He locked the phone without replying.
Kam raised an eyebrow, having caught a glimpse of the photos. “Seem like you don’t need me to remind you of that though. Go ’head. Take the rest of the night and get your mind off this.”
“She ain’t what I need right now,” Zay muttered. “That ho barely has a brain. I like that, . . . but maybe that’s the problem.”
He nodded again, slower this time. “So what you gon’ do?”
Zay looked back toward the booth where the artist swung the door open and walked back in.
The artist stood in front of the mic, grabbed the headphones off the stool, and raised his chin at him, signaling if he was good to hop back into work.
Zay scooted his chair closer to the talkback mic and clicked it on.
“We good for today. Get some rest. I’ll call you when I’m locked in.”
The artist gave a confused “bet,” placed the headphones back on the stool, and grabbed his things to leave.
Zay slumped back and steepled his hands behind his head.
“I need to figure some shit out,” he said, more to himself than anyone else.