Here we go. No time for insecurity. Pete said I’d never pull it off if I worried.

The song started with Jules and Pete, eye to eye, racing each other from beat to beat as they burned up the intro. Jules wailed a simple rhythm on her rickety old drum kit while Pete’s fingers danced deftly but wildly across his buzzing steel strings. They egged each other on, dared each other to play faster, harder…

Until the rest of us came in. Their competition would have to wait until later.

The bass line began shaking the flimsy walls as the keyboard and rhythm guitar slid in, laying the bedrock for my vocals. My breath fluttered uneasily in my throat as I grabbed the microphone in both hands, knocking off another chunk of the peeling red paint, and pressed my lips to the freezing surface. 

In the verse, the vocal phrases were fast and low, so they didn’t scare me so much. Even though I had to grip the microphone extra tightly to try to hide the tremor in my hands, I knew that I could handle those early phrases. In fact, all of us could mostly handle those early phrases—even River, who was as insecure as me, but perhaps more ashamed of it. 

Unfortunately, those ‘safe’ phrases lead to the chorus, and even after a few hours of practice, we were still woefully unprepared for that. 

River’s guitar buzzed as he missed the first chord change, and my entire body tensed as I squeezed the mic for dear life and tried to push out the first of many high notes. When Pete had first presented the vocals he wrote for this song, I’d called him a masochist, and my feelings hadn’t changed in the last few days. My body coiled up so intensely as I sang that when the chorus finally came to an end, I felt myself release like a slinky, and I almost slumped to the floor. 

Pete laughed and somehow managed to playfully slap my back before launching into another intense, improvised guitar solo. 

Verse again. I could handle the verse. Nice and fast—one of the only things the band could pull off well. 

Once I’d stumbled into the second chorus and staggered my way through the racing measures, we eventually reached the bridge, and for the first time in the song, I let out a long exhale. Just over my shoulder stood Pete, grinning ear to ear in that way that constantly got him in trouble as he let loose on the scarred old electric he’d been playing for years. There was something fascinating about the way he played with incredible knowledge and skill while remaining completely wild and unpredictable. People usually associate skill with stability, but there was nothing stable about Pete. You couldn’t trust him for a second. Even he didn’t know what he’d play next. 

And it was utterly exhilarating to watch. 

Eventually, the bridge came to an end, though, and before I could break myself out of my trance, we were at the chorus again, flying through as if for a moment, we’d forgotten it was a challenge. Mistakes came, of course, but for a few magical beats, we were all so enraptured by Pete’s show that we forgot to worry, and the music just flowed. 

We finished the outro roughly, stumbling over the rhythms and fumbling the notes that were supposed to be easy as the fatigue set in. When the last note rang out, buzzing and angry, we all relaxed the slightest bit, anxious but relieved that we’d made it through. 

“Yes!” Pete exclaimed before the sound could properly leave the room. His voice fought for dominance as the buzz from our instruments bounced wildly off of the walls. “Yes, that was it!”

“That was shit,” River corrected.

In the corner of the small room, tucked away near Jules’s drum kit, Kei snickered. 

“No, it was great! Like, there were some spots to work out, but it’s seriously coming together! Don’t you guys hear it?”

“Maybe you’re listening to a different band,” I said sheepishly, releasing the mic from my death grip and finally taking a step back. 

“With those vocals? No way.” Pete smiled, giving my shoulder a squeeze. “You sound amazing, Ally.”

My throat suddenly felt impossibly dry, and without meaning to, I averted my eyes. 

“It just needs practice. You guys’ll hear it too, soon. Perfection takes time, right?” Pete asked, gently letting me go as he turned to the rest of the band. 

“Maybe let’s just shoot for tolerable? Bearable, maybe?” Jules suggested. 

Pete rolled his eyes. “You’re my band, so we’re going for the top. The best or nothing.”

“Please, Pete. ‘Nothing’ almost just killed us,” I whined. 

“Fine. Take five,” he sighed. 

“Make it ten or I walk!” Jules shot back.

“Do it!” Pete snapped.

“Oookay, I’m gonna get some fresh air,” I cut in, shrugging on my coat as I nodded toward the door. 

“Sounds nice. Where ya going?” Jules asked. 

I sighed, shaking my head in amusement as I headed for the door. After using my shoulder to release the perpetually jammed lock, I stepped down onto the uneven sidewalk and took a deep breath. Behind me, the door moaned as Pete emerged, finding his way to my side. The familiar scent of cheap cologne and smoke from the e-cigs he used in an effort to quit were present even before he appeared, right by my side where he fit so effortlessly. 

“It’s sounding good, right?” he asked, staring out at the sun-bleached street. 

“Yeah,” I replied, nodding. “It’ll take some practice, but it’s a good song, so I know it’ll turn out.”

“Well, you guys make everything sound good. It’s just the energy, ya know?” he asked. When he glanced my way, I nodded without thinking. “You can tell you guys care about the music. You can pull anything off.”

I considered denying his words, but I let them pass by instead. 

He chuckled, touching the back of his neck. “Takes some of the pressure off, I guess. You guys make writing music easy.”

I smiled.

“Kei sounds good, right?” he asked, quickly changing the subject. I laughed and nodded. “Like, he gets better every day. You used to be able to tell that he played in a school band, but now he sounds legit. Like a true rock star.”

“Sure,” I said, not daring to interrupt his train of thought. Once his words started rushing out and blurring together, no one could stop him. It was always a race for people like Pete Black to speak as much as possible before they ‘ran out of breath’.  

“River too! He takes time to get the hang of things, but you wouldn’t know he’s only been playing guitar for a couple years. I mean, he practices more than anyone. But still, he sounds good these days, huh?” Pete asked.

“Yep,” I replied, watching the way his eyes crinkled in his smile. It was undeniable; he absolutely glowed when he talked about the band. Could other people see how much the band meant to him? Was it evident that he lived for every rehearsal, performance, and late night chat with his bandmates, or was it only us that could see it?

Everyone deserved to see someone shine like Pete did.

“And Jules and Eli are as good as always. It’s like, they don’t even need to get better, but they do it anyway.”

I chuckled, shaking my head. “Damn them.”

“We can’t fall behind. We’re not gonna lose to them, right?” he asked, suddenly looking directly at me. He was close—closer than you’d usually be talking to someone, since he’d only just turned to face me. He was close enough for me to see the blush of pink that still clung to his cheeks from intense, nonstop rehearsal, and the freckles that decorated the bridge of his nose after the summer months, when he walked everywhere under the bright sun rather than taking the bus. Then there were those flecks of gold that floated around in his deep brown eyes, catching the sun and shining like there was a spotlight inside his head.

“Of course not,” I said. 

“‘Cause we’re gonna be the best band in the world someday, right?”

I smiled. “Yep.”

Before he could say any more, the door behind us swung wide open and slammed into the front wall, making the hinges squeal in the quiet afternoon. Jules leaned out, hands planted on either side of the doorframe, as she peered at us. 

“Dude!” I exclaimed, unable to come up with proper criticism for her almost breaking the door. 

“Are we gonna rehearse again or what? ‘Cause dinner’s on River tonight and I’m ready to go in on some short rib,” she said. 

“Dinner’s not on me!” River called from behind her.

“As I remember, he was late to rehearsal,” Jules said simply. 

“Seems like an offer to pay,” Pete added. 

“Listen here, freeloaders—,” River snapped, earning a grin from the three of us outside. Pete and I followed Jules back through the threshold and into the practice room, where River was pouting on the floor while Kei and Eli sat in the corner, watching a video on someone’s phone. Before saying anything, Pete turned to the ice chest near the door—the one that once held ice but was now mostly used as a seat—and retrieved a plastic bag of lukewarm drinks. Without questions, he dug out a few different bottles of Gatorade and tossed each to its proper owner, only pausing for a moment when Kei didn’t see his coming and let it bounce out of his hands. Once the Gatorade was distributed, he turned to me with a bottle of water. 

I smiled, accepting it gratefully. 

“Drink up!” Pete called out. “We have six hours until the barbecue closes, and a lot of ground to cover before then.”

“I thought you said we sounded good,” Eli said. 

“You did. Now, it’s time to sound great.”

I shook my head, smiling despite myself, as the band moaned reluctantly and began to nurse their drinks. At my side, Pete took a deep breath, watching out over his friends with pride. 

Screwing off the top, I took a long drink of water—enough to get me through the rest of rehearsal. 

-

“Pork belly, I said you can have pork belly!” River snapped for what must’ve been the hundredth time as Eli attempted to order more expensive meat. The waitress glanced in confusion between the two boys, her pen hovering uncertainly over her notebook, as Eli persuaded her to take his order to the kitchen. I leaned forward, glancing around the frosted window that separated our table from the restaurant, hoping that none of the few remaining patrons were bothered by the scene my friends were making. Near the entrance of the small barbecue restaurant, the last occupied table was crowded by a group of middle-aged men who refused to leave even after closing earlier in the hour, but they were so rowdy that they couldn’t have noticed us. Not unlike most regulars, they were contained in their own little bubble of soju and cigarette smoke, unbothered by the teenagers at the reserved table in the back. Or maybe they recognized the owner’s son among the group and knew better to complain. 

My eyes flicked up toward the dusty clock on the wall over the kitchen. A quarter to one in the morning—I would have to leave soon if I wanted to get home before my father. 

“Why don’t you guys ever listen to me?” River demanded as I finally tucked back around toward our table. “This comes out of my paycheck. I’m not paying for your expensive taste.”

“Well, I’m certainly not paying,” Jules said. “Maybe you won’t be late to rehearsal next time.”

“I was babysitting my sister!” River snapped. 

“And I was babysitting my shit-faced mom, but I gave her a melatonin and got to rehearsal,” Jules replied. 

I sighed deeply, reaching across the wide table to tend to the meat that my friends had clearly forgotten about cooking. With Kei hunkered down next to River, his eyes darting back and forth between his textbook and the crowded, boxy handwriting that covered a sheet of wrinkled binder paper, the responsibility of cooking fell squarely on my shoulders. Of course, no one could fault him; he was the only one of us who ever took his studies seriously, and despite the teasing he got for it, I was always secretly envious of his dedication. 

As I removed the batch of meat from the grill, I dropped a few pieces onto Kei’s plate. He glanced toward me, causing his glasses to slip down his nose a bit, and fixed me with that crooked but inarguably pure smile that I couldn’t help but love. Before I could say anything, though, Pete elbowed my shoulder and cut in. 

“Take a study break, Einstein. He needs to eat, right, Ally?” Pete asked. 

I nodded. “He’s right. Want me to grab you something to drink?”

Kei quickly waved me off. “I’m fine. Just need a snack, and then I have to finish this study guide.”

“For what class?” I asked, leaning forward to glimpse his work. 

“Ugh, can we please not talk about school right now?” Jules asked, leaning back against the wall behind her. 

I laughed. “It’s going that well?”

She scowled. 

“No, she’s right. Anything but school,” River agreed.

“You guys make college sound so great,” I said, chuckling nervously. 

“You and Kei will understand when you get there,” River said simply. 

“Or don’t get there,” Eli added.

“Hey, who needs college when you’re part of the best band in the world?” Pete asked. 

I glanced toward him, watching the way the dim lighting of the barbecue glowed around the edges of his long hair, clinging to his skin and smile. Why was it so easy to believe anything he said when he looked like that?

“Oh, please,” River said with a roll of his eyes. “We’re just a band, Pete. A decent band, maybe, but still a band. A backup plan probably isn’t a bad idea.”

“Hey, there’s always modeling,” Jules quipped. 

River’s eyes narrowed. I cringed, turning my attention back to the grill. 

“Oh, don’t be so sensitive. Being gorgeous isn’t a bad thing,” she reminded him. 

“Neither is having a dozen girlfriends at once. Maybe we should both go back to what we do best,” River replied.

“Don’t be jerks, guys,” I said. 

“It’s fine. If River’s jealous of all my girlfriends, he can say so,” Jules replied, sending a challenging grin River’s way.

I sighed, turning to Pete for help. Instead of being invested in the conversation, though, I found him hunched over the table much like Kei, scribbling messily on a paper napkin with the permanent marker he always kept in his pocket. I leaned toward him, my chin hovering over his shoulder as I strained to make out his predictably messy handwriting. The lyrics scrawled diagonally across the napkin, placed haphazardly in no particular order, but were somehow beautiful and intriguing all the same. I watched him until his hand finally stopped moving, and he looked up toward me. 

“Wanna write something new?” he asked. 

I nodded before thinking. “Of course.”

“Come over tomorrow after school and we’ll work on it.”

“Sure.”
He grinned, and for a moment, his eyes stayed on me. I always wondered in these moments what thoughts were swirling around his head while he appeared to be so anchored in time. His gaze was settled, but something behind those familiar eyes showed a mind that was far elsewhere. When he finally came back to the moment, he turned toward the end of the table and grabbed a television remote. With a faint buzz of static, the TV suspended in the corner near the ceiling of the small nook we were in flickered to life, bathing the table in a cool glow that counteracted the flames from the grill. 

Pursing my lips, I glanced down at the watch on my left wrist. It was getting late. I knew that, of course, but I couldn’t help wishing I’d just forgotten. Who knew what Dad would do if one night, I just forgot what time he arrived home from work, and didn’t ensure that I was there, dutifully pretending to be fast asleep?

I sighed. 

On the other side of the table, Jules and River continued to bicker as Eli returned from the kitchen with a couple bottles of soju and some glasses. There was still some meat left on the platter at the end of the table, but as I dished out the latest round of cooked bulgogi, I turned the grill down as low as it would go and watched Eli fill the glasses and then slide them around the table. One for River, who’d been drinking soju in his step-father’s restaurant since middle school—one for Pete, who couldn’t say no to a drink any more than he could turn away a cigarette or a free meal—one for me, although I didn’t have a taste for alcohol yet but longed to—and one for Eli himself. 

Eli was just raising his glass in a cheers when Pete’s voice cut through the group, silencing everyone the way it always did. 

“Look!” Pete said, his eyes shining as he gestured toward the tiny TV in the corner. I squinted to back out a band performing at one of those outdoor concert series, interacting with an excited audience.

I raised an eyebrow, reflecting the rest of the group’s confusion as I said, “What?”

“Don’t you see it?” Pete asked, as if he couldn’t quite understand my question. “Look at that. That’s what we’re meant for.”

Again, my eyes flicked toward the TV, and suddenly, it felt as if I was watching the performance through Pete-colored glasses. The band was perfect, toeing the line between stunningly unique and completely transparent. They were brilliant, and yet somehow, it could’ve been any band on that stage, beating on their instruments and shouting at the crowd. To their credit, the audience was just as incredible, building the energy almost as much as the band itself. Even through the tiny screen of an impossibly old TV in a rundown Korean barbecue in the middle of the night, one could almost feel the sweat and electricity. I could feel myself in that crowd, the hair on my arms standing on end as the sea of strangers moved in subtle waves that crashed against the stage and settled back into the lawn. It didn’t matter what band it was, or where the concert was, our who was in that crowd. 

We could all feel it. Moments like that were ephemeral magic. 

When I finally looked back at Pete, though, to tell him that I did see it, he wasn’t watching the TV at all. In fact, his eyes were glued to his phone screen as he typed out a quick message in response to a name I couldn’t make out. 

He caught me staring. “Sorry, I told someone I’d meet them tonight.”

“Who?” I asked. 

He smiled, gently ruffling my hair before saying, “Just a friend.”

“Are you skipping out on us?” Eli asked from the other side of the table. 

Pete grinned sheepishly. “Sorry.”

“And after all our hard work,” Jules said with a sarcastic roll of her eyes. 

Laughing, Pete stood from the bench and slid his phone into his jeans pocket. “I know, I know.”

River held up his glass of soju, watching as the other three of us followed suit, before saying, “To our fearless leader, for always leaving in the middle of dinner and making us practice way too damn hard.”

“Cheers,” Eli said with a firm nod. 

Pete chuckled, raising his glass and then downing it in one shockingly fast gulp. At his side, I took a small sip of mine, trying not to cough lest I incur the relentless teasing of my friends. Shrugging on a coat, Pete swiped his keys off of the table and shimmied past Kei and me   on his way to the door. 

“Hey,” I said, quietly enough that my other friends wouldn’t notice. Pete always heard me, though, and he quickly turned my way. “I was hoping to talk to you about the song.”

He smiled and gave my shoulder a squeeze. “We’ll talk tomorrow, okay?”

I wanted to protest, but the words died in my throat. 

Pete’s eyes flicked to the rest of the group. “Don’t drink too much without me. We’re rehearsing on Wednesday, okay?”

“Yes, Mom,” River sang mockingly. 

Eli grinned and began to pour the next round of soju. I quietly scooted my glass out of his line of sight. 

“Night, guys!” Pete called. 

A chorus of goodbyes shook the restaurant, and from somewhere beyond the glass partition, one of the other patrons shouted at us to quiet down. Pete grinned and waved as he headed toward the door, stopping at their table to effortlessly smooth things over. In the corner where we sat, my friends comfortably continued on with their meal. 

I watched Pete’s silhouette meet up with a much shorter, slighter silhouette just outside the restaurant, and they met in a quick hug before stepping out of sight. 

“Hey, Ally,” Eli called. I immediately turned to him, and he held up a half-empty bottle of soju. “Want some?”

I hadn’t always been a heavy sleeper. 

When I was a baby, my dad said that I hardly slept at all. I was so irritable and nervous all the time that I’d only ever drift off to sleep when I was in my mom’s arms. A few short years later when her battle with cancer finally ended, I slept even less. The extra jobs my dad picked up to make ends meet kept him away from home more often, and even with relatives around to look after me, I could never sleep until I heard his key turning in the lock. 

Eventually, though, I guess my body realized that reality had become different. I stopped waiting up for him. With time, I stopped falling asleep in class and in the car on the way to school each day. Finally, I got my sleep at the proper time, alone in a shabby apartment that felt so stunningly normal that I could no longer be bothered by it. 

I learned how to sleep through anything, especially my dad getting home from work. 

But when the deafening ring of my cell phone began chiming at half past 4 AM, right next to my head where I always left it, it was enough to pull me out of my slumber. My fingers fumbled over the cool surface of my mattress, sleepily trying to silence it before waking the entire apartment complex. When I finally found it, squinting into the intense glow of the screen, I was just awake enough to be surprised at the call that was coming in. Taking a deep breath, I aggressively rubbed the sleep out of my eyes and answered the call with a groggy, “Hello?”

“Hey,” Pete replied nonchalantly. 

“Pete,” I whispered, burying my face in my pillow. “It’s… so late.”

“Nah, it’s early,” he said with a chuckle. Beyond the phone, I could make out the breeze passing by and his slightly uneven breath as he walked. In the distance, the sound of tires rolled over the wet pavement, still littered in puddles from the evening rain. 

“Are you outside?” I asked incredulously.

“Of course!” I could hear a splash, and knew immediately that Pete was tromping through all of the puddles he could find in his worn-out boots. “I do my best thinking in the fresh air.”

“Mmhmm,” I hummed, my eyes falling closed. 

“It’s when I get all my best ideas. Late at night, outside, in the dark.”

“Sounds safe,” I muttered. “And so many great ideas have come of it.”

“That sounded sarcastic, but I know you don’t think I’m lying.”

“Oh, no. People are still talking about Smooth, so I guess they haven’t realized it’s literally an entire album about a smoothie.”

“What the people don’t know won’t hurt them,” Pete laughed. “You gotta get your inspiration from everywhere, Ally. Let the world speak to you. Let that beautiful mango-papaya smoothie speak right to your soul.”

“I have bad hearing,” I mumbled. “What’s the world saying?”

“You wanna write something new.”

I propped myself up on my elbow, once again trying to rub the sleep from my eyes. “Something new?”

“Yeah!”
“You just brought us a new song yesterday. And that took you like… months to write.”

“Yeah…” he said, his voice noticeably dipping. I hated when he sounded like that. “But I wanted that song to be perfect.”

“You don’t believe in perfection.” Pete laughed, and I relaxed a bit. “Why’s it need to be perfect, anyway?”

“It’s a secret,” he replied, his lips surely tugging into a grin. 

I scowled. “What?”

“But it’s got me excited! So I wanna right something new. What are you doing right now?”

I sighed. “Sleeping, Pete.”

He paused. “Oh. Right.”

Slowly, I sunk back down onto my pillow, curling up on my side and cradling my phone near my ear. “Have you been drinking?”

Pete chuckled. “Not much.” When I didn’t say anything, though, he sighed. “You always notice, huh?”

I closed my eyes. “Go home, Pete. I hate when you’re out late like this.”

“Yes, ma’am,” he said without argument. “But only if you come write with me.”

“Right now?” I demanded. 

I could feel his grin through the phone. 

“Pete, it’s the middle of the night,” I said. Then, lowering my whisper even further, I added, “And my dad’s home.”

“Come on, Al,” he said, smiling.

I stared out into the darkness of my bedroom. “Are you gonna be home soon?”

“I’m a couple blocks away.”

I took a deep breath, nodding. “Okay. I’ll be there soon. But we can’t work for too long, okay? I have school in the morning.”

“I know, I know,” he replied. “I’ll see you soon.”

“Yeah,” I said, slowly shaking my head. “See ya.”

For a moment, the world plunged into darkness and silence, and for as long as I could bear it, I laid in bed and stared at my shadowed silhouette in the mirrored closet doors. Quickly, though, the sensory deprivation became too much, and I slipped out of bed—sweatshirt and cell phone in hand—and began to shuffle down the hall. Careful to avoid the creaky floorboards, I ghosted past my dad’s room and made it to the front door. With a glanced over my shoulder, I slowly eased it open and stepped into the cold. 

Outside, my fingers, still partially asleep, fumbled to lock the door. When the cold metal gave way with a subtle click, I pulled the key out and then slid it back in, locking and unlocking it once more. Today, it took five tries before I was satisfied with it truly being locked, and with a deep breath, I shrugged on my sweatshirt and began the long trek up toward Pete’s place, four levels above my own. 

The rickety iron staircase, once a simple fire escape that snaked up the side of the building, was the only access to the odd one-room property that topped the complex. It was the cherry on top of an unremarkable building just outside the business district, nestled in the shadow of many distant high rises. In all the time I’d lived here with my dad, I’d never gotten a clear answer on how the rooftop apartment came to be. Separated from the rest of the units like a quarantined virus, the tiny building sat opposite a storage unit and rusting metal pipes, just a short walk from the fire escape. The wall that lined the roof was all too short considering the tenancy in the tiny apartment, but it had become more than clear over the years that no one was meant to live on top of this complex. 

The world was filled with desperate people, though. People like Pete, who were all too comfortable living in the equivalent of a storage shed with running water and electricity (when he remembered to pay the bills). 

Careful not to slip on the rain-slick steps, I climbed up the side of the building toward the roof. Somewhere not too far away, tires squealed across the wet pavement as a driver lost control and interrupted the peaceful night. I paused, looking out at the city and the long way down if I took one wrong step. A single mistake would make that distant stranger and I more alike than I wanted to be. Any number of wrong steps could completely change the course of this walk, this night, and my lifetime if I wasn’t careful. I was always aware of this, always worrying over it. Always paranoid about becoming the background chaos in a stranger’s life—the tires squealing through a quiet night.

With a deep breath, I refocused my steps and continued up the stairs. 

As I ascended the last level, I half expected to find Pete seated on the wall that lined the roof, feet dangling over the street below and eyes sparkling as he pointed out constellations to some girl I’d never met before. The scene was familiar, if not common. For a man whose soul shook everyone he’d ever met, he seemed to try women on like jewelry—never committing to one for long, or promising to. 

When the roof came into view, though, no feet hung over the edge. As I stepped onto the rough gravel, I found the open space empty, with the exception of a horribly worn, faded green lawn chair that sat at an angle in front of his apartment, looking out at the world. 

Hugging my sweatshirt around me, I headed over to the wall and carefully climbed on top of it, letting my legs dangle precariously in the air as I watched for Pete to appear in the dark street below. None of the streetlights on this stretch of the road worked, but I knew I would recognize him by his silhouette—the long, lanky form that he never seemed to grow into, mirrored in his dark, shaggy hair that he kept long and unruly. The sparse light from the moon would reflect in the necklaces he wore, sometimes tucked into his tee shirt but usually jangling around his neck, framed by that leather jacket he found in a thrift store last year and never really took off. His long, loping strides were impossible to mistake, along with the way he often walked with his hands in his jeans pockets and head titled toward the sky.

He didn’t appear, though. In fact, no one did. The stretch of street below the complex was completely deserted at this time of night. Growing impatient, I fished my phone out of my pocket and let the screen blind me once more as a missed call announced itself. Of course. I’d silenced it after Pete’s first call, knowing I was doomed if it rang while I was trying to slip undetected out of the apartment. Sighing, I clicked on the voicemail and pressed play. 

“Come on, we were just talking. I know you have your phone,” Pete playfully whined as the message began. That slightly breathless quality was still present, telling me that he was still on his way back, at least at the time of the voicemail. “But look, I have this idea. I’m not very good at singing, but like, you’ll get the gist of it. It goes something like…”

Pete’s raw, untrained voice floated through the phone, growling in the quiet night as he felt out a few melodic phrases with simple na-nas. The idea was simple but pretty, and not unlike everything he sang, was intensely laced with the emotion and passion he seemed to exude. Even as I listened, I felt myself finishing the phrases in my mind, imaging where the music could go and what words could fit into each note.

But, it ended too soon. Pete never sang for long enough—only just as long as he needed to pass the idea to someone new, and then his lips sealed in that charismatic grin that almost made you forget how much you longed for his voice. 

“…something like that,” he continued. “I want something softer, you know? I know I always said we shouldn’t cram a ballad into each album just because we have to, but…” He paused, his breathing filling the air for a moment. “Maybe something’s changed my mind. You’re better at making things pretty than I am, though. That’s why I need your help, Al. I can chalk up some chords on my guitar when I get there, and if you have some lyric ideas…”

Suddenly, his voice trailed off. I scowled at the street below, pressing my phone harder to my ear as the beat of silence felt like it stretched on forever. Then, there was a sound that was so familiar I hadn’t even properly feared it. 

Squealing tires. 

Much louder this time, as they were coming through the phone at a much closer proximity. I instinctively jerked the phone away from my face, deafened by the scream of the car, which sounded like it was practically on top of the phone on the other end. A few impossible milliseconds passed, Pete’s breathing quickened, and there was a shuffling as if he began to run. My name, quiet and breathless, came out like a sudden exhale, tumbling into the phone as he moved. 

“Ally…”

The squealing stopped. Pete’s breath fanning against the phone’s receiver stopped. With a sharp ringing, the line went dead. 

I froze. My phone pressed so hard against my ear that it began to throb. Slowly, my mind worked to catch up with what I’d heard. 

When I tried to climb off of the wall, I was shaking so badly that I lost my footing and fell onto my side, the pale gravel on the roof digging into my shoulder and hip. Pressing myself unsteadily to my knees, I fumbled a few times before successfully dialing the one phone number   knew by heart. 

Straight to voicemail. 

Try again. Try again, my mind pleaded. 

I tried until an alert about low battery broke me out of my trance. With my quick, shallow breaths beginning to make my head pound, I found one of the first contacts in my phone and listened painstakingly as it rang. 

“Hmm?” Jules hummed sleepily. 

I tried unsuccessfully to steady my voice. “I think… something happened to Pete. He was on the phone… and…”

“Whoa, Ally,” Jules said, her voice suddenly crystal clear. “Slow down. What’s going on?”

“I heard a car, like… skidding, and…”

“Where are you?”

“I think he’s nearby,” I finally managed. “I’m scared.”

“Everything’s gonna be fine, Ally,” Jules said simply. “Are you at home?”

I nodded, then, realizing she couldn’t see me, said, “Yeah.”

“I’m on my way. Stay where you are, okay?” 

I nodded again, already beginning to push myself to my feet. The gravel crumbled under my slippers as I moved toward the fire escape. “Okay.”

-

I hated music recitals. I’d told my dad that a thousand times already, but he insisted that I perform at least one song at tiny music studio where I was learning to sing. He’d gotten the lessons for a discount with a variety of coupons, but still, he claimed that he was entitled to see his daughter on stage as reparation for the money he’d spent on lessons.

Sheesh. It wasn’t even a real stage—just a wooden platform raised a few inches above the ground. Was this really what Dad wanted?

From my stiff foldable chair in the back row, I stole glances at my dad near the front, busying himself with responding to emails and taking phone calls that caused him to leave the building and return in the middle of other kids’ performances. Even though I didn’t know any of my “classmates,” I still felt partially responsible for the dejected looks on their faces when they saw a stranger leave in the middle of their song. I should’ve done a better job at keeping him from the recital. 

I should’ve done a better job at not being here at all. 

The recital was impossibly small and embarrassing, not unlike most of the building where I’d taken singing lessons for the last six months. The parking lot where the unmarked unit sat was completely hidden from the street, tucked away behind a bustling shopping center and, in particular, a health food grocery store. What they referred to as a studio was really a reception area, two rooms for lessons, a tiny booth for recording that never seemed occupied, an awkward room—or perhaps hallway—that bridged the gap, and now held a makeshift stage and about 20 folding chairs, a quarter of which were occupied by performers. 

Up ahead, my teacher and the other instructor played whatever instruments were necessary to backup their students while also troubleshooting the technical difficulties that seemed to arise during every set.  

Somewhere up front, near my dad, was the owner of the studio and father of one of my “classmates,” carefully watching the performance. I’d seen him before, but I was suddenly grateful that he wasn’t around much during my own lessons, because his scrutinizing stare was enough to make me forget my stage fright and be nervous for an entirely different reason. 

Why was I more afraid of disappointing this stranger than my own father?

At the moment, though, the man seemed thoroughly distracted by a teenage boy who I presumed to be another student, but whom I’d never seen before. He’d been talking to the man in between songs for a while now, despite the owner’s dismissive reaction, and since the student sitting next to the man had gone to perform, the boy slid into the now empty seat and continued his eager pursuit. I couldn’t make out the hushed conversation, but I could see the irritation flickering in the man’s eyes. The teenage boy set a soft case holding a guitar on the ground in between his knees, gesturing toward it proudly and earning a festering glance from the owner. I couldn’t help but cringe. How could this kid stand his ground while being looked at that way?

It was a welcome distraction from my own performance, which was up next. My song—a pop song from last year that I once had an affinity for, but now had grown bored of—had already been played once, when a girl I’d seen a few times before performed it earlier in the recital. I could’ve ran out of the building right there if I had the guts. In the end, though, I was more worried about causing a scene and ruining someone else’s moment in the spotlight. Still, the sting of being a copy-cat was horribly new and wouldn’t fade in time for me to stand on stage.

The boy before me was fine. I didn’t really notice, or maybe I just couldn’t focus. I’d told my dad a thousand times that I’d rather die than perform in front of so many people, but he’d insisted that I step outside of my comfort zone. My teacher had suggested it too. He said that if I gave it a chance, I might be surprised about how it changed my relationship with music. 

Oh, I was surprised. I was surprised about how much it made me want to never sing again. 

Up front, the teenage boy seemed to have bothered the owner for the last time, because the man turned and waved him away in the most furious, intimidating way possible, and finally, the kid retreated. I deflated. 

Come on, kid. If you can’t do it, how can I?

All too soon, the song ended. A smattering of applause brought me back to the reality—the fact that I was up next, and I was going to have to sing in front of a group of relative strangers. My body froze up, tensed from head to toe like I’d been paralyzed, as the student before me set down his guitar and made his way back to his seat. 

My turn. My turn. 

On the makeshift stage, my teacher met my eyes and smiled warmly, waving for me to join him. I wanted to thank him for everything he’d done for me, but tell him I couldn’t do anymore. This was as far as music went for me. I should’ve drawn the line that night a few months ago when I picked up Mom’s old guitar. I should’ve known I was getting in too deep. People were going to start expecting things of me. 

If there was anything that felt more impossible than performing, though, it was making a scene and inconveniencing other people, even if I didn’t know them. With a deep, shaky breath, I stood and made my way down the rickety wooden risers, stepping on stage where a mic stand waited with a shiny microphone. 

My teacher smiled and nodded encouragingly. Suddenly, my new fear became throwing up on this new microphone—probably the only new thing in the entire building. 

After a few seconds, the two instructors began to play the upbeat opening phrases of my song—a song that had already been through these speakers once—and I watched the audience adjust to the surprise. They’re already bored, I thought. They already don’t care about you.

Suddenly, I was singing. The instinct was more natural than I thought it’d be, but it didn’t relieve my nerves in the slightest. With every note I sang, my hands shook, and I tightly gripped the microphone to keep myself steady. Slowly, the song began to unravel. I was okay. I was doing it. While the nerves remained, I carefully began to loosen my grip on the microphone, and even dared to glance at my dad. 

He smiled. 

Then, just like it had never started, the song came to a grinding halt. A string on my teacher’s guitar snapped and began to wave wildly in the air, like it was signaling me to stop singing. I froze once again, the fear rushing back to me in full force. The audience muttered to themselves as my teacher laughed and apologized, rushing into one of the teaching rooms in search of another guitar he could tune up quickly. 

Just as I was about to get myself moving again, fully prepared to return to my seat and pretend like nothing happened, a beautiful open chord on a guitar played out from the risers, silencing the audience in a heartbeat. Beyond the edge of the stage, the teenage boy stood next to the owner, one foot planted on his chair and a beaten-up acoustic clutched to his chest. He grinned, plucked a string a couple times to perfect its tune, and then locked eyes with me. 

I was immediately scared for a new reason. His eyes were so wild I didn’t even know how to hold his gaze. 

He started playing, fast and loud. The chords were all too familiar, and after a few seconds, he started to sing in a rough, pitchy voice that somehow managed to be completely charming. I couldn’t respond. He was singing my song, so unapologetically, in a room full of people who anticipated a tightly woven program. There was nothing to do or say in response to such a display. 

All I could do was sing. 

It scared the hell out of me at first. I don’t know how I convinced myself to do it at all; that part of the performance always feels like a daze. But before I knew it, I was singing, and the boy stopped to give the stage to me.

The music flowed out of me. I’d never felt it like that with another person. Sometimes it felt natural when I was at home in my room, plucking at Mom’s old guitar or singing in the shower, but I’d never felt natural around other people. It never flowed. I was always acutely aware of what was happening around me, and how to execute every individual note. 

But with this stranger, banging wildly on his guitar in a room full of people neither one of us knew, made me feel like I was alone with the music. 

He got louder. I did too. He got softer. So did I. The bridge swept us up, and those phrases that felt so impossibly high that I was positive I would butcher them and embarrass myself completely just tumbled out of my lips like air. My voice reached up high into the notes that I was so terrified of, moving with the guitar through the rise and fall as we rushed into the end of the song. 

My body, which felt ice cold only minutes ago, was suddenly on fire. My mind was blank. All there was was me, a total stranger with a guitar, and about ten feet of open air that buzzed with our sound. 

When he played the final chord, I was still tingling. Down to my fingertips, I felt so packed full of emotion and excitement that I wasn’t sure if I could keep it down. The boy lowered his guitar, smiling a smile so wild and unhinged that I couldn’t look away. Together, in the place between reception and the practice rooms, we created an electrical charge between our eyes that couldn’t be touched. It wasn’t until a wave of dizziness hit me that I finally took a step back, that the energy between us exploded, bouncing off the walls and hitting me straight in the chest. It knocked the air out of me and I stumbled backwards, bumping into the wall and almost knocking the microphone stand over.

“Dude,” the stranger said, completely dead to the sea of strangers whose eyes couldn’t leave him. He watched me and only me as he grinned and said, “Wanna start a band?”

-

“Pete!” I yelled for what must have been the hundredth time, the name tumbling out of my lips as if it was the only word in the world I remembered. The street was impossibly dark as I stumbled onto the sidewalk, hugging my sweatshirt around me to block out the cold. Somewhere in these winding streets, Pete was waiting for me. I squeezed my eyes shut, pressed the tears away, and kept moving. 

I called his name like a chant or a spell—like I could summon him if only I wanted it badly enough. If I really cared about him, I could weave together the misty rain and the damp pavement that we’d walked on so many times, knotted together with the smell of smog and an early winter storm to materialize my friend, sitting there under one of the flickering streetlights. 

Tears stung at the corners of my eyes as I moved, blinking away raindrops that fell on my lashes. His name fell from my lips over and over again, immune to any thoughts of rationality that I’d left somewhere at home. The temperature dipped, and somewhere in my clouded mind, I stopped to think that I should hurry, because he could be cold.

It took a while before I realized I was hearing the hum of an idling engine. When I realized it, though, my mind immediately cleared, like a drop of iodine had broken up the fog of my mind. My feet started moving toward a nearby alleyway, and I left the streetlights of the neighborhood thoroughfare behind to chase the rumble of the engine. Slowly, my strides grew longer, and before I knew it, I was running over the rain-soaked pavement, my slippers splashing through puddles as I moved. 

Then, just as suddenly as I noticed the engine, the end of the alleyway opened up before me, and I found my friend. 

The humming engine belonged to a shiny new pickup truck, the pale silver bumper splattered with blood. Along the reflective lane markers, just past the intersection, a stranger knelt in the middle of the street, knuckles white as he pressed his phone to his ear. Beneath his other rough, callused hand, he pressed a flannel shirt to Pete’s hairline, almost completely obscuring his face, but not the blood. 

Still, I knew. 

There was the long, lanky form that he never seemed to grow into, mirrored in his dark, shaggy hair that he kept long and unruly. The sparse light from the moon reflected in the necklaces he wore, now fallen to the side of his head like a noose, framed by that leather jacket hanging off one of his shoulders, showing the blood pooling under his head. He wasn’t moving anymore, but somehow, down near his hip, one of his hands was still tucked into the pocket of his jeans, like he’d only just been wandering the dark streets like he so loved to do. 

I like out a strangled cry that resembled a dying animal and rushing into the glow of the headlights. 

“What did you do?” I yelled.

The man, eyes wide with shock, slowly looked toward me. “I…”

I shook my head quickly as the tears began to overwhelm my eyelids. Falling to my knees on the pavement, I pulled Pete away from the man and angrily discarded the flannel that had been held to his face, cradling his head in my lap. Grimacing, I bent down to rest my forehead on his, my breaths coming in faster and faster. 

“What have you done?” I demanded.

“I’m sorry…” 

In the distance sirens began to scream through the air. I shook my head, pounding my fist on Pete’s chest. “No. Not like this.”

His chest wasn’t moving. I’d known it before I even got close, but now, with his form gathered up in my arms—all six feet and two inches of a man who should’ve never been gathered up so small—it was so disgustingly real I felt bile rising in my throat. 

I couldn’t breathe. I didn’t want to.

“You didn’t even finish the song,” I said desperately. 

As if he would respond. As if his blood didn’t paint a neat line down the middle of the dark, empty street. 

The rain was falling heavier now. Somewhere out there in the fog, my friends were looking for me. It didn’t matter though. Nothing mattered. Nothing mattered in a world where Pete Black wasn’t grinning ear to ear in a way that was so wild and unapologetic that even the most fearful, cynical person could believe in beautiful things. 

The rain washed away all things, though. Even the most beautiful ones. 

Blue, red. Blue, red. The light from the approaching emergency vehicles painted the dark street in primary colors, but all I could see was black.

I didn’t want to knock on the door. I didn’t want to admit that I’d lost my house key after a stranger pronounced my best friend dead on the scene and I wandered the city like an untethered ghost until the sun began to peer over the horizon and I had to retreat inside because nothing felt more disgusting than the sun. Nothing was more revolting than the damn sun, climbing into the sky to warm up the day as if a 20-year-old boy didn’t unceremoniously die in the streets just hours earlier. 

I was mad at the sun, at the city, at the street that watched him die and did nothing. I was mad at myself for being alive, as if that mattered anymore. Me, an insignificant shred of humanity, here breathing when the most beautiful thing the city had ever seen was taken so callously. 

I was so mad I didn’t know how to feel anything anymore. 

Slowly, I raised my fist and knocked on my front door, so softly that I was sure no one would notice. Within seconds, though, it burst open and Jules appeared, enveloping me so tightly in a hug that I felt like I could simply disintegrate into her arms. Behind her, River approached the door, which still hung ajar, calling over his shoulder to alert my father that I was home. As soon as he got a proper look at me, though, his jaw tightened, and he seemed to freeze a bit. Noticing his reaction, Jules took a step back and held me at an arm’s length, studying me and trying to hide the fear and concern on her face. 

From somewhere further within the apartment, though, Eli’s voice interrupted. “Ally?” When he rounded the corner to the foyer and finally found me, his eyes widened slightly. “Where’s Pete?”

My face fell. It was impossible. The accident was only a few blocks away. They must’ve been listening to the song of sirens for hours while they waited for me to come home, trapped by small talk with my father who likely didn’t even recognize them (even after all these years) before he excused himself to go to work. They must’ve known. They must’ve figured what happened. 

But their faces told me they didn’t. Jules’s fearful eyes found mine. “Ally, where’s Pete?”

There was hope, too. The apartment was stifling, so filled with the hope that Pete was okay and would come walking in behind me like nothing had happened. I could hardly breathe with how hard they clung onto a reality that shattered before a pair of brand new headlights hours ago. 

“Ally?”

Without a word, I pushed past my friends, ignoring Kei where he sat in our cramped kitchen, nursing my dad’s cheap instant coffee, and made for my bedroom. When I got there, I slipped inside, closing the door and leaning against it as hard as I could. 

From the hallway beyond, my Jules’s voice came again. “Ally, please come out. I’m… I’m sorry we couldn’t find you. We’re here now, though. Just… tell us what happened.”

I shook my head. 

“Please,” she begged, her voice breaking slightly. 

I swallowed slightly, staring at the wall. “Didn’t you hear it?"
Silence. So she did.

“He’s… not okay, is he?”

Slowly, I stood and approached the mirrored doors of my bedroom closet. The sweatshirt that I’d passively grabbed on my way out the door was wrinkled after being soaked from the rain and then dried over time, and the cuffs of my pants were muddled with dirt and grime from the street that I’d kneeled in for so long. What caught everyone’s eye, though, was the blood. Pooled across my thighs, smeared on my hands and sleeves, and even in one slightly faded streak on my cheek. Signs of Pete were everywhere. 

Just as I was beginning to feel sick again, though, someone in the distance called out Kei’s name, and a pair of footsteps thundered down the hallway toward my room. I braced myself for someone to try to force the door open, but no one did. Instead, there was some shuffling in the bathroom across the hall, the lid to the toilet hit the wall, and I heard the unmistakable sound of someone vomiting. 

Without thinking, I pulled the door open and pushed past Jules and Eli, silently entering the bathroom to find Kei. He’d collapsed on the stained tile floor, half sitting and half on his knees, hugging the toilet bowl as he threw up. Instinctively, I quickly slipped past River, who stood worriedly over his friend, and knelt next to Kei, my hand laying gently on his back. He slowly turned up toward me, eyes muddied with tense tears.

“He’s gone, isn’t he?”

In an instant, I fell back down to earth. The instinct that had driven me from my room and to my friend’s side when I heard him sick left me, and I found myself free-falling straight back to reality. 

Pete. Blood. Headlights. 

I started crying before I could stop myself. Once the tears started coming, they fell so hard and fast that my vision blurred and I felt as if my entire body was grinding to a halt. Somewhere beyond my clouded vision and the grief that completely encapsulated me, a pair of warm arms wrapped around me, hugging me tightly against the cold. 

I could hear the tell-tale hitching of breath near my ear, though. I could feel, even as I fell apart, that my friends were, too. 

And after the death of a person like Pete Black, the entire damn world should have fallen apart along with us.