by N. N. Britt
“I personally think you’re pretty stunning.” He patted his pockets and fished out a lollipop.
I stared up at him, allowing his words to settle in. Something shifted between us. There was a change, a stir, a transference.
My heart thudded. “What are you doing?” I asked quietly, unsure if he could hear me over the racket of equipment and the buzz of voices dribbling out from the club and the pizzeria next door. We were right in the middle of everything, surrounded by the noise.
He unwrapped the candy, stuck it between his lips, and inched closer. “It’s called a compliment, Camille. Just accept it.”
Blood rushed to my face and lit it on fire. I swallowed past the sudden tightness in my throat as the burn of embarrassment sizzled beneath my skin, in my chest, in my stomach. Everywhere.
His mouth was too close. I could feel the soft rush of his breath on my cheek and neck as it crawled down to my collarbone. He stayed like that longer than necessary before taking a step back.
The last rays of evening sun slid across his face, illuminating his skin. In this light, he seemed almost as if he were made of gold and charcoal, painted on a canvas of dullness by some unknown artist.
“There you are!” Jules’ voice drilled through the steaming air, ruining the moment. When she rushed over, her eyes deserted me and wistfully roamed over Dante’s physique. “Hi! Have we met?”
“I don’t think we have,” he said with a reserved smile, the lollipop stick poking from the corner of his mouth, and I caught a hint of annoyance in his tone.
Jules whipped out her hand. “Are you sure? Because you look very familiar.”
“I get that a lot.”
A laugh was forming inside my chest, but I held it in. Part of me wondered if she was going to recognize Dante and part of me hoped she wouldn’t.
“It’s so nice you came to see the guys play. I’m Jules. My daughter sings in Systematic.”
He finally put her out of her misery, but their handshake was quick, almost nonexistent. I could understand why he didn’t want to be touched. I could also understand why he was polite. Public people were under constant scrutiny. Although the tabloids didn’t seem to bother him a single bit according to what I’d seen online. He didn’t mind the spotlight. He’d done it all and he’d done it in front of the cameras.
“What was your name again?” Jules refused to let it go. She was onto him.
“Dante,” he said matter-of-factly.
Her expression went from mildly surprised to shocked. “Ohmigod!” She shot me a wide-eyed glance. “Is this who I think it is? Dante Martinez?”
Unsure if she was talking to me or herself, I gave her a single nod and flicked my gaze over to him. He looked devastated. His eyes—dark, nearly black, with flecks of bronze when the sun hit them just right—were transfixed on mine and pleaded to get Jules off his back.
“I knew I’d seen you somewhere before. My husband is a huge fan.” She launched into a mad rave about how much Ross loved Dante’s guitar solos. Her breathy voice jumped up and down and her hands gestured wildly. There was some name-dropping and hip rolling. The woman couldn’t stay still for a second.
Dante took the verbal abuse like a trooper. Obviously, he had the experience.
“We should get a group photo before you guys go.” Jules finally revealed the real reason she’d been searching for me. “Would you like to come with us, Dante?”
Hesitant, he looked at me, then back at Jules. “Sure. I’d love to meet the band.”
Jesse Catchum who?
That was my first thought when Dante stepped into the dressing room. All twenty-something pairs of eyes shot at him as if he were the Second Coming. The stuffy air stood still and it was so silent I could hear my own heartbeat and the mad whooshing of my pulse in my ears.
“Look who I found!” Jules said in a sing-song voice, a shit-eating grin spread across her face. She was shamelessly taking the credit for discovering Dante and I didn’t have the guts to stop her, so I lingered off to the side and watched the awe settle in everyone’s gazes.
They lunged at him all at once. Teen zombies with admiration on their faces and hands outstretched with cell phones snap-ready. Ally was part of the flock.
“You came!” I heard her squeal.
“Would you like to be in the photo?” Jules asked Dante while trying to gather the parents.
“Thank you, but I’ll pass.” He shook his head and moved to the corner. Some of the guests, including the beer guy, trailed after him, wanting to get a spot next to the international rock star.
I noted a few unfamiliar faces coming in from the dressing room across the hallway. They were the members of Dead on Fire, the only band on the bill that was rumored to be in talks with an indie label. The news about Dante’s impromptu appearance spread faster than an outbreak of a deadly virus in an end-of-the-world movie. More people showed up at the door, but the security guard didn’t let anyone else in.
Disappointment momentarily crossed Jules’ features, but she managed to muster a smile and yelled, “Okay, everyone! We have ten minutes left. Let’s get a photo.”
Ross fussed with his Sony.
“Get in here, Camille.” She waved at me.
Reluctant, I squeezed into a narrow spot in the back row and willed myself not to stare at Dante as a sea of moving bodies cloaked him.
“Ready?” Ross shouted. “One, two, three.”
The camera flashed and clicked. He raised his finger in the air and urged everyone to stay still. As soon as the photo op was over, the kids grabbed their instruments and poured into the hallway.
I followed after them, my gaze trained on Ally.
Behind me, Jules, Ross, and a few more parents marched in tight formation. For a moment, I lost Dante while my mind was preoccupied with my kid. She’d done a few small talent shows at school but was mostly a closet musician up until last summer when Pauline had come up with the idea of forming a band. They’d faced some rough times at first—no one had wanted to play with two fourteen-year-olds—but everything had come together after Christmas.
My phone buzzed.
Harper: Where are you? Ally is about to go on.
I know. Come meet me backstage, I replied.
Ross rushed over to the front row with his camera to record the set. Jules pulled out her phone. Ally stood off to the side, her new guitar strapped over her neck. She ran through a few chords and mouthed some lyrics, her tiny nose screwed up in concentration. The rest of the guys seemed more at ease, as if this were just any other evening. Admittedly, Pauline and Trent had more experience with crowds. Though tonight’s audience consisted mostly of friends and family, it was still a nerve-wracking affair.
Ally was a lot like me. A loner who needed her space when under pressure. I knew she didn’t want to be bothered before the performance, but something inside me yearned to share this moment with her. She was my child, my blood, my most fascinating creation. A small piece of me, an extension of my dreams. Wanting to be there with her and bathe in her adolescent hopes was what a selfish part of me craved.
I pushed past a group of club employees and gave Ally a shoulder squeeze. “Break a leg, Bug.”
“Don’t forget about the video.” She glanced up at me through a black curtain of hair, and we swapped long, wired stares. I was just as tense as she was. Maybe even more.
“All right, I’ll leave you alone now,” I whispered. Trent’s friends were headed in our direction and something told me Ally didn’t want me around. “Go get ’em, tiger,”
“Thanks, Mom. Now go. Okay?” Rolling her eyes, she fiddled with the guitar strap and joined the rest of the guys.
Wrapped in a blanket of hammering noise, I stood near the line of speakers and watched the kids take the stage one by one. My phone was clutched in my hand. They did a quick soundcheck and tuned their instruments. Trent fumbled with the cymbals on his kit. Pauline adjusted the microphone. Mac, a senior who played bass and went to the same high schoo
l the girls did, hid in the corner. Round with long hair that concealed his entire face, he was the quiet one in the band. His father owned a small recording studio in North Hollywood and promised to help with the EP.
It seemed like ever since the girls had gotten together to play music, everything had moved too fast. Each minute felt like a second and I could hardly keep up with the changes my daughter was going through. The fact that she was about to record the songs she’d written with her friends in an actual studio blew my mind. At her age, I’d been a nerdy girl who spent most of her free time reading.
“We should watch it from the floor.” A voice near my ear cut through the rumble of the club.
His scent was unmistakable. The goosebumps that riddled my back told me my guess was correct when I turned and saw Dante’s face. His body aligned with mine, we were shoulder to shoulder, our feet almost bumping.
“You think?” I asked, dropping my gaze to the floor to make sure my heels didn’t get caught in the cables.
“The sound is better,” he explained while motioning at my phone. “Especially if you’re going to record.” Like Ally, he wore tall boots that were laced only at the bottom, as if he was in a rush to leave his house.
“Any chance you can talk my daughter out of wanting a tattoo?” I joked.
“I don’t know if I’m the right person to ask.” He was smiling, his gaze concentrated on the stage, arms crossed over his chest. “I can give it a shot if you want.”
I didn’t know what it was about Dante or how and why this man had gone from potential predator to a role model. I couldn't really pinpoint the exact moment my mind had done a one-eighty, but I no longer felt threatened. On the contrary, he was like a magnet. The combination of dark allure and absolute openness in front of all these parents intrigued me. My mommy radar wasn’t detecting any bad vibes either.
“But I have to warn you, I don’t have a lot of experience in that department,” Dante whispered.
“You mean children?”
“Yes.”
The lights dimmed and all eyes were on the stage.
“I was kidding,” I confessed. “I don’t think she’ll listen to you or anyone else.”
“Have you tried giving her money?”
“What?”
“Offer her money. Trust me. Works like a charm.” He turned his head to look at me and grinned.
Trent tossed up his drumstick and a collective whisper came from the audience. Ally was in the shadows, her guitar and makeup glittering beneath a stray streak of dancing stage light. I felt immense pride. My breath caught in my chest and my pulse roared.
I saw Harper in my peripheral.
“I’ve been looking for you all over, sweets!” unsteady, he shouted. His words slurred against a backdrop of anticipatory noise.
With a clumsy smile, I grabbed his hand and drew him closer. He was drunk, and under different circumstances, I would have been fine with that since he was still in denial over what had happened with Lucas, but the place was filled with teenagers and this wasn’t the best way to set an example.
“You okay?” I mouthed.
A gummy grin spread across Harper’s face. He flicked his gaze to Dante and whipped out his hand.
“Hi there! Big fan! My ex-boyfriend loves your solo work.”
Uh-oh. This can’t be good.
“This is Harper,” I explained, trying to steer the conversation away from the topic of cheating asshole Lucas Bail. “Ally’s godfather.” And my best friend who’d apparently had one too many drinks and was about to start embarrassing himself.
“Hi.” Dante shook his hand. “Very nice to meet you.”
“Ally adores the new guitar,” Harper said in a wistful voice. “Thank you for your g-generosity.”
“That guitar deserves a player like Ally. I think they’ll do a lot of great things together.”
As soon as he finished his sentence, Trent hit the drums and the stage came alive. There was no warning and no prelude. They jumped right into it, unleashing the madness onto the unprepared audience. I’d forgotten all about my phone and that I was supposed to record the set for Ally’s YouTube channel. Watching my fifteen-year-old daughter playing in front of other people filled me with unimaginable delight. She was a strange bubble of dark light and she put her heart and soul into every single note. I didn’t need a degree in Fine Arts to know she wasn’t just good. She was great. All those hours and hours of enduring her practice at home were finally paying off.
It took me a few moments to regain my composure, and by the time I remembered to turn on the camera, the song had passed the midpoint.
Harper clapped and bobbed his head to the beat and the audience was finally warming up to Pauline’s screams. She straddled the microphone stand and continued to work the shock factor angle.
I felt warm fingers slipping across my back, and Dante nudged me in the direction of a small walkway that led down to the main floor. We pushed our way through a group of cheering parents gathered in the corner and made our way to the center of the room.
Dante was right. The band sounded much better from here. To me, it was still just a bundle of noise, and I could hardly make out the lyrics, but I could hear the instruments now in their full force.
The song ended and a round of applause rolled through the club.
“Hey, all!” Pauline roared on stage. “We’re Systematic.” She went on to introduce the rest of the band while her father continued to snap photos. The camera flashed nonstop and I prayed to whoever was overseeing things upstairs that our kids didn’t go blind by the end of the set.
“They look great together, don’t they?” Dante said, leaning closer.
“They’ve been rehearsing for months,” I explained, turning to look at him.
“I meant Ally and her new guitar.” A smirk tilted his mouth.
“Oh.” I bit back my smile and gave him a nod. “They do, actually.”
He didn’t respond, but his dark eyes roamed my face.
“Do you do this a lot?” I asked.
“What exactly?”
“Check out high school bands?”
“No.” Dante shook his head. “Only if I like a band member’s mother.”
My cheeks flamed. He was so direct, it almost knocked me off my feet. My breath was suddenly stuck somewhere between my lungs and my throat and I felt completely naked under his gaze. No wonder the man changed girlfriends like socks.
Pauline was done with her speech and another blast of loud music poured from the speakers, erasing the uncomfortable tension that his words had created. I turned on the camera and raised my phone in the air to get a better view of the stage.
Silent, we stood side by side as I filmed the performance. Dante’s hands were buried in the pockets of his sweatshirt, and from afar, he probably looked much the same as all the fathers who were attending the show tonight. However, up close, he was just the opposite. He was a distant yet tangible idea of what fame could turn my daughter into.
The thought gave me chills.
When the second song ended, I shut off the camera and rolled my shoulders. Trying to stay still for three minutes while holding a phone had proved to be challenging, and with the way my brain was abuzz, I regretted not bringing some earplugs.
“Allow me?” Dante asked, motioning at the device.
“That’s okay,” I protested politely.
“We can switch,” he insisted. “And I’m taller. Ally will want some full-body videos, right?”
“Are you saying I’m short?” I laughed, refusing to give the man my phone.
“No. I’m saying that there’s a whole lot of hands and heads in your frame and you probably want to make sure she has a video of her solos.”
“Okay. You win.” I smiled and handed him my phone.
We alternated just as he’d promised. There was very little talking, but several fans attempted to strike up a conversation with him during the last song. Then as soon as the set ended, a group of peop
le swept him away.
“Did you get it?” Ally rushed over to me as I walked into the dressing room. The air here was stuffy, filled with remnants of adrenaline and the smell of sweat. There was hardly any space to breathe, let alone socialize, and I didn’t dare try to imagine how much worse it would be if my daughter were in an actual touring band.
“Yes.” I looked around, trying to figure out what was causing the racket I was hearing. Where’s your guitar?”
“Cal’s watching it.”
“You can’t just leave it like that.” I lowered my voice. “It’s worth more than my monthly mortgage payment.”
“You zoomed in when I was doing my solos, right?” Ally continued her interrogation as we moved past loud clusters of people.
I had to think about it because my head was still ringing from Pauline’s singing. Face split into a huge grin, she maneuvered her way through the crowd, chatting and laughing. I wondered how the kid could still talk after tormenting the club for thirty minutes straight.
“Mom? You zoomed in, right?”
I nodded, unsure of whether I was telling the truth.
“Dante saw me play?”
“Yes.”
“Did he say anything?”
“You were great, Bug.”
“He said that?”
“Killer set,” a voice to my right muttered. It belonged to the beer guy. Ignoring my presence, he shot Ally a lazy scowl, the kind I knew all too well. It was perfunctory, and men who didn’t care to put some effort into a smile didn’t make it on my list of those who deserved much attention. But sadly, teenage girls were impressionable and impossible to argue with.
What was his name? Brandon? Ah, yes. Braden.
“Thanks.” Ally’s chin went up and her shoulders straightened. She literally grew two inches right in front of me. “It’s cool you came. Wanna check out my new Les Paul?”
Two seconds later, my daughter was gone, and Jules took the liberty of squeezing into her spot.
“You need to meet Jesse.” She grabbed my hand and dragged me across the room. “He’s impressed.”
My memories of the “Sugar Sky” music video were vague. It’d been years since I’d heard the song, and if Jesse Catchum were to pass me on the street, I wouldn’t know who he was. Nothing about him stood out. Here in Calabasas, he was just another brick in the wall with his hipster beard, skinny jeans, and tobacco leather boots.