Chapter 1 #2
“I’m looking for real suggestions here, Harold,” Sigrún says. Through a bit of cyberstalking, I know she’s twenty-nine, only six years older than most of us, but she acts like our mum, sharp glares and all.
“How about Cubby Clark and the Bad Apples?” Harry tries again.
I flinch, mouth dropping into a sour frown. “Why my name?”
He shoots me a confused smile. “Because you’re our fearless leader, Cub.”
No. He’s wrong. So wrong. I used to be our leader.
There wasn’t a song or riff or key change I didn’t have an opinion on.
I organized gigs and accommodations and delegated anything else I was simply too exhausted to manage, but I led it all.
Now it’s hard to even get myself out of bed, let alone lead anybody anywhere.
“That’s the cheesiest name I’ve ever heard,” Kale sneers. We ignore him.
“Why not Darcy’s name?”
“Darcy Burton doesn’t have as lovely an alliteration,” she says, knowing what a sucker I am for the way words balance and bounce.
“I don’t think Cubby’s name should be front and center. We’re all equally contributing members here,” Kale presses.
“Right. Because you bitching and moaning from the corner about how miserable you are really adds a lot to our collective morale.” I don’t generally like being an asshole, but fighting with Kale is the only time I feel anything but blue lately, so I’ll take it.
“And you cursing out your ex into a microphone for hours on end is much better?”
“Oh, bugger off, you cabbage. No one asked you.”
“Would you both shut up?” Sigrún barks, rubbing her temples. “I’m sick of this incessant bickering.”
“Sorry, Sigrún,” we mumble, looking down at our shoes.
“Don’t be sorry, just knock it off. This isn’t some open mic night at a shithole bar.
You all pursued a music career because you apparently wanted one, so start acting like it.
” Sigrún’s piercing gaze sweeps across us once more.
“Right. Now that’s settled, I’m going to pick a name and you’re all going to shut your mouths about it.
” She looks around for a moment, eyebrows furrowed.
Her attention locks on the mugs of stale tea.
She snaps her fingers and points at it. “Tea Time Tantrum. That’s your new name. ”
“Oof,” Harry whispers from the corner. “That’s…”
“A bit shit, innit?” Darcy mumbles back from her spot next to him.
“It’s a fitting description of you,” Sigrún replies dryly. “It’s all you seem to know how to do. Lord knows you haven’t been making any music.”
While we have some home-recorded demos from the last few years up for streaming, we don’t have anything professionally produced, and nothing without Connor credited.
We’re in a mad dash to get a song out while we’re still benefiting from his betrayal.
This isn’t at all a horrifically bitter pill for me to swallow and doesn’t eat me alive every night as I try to go to sleep.
“Good,” Sigrún says, absorbing our silence. “Glad that’s sorted. Now let’s focus on the other elephant in the room. How is the new song coming?”
“Really great, thanks,” I lie. Kale snorts.
“Can I hear it?” Sigrún asks, arching an eyebrow.
“Sorry, what now?”
“The song that’s going really great. Can I hear it?”
It doesn’t exist. “Still not finished,” I reply, chewing on my lip.
“I don’t care.” She waves her hands. “Play me what you have so far. I can help brainstorm where to take it.” Kale lets out another snort, and I’m seconds away from personally stripping the strings from his precious violin and strangling him with them.
I’m frozen, Harry’s eyes fixed on me, Kale’s smug grin burning into my cheek, Skull’s … well, Skull is in his own world at the moment, where he tends to primarily exist, balancing a drumstick on the tip of his long finger.
Darcy’s phone beeps, and she fishes it out of her pocket, murmuring a “Sorry” as we all turn to look at her. She glances at the screen, and her sharp intake of breath ripples across the room.
“What’s wrong?”
Darcy shakes her head, shuffling backward as she looks at me. “I—No. Nothing. Nothing at all … I…” She collides with the soundproof wall, a small grunt tumbling from her full lips.
“What are you on about, Darce?” Harry asks, closing in on her with me.
She clamps her mouth shut, shaking her head like a wild thing, shooting out waves of panic that we all feel. “Nothing. I swear,” she squeaks, phone clenched to her chest.
I narrow my eyes, then grab for her phone, but Darcy knows my tricks, her palm pressing squarely against my chin as she pivots away, my hand accidentally slapping her tit. She lets out a squawk of surprise, and I duck under her arm, only to be met with her elbow near my eye.
“Cubby, stop it,” she hisses, trying to roll away along the wall.
I stick out my foot, our calves twisting together until we tip into a jumbled mess against the ground.
We squirm for a few more seconds, arm wrestling for the phone until I take a cheap shot and tickle the soft skin between her shoulder and jaw, a spot I know is incredibly sensitive.
Her hands dart to her throat in protection, and I snatch up the phone, tapping in her passcode and squinting at the screen.
Connor’s face glows back at me, black hair the perfect mix of styled and disheveled, green eyes glinting with mischief yet somehow also looking desperately bored. One corner of his mouth is tipped up, the hint of a dimple making his smirk just approachable enough that it’s dangerous.
Dickhead.
I scroll to the headline, heart sinking like a stone in water as I read.
SPECIAL GUEST: CONNOR MCCABE!
Connor McCabe, overnight musical sensation, is making a surprise appearance on Evenings with Evening where he’s slated to debut a new song and offer up a few hints at the album he’s rumored to be releasing any day now.
Connor went viral after his first single “can’t bear it” dropped, the internet buzzing over his angsty sound and unarguably gorgeous appearance in a simply shot black-and-white music video.
But what really fueled the frenzy was the plethora of hidden messages in the lyrics.
In the age of social media, almost any couple has the potential to become global gossip if the drama is juicy enough, and Connor’s coded references to former girlfriend and bandmate, Cubby Clark (lead singer of a band that apparently doesn’t have a name), has everyone intrigued, his use of intricate Easter eggs creating a storm of excitement and guesswork online.
Okay, I literally just threw up in my mouth.
It is a musical hate crime to offer any praise to lyrics like “Tease me up, wear me down / Promised paradise didn’t feel that nice / You’re an empty vase with a pretty face.
” It doesn’t take a genius to pick up that he’s speaking of my apparently disappointing vagina, pop culture sleuths requiring all of four seconds to decode that hidden meaning.
High fives to all the brainiacs who took the time to tag me in their revelations.
“Cubby love, leave it. He doesn’t matter,” Darcy says, reaching around me to try to grab her phone, her chest plastered against my back. We’ve been here so many times before, Connor slicing me open and Darcy trying to hold the edges of the wound closed.
“What’s going on?” Sigrún says in a clipped tone, snatching the phone from me. Her eyes flick across the screen, Harry and Kale coming up behind her to read. I don’t bother checking on Skull. I’m sure he’s still fully engrossed in his stick.
Sigrún lets out a deep sigh, closing her eyes and tapping the corner of the phone against her forehead.
“I’m sorry, Cubby,” she says, rolling her neck, then fixing her weary gaze on me, “but we’re going to have to watch.”