chapter 2
Sebastian
LAS VEGAS IS HOT AS fuck. The sun went down hours ago, but the air still feels dry and scorching, like sand is blasting down my throat every time I take a breath.
Even though it sucks, it’s pretty sick too.
The energy in Vegas is electric. We’ve played so many venues that I probably couldn’t recall half of them. But I’ll remember this one: the Sin City Sound Festival, a two-day event with tons of big-name artists. And Loaded God Complex landed the sweetest spot of all.
Saturday-night headliner.
It’s just after eleven when we prepare to step onto the main stage. Heat radiates up from the stage and into my sneakers, and I draw an arm across my forehead. I’m already sweating, and I haven’t even pulled out my drumsticks yet. This is going to be a hell of a show.
Beside me, Dex has his arms by his sides, wearing a tank revealing the tats covering his skin. And when my gaze dips down to his left hand, I still feel surprised to see the ring there.
He’s not even married yet, but he’s been wearing a ring since he proposed to Nora.
That’s how obsessed he is with her. If someone had told me last year that he’d been engaged to a shy violinist with a cat and a gaming hobby, I would’ve asked if they were drunk.
Guess that’s what love does to you—not that I’d know, being the only single one in the band.
Lucas and Michael are behind us.
Lucas rolls his shoulders once, his jaw tight, his shaggy blond hair falling into his eyes.
He’s letting it grow out, but I think it just makes him more irritable than usual.
He’s got that look in his eyes that he gets before a show—half tense, half bored, like a snake deciding whether it wants to strike.
And Michael looks calm, as always. He glances down at his phone, then types a quick message before silencing it and sliding it into his pocket. Probably texting Jordan, his wife. None of the ladies came with us this weekend; they weren’t stoked about a Vegas show in the summer.
A stage manager gives us the signal, and onstage, the lights change, swirling in a dizzying dance against the blue-black Vegas sky.
The crowd roars, even before we step onto the stage. Their screams vibrate through the metal scaffolding and up through my legs, rattling my bones, making my blood course fast through my veins. At my sides, I flex my fingers, already imagining the feel of my drumsticks, the pedal beneath my foot.
Ever since the beginning, since we were nobodies playing in shitty clubs and bars in LA, this has been my favorite part: the moment before we walk out, where every breath feels suspended, like the moment of weightlessness at the very top of a roller coaster. And I love this fucking feeling.
Dex glances back at me, his pale eyes and lip ring illuminated by the lights, and offers me his fist. I bump it, then turn and do the same to Lucas. It’s our ritual, a preshow tradition since the very beginning.
Dex bounces on the balls of his feet, the chain he wears around his neck thumping against his chest as he rolls out his neck.
“Let’s do this shit, boys,” he says.
Then he explodes through the curtain and onto the stage, and the sound that erupts is deafening, tens of thousands of voices rolling across the desert.
I follow behind him, breathing in the heat and the dust. It’s gritty on my tongue, and it reminds me of the beach back home, where I like to surf.
In the distance, the Strip glitters, casting light for miles all around.
I move to my drum kit and settle onto my stool, then pick up my drumsticks, twirling them a few times, warming up my fingers and wrists. A bead of sweat slides down my spine before I even hit the kick.
The crowd chants our name.
“LGC! LGC!”
Dex, Lucas, and Michael have their instruments slung across their bodies, and I can see they’re already sweating too, their skin shining under the lights.
After this, I’m going to need the longest shower ever known to man. Then another one for good measure.
“Fuck, Vegas,” Dex says into the mic, his voice echoing out over the crowd, causing them to scream some more. “What the fuck are you all doing out here? Don’t you know this is the desert?”
A wave of laughter rumbles through the crowd, and he glances back at me. That’s my cue.
I twirl my sticks again, and my lips pull up into a smile. Then I lift my arms, striking the sticks together to count us in.
Four. Three. Two. One.
My first kick hits like a gunshot, sending adrenaline straight into my chest and bursting through my veins.
The sound rolls out over the desert, and the crowd surges, their hands lifting into the air, like we’re some old-world gods they still worship, complete with sweat and dirt and screams.
Guess we are called Loaded God Complex.
My smile gets a bit bigger.
Our opening song is “Last Night.” Lucas and Dex launch into the first riff, their guitars screaming against the night. Michael’s bass meets my drums, the two of us providing the spine of the song, the foundation everything else stands on.
All it takes is a few measures, and I can already feel myself drifting away, getting lost to the music. My heart becomes the drum, and there’s no longer any separation between the music and me. I couldn’t extract it from my soul even if I tried.
The lights strobe across the crowd in bursts of blue and white, illuminating screaming faces, homemade signs, and raised phones. But to me, it’s a blur. It’s the music I’m here for. Not the crowds, not the fame, not the money—though it sure doesn’t hurt either.
My arms get warm as I drive the tempo harder, sweat already dripping from my chin and onto the snare. In most of the pictures and videos from our shows, I’m a sopping-wet sweaty mess, and tonight’s going to be even worse than usual.
So, during our third song, I strip out of my tank, use it to wipe my face, and then fling it into the crowd. Hands snatch at it, and one woman shrieks in victory as she grabs it out of the air. I laugh and strike the snare to the sound of screams.
By the end of our show, Michael’s the only one with his shirt still on. He’s like our dad that way: always the grounded one, never caught up in the whirlwind of things. Though I wish he’d let loose sometimes. He’s a fun motherfucker when he lets himself go.
We close with “Ghost,” our single from last year.
Nora’s not here to play it with us, which sucks balls, because she’s rad on an electric violin.
The crowd sings the song along with Dex, their voices drifting out into the night, always sounding a beat behind: “I let her slip away, too scared to face the truth. Now I’m haunted by her absence in this lonely fuckin’ youth. ”
I hit the cymbal with a final crash, and fireworks explode from behind the stage, sending bursts of red and gold arcing through the night sky.
For a single second, it feels like this entire city belongs to us. And I wish I could live inside that single second forever.
“Thank you, Vegas,” Dex says into the mic. “Good night!”
I stand from my drum kit, and my eyes go to a man in the front row, holding a kid on his hip. She has bulky rainbow headphones on, and her eyes are wide, glittering in the stage lights, like she’s already got this life in her veins.
Grinning and sweating like mad, I jog across the stage, then reach out across the security space between the stage and the crowd to offer the man my sticks.
He looks shocked, like I’m playing a joke on him.
But he finally wraps his free hand around them, and I bump his fist with mine. His kid smiles.
Then, shirtless and riding a high only the stage can give me, I slip through the curtains and into the darkness backstage.
The crowd is still rumbling, but it fades as I follow the guys into the production tent back behind the main stage. Industrial fans blast cool air around the space, and I immediately prop myself in front of one, sighing as the sweat on my skin finally dries.
“Dude,” Lucas says. “You reek.”
I just lift my arms higher, letting the fan cool my pits.
One of the assistants hands me a towel and a bottle of electrolyte water, and I give her a smile that makes her cheeks red.
Then I mop my face dry, twist the cap off the bottle, and down the whole thing in a few swigs—the way I used to drink beer when I was younger and just a little bit stupider than I am now.
A vibration in my pocket catches my attention at the same time Michael says, “That was a hell of a show.”
Lucas and Dex turn their attention toward him as I fish my cell from my pocket and glance at the screen.
Dad.
The high I was riding drains out of me so fast that it makes me dizzy, sobering me up about as fast as a funeral.
He knows I have a show tonight. Or maybe he forgot. It wouldn’t be the first time.
Maybe he’s calling to ask how it went. But more likely, I’m an idiot for even thinking that’s a possibility—eternal optimist and all that shit.
Phone in hand and the damp towel wrapped around my neck, I step out of the tent and into the dry Vegas air. My thumb hesitates over the screen—my dad is always such a buzzkill—but I know he’ll just be more pissed off at me tomorrow if I don’t talk to him tonight.
I take a steadying breath, then tap the screen and lift the phone to my ear.
“Hey, Dad.”
“Sebastian.”
There’s no warmth in his tone. You’d think I’m his accountant or something.
Actually, he probably likes that dude more than he likes me.
In the background, I hear glass clink against a tabletop, and a television is playing low, so I can only hear the gentle buzz of voices. “You play yet?”
One of my brows arches up in surprise. So, he did remember. One point to the old man.
“Uh, yeah.” A couple sound techs walk by me, glancing in my direction, and I move around the far side of the tent, where I take a seat on some big rolling box with wheels. “Just finished.”
“You boys doing okay?”
Ah.
Immediately, I know what’s coming. Dad never asks about me or anything in my life unless he needs something. Hell, it’s one of the only reasons he calls.
But for some reason—some stupid reason—I keep picking up, like I expect something to change. Turns out, it never does.
“Yeah, we’re good,” I say, not letting my disappointment bleed into my voice.
“Good.”
I nod in the darkness. I could probably have a less stilted conversation with my skateboard.
“What about you?” I ask. Then I wait to hear his excuse. He always has one.
“Not too good.” He takes a sip of something, then clinks the glass down again. “Truck’s actin’ up. Took it to the mechanic. Transmisson’s goin’ out. It’s gonna cost an arm and a leg to get it fixed.”
Of course it is.
My stomach squeezes as I tip my head back to look at the sky. Out in the desert, you’d think the sky would be a blanket of stars, but Vegas’s lights drown it all out. I still know they’re up there, though, even if I can’t see them.
“How much to fix it?” I ask, barely resisting the urge to sigh.
He tells me. And it’s not that it’ll inconvenience me; it’s that I feel more like an ATM to him than his only son.
“I wouldn’t ask if I didn’t need it,” he says, using that voice that he’s used since I first came into money, the one that invites me to pity him, even if I know he doesn’t deserve it.
Pulling my gaze from the starless sky, I swallow hard. Infusing my tone with a lightness I don’t feel, I say, “I’ll take care of it.”
“That’s my boy.”
I’m not sure if that makes other sons feel good; it just makes me feel used.
After that, he ends the conversation quickly. When we hang up, I’m left sitting there alone, listening to the distant rumble of the crowd leaving the grounds and the crew scurrying to start packing shit up.
With a sigh, I pull up my banking app and make the transfer into Dad’s account. I get confirmation that it’s being processed, then slip the phone into my pocket and scrub a hand down my face.
“Yo, Sebastian.”
I glance to the left, and Lucas is standing around the corner of the tent, his figure silhouetted against the bright lights still illuminating the concert grounds.
“You hiding out back here?”
“Nah.” I flash him a quick smile and run a hand over my buzzed head. “Just needed air.”
I don’t think he buys it. But he doesn’t mention it. Instead, he says, “Let’s go out. I wanna party.”
Briefly, I fight a battle with myself. Eating an entire pizza and falling into a hotel bed sounds amazing right now. We’ve gotta be on our plane back to Cali at seven, so going to bed would be the responsible thing to do. But my blood is still humming from the show.
And I don’t really want to go back to a quiet hotel room alone.
So I say, “Yeah, sure.” Then I slide off the box and stride toward him, stealing the beer can from his hand and taking a big swig, ignoring his burst of curse words. “But first, a shower.”