33. Away From the Table
Chapter thirty-three
Away From the Table
Dex
Four weeks in Chicago teaches me several important things.
One: Austin Fletcher considers “one more pass” a legally binding agreement to remain in a recording studio until somebody's organs begin shutting down.
Two: people who make multi-platinum albums are still just music nerds. They have bodyguards, nicer equipment, and assistants who bring them coffee, but they will absolutely spend forty-five minutes arguing about whether a snare sounds too emotionally secure.
Three: I am apparently very fucking good at writing songs for other people.
That one takes longer to accept.
Apparently I had proficiency in this shit the entire time and just assumed I was bullshitting the roll.
The first week, I'm positive everyone is going to figure out Austin accidentally invited a bartender from Denver into a professional writing room.
By week two, I'm arguing with Signal Saints' bassist over an instrumental arrangement like I pay rent there.
Week three, Austin hands me a lyric sheet at eleven in the morning and tells me the second verse sucks.
It does.
I fix it.
Then I rewrite half the chorus.
Then we lose six hours.
By the end of the month, I've written lyrics on two songs, contributed enough to several instrumentals that lawyers and publishing percentages are now involved, and somehow written an entire fucking song by myself.
Not a Grave Intentions song.
That's the weird part.
It doesn't sound like me fronting my band.
It sounds like Signal Saints.
Big.
Dirty.
Hooky as fuck.
The kind of chorus built for eighty thousand people screaming it back at Austin while pyro goes off behind him and some poor venue employee develops tinnitus despite following Ronan's recommended hearing-protection protocols.
Austin listens to the final demo three times.
Then looks at me.
“This is going on the album.”
I laugh.
He doesn't.
I stop laughing. “Like... theoretically?”
“Like unless the label commits an act of terrorism against good taste.”
“That feels dramatic.”
“It’s as if you don’t know me.”
Fair.
The song isn't guaranteed until there's an actual track list and contracts and all the music-business bullshit I have recently learned exists between I wrote a song and other humans can purchase the song.
But it's real enough that my name is already attached to it.
Dex Mercer—Writer.
Possibly songwriter on the next Signal Saints album.
Which is fucking insane.
Four weeks ago, I was worried I'd walk into that studio and discover I didn't belong.
Turns out I do.
That isn't even the most surprising thing I learn.
Number four is that Austin was right about something I didn't know he was teaching me.
Writing rooms are addictive.
Not performing.
Writing.
Building something from nothing with people who hear music differently than I do.
Writing a lyric for a voice that isn't mine.
Taking someone else's half-finished melody and finding the part it's missing.
Getting into an argument at ten-thirty at night because I know the song wants one thing and somebody else hears another.
I fucking love it.
Austin gives me names before I leave.
Artists.
Producers.
People who apparently sometimes need songs.
“Send me demos,” he tells me. “Not just Signal Saints shit. Write whatever comes out.”
“That sounds suspiciously like homework.”
“It is.”
“I'm thirty percent less interested.”
“You want to do this professionally or not?”
I open my mouth.
Then close it.
Because—
Yeah.
I think I do.
Not necessarily full-time.
Not necessarily in Chicago.
But more than I have been.
More sessions.
More writing trips.
Maybe other artists.
Maybe someday music pays enough that bartending becomes the thing I do sometimes instead of music being the thing I fit around bartending.
That possibility no longer makes me want to throw up.
Much.
The last thing Chicago teaches me is the one I didn't expect.
I don't want Austin's stage.
I like stages.
I fucking love stages.
Give me a microphone, four idiot bandmates, two hundred drunk people, and an electrical system that is probably violating at least one municipal code, and I am having an excellent night.
Even the charity show was incredible.
Walking onto a stage that size was like somebody injected adrenaline directly into my spine.
I would absolutely do it again.
Occasionally.
But watching Signal Saints live inside that machine for four weeks?
Security.
Paparazzi.
Schedules.
Interviews.
Hotel entrances.
Publicists.
Planning rehearsals and choreography for a tour for an album that hasn’t even been recorded yet.
Every performance planned down to a lighting cue while still somehow being expected to look spontaneous.
Austin belongs there.
I don't think I do.
Weirdly, figuring that out doesn't feel like admitting I'm not good enough.
Maybe that's growth.
Disgusting.
I belong in the room before the stage.
And then I want to go home and play Lair 47 with Grave Intentions because Cruz loses drumsticks and Mila occasionally forgets the set list and someone in the crowd will inevitably yell for a song we stopped playing three years ago.
Turns out my dream got bigger without needing to become shinier.
Rude.
I spend the entire flight home thinking about that.
And Micah.
Mostly Micah.
Potentially Micah's mouth.
Also his hands.
I didn’t go home that weekend.
A dinner with a producer was planned.
So it has been four weeks.
And I miss him.
I miss all of them.
This is a very thoughtful and emotionally complex flight.
Micah is waiting for me at baggage claim.
I see him before he sees me.
Black hoodie.
Black jeans.
Hands shoved into his pockets.
Hair longer than it was when I left because apparently four weeks is enough time for dramatic physical transformation.
Or I missed him.
Probably that.
Then he looks up.
His whole face changes.
Fuck.
Home.
I leave my backpack where it is.
Just abandon it directly beside the carousel like luggage no longer matters.
Micah takes three steps toward me before I reach him.
Then I'm in his arms.
No witty opening.
No smartass comment.
Nothing.
I just grab him.
He catches the back of my neck and kisses me.
Hard.
Not obscene enough to get us removed from Denver International Airport.
Close.
Someone walks around us muttering something homophobic.
I don't care today.
Micah finally pulls back.
His forehead rests against mine. “Hi.”
My throat does something stupid. “Hey, Sad Boy.”
His mouth curves. “Missed you too.”
I kiss him again.
Shorter.
Then look over his shoulder. “My bag.”
“You dropped it.”
“I got distracted.”
“No shit.”
It takes another fifteen minutes to collect everything.
In the car, Micah reaches across the console before we're even out of the parking garage.
I look down.
His hand is on my thigh.
I lace our fingers together, and neither of us says anything about it.
We hold hands almost the entire way home.
Sometimes intimacy is apparently extremely boring.
I love it.
“So,” Micah says eventually. “Was it what you thought?”
I look out the windshield. “No.”
His thumb moves over mine. “Bad no?”
“Opposite.”
I tell him about the song.
Not all of it.
He's heard pieces already through calls and texts.
But saying “Austin thinks it's making the album” while Micah is sitting beside me makes it real in a different way.
Micah smiles.
Not huge.
Micah doesn't really do huge unless somebody's bleeding and survives or Dex Mercer finally follows basic instructions.
But he’s obviously proud.
Fuck.
“I knew you'd be good.”
“That is deeply unhelpful now that I have evidence.”
He laughs.
Then I tell him the other part. “I don't think I want the stage.”
He glances over.
“I mean, I want a stage. Grave Intentions. Shows. Maybe guest stuff sometimes. But not…” I gesture vaguely. “That.”
“Austin's life.”
“Yeah.”
Micah nods.
No disappointment.
No but you could.
Just, “Okay.”
I look at him. “That's it?”
“What do you want me to say?”
“I don't know. Something inspirational. You had four weeks to prepare.”
He squeezes my hand. “You figured out what you want.”
“Gross.”
“Yeah.”
“I think I do want to write for people.”
“Then do that.”
I stare at him.
He glances over again. “What?”
“I love you.”
His face softens. “I love you too.”
“Still gross.”
“Definitely.”
We keep holding hands.
Cami hits me at approximately Mach three.
The front door isn't completely closed before she launches herself at me.
“DEX!”
“Jesus fuck—”
I catch her mostly because reflexes exist.
Her legs wrap around my waist.
Arms around my neck.
Mouth on mine.
I laugh into the kiss. “Hi, Dollface.”
She kisses me again.
Harder.
Behind her, Griffin is laughing.
Ronan is standing several feet away, which is probably wise considering the incoming-Cami problem.
“She has been watching your flight tracker all afternoon,” Griffin says.
“I was not.”
“You refreshed it like one-hundred times.”
“Why are you counting?”
“Because you were sitting beside me.”
I set Cami down.
She keeps both fists twisted in my shirt.
Like I might escape.
“Missed me?”
“No.”
“Convincing.”
Her eyes narrow.
Then she kisses me again.
Ronan approaches once the risk of airborne girlfriend appears to have passed. “Welcome home.”
He doesn't hug me.
I don't hug him.
I bump my shoulder lightly against his instead.
Intentional.
Visible.
His mouth curves. “Chicago was productive?”
“You have no idea.”
“I've received seventy-six text messages about it.”
“That seems low.”
“It isn't.”
Griffin gives me a quick one-armed hug and squeezes the back of my neck. “Good to have you back.”
Something catches under my ribs.
This fucking house.
I clear my throat. “Yeah, well. Try not to get emotional.”
Griffin releases me. “Wasn't planning to.”
“Good.”
Cami is still holding my shirt like a fucking lifeline.
Nobody says anything.
The house reunion lasts about two hours.
Food appears.
Apparently they ordered from my favorite burger place because everybody here is determined to make me develop emotions against my will.
I give them the condensed Chicago report.
Ronan asks actual questions about publishing rights.
Griffin wants to know whether I have a lawyer reviewing contracts.