8. CHAPTER EIGHT #2
Zhari opened with the up-tempo run—chromeskin catching the lights in hot pink and silver, the crowd already screaming before she hit the first note. She crossed the stage as if gravity didn’t apply.
Hair whipping. Hips hitting the downbeat.
“Satellite superstar,” she sang. “Shining where you are—”
The dancers locked in behind her, sequins and platform boots flashing through sharp arm lines.
“Beaming from the sky like a neon avatar—”
Confetti cannons went off on the chorus. The whole place filled with glitter.
My pen moved across the page. I caught her mid-spin, one arm out and light threads flaring white. Then her outline against the crowd. Then her face from memory—
“Calling out your name through the radio waves…”
I looked up.
“Dancing in the dark like we’re lost in space…”
That part always shifted something. It was quieter, but not softer. Like she stopped performing for a second.
I kept drawing. That expression—eyes half-closed, mouth slightly open, as if she’d forgotten anyone was watching.
That was the one I kept.
I used to think I knew her—every line of her face, every angle of light on her skin—as if I could capture her if I just kept trying.
But the stage changed all the math.
She was motion and heat and gravity. She wasn’t something to draw anymore.
She was something that drew you in.
Even after so many of the same concerts, I couldn’t get tired of it. Not the spectacle, though that was unreal.
Her.
The way she changed up there. The way she gave everything to a room full of strangers and made it feel like it landed on you.
I’d drawn her a thousand times from screens, photos, and magazine spreads. Watching her live ruined all of it.
Nothing flat would ever be enough again.
The encore was chaos. She stretched the last chorus, pushing it longer than it should have gone, her voice rough at the edges. Lyn threw her head back behind the kit. The monitors clipped. The crowd got louder instead of burning out.
“Satellite superstar—don’t you fade away—”
They screamed it back at her.
Again.
Louder.
I closed my sketchbook and held it against my ribs. My pink butterfly clip had slid halfway down my hair while I was dancing earlier. I pushed it back up, tucked a curl behind my ear, and adjusted the straps on my jelly shoes where they had started to bite.
After the show, the loading dock was overcrowded. Venue staff were everywhere while gear was being loaded up. A sponsorship team was also there, walking around with clipboards and pointing at things.
Zhari got pulled into a debrief with Sira, and the usual post-show snack spot was occupied by stacks of speaker cases.
I drifted back through the bus alone, clutching a bottle of Space Raiders fizz. I hadn’t exactly planned on going to the viewing bubble. My feet just seemed to know the way.
The hatch was already open, and the interior was dark—a sign that it was empty.
Perfect.
I climbed inside, settled onto the curved bench, and watched the silent glow of stars drift by.
That was the thing about space. It didn’t care what you were carrying. You were just a small person drifting through it, hoping you mattered at all.
Everything kept moving, every second a new arrangement of light, and you’d never see the same sky twice.
I pulled out my sketchbook, opened it to a blank page, and just stared at it. My pen rested in my hand as I lost myself in thought, wondering if maybe this was all a dream.
Maybe I was in some sappy rom-com.
I could hear footsteps in the corridor below me, getting closer. For a second, I thought they’d pass by, but they didn’t.
The hatch lifted, and Zhari’s head appeared.
“Dune said you were up here,” she said.
Of course she did.
“Dune really needs to stop reporting my location.”
Zhari climbed in, brushing her hair out of her face.
“She worries.”
“I am not worried,” Dune said from somewhere in the walls. “I am simply monitoring.”
I rolled my eyes. “Good night, Dune.”
“Good night,” she said.
Then there was a pause, followed by a faint click that meant she had actually left—or wanted us to think she had. Nobody really knew.
Zhari settled onto the bench across from me, pulling her knees up as she settled the Nebs she had brought with her. She must have gone back to the room to shower and change, because she was wearing her favorite soft track pants and an oversized crew hoodie that said Cosmic Girlz Tour on the back.
Her hair fell loose, brushing her shoulders as if she’d just had a blowout.
“Wow, what a show,” she sighed.
“You were amazing, Zhar,” I beamed.
“Thank you. But you say that after every concert, my little noodle.” She rolled her eyes and smiled.
“This is true,” I said, “but I mean it every time.”
Zhari laughed beneath her breath. Her glow flickered faintly along her cheeks as she turned toward the viewport and then back to me.
“Well, thank you.”
“You’re welcome,” I said as my gaze dropped from her eyes to her lips.
“So, you have excellent taste in food and terrible taste in Earth music,” she said. “That playlist of human singers you made me made me cry last night.”
“That’s not terrible taste. That’s good taste. The crying is the point. It gets you all in your feels, you know?”
“The point of music should not be crying,” she said.
“On Earth, it is,” I said. “We love to cry. It’s our whole thing. We cry at songs, we cry at movies, we cry at bread. Remember?”
“The bread,” she said. “Still so weird to me that humans cry over baking or cooking.”
We both laughed, then let the moment settle into a comfortable silence. We leaned back and watched the stars glisten above us, saying nothing at all.
My sketchbook was still open on my lap, the blank page staring up at me.
“You are quiet tonight,” she said as she reached out and tucked a loose strand of my hair behind my ear.
“I’m thinking.”
“About what?”
About your hands. About the way you hand me drinks. About the scar on your thumb. About the fact that I asked you to wait, and you did, and you haven’t complained about it once. I don’t know if that makes you the most patient being alive or if you’re just very good at pretending.
About the fact that Lyn called my sketchbook a love letter today, and she wasn’t wrong. I don’t know what to do with that.
About the fact that I think about you—about us—every moment I can.
“Noodles,” I said.
“Noodles,” she repeated.
“Yeah. I was wondering if there’s a Nebs flavor I haven’t tried yet.”
She knew I was lying. I could see it in the way her eyes narrowed slightly.
“Ah, I see. Well, like I mentioned before, there are so many flavors. We will have to try them all. It could be a fun little challenge,” she said excitedly.
I smiled and closed my sketchbook, clipping my pink glitter gel pen to the front before setting it down beside me.
Looking back up at Zhari, I just stared.
She was so beautiful.
Zhari must have caught me staring because, without looking up from her noodles, she asked, “What?”
“I just think you’re beautiful, is all,” I said.
Her chopsticks stopped moving. She looked up at me and just smiled meekly.
“I’d like to kiss you,” I blurted out.
“Oh, you do? Well, good news, because I’d like to kiss you back.”
I smiled and leaned closer to her, setting my sketchbook down beside me.
My hand slid to the back of her neck, fingers weaving through her hair as I pulled her in. My lips brushed hers once before I kissed her.
She didn’t pull away. She set her noodles down beside her, then brought her hands to my face. She let out a low, breathy moan against my mouth, and her fingers trembled where they covered mine.
That broke me a little.
She’d been patient and steady, so sure all this time.