17. Alone
Alone
Cam
They say the stage is always bigger in person, but nothing prepares you for the way a hundred thousand watts will turn your own reflection inside out.
The awards show floor was twice the size of the last venue and ten times the drama, a single stretch of LED risers running through the building like a racing stripe.
Camera cranes swung in slow, predatory arcs overhead. Every step you took had a price.
They lined us up for a run-through at eight a.m. sharp, and the second I hit backstage I knew we were in the big leagues.
Fifteen handlers in varying shades of slate and black, all acting like a crisis was already in progress.
The air tasted like rental fog. Stacks was doing squats in full glam, rhinestones glinting between strobes.
Skye was perched on an amp case, touching up her lipstick in her selfie cam.
And then there was Romi. Mic'd up, sitting alone on a high stool, hands in her lap.
In costume for the run-through: strapless, deep-brown shoulders and arms bare and shimmering with glitter, breasts straining against the top of the bustier.
Braids in a loose knot. One leg crossed over the other, a single stiletto tapping out a rhythm on the steel footrest. I tried not to look too hard. We both know how that went.
I weighed when it'd be safe to say hi. The answer was never, but old habits die hard. She'd asked for space, so I gave her a nod instead. She didn't look up, but her fingers stopped moving for half a beat. Long enough to let me know she'd seen.
The first run was a dry walk-through, no music, just blocking under the full blast of light while the director called notes from the booth.
"Three inches left, Cam." "Romi, the walk again.
" "Stacks, hit your mark." I ran a finger across my hairline, making sure the wig was flush, then flexed my jaw to see how it'd play in the monitors.
None of us talked. One foot in front of the other.
When they called lineup again, Romi ended up directly behind me, her presence straight heat against my back. The crew paused to re-mic her, makeup moving in, and she handled it. "Do what you need to do." No small talk. No thank you when it was done.
We held our finish for ten seconds. The house lights faded, the crew called "Clear," and we scattered.
"Take a picture, it'll last longer."
She wore an acid yellow hoodie with Devil May Care ironed on in lettering that looked as if it was melting, half-cut at her belly and matching bike shorts that hugged her wide hips so tight they could've been painted on.
If you were staring hard enough, you could see the gap between her waistline and the bottom of the hoodie.
She walked right up, no hello, and snagged a fry from the basket I'd smuggled out from craft services.
"Don't even pretend you weren't waiting for me," Skye said, popping the fry between her lips and grinning. "You set up camp by the fire exit and everything."
"I was just trying to not die of boredom," I said, scooting my bag across the bench. "You stalking me now?"
She slid in close, so our arms touched. "Maybe. I could think of worse hobbies."
The air was suddenly thick with the scent that always made my head swim—dragon fruit and syrupy underneath. I inhaled, regretted it, then did it again anyway.
Skye bent toward me, her voice pitched for private consumption. "You see how Stacks nearly ate it on the downbeat? That was hilarious. I need to put that shit in the blooper reel." She cackled, the sound bright and cruel.
I tried not to smile. "You're mean."
She shrugged, clearly pleased. "So are you."
She draped a leg over mine, casual as throwing on a jacket, and fished another fry from the basket. I pretended to care about my phone, but my skin was already humming, aware of every bit of skin-to-skin contact.
This was the problem with Skye. She never recognized a boundary as anything other than an invitation to breach.
"The way y'all keep clocking each other and then looking away? And every time you look back, she gets fascinated with the ceiling. It's cute." It was a grenade tossed over her shoulder with a wink.
"Akasha."
"Camryn." She made a face, mocking, skeptical but not mean. "I'm saying. It's giving middle school cafeteria energy. Like y'all need to clear the air, or get a room."
A quick flash, barely a second: The last time we "cleared the air" was at the photoshoot. That was literally how we got this mess right here.
"Romi and I are professionals. I'm sorry, are we not entertaining you, or—"
"Professionals?" Skye repeated, eyebrow raised. "Is that what they're calling it now?"
I side-eyed her, but she was leaning in closer. She tucked a loose strand of hair behind my ear, letting her knuckle linger on my cheek.
"You've got a little—" she started, then licked her thumb and wiped an imaginary smudge from the side of my mouth. "There. Fixed you."
I batted her hand away, trying to laugh it off, but it came out weird and jittery.
"Mm. I know that face. Gave me that face once upon a time." She shrugged, but held my gaze. "Romi's lucky. Or doomed. Jury's out."
I opened my mouth. Closed it. Nothing in there worth saying out loud. Skye was a door that only ever opened onto more Skye. I'd already walked out once.
Skye grinned, satisfied. "See? We still have chemistry."
Chemistry. That's what she always called it. Never connection, never anything that required her to fucking show up as a partner.
I wanted to tell her to fuck off, but the words got caught in the back of my throat. Skye was always like this—push, pull, then run laps around the emotional carnage. It had been our dynamic since day one. If there was a limit to her audacity, I'd never found it.
She watched me squirm for a second, then dropped the act, flopping back against the chair and stretching her arms overhead. "You're uptight today, Cam. Loosen up."
I muttered, "You're not the one getting grilled by a million-watt spotlight every time you speak."
She shrugged, unconcerned. "I like it. All those eyes on us. Makes it hotter."
There was that word again. Hotter.
I knew what she meant, but I also knew the other side—the nights when it burned too much, when it left nothing but scorched earth.
We sat in silence, the kind that isn't silence at all.
Skye picked at the fries, then started narrating a story about the time she got kicked off a morning show for telling the host his breath smelled.
I only half-listened, my mind busy replaying every time she'd crossed a line, every time I'd let her.
First time we hooked up backstage was at a festival, neither of us even pretending to be sober.
She'd grabbed my hand during a group photo, pulled me into the green room, and kissed me hard while I fucked her harder.
It was reckless, addictive, and totally unsustainable.
I told myself it was because we hadn't seen each other in years.
But the next morning, I texted her anyway.
Because that's what I did with her. Kept coming back for crumbs, convincing myself it was enough.
Then the last time, after I ended it for real.
After I found out about her fucking Bishop—who was more "masc," more what Akasha apparently needed when I wasn't performing masc enough for her.
Or she knew it would piss me off, knew the beef went so deep with us we kept it off the timeline to not embarrass Shiloh.
Hard to say which one was the real reason with her.
She called me "soft," and I called her "toxic," and we screamed at each other in the alley behind her friend's birthday party until I walked off.
Akasha didn't try to deny it. Just shrugged and said, "You weren't giving me what I needed."
There was this look in her eyes, like she'd been waiting for me to explode, to grab her, to pop off in a way that proved she mattered enough to wreck me. But I was tired of her shit at that point. So she trashed my place.
That one made the blind items buzz for a good minute.
Skye plucked my wrist. "You're in your head," she said, soft. "Come back."
I pulled away. "Skye."
She looked at me, surprised. "What? Not even a little fun?"
I shook my head, but my heart was thumping so loud I thought she could hear it. "I'm not trying to get into nothing right now. Especially not…this."
She grinned, unbothered. "I'm not just anyone, Cam. It's us."
That was the lie she always told, and the one I always believed. Until we ended up sneaking off on music video sets to hunch again to scratch the world's most annoying itch.
I looked up and peeped Romi staring at us from across the room.
Not trying to be slick about it. Straight up watching, as if we were some kind of lab experiment.
The second she caught me looking back, she turned away and crossed her arms, suddenly very focused on what the lighting guy was saying. Her whole posture went stone.
The look on her face, though? When I pinned the feeling down, it felt like being caught wrist-deep in a candy jar.
I wasn't doing anything wrong, was I? Skye's hand was warm on my knee, and suddenly it felt heavy.
Wrong. Evidence of a thing that made me want to offer explanations where they weren't needed.
I didn't know what I wanted from Romi. Approval? A different look? All I knew was that being seen with Skye's hand on my knee made guilt crawl up my neck faster than the heat did. For half a second, it was as if I'd torched a bridge I didn't know I wanted to cross.
When the PA came by to call us back to rehearsal, Skye stood and offered a hand to pull me up. I took it only because she wouldn't let go until I did. But my eyes went straight to Romi, who was walking away.
She squeezed my fingers hard. "See you on the riser, superstar."
Then she was gone, hips swaying as if she knew I was watching.
I watched her go, wondering why I felt her fingers on my skin, and why it made me want to crash out.