6. Tom Cobalt #2
“Our band.” Phoenix swallows a bite of egg.
I drop my silverware on the table. Hunger evicted from my body. “I’ve had that name since I was fourteen.”
He washes down his food with iced coffee. “Technically, you’ve had it since birth. It’s your name. Your middle name.”
I nod repeatedly. “Thank you for demonstrating the importance. And you want to change it because?”
“Because we’re a two-person rock band, and I’ll forever be known by your middle name.”
“You’re welcome.”
He drops his silverware now. “Tom.”
“Phoenix,” I snap. “Non-negotiable.”
He laughs. “You were about to lick my boots.”
“Over an NDA. A document. A piece of fucking paper. Not my legacy.”
“Jesus Christ.” He picks his fork back up, but it hovers over his plate. “If you want the name that badly, then give me something.”
“What do you mean?” I frown. “Is this like Medieval Europe? You want the rights to my firstborn?”
“Man, you are so dramatic.”
“I’m dramatic?” I point at my chest. “You just made a whole display of flying to fucking Australia to give me space.”
He rubs his pouty pink lips back and forth. Is he trying to restrain a grimace or a smile? “Fine.”
“Fine,” I nod, but I feel out of breath like I’m being chased. “And just a reminder, I’m a Cobalt. I come from drama. You haven’t even met my brother.”
“Don’t you have like ten of those?”
“Four. And I meant Eliot.” I wait for him to ask me more. Most people would be dying for details. I don’t even know why I’m itching to share them, and it comes as a complete pie-to-my-ego when Phoenix dodges over the topic.
“There’s only two of us in this band,” he says. “We don’t have a mediator. We can’t call Jere every time we have a fight. This has to be a collaboration or it’s not going to work.”
I agree with that. “So you want quid pro quo,” I say. “You get something. I get something.”
“Exactly. We compromise.”
“Seems fair.”
“Great, so we’re adding synths and tracks to our live setup.”
It’s not a question. It’s not even an ask. Blood rushes out of my body. “Hell no.”
He growls. “Tom, we just went over this—”
“The Carraways is an emo punk-rock band. We don’t play synth.”
“We’re only two people. We don’t have the manpower to do this without synth pads and backing tracks.”
I think about one of the most successful two-person bands of all-time. “The White Stripes used to play live without backing tracks.”
“I don’t want to be The White Stripes. Our sound could be more complex live if we don’t limit ourselves. Look, I’m not saying we have to use tracks for the bass. You can still use a pedal to drop the octave on your guitar. It can mimic a bass when we need it, but there’s more we could do.”
I grind my jaw, feeling emotion sputtering through me. I’m trying not to cry because fucking hell, I cannot shed a rare sad tear in front of Phoenix St. Pierre. He’s too hot, and he’s called me a “nepo baby” too many times for me to fuel that insult.
It must be obvious though that this is hitting me hard because Phoenix isn’t slinging any snide comments my way.
I find my voice to respond. “What if we could try to figure out a way to do it without the synth?”
“Even if we could, it’s my demand in exchange for the band name. I want synth pads.”
I wince. “You like pop music?”
“Some pop music. Yeah, I do. And you can be all purist about your punk rock, but obviously something isn’t working. Your EP is good, but it didn’t chart.”
My muscles are tight. My stomach uneasy. I stare at the waffle, feeling like someone took a spatula and splatted me face-down on hard cement. “This has been my band for seven years,” I tell him. “It’s been your band for one day. Change is going to feel different for me.”
“I know it’ll be harder for you,” Phoenix acknowledges at least. “But this is a process. And there are going to be just as many concessions I make. The name of the band is not a small thing, Tom. I’m literally adopting your middle name into my life.”
“Yeah, I know…just…let me mourn.” I take a bite of waffle, and it goes down thick.
He kneads at the edges of his eyes. “What’s significant about Wednesdays?”
Another gut punch, but this one is filled more with confusion than despair. “Dude. You don’t know about Wednesdays?”
He glares. “Other than it’s the most hated day of the week.”
“That’s so not true.”
“It’s literally called hump day because it’s an obstacle.”
I touch my chest. “It’s my favorite day.”
“It’s the day you jerk off, then.”
Holy shit. He says that without even blinking. He’s serious. “You think I marked the days I masturbate on the calendar? Seriously?”
He’s so over this conversation. His eyes pinpointed in a scowl. “I don’t know, Tom. You tell me.”
“Happy to.” I sit more upright. “First, I jerk off more than once a week. Second, maybe you need to brush up on my family’s Wiki page.”
“I’m not doing that,” he snaps.
“Fine,” I snap back. “Your loss. Just trying to avoid these awkward conversations, dude.”
“This isn’t awkward for me.” His voice is deep confidence.
Oh my fuck. Why is he like this? I’ve never been verbally volleyed so hard that I feel like someone just spiked a ball in my face. “Cool,” I say. “I guess we’ll be having more of these then.”
“Just explain it, man.”
I sigh out. “It’s called Wednesday Night Dinner. No, you aren’t invited. You’ll most likely never be invited. It’s something I’ve done since I was little, and they’re secret and exclusive.”
“So it’s a dinner party?”
I grimace. “It’s more than a dinner party—but I can’t explain it. Okay, it’s secret.” Wow, how did I just sound like I was seven years old telling a playmate he can’t come to my secret hideout. I’m roasting.
“Jesus Christ.” He groans, and his phone buzzes on the table. He shuts it off without even looking at the screen.
I stare at it. “You have enemies or something?”
“Roommates.” He pauses for a weighted second. “Who are also the members of Nothing Personal.”
Fuck me. “What?” I cringe.
He slides a hand through his hair, then lets his fingers fall to the table. “I live with the band.”
“My rival band.”
“No offense, but they don’t think of The Carraways that way.”
My brain almost can’t reason with this. Not when I’ve considered Nothing Personal my adversary for years. “You’re telling me your brother, the drummer of Nothing Personal, doesn’t hate me? I don’t believe that.”
“Okay, yeah. My brother hates you. But the others don’t.
They just think you’re an idiot for not hiring Birdie as your drummer when you had the chance.
They’re the ones who benefited from your dumb decision.
” He daggers his eyes on me. “And they’re right, it makes zero sense. Why didn’t you hire him?”
Holy shit, I cannot admit that I found his little brother so attractive that I didn’t want him in my band. “The timing was wrong,” I lie. My only lie to Phoenix St. Pierre, I promise myself.
“Is that why you called him years later?”
“You know about that?” I’m dying under his intense brown-blue gaze.
“That he asked you to beg him? Yeah, I know.”
My voice is caught on a laugh. “And you think I’m the egomaniac. Maybe look at your fucking bloodline, dude. And I didn’t do it. For. The. Record.” I pound my finger on the table for each word. “No begging was had.”
He arches his brows. “You want that in writing for your future progeny? Let them know their dad didn’t drop to his knees.”
“Please and thank you.” I’m out of breath as I fork my waffle.
Phoenix watches me before he says, “Nothing Personal doesn’t view you as competition. That’s a good thing.”
I wince. It still stings to hear. “I don’t see how.
And I take great offense to you saying I’m in a one-sided rivalry with your brother’s shitty band.
” I want to bring my hands to my face and careen forward, but I force myself to stay somewhat professional and not have a complete meltdown.
“How is this even going to work? You’re living with the enemy. ”
“We focus on ourselves. Again, we aren’t competing with them.” His phone vibrates again. He flips it over this time to look at the screen. “Shit.”
“What?” I frown.
Phoenix scrolls on his phone for an agonizing five seconds. “I only told my brother I joined The Carraways, but I’m guessing he just spilled the news to the rest of Nothing Personal.”
“You just said I’m not competition to them. So they won’t care, right?”
He seems uncertain about it. “I didn’t think they would…” He stands up from the booth, phone in his grip. “Your schedule. Don’t forget to resend it to me without the black boxes. Or at least, let me know which family functions I can attend with you.”
“Yeah, sure.”
He’s on edge as he starts texting. “And I’m sending you money for breakfast.”
I roll my eyes. “It’s on me.”
“This isn’t a date, Tom.” That’s all he says before grabbing his black jacket and leaving the booth. My muscles have not untwisted at that exit note.
This isn’t a date, Tom. Did he think that I thought it was one?!
Fuuuck. I lace my hands on my head and try not to sink down. I don’t even know if he’s into guys. No, he’s definitely straight.
I’m clocking it right now.
My phone pings with a notification from him through a money app. He sent me his share for breakfast and in the memo line he put a single emoji.
The middle finger.