timbre in his voice resonated with me, almost familiar, and I regretted my flippant sarcasm.
Before I could repair my social missteps, the lights faded again, and the girls near the stage screamed in anticipation. A spotlight hit the mic, and Micah unceremoniously took the stage. He strummed a few notes and broke directly into a song everyone knew. The girls up front sang along, swaying and trying to out-do each other in their excitement.
Adam twisted around and watched me, eyebrow raised. Maybe he expected me to sing along, too. I raised an eyebrow back and mouthed the words along with Micah. Wouldn’t want to disappoint him. Finally, Adam straightened up to watch the performance, ignoring me for several songs.
Micah performed another well-known song, then a new one, introducing each with some casual-seeming banter. I knew he planned every word he said onstage, but the stories he told were no less sincere for that. He controlled his stage presence like a pro.
Before the fourth song, he announced, “This next song requires some assistance. If you would all encourage my sister, Eden, to come join me, I’m sure she’d hop up here and lend me a hand.”
The audience applauded on cue. As my feet hit the floor, Adam’s eyes narrowed and then opened wide as he did the math. I curtsied and left him behind to climb up onstage to perform—Micah’s support vocals once again. Micah strummed a chord, and I hummed the pitch. Then he began to play the song, a beautiful ballad about a man with an unflagging devotion to a woman. The ladies in the front row ate it up. Micah knew I got a kick out of performing, and I suspected he asked me up so I could live his musician life vicariously.
When the song ended, I headed back to the anonymity of my stool. The hard-core fans all knew who I was, but if they weren’t pumping me for information about Micah, they didn’t pay much attention to me. There was a fresh beer waiting, and I nodded to Adam, appreciative. He winked and faced forward to listen to Micah. That was the extent of our conversation until Micah performed his last encore and the lights came back up.
Then he turned back. “You were right. He’s very talented.” He tilted his head. “But you held out on me. Your opinion was a little bit biased.”
“I was telling you the truth,” I deadpanned. “I am his number one fan.”
“You two look nothing alike. I’d never have guessed.”
“We have a crazy mix of genetics.”
As we chatted, the area behind us, near the merch table, filled up with people waiting for a chance to talk to Micah, get an autograph, or take a picture with him. The lady with the cat-hair cookies had nabbed the first place in the amorphous line. I scanned the rest of the crowd and discovered that Tobin had lost his bet. A pair of teenage boys holding guitars stood on their toes, trying to get a glimpse of Micah over the heads of the other fans, but he hadn’t come out yet. They were most likely fans of his edgier rock band, taking advantage of the smaller venue to meet him, pick his brain about music, and have him sign their guitars. They’d still be competing with at least thirty people for Micah’s time.
If I wanted to go home with my brother, I’d be hanging out a while. I could still catch a train back to New Jersey, but Micah’s place in Brooklyn was closer. I decided to stay. It had nothing to do with the cute guy paying attention to me. I just didn’t want to navigate Manhattan alone and drunk.
Adam leaned in and asked, “So what do you do? Are you a musician, too?”
“Actually, no. I’m a biochemist.”
“Finding cures for Ebola?”
That caught me off guard, and I snorted. “No, nothing like that.” I didn’t know what to tell him about what I actually researched, so I half-lied. “My company’s developing a perfume.”
“What’s it like?”
I scooted over. “I’m wearing it. Can you smell it?”
He met me halfway, eyes dilating black. I knew I shouldn’t be flirting. He didn’t appear to meet a single one of my criteria and, in fact, actively ticked boxes from the “deal-breaker” list. I didn’t want to lead him on only to have to give him the heave-ho in the next thirty minutes.
He took my hand and kept his dark eyes on mine as he lifted my wrist up to