was helping. Helping me to see all the lies I’d been telling myself over the years, to fool myself into believing that I was doing better whenever I really wasn’t. Now, I told myself I was living a normal life because I left my house a few days a week and I saw other humans regularly. But really, I’d just swapped the controlled one-man environment of my home studio for the controlled ten-or-so-man environment of Little Black Hole studio.
The album had kept me busy enough that I didn’t need to think much about that. So I could just keep deceiving myself. And the album had turned out incredible. But now that it was done, I kept second guessing if every little thing was perfect. Basically, I was driving everyone crazy—except Summer, maybe. She’d seemed to appreciate, and defend, my perfectionism, at first.
But now even she was telling me that I needed to let it go. That I was overdoing it.
The songs don’t need to be perfect, she’d say. They need to be authentic.
She was right.
The band members were anxious to get the album out to the world. Like yesterday. Brody had given it a thumbs up. And the band had brought in a few other close, trusted friends to listen to the album. A few days ago Summer’s best friend, Elle Delacroix, had come to listen with Seth Brothers. Earlier today we’d had Ash’s best friend, Dylan Cope, and Zane Traynor in here to hear it.
Everyone loved it.
At this point, we were actually ahead of schedule. Production on the album had gone smoothly, and everyone had brought their A game. I knew I was just trying to delay things because I was scared. Scared of the album release.
And of what would happen next.
Terrified of the release party that I knew everyone was silently expecting me to show up at.
It wasn’t the crowd that was the problem, exactly. It was being looked at, talked about. The reclusive freak. It was the fear of not being able to handle it. Of freaking out, losing control. Of having a meltdown like the one I’d had on my birthday—in front of so many people.
Taylor.
When she texted me, a couple of weeks ago, to say maybe she’d see me there, and I told her I wasn’t going… I’d never felt more like a failure.
Without her these last few months, I would’ve been a fucking mess if it weren’t for the Players. This album. Music had saved me, and not for the first time in my life.
And now it was over.
I hadn’t even lined up my next project yet, because I couldn’t stand to see an end to this one. This time, I didn’t want everyone to move on, without me.
I’d never felt this way before. Not once since Alive broke up.
I’d never wanted to continue on with the other bands I’d produced after we’d finished the album.
But here we were.
I was about to be alone again. The band would be leaving, on tour. And Taylor had left, because I’d asked her to.
It was the second worst thing I’d ever done.
I wanted to fix it. I really did. I fucking missed her, every hour of every day. I wanted her like I’d never wanted anyone before. But that just scared the shit out of me.
I was afraid, more than anything, of hurting her.
I’d promised myself I wouldn’t be with her again, wouldn’t even see her, until I could be sure I was better. So I wouldn’t ever do something like that to her again—like freak out on her like a psycho when she tried to throw me a birthday party.
I broke things off with her and let her go because I could see how I was going to hurt her.
And she deserved so much better than that.
So did this band.
I looked around at them all, just waiting for me. They’d been more patient with me than I deserved. They respected me and my input too much.
“Alright,” I said. “Let’s move on. We’ll call it The Players for now, The Red Album, whatever. If we come up with something else before the official release, we can go with that. Let’s get this thing mastered and over to Brick House. And you guys can enjoy your party.”
The party for the album was happening next week, on the eve of the release of the lead single. And they all deserved to get on with it already. Release the album so they could finally reap the rewards of their hard