More Than Maybe - Erin Hahn Page 0,40

close to each other we’re rubbing elbows, and I can somehow feel his body heat through the sleeve of my hoodie, and he smells like Tide PODS.

To the band’s credit, they are killer. So much so that I hardly notice the delicious way my coworker smells. We’re in that weird fake-ending spot right before the band comes back on for an encore, and I wonder idly whose idea this whole pretense was in the first place? Like, “We’re all done, folks. Have a good night!” and three and a half minutes later, “Just kidding, we thought of two more original songs and a super-long cover to play for you guys, so thank God we didn’t turn all the lights back on.”

“I wonder who the first band was to do the delayed encore?” Luke asks, his voice slightly raised over the murmur of the crowd. “It’s not like we don’t all expect it now.”

Jesus Harold Christ.

He looks at me; his eyes practically glow in the dim blue light of the stage. “Like, what are they doing back there? Counting to one hundred four times?”

“Microwaving a Hot Pocket?” I suggest.

“Retying all their shoes, double knotted?”

“Checking their Instagram feeds.”

“Checking your review blog, more like,” he says, and I feel my face grow hot.

“I doubt they even know,” I say.

He holds a fake mic to my face. “Ms. Carsewell, just how many eye-closers did tonight’s performance warrant?”

I’m tempted to bite his hand. To taste it or fend him off, I can’t tell.

“Honestly, at least three. They were excellent.”

He nods, pulling his hand back and stuffing it in his pocket. “They were really good. And history has shown the best is still to come,” he says as the stage lights come on once more and the crowd roars its approval.

The lead singer plucks at his electric guitar as the secondary vocalist takes center stage. She has an incredible indie Meg Myers sound going for her, and I almost wonder if she’d be better served as the main vocalist.

She could pull it off, if this pop-y electronic track is any indication. She drapes over the mic sensually, and I watch the guitarist watch her.

“Wonder if they’re sexing it up?” Luke’s breath is in my ear, and I jump. “Sorry!” he says.

My eyes are wide. “I was thinking the same thing!”

After that, I’m totally distracted. If they aren’t sleeping together, they ooze chemistry. Sex appeal can boost a band from great sound to great show.

It can also disintegrate a band faster than Spider-Man facing Thanos.

For their final song, they do a duet, during which I forget my own name or where I am or what day it is. The lyrics are soft and achingly powerful. I wish I had written them. I haven’t ever been in love, but I feel it in the song and their voices, and it fucking sucks to be in love. My heart is quiet, and my breath stops in my lungs. I’m so still that I can feel my bones creak when I come to life once more. That is the best fucking feeling in the world. The lights come on, and my throat hurts from screaming and my hands itch from clapping, and Luke turns to me, brushing a tear from my cheek with his thumb.

“Five eye-closers,” he says. “Easily.”

“Holy shit,” I reply. “What just happened?”

“I think we saw history being made.”

We stare at each other, the room erupting around us, but don’t move. I’m afraid to. At last I close my eyes, taking a picture in my mind.

I want to live in this moment forever, and maybe I’d like it okay if Luke were here, too.

15

LUKE

The night after I see that band with Vada, I finally have the house to myself. My parents went to see the latest Marvel movie, and Cullen is out to dinner, and it’s awesome. I’m a high-functioning introvert in a houseful of raging extroverts.

I’ve pulled my keyboard out of my closet and set it on its stand. After switching it on, it glows at the touch as though it’s been waiting for me. I lightly press a few of the keys, caressing them, and immediately feel stupid. It’s only a cheap keyboard. Get your shit together, Luke.

Pulling aside my curtains, I reassure myself the driveway is empty before returning to sit at the keys. I play a melody that’s been itching to get out. Once. Twice. Changing it a little and humming under my breath. Changing it again. Then I close my eyes and let