The Heartbreak Youth

one

A few weeks ago, if you'd have told Lander Sorenson that he would be spending the last month of summer touring with none other than Kai freaking Morganson of The Heart Thrums from Darling, Colorado, he'd have laughed right in your face and used some very, very choice words to explain just why that would be absolutely impossible.

For starters, he never imagined Kai's band would ever in a million years sign with Equinox Harbor Records, a record label known for its exclusivity to the post hardcore music scene. Second, there was no fathomable reason Kai should have even been interested in signing with the label, seeing as one of their top acts had Lander as a frontman. He'd have known that, and should have avoided the label completely.

Yet here they are, three weeks after Kai's band signed with the label, and Lander is in a foul mood.

"We're not asking you to become best friends," Jason, Renegade Sundown's manager, is saying. They've been arguing about this since the tour was announced, and Lander knows Jason has about had it with him. But he doesn't want to go down without a fight, and so, he is fighting.

"No, you're just asking us to spend weeks on the road with them, eating meals with them, staring at their dumb faces." Lander is aware of how whiny he sounds. Ask him if he particularly cares at the moment. "Look Jason, I just don't understand why this wasn't discussed beforehand."

"The label wasn't aware of your...dislike for them," Jason sounds like he might be scowling. Lander can picture him rubbing his forehead in irritation, frowning at the mug of tea he most likely is holding at that very moment.

But still, Lander presses on. "It isn't about all of them, Jase. It's Kai."

"You don't really have to interact with him, you know. Maybe take some photos, do a couple interviews on the road. Nothing major." Jason sighs. "Look, I've gotta go. You are horrible and relentless, and I hate you."

"Love you too," Lander says in a sing-songy voice. "I'm not ready to drop this, though."

"Of course not," Jason says, and he hangs up.

Lander lets out a heaving sigh and tosses his phone onto his bed, falling backwards into the pile of pillows at the head. His hair billows around him and he swears, for about the sixtieth time this week, that he's going to get it cut. He was really only growing it out while Renegade Sundown was writing and recording their newest album, Marking Of Words And The Silence It Brings. It's a mouthful of a title, but he can't really be bothered with it. It was Kyle's idea, claiming "Long album titles are unforgettable, man."

Kyle, the bassist for Renegade Sundown, is always saying man or dude or bro. It used to annoy Lander to no end, until he realized it was Kyle's way of speaking to those he was most endeared to. After that, while it still irks him occasionally, Lander doesn't mind so much.

Renegade Sundown was formed in 2015, right after Lander's graduation. Lander took up as lead singer/screamer, and was occasionally known to play the keys when a song called for it. Harris Redford, Lander's best friend since childhood, naturally became lead guitarist and backup vocals. Next was Lori Burton, a trans woman who'd moved to Darling six months prior and was an absolute badass on the guitar, who took up the role of rhythm guitarist. Kyle Bennett on bass, who was quite honestly the last person Lander had ever expected to be both a bass guitarist, and interested in performing post hardcore music, as he'd been on the basketball team. [Trivia note: Kyle was meant to go to the University of Colorado Boulder on a full-ride scholarship, but had backed out at the last moment to pursue his dream of "Becoming a rock star."  When asked why by interviewers, Kyle always shrugs and says, "I was tired of living a life of lies." He never elaborates, and eventually, everyone stopped asking.]  Finally, there was Renee Forester on drums. Renee was the youngest in the group, only sixteen when she joined. Lander had been skeptical of her abilities when she'd shown up to audition, having known her as the quietest girl in their tiny high school, but was quickly proven wrong on every level by the small and fierce red-haired girl. [Trivia note: Renee is not naturally a redhead. She has dyed her hair blood red consistently since she turned thirteen. When asked if she was inspired by Hayley Williams from Paramore, Renee has been quoted as saying, "God damn, when will every woman in the music industry stop being compared to Hayley Williams? I just like the color red, it's not that complicated."]

Lander loves his small group of misfits, and always feels grateful to whatever great and powerful being may or may not exist (he's unsure, but hopeful) that he met and became friends with each and every one of them.

As Lander lays there, thinking how grateful he is to have the friends he has, grateful to the band's community of fans, his thoughts turn bitter as he remembers that soon, in less than a week, touring for promotion of their newest album will begin.

And he will have to deal with Kai Morganson.

It's not that Kai is a particularly terrible person necessarily. In fact, he's a super nice guy. Well, that is, to just about everyone except Lander.

He doesn't know when it started. Kai and Lander hadn't really been friends or been around each other in elementary school or middle school. They both knew each other in passing, friends of friends, that sort of thing. Their paths didn't cross until sophomore year, when they were assigned to sit next to each other in biology.

"I'm Kai," Kai had said, nodding to Lander in that way that guys did.

Lander nodded back. "Lander."

And that was it.

The introduction had been perfectly polite, and Lander expected all of their interactions would be this way. But as the school year progressed, Kai spent nearly every single second ignoring Lander in biology. At first, Lander thought he was just a quiet kid, and he was fine with that. Lander was of the mind that talking when you didn't really have anything to say was a waste of time and energy that could be put to better use elsewhere. As weeks went by though and Kai just didn't talk to him, would completely avoid him and obviously search down other folks in class to use as lab partners, and even once went completely out of his way to duck out of a conversation Lander was involved in, Lander began to realize Kai actually might genuinely dislike him, and he didn't understand why.

And thus, their feud began.

The interview The Heart Thrums had done in the last issue of Alternative Press was complete bullshit, and Lander knows that without a doubt. Kai is an asshole, and Lander has decided to make it his mission on this tour to prove exactly that.