Cassie
“Holy shit, Cassie.” Nora had latched herself to my back, muttering repeatedly as we exited the stage as one strange, sweaty creature. “Holy shit, holy shit, holy shit.”
We had even done an encore. I had nothing left. They had it all.
You could still hear the crowd, even from back here.
Toby had jumped into the crowd at the end of the set, greeting a friend. Now he wove through the edges of the mob, his gap-toothed grin bobbing over screaming head after screaming head. He held my shoulders and we rocked back and forth, laughing. And yet I couldn’t be in his arms long enough without my throat seizing, thinking of Luke.
His image was a stone I kept choking on. That asshole. That fucking asshole. He wasn’t here.
“They want to sign us,” he said into my hair.
I unlatched and looked up at him. “What?”
“What?” Nora repeated. Her eyes were glued on Toby.
“They want to sign us,” he said louder, making a circling motion with his finger. “My friend heard him talk to the owner of the Sahara. They may even have us start opening for one of their bigger bands right away.”
“On tour!” Nora screamed. “We’re going on tour!”
“Is he still here?”
Nora and Toby held each other’s hands, hopping in a circle, chanting, “We’re going on tour, we’re going on tour, we’re going on tour.”
I had to laugh.
“Quick, get your phone!” Toby said, ignoring my question, shuffling me toward the greenroom. “He may call right now.”
Not a minute after Toby said it, the phone began to ring. I smacked Toby and Nora on the arms, pointing.
They stood with their arms around each other, looking at me.
“Hello?”
“Cassie?”
That did not sound like Josh van Ritter’s New York voice. It sounded like a Texas voice. A Texas voice, beat down.
“Yeah?” I said, moving away from the eager onlookers.
“It’s Jacob Morrow. Senior. Luke’s dad.”
“Hi,” I said, my blood suspended.
“I have some bad news. Luke’s been arrested.”
That fucking asshole, I thought, and immediately burst into tears.
