let's light up the sky ☆

Chapter 23

"Marco!" I yelled from the third floor of the Kia Forum down to the open pit area below. These are moments where I bet Matias wishes his annoyance could cut like a knife. He slowly turned his head to stare right up at me, spotting me from 100 feet away.

"I'm not playing these games, Anoush!" he responded.

"Yes you are, you love me!"

"We'll love you even more if you could go pick up our coffee orders," Uncle Nate joined in. He finished setting up his drum kit at the back of the stage.

I smiled devilishly. "Could I get Matias to come with me?"

Matias groaned loud enough to echo off the walls, followed by the sound of everyone else laughing on stage.

Sometimes I think I enjoy Power's shows more than the guys do. We arrived at the Kia Forum in Inglewood at 9 am to set up for Power's first show of their new tour. I promised to help set up gear and I lasted a little over 2 hours. Instead, I got bored and decided that it was more fun to wander around the stadium. Power has several regular venues in LA, but this is my second favorite behind the Troubadour.

I barreled down to the pit area and ran by Matias, the skirt of my sundress swooshing by him as I passed. "Wait, are we going now?" Matias called out, catching the hint.

"Your dad's putting in our orders now," Dad replied. "Anoush, the usual?"

"Is her usual order full of sugar? Because I think she's had enough," Matias complained.

I ignored him, instead going backstage to grab an empty trolley for everyone's drinks. The guys still needed to get around to their sound check, but that could wait until we put away the mess of boxes and crates. Oh, and after we return back from our dutiful coffee run.

"How are you even this perky after last weekend?" Matias asked as we walked down the road to the nearest Starbucks. "I'm exhausted just looking at you."

He's got a point. It's a miracle I even have the energy for the show tonight. I've almost tired myself out by prancing around the stadium and volunteering for everything I can get my hands on.

I shrugged my shoulders. "Comps do that to me, I guess."

"So I'll never understand the epic highs and lows of high school dance championships?"

"Weeeeeeell, when you put it that way–"

It was less about the leftover excitement from the weekend itself than it was for my second place. I was a full 8 points behind the actual winner. It was a pretty big gap, but it was much easier to process than if I had missed gold by one or two points. 1st place would have been nice, but nothing made me happier than knowing Meredith ate my dust. I can't wait until school starts back so I can hear her whining because she never lets shit go. Maybe next time she'll spend more time worrying about herself than trying to drag me down.

"I also overheard Uncle Gi telling everyone else that there was some drama? What about it?"

I laughed. "I need to only say one name and you'll know exactly what's up."

He leaned forward and intently eyed me. "Who?"

"Meredith Marchant."

Matias was already about to fall over himself before her name even rolled off my tongue. As a marching band kid himself, he knows Meredith about as well as I do. She once hid his clarinet reeds right before a game because he called her "Taylor Swift from Wish.com". In his defense, that was the year we wore those sparkly short dresses for our halftime show. It kinda made all the blondes on our squad look that way. But Meredith got called out for a joke and had a problem with it.