The Beach Princess

Chapter 2

“Do you hear something?” Beth stood up, looking in a distance. She shrieked, and from her voice and the look in her face, Collin felt defeated. “Eh—I think it’s a concert. A young band is playing here tonight, some sort of meet and greet beach party,” he remembered something from today’s morning news. Bad timing, Colls, bad timing!

“Gather around people, it’s sunset! Which means we’re gonna turn this beach upside down and rock all night!” a voice was heard, followed by what sounded like hundreds of cheers. Beth looked at Collin hopefully, and Colin could not resist but nod. “Okay, Princess, let’s go there.”

-

“We don’t have the passes!” Marybeth’s forehead frowned into a crease as they sneaked into the crowd. Every person that stood in front of them handed out some sort of ticket before some big guys let them in. The boundary wasn’t that hard to cross, though—since it was a beach, the concert crew only bordered some area with queue lines. But the stage was huge—with a full-equipped sound system that Beth’s heart thumped every time the drum was hit.

“Come on! Over here,” Colin whispered and pulled her to the side of the stage. There was no bodyguard there, and they easily slid under the ribbon and mixed in with the audience.

-

“See that? That’s sneaky. I better call the bodyguard.”

“Wait, wait, don’t—“

“Why not? That’s illegal. That’s breaking the rules in your face, Mister!”

Chris knew the look on his bandmate so well that he stopped asking questions. Martin’s hazel eyes were locked on one view—just one specific view—a petite girl that sneaked into the audience. Her face was red with guilt, and both Chris and Martin felt that this girl wasn’t used to doing all these bad stuffs. But this vocalist he had been working with since they were in high school—he knew what was up with him.

“You like her!” Chris whispered and slapped Martin’s chest. Martin laughed. “Chillax, won’t you. I just find her attractive. A flower in the middle of all this—ambush. I don’t even think she will jump when I sing!”

“Okay, everybody, we are The Corridors!” Martin shifted to the mike stand and greeted his fans. “Now, now, this is a special night, so I want y’all to sing along and have fun, do you hear me?”

“Yeaaaaahh!!” the audience replied in unison. Martin nodded at Gerrard who was sitting behind the drum. With that signal, he began playing the drums to form an upbeat rhythm.

“Put your hands in the air!” Martin grinned and turned to Chris, who started strumming the electric guitar. He saw the guy who came with the pretty girl freaking out and jumping already, but the girl stood still.

-

Stop! in the name of love

Before you break my heart…

Marybeth couldn’t help but laugh when she heard the seemingly new band sing a cover of a classic song she knew from her father’s playlist. But they were really cool—and they had really great chemistry, and they did not mind being crazy with the audience too. Before she knew it, she followed Collin jumping and throwing her hand in the air.

The singer had so much… energy. His voice did not seem to fade weaker with each song, and his smile seemed natural, too. He wasn’t the kind of star that appeared fakely friendly to his fans. Besides that, he was really good-looking. His hazel brown eyes were warm and pleasant; every song he sang seemed to glow through them. His figure, tall and athletic, was well-groomed in a loose white shirt and black leather jacket. He was lucky—Marybeth was already shivering with all these adrenaline and the night weather.

The jam continued. They sang few other covers, but there were some songs that Marybeth did not know, so it seemed that they wrote original songs themselves too. After a cover of What If by Jason Derulo, Marybeth thought that the concert was over. They had sung so much by now…

“And before we close this sweet night,” she heard the vocalist speak in the mike. “We have a special surprise for you!!”

“Aaaaaaaaa!”

“That was the scream coming from the stupid girls who think Martin would take his shirt off and hand it over to them,” Collin whispered to her, and Marybeth blushed. “What the hell, Beth? You’re not one of them, are you?”

“Martin’s really hot, Colls,” Marybeth whispered back. “But anything he gave—“

Collin did not hear anything else after that because he was too crushed plus the audience was even more freaked out than before. He took Marybeth on a date (yes, it was a date to him) only to make her meet and get mesmerized with another guy? Not funny.

-

Chris gave Martin the “what-the-hell-are-you-doing” look. What was he planning? An encore? A giveaway? None of those was prepared. Chris and the rest of the band members had warned Martin so many times about how doing an encore was not as easy as him opening his mouth and singing any song he wanted for the musicians. But it seemed like Martin wasn’t going to do an encore after all.

Martin stepped down the stage and whispered something to the technical guys who worked on the sound system and lighting. When he returned, he had a big, almost mischiveous smile on his face. “Well, I have a special giveaway.”

“Aaaaaaaaaaa!” (Dang, Collin thought, because Marybeth was one of the girls who joined the screaming choir now.)

“So my man up there will help me shine the spotlight randomly—yes, randomly,” He winked at Chris with the “no, I lied” look, “to any one of you here. The person where the spotlight stops at will get my special giveaway. Okay, ready?”

He gave a thumb up to the lighting guys. They rolled their eyes—Martin was really crazy this time. They turned the spotlight randomly before stopping on the place where Martin had previously told them to.

“Congratulations! You! Girl with the black hair right there! Step up here!” Martin’s eyes met Marybeth’s and he smiled widely. “Congratulations!”

“What the hell is he doing,” Collin almost spat at the ground angrily, but Marybeth had stepped away from his side and went onto stage. She did not smile—she was speechless. She was not used to this entire crowd, and these lights, and the loud music. She was not especially used to standing in front of a guy that could make her faint any minute…

“For the special giveaway, now—“ Martin stared at the girl who was much shorter than him. She wasn’t even wearing decent clothes—only a piece of sleeveless blue shirt and shorts. Does she live around here?

“I’m gonna need your ticket,” Martin stretched out his hand to her. Marybeth gasped.

Is this a trap? Does he know I came here without any ticket? Marybeth cleared her throat, instantly burning with hate for this sexy demon. “But I—“

“Did you drop your ticket somewhere?” Martin smiled. The audience watched in confusion. But Martin knew he did not call the girl up here to humiliate her. “Well sorry, but we can’t give you the special gift if you lost your ticket. What’s your name?”

“I—It’s Ma—“

“Ah, you don’t want to publicise it. Nevermind, I’ll just call you Beach Princess, because you smell like you’ve been on this coast forever,” Martin chuckled. “And now, Beach Princess—“

The audience gasped. Collin gasped too, as Martin took his jacket off and wrapped it around Marybeth’s tiny shoulders. “I don’t think concerts are your thing. Be careful on your way home, won’t you? It’s a cold night,” Martin said with his low, soothing voice. “Is it warm enough?”

“T-thank you,” Marybeth nodded, not daring to look at him. “And by the way, it is a great concert.”

“It is indeed! Aaaaaaa! Martinnnnnnnnnnn!” a thousand jealous girls started screaming again. Marybeth held her smile and stepped down the stage, still feeling like she was in some bizarre dream.

Martin smiled to himself. He must be crazy.

Really, really crazy.