Rydel’s POV
I can’t believe they would do this! And behind my back? Ugh! They need me, but they lost me. I want to see what they do. I called Cameron to meet me outside the theatre. He gave me his hoodie and sunglasses to wear as a disguise. We walked in and were near the back. I saw the boys run out on stage and the crowd screamed.
My keyboard position was empty. The boys all exchanged worried looks then they looked off stage. Ryland was pushing Renee onto the stage, she was kind of resisting. The crowd started chanting my name. Riker walked over to his mic and he looked at me, “Rydel couldn’t be here tonight because she was hanging out with a sick person, a really sick person, and she got sick herself.”
Ross said, “Hopefully she’ll get better soon, but for now our good friend Renee will be filling in for Renee while she’s out.” Rocky started joking around with Ratliff and the crowd and Riker ran over to Renee.
Riker’s POV
I went over to Renee who was panicking. I said, “You’re gonna do fine.” She pointed at her ears, “Riker, I’ve never heard any of your songs.” I said, “Here’s a sheet with the chords, Rocky wrote them out for you during rehearsal, just do what you can.” I handed here the paper and she took it.
She sighed, “Oh boy.” I said, “It’ll be fine.” I ran back to my mic, “So, something you should know about Renee is that she isn’t friends with us because we’re well-known. She’s a real friend of ours. So when we moved here, she was really nice to so, be she had never heard of us before. So, she hasn’t heard any of our songs. She can’t do any of it by ear because she’s deaf. She can’t even tell what I’m saying right now because my back is to her. So if she messes up, go easy on her, we had to call her last minute because Rydel bailed, I mean, she’s sick.”
There was some confusion, I said, “What I meant by that was she bailed on us by getting sick, like, she’s just not here.” Rocky started our first song; I nodded at Renee, letting her know to begin. She was good, maybe even better than Rydel. I noticed Rydel in the crowd, she was angry. She knew that Renee was good, everyone knew. I smiled at Renee to let her know she was doing well. She didn’t just play the chords, she played, more. I saw Cameron smiling at me. I stopped smiling. His faded. He tapped Rydel’s shoulder and said something to her and they left.
After the show we went to dinner at some diner. Renee said, “Oh, have you guys eaten here before?” I said, “Yeah, we love this place.” Ross said, “But we stopped coming here a while ago.” I said, “Ross, don’t.” Renee said, “Why? What happened?” Ross said, “Our friend used to work here, before she died. That’s why we moved, we just couldn’t take it.”
Renee’s face looked so sad. She said, “I’m so sorry, why don’t we eat somewhere else then?” Ratliff said, “We need to face it and let go sooner or later.” I knew I was about to break down. I said, “I’ll be right back, you guys take a seat.” I walked down the street a little bit and sat down at a bus stop. I wasn’t going anywhere, it was just raining and I wanted the cover.
A few minutes later, Ratliff appeared his hood over his head, hands in his pockets. He sat down next to me. He said, “When I said, sooner or later, I faced it sooner. But you were closer to her, so later is not a problem for anyone.” I let a tear fall, “Something about Renee, it makes me think about Sky.” Ratliff said, “I know, I see it too.”
I said, “Remember how Sky used to just disappear sometimes, for days even? Where do you think she went?” He said, “I don’t know, it’s nothing to worry about anymore though. We have Renee now, Sky’s gone, and we need to accept that.”
