Rising Star: Book 3 of The Orion Series

Looming Shadows

Breathe, just breathe

Breathe in this epiphany

Paint your white picket fences

Just surrender to the ocean

Let it wash over you

What do we do with the impossible?

I fly without wings

Catch my fall

Make your demands

Pull me apart, rip me limb from limb

I'm riding this whim to leave you in sin

--From the song Psychopathic

Lyrics By: Orion Bauwens

After word of Orion's little autograph stunt got out, we gained even more popularity. We became known as the nicest upcoming band, which made everyone want to see us in the hopes of talking to us. The first few concerts we gave we gleefully obliged. 

But as our name really started to make a mark, it became hard to stick around and chat. Within a month we had security guards, which was...Eerie.

We technically had security out of the gate, but Orion refused to employ them. He wanted to be as accessible to the fans as possible. He wanted to be a "human" band. But we discovered that was, unfortunately, impossible, given the level of fame we were quickly achieving.

A good example was one day when we decided to go to a local coffee slash ice cream shop. At the time the three of us thought absolutely nothing of it. Oh, our naivety was epic.

We had ordered; me with my coffee, Ben with some ice cream, Orion with a small cone. It was nice, it was normal. It was just us being us, talking and laughing and being dorks.

The shop had the radio on and one of our song started playing. Once again, our exuberant naivety was on full display. We started singing along. A few people in the shop realized who we were. No big deal, right?

We ate it up. It ended up where we, unintentionally, created a music video that went viral. Orion was up on the table, performing, Ben and I singing along, Ben banging away on a chair for the drums. Everyone--I mean everyone--in the shop was singing along.

It was a lot of fun. It was a lot of fun until we tried to leave and couldn't. Like...we physically couldn't.

I could tell Orion was starting to panic besides me. Not wanting to make things weird, I discreetly grabbed his hand and gave it a quick squeeze, trying to calm him down. He looked at me, his expression exactly as I expected it to be.

"We have to get Orion out of here," I whispered to Ben, "he's gonna freak. In a bad way."

Ben looked at him and swore under his breath.

"How do we get out of here?" I asked the manager who had come out to sing.

She saw my panic and led us to the back after a failed attempt at getting people to clear a path for us. The back, however, wasn't much better. By the time everything was said and done, all of our respective hair was messed up from people touching it and Orion couldn't breath.

Having that many people surround you with nowhere to go, clambering over you, touching you all at once...Not caring that the lead singer of the band you supposedly love couldn't breathe because he was having a panic attack...it was horrible.

It was our first real mobbing, and it was absolutely, sheerly petrifying. We were being jostled, hands flying everywhere, and no one cared. It's like they forgot we were people.