“You know this song?” Lilith asked, turning her head slightly so her cheek brushed Cam’s lips. “It’s catchy.”
“Lilith,” he said, “there’s something I’ve been wanting to tell you.”
Now she turned fully, as if she could hear the intensity in his voice.
“I don’t know if it’s the right time, but I have to let you know that—”
“Hey,” a voice interrupted Cam, and a moment later Luc shoved Cam aside to stand in front of Lilith. “Have you kids signed the waiver yet? Every performer has to sign the waiver.”
Lilith glanced at the densely printed document. “What’s it say? It’s hard to read in here.”
“Just that you won’t sue King Media, and that we can use your image for promotional materials after the show.”
“Really, Luc?” Cam said. “We have to do this right now?”
“Can’t go onstage unless you do.”
Cam speed-read the document to make sure he wasn’t locking himself into any darker deal with Lucifer. It seemed, though, that it was nothing but a way to interrupt the moment. Cam dashed out his signature. “It’s fine,” he told Lilith, and watched as she signed, too.
Cam shoved the documents back at Lucifer, who slipped them in his pocket and grinned. By then, the performance was over and the applause for Love and Idleness had diminished.
Luc strode back onto the stage. “Provocative.” He smirked. “Without further ado, our next band: Death of the Author!”
The crowd cheered weakly as a short kid named Jerry and his three friends strutted onto the stage. Cam cringed as Jerry tried to adjust the shared drum kit to fit his small stature. After a few painful moments, Lilith nudged Cam.
“We should help them,” she said.
Cam was surprised, but of course Lilith was right. She really was different from the angry loner girl she’d been two weeks ago.
“Good idea,” Cam said as they hurried onstage to help adjust the height of the drums.
When the instruments were tuned and the band was counting off, Lilith and Cam slipped back to the wings. Lilith didn’t seem to care how bad Death of the Author was. She was simply happy to have helped a fellow musician. But she was the only one who was happy. Jean squirmed miserably as Jerry belted out the lyrics to a song called “Amalgamator.”
“He doesn’t even know what an amalgamator is,” Jean said, shaking his head.
“Yeah,” Luis said. “Totally. Um…what is an amalgamator?”
The audience was bored before the first verse ended. People booed and drifted away to buy sodas, but Death of the Author didn’t notice. At the end of the song, Jerry embraced the mic, nearly falling over with adrenaline. “We love you, Crossroads!”
As Jerry and his band left the stage, Luc returned to it. “Our next act is already well-known throughout town,” he said into the mic. “I give you the lovely and talented Perceived Slights!”
Applause echoed throughout the Colosseum as the crowd went wild.
Cam and Lilith peeked through the curtain to see the popular crowd from Trumbull all but rushing the stage. They were screaming, girls hoisted up on their dates’ shoulders, chanting Chloe’s name. Cam took Lilith’s hand. Even if she had smoothed some things over with Chloe, it must be hard for her not to envy the reception the Perceived Slights were getting.
“You okay?” Cam asked, but the crowd was too loud for Lilith to hear him.
Luis gave Karen Walker a pat on the butt as she dashed out from behind the curtain to check the Perceived Slights’ amp connections. Fog from a few buckets full of dry ice filled the stage, and a few moments later Chloe King and her band emerged from the wings.
They were pros. They beamed and waved into the stage lights, finding their places at their mics as if they’d played a thousand shows bigger than this. They wore matching white stilettos and leather minidresses in a variety of colors, their pastel pink prom-court sashes draped over their dresses. Chloe’s dress was buttercup yellow, to match her solid-gold glittery eye shadow.
“The feeling is mutual, Trumbull!” Chloe shouted.
The crowd roared.
Chloe pouted and leaned seductively into the mic. The crowd was mesmerized, but all Cam could do was watch Lilith. She was leaning forward, chewing her nails. He knew she was comparing herself to Chloe—not just to the way the audience responded, but to the way Chloe grabbed the mic with the flick of a wrist, the way her voice filled the Colosseum, the passion she brought to her guitar.
If he could hold Lilith one more time before they played, Cam was convinced that he could make her see that this performance wasn’t about competing with Chloe. It was about what she and Cam had together. He could say the three words that had been burning in him for fifteen days, and her response would tell him whether they had a chance.