“What’s so funny?” I asked, taking in his grin. I tugged at my throat, which felt as dry as the hot concrete under my feet.
“Would you have come if I told you I had gathered an audience for you?”
I stared at him with steely eyes, confirming whatever point he was trying to make. Asher set a hand on my chin and raised it to his.
“Look at me,” he demanded.
His eyes swallowed the sun, and I watched him breathe in and out, deeply. I echoed his breathing, still mad at him, but also less mad because when he looked at me this way—unflinching—I wanted to fall onto his lips.
Last summer was spent working with different camp directors to polish my songwriting skills and vocal techniques. I learned the fundamentals—from developing my vocal sounds, to understanding different rhyming patterns. I was relaxed when singing and playing guitar in front of a paid professional—because I knew they wouldn’t tear me to shreds. Singing in front of my peers was a different story. I was at a sleepaway liberal arts camp—every camper here thought they were The Next Big Thing. It didn’t help that my mother believed singing and songwriting was a cute hobby that I’d one day outgrow. What if I was just mediocre, and singing in front of everyone proved her right?
“I’m not ready.”
“You know the song backward and forward. Mags, you have nothing to be scared of when you’re this great.”
He placed both his hands on my shoulders and tilted them back.
“Your confidence goes the way of your spine.”
I let my shoulders fall back into their protective place. “Did Mr. Greenway teach you that?” I asked, rolling my eyes.
Mr. Greenway was his high school drama teacher—a man who I gathered was more important to Asher than Asher’s parents. Asher talked about him more than his mom or dad, which was odd, because when Asher described his parents, it was always with such warmth. One would think he’d have more stories to share about his family, but it was always, Mr. Greenway THIS. And Mr. Greenway THAT.
“Wanna know my secret?”
“If you say, ‘picture everyone in their underwear,’ I’m going to physically harm you.”
“Find one person in the audience who loves you no matter what. No matter if you’re great or good or just okay.” He pointed to himself. “Sing to the person that feels like home. Everyone else will disappear.”
“You must think very highly of yourself.”
He tilted back on his heels. “‘Your eyes look like the stars I couldn’t see out my childhood window’ was quite the ego boost,” Asher said, quoting my lyrics.
“That might be the last nice thing I write about you,” I hissed.
“Somehow, I doubt that.”
Asher grinned and backed away from me, his eyes still on mine. He took a seat toward the right side of the terraced steps, purposefully next to a lanky kid named Peter, whose fingers were twisted around a worn yo-yo string. My insides softened as I watched Peter smile up at Asher. Asher became a theater god the second he opened his mouth onstage last year. He had that thing you can’t teach—and while theater was competitive, he was so great that everyone wanted to learn from him, rather than wallow in the fact that they couldn’t measure up. Asher first noticed Peter last summer—he was the kind of kid who walked around camp like he had an invisible friend. After Peter bombed an audition for My Fair Lady and cried onstage, Asher ran after him and asked Peter if he wanted to be his understudy. Asher used his quick camp celebrity not to boost his own profile, but to fill in the lonely space of a kid without a friend.
Watching Asher trade smiles with Peter, my angry insides gave way to gratefulness. My eyes locked on the guy I loved—the kind of guy who went to the ends of the earth to make sure others would thrive—the guy who was bringing me out of my comfort zone just so I would succeed. I inhaled deeply from my diaphragm, opened my quivering lips, and let my first love song, “Invisible Skies,” find new sets of ears. It was the song I had started writing the very first night I met Asher. Adrenaline beat through my chest as the folksy, soft love song echoed against the stone wall behind me.
I had never seen Asher smile this wide. I felt the warmth of the sun on my cheekbones as my eyes moved from Asher onto the other faces that were glued to me. I watched as the booming bridge made each jaw in the crowd go slack. The last note left my lips, followed by the longest second of my life: dead silence. All at once, they rose from the stone steps and effusively clapped and whistled. I pursed my lips together, trying to keep from screaming. This adrenaline was new. It was big. It had pulled my spine upright so I could touch the sun. My voice made strangers come alive. I wouldn’t ever let another person convince me that I was meant to do anything else but this. I wouldn’t let another stage intimidate me.
Asher mouthed, “Told you,” in my direction with a proud smile stuck on his face.
The theater crowd jumped off the steps and onto the field quickly, shooting me effusive compliments as they passed. Wide-eyed, I watched them disappear down the grassy hill. My heart was pounding in my eardrums, my entire body shaking as I set my guitar down into its hard case.
Asher walked forward with a big grin.
“So, will I ever be the subject of another Maggie Vine original, or are you done with me?”
I stood in front of him and clasped my hands around his neck, scrunching my nose up to his.
“You get like…all of the songs, forever.”
“Forever, huh?”
I nodded. “Thank you for today,” I said.
“You’re welcome.”
I grinned and tugged him onto my mouth. My hand curled around the nape of his neck, his hand went under the back of my T-shirt, and I felt him harden against me, sending a new kind of shiver all over my body. My fingers moved from his neck to his warm torso, slowly inching downward, stopping at the elastic of his mesh athletic shorts—when a loud gong sounded over the speakers.
I slid my hand back up to his hard stomach, raising myself up on my tiptoes. “Dinner,” I whispered, with my forehead pressed against his.
He held me tight against his body. “Let’s skip it and watch the sun set somewhere.”
“Skip dinner?”
“I have the good canteen snacks,” he said, patting the JanSport backpack slung around his shoulder. I let my heels fall flat on the ground and took a step back, grabbing my guitar case.
“I’m pretty sure my counselor will go searching for me when I don’t show up at head count.”
“Okay.” He adjusted his shorts and combed a hand over his tousled hair.
“Shall we?” I asked.
Asher smiled quickly and grabbed my hand as the sun started to dip below the trees.
We walked silently, hand in hand, my body skipping with energy. The crowd poured in from every angle of camp as the dining hall came into view. I noticed that Asher was moving slower, tugging me back toward him as hungry bodies shoved around us to get into the door.
“Um—meet by the lake tonight?” he asked, his tone unusually nervous.
I took in his searching expression, as if my answer could make or break him. We met by either the gazebo or the lake every night after curfew.
“Yeah, of course.”
“Cool,” he said, exhaling as he studied the gravel road below our feet.
I squeezed Asher’s hand in mine and playfully brought it up to my mouth, biting his knuckle. He could barely manage a grin, his expression still fixed on the scuffed rubber of his shoes. An unease settled in my gut. Asher was someone who kept his eyes on you, or who studied the road ahead. He made up stories about the people passing by or the stars in the sky. He rarely looked down.
“Hey,” I said, gently dropping his hand. “Are you okay?”
Asher’s eyes searched mine, and he flashed me a quick smile and pulled his shoulders back.
“Yeah. Why wouldn’t I be?”
It was a good question. One I wanted the answer to.