“Cool. Like you?”
“Sort of.” He revved the engine and started to drive them out of the city. “We started doing shows around the same time, but now, he’s kind of a big deal. He got a record deal, and his shows are pretty packed.”
“All for a DJ?” she asked curiously.
“Well, yeah. I mean, Calvin Harris is recording with huge celebrities, and Skrillex has his own gig. They’re huge in the music industry. If you make it, you make it. And Poet is on his way.”
“Poet?” Trihn asked. She tried to hold back her laugh. “He just goes by Poet?”
“Yeah. His last name is Poe, and the label thought he’d be more recognizable with a stage name.” Damon shrugged. “Poet was his nickname in high school because he was always scribbling lyrics into his notebook.”
“Did you go to school with this Poe…Poet guy?”
“No, but I have a friend who did.”
“You seem to know a lot of people.”
“That’s the industry,” he said with a smile.
“What’s his real name?”
Damon glanced at her. “James Poe. Not exactly the sexy stage name they were looking for.”
“And what about Damon Stone? Would they make you change that?” she asked curiously.
“I wouldn’t let bigwig asshole music producers who were paying me thousands of dollars to do what I loved change anything.” He looked over at her with a smirk on his face.
“Well, for the record, I think Damon Stone stays. You don’t want them to call you something like Stoned or Stoner.”
“I heard that enough in high school,” he said. He brushed a hand back through his unruly dark hair, and the strands fell back into place almost instantly. “And what about you?”
“Me?”
“You’re going to be in that fashion show. What’s your line going to be called?”
Trihn chewed on her bottom lip. “You know…I never thought about that. Maybe just Trihnity.”
“That’s not you. Go with just Trihn.”
“You think?”
“Yeah. Then, when I’m on the red carpet, people can ask me who I’m wearing, and I can say Trihn.”
She burst out laughing. “You are insanely way ahead of yourself…but I like it.”
His eyes lit up at her enthusiasm. “Good. I like it, too.”
A few minutes later, Damon pulled into a parking lot. He had a tag that let them pass the crazy line of cars waiting to get into a general admission section. But even their passes kept them pretty far from the venue. She was glad that she had chosen to wear boots tonight with her white jeans and shirt. The jeans weren’t exactly something she wanted to ruin, but he’d said white, and she couldn’t help herself when it came to dressing fashionable for an event, especially a first date.
Damon handed over two passes to a guy, and he nodded his head for them to take the line to the right. Someone checked her small purse and gave them each a handful of glow sticks, and then they were through.
They entered what more or less looked like a closed-in mosh pit. There was a stage at the far end of the football field–sized area. Damon took her hand and seamlessly threaded his way through the crowd, getting as close to the stage as they could get.
In confusion, Trihn held out her glow sticks to Damon.
“You’re going to need those,” he said.
After breaking them in half, she pushed the ends together and created a necklace as well as a few bracelets. Damon had a long chain up his arm. The sky darkened, and soon, the entire audience was glowing. Black lights flickered to life around them, illuminating their white clothing, and then the music started.
“Welcome to Poet’s Paint War. Rock on.”
The music grew with intensity as DJ Poet got into the groove. The crowd immediately started dancing all around Trihn, but she was focused on one word that had come out of Poet’s mouth.
“Paint?” Trihn asked.
Then, she felt it. A giant glob of neon green paint landed in the middle of her white T-shirt. Damon laughed at her reaction just as more paint rained down on them.
“Where the hell did you bring me?” she asked.
His hands landed on her hips, and their bodies moved together, as if they were made for each other. “A rave.”
“This isn’t any old rave.”
“It’s like those color runs everyone goes on about but with dancing and good music. And you.”
Paint covered their bodies. Her skin was already plastered with neon green, orange, pink, and yellow. It was on her clothes and skin and in her hair.
Everyone threw their hands up in the air and danced with their glow sticks over head.