“Be quiet, Ronan.” I keep my focus on the screen as the shot of Emma and I opens.
The rock star is momentarily forgotten. It’s perfect. The light, the positioning, the way we’re laughing. Again, I marvel at how beautiful my sister is. Emma needs to see this, her smile is so infectious, her eyes sparkling with just the right mixture of laughter and love. That it’s me she is gazing at makes my heart swell.
Everyone should have a sister like Emma.
Ronan clears his throat. I almost forgot he was here. It takes a second to blink out of the haze I went into staring at the picture. I click out of it, ready to face the rockstar in person, instead I’m confronted with another glimpse at the picture of him.
“What is it the band are looking for?” I lean back in the seat, not shutting out of the email, but keeping my attention on the real man. Not his image.
“A re-brand.” He taps his fingers against his knee.
He’s beating out a continuous rhythm, over and over. Since coming in here, he’s been lighthearted, kind of cocky, and bantering with me in a way I’m trying not to enjoy. This is making him nervous.
Anxious is a better word.
It’s time to dial in the sarcasm. He’s feeling this break within his band. I’m guessing he doesn’t want sympathy.
“We’re a four piece now. We want to unveil it to the world.”
“Isn’t it a foregone conclusion?” I’ve seen the news articles.
“From Christopher.” He blows out a heavy breath. “The rest of the band hasn’t said anything.”
Okay, he doesn’t want to share. I am fine with that. Maybe. I’m also a nosey bitch. “And having a photoshoot is how you’re planning to announce it? Don’t bands normally release a statement via their social media with things like this?”
“We’re not normal.” He smirks. “Which is why this isn’t an announcement. It’s a new album cover.”
I sit back further. This is huge. Not just an album cover for a massive rock band. A new album without their lead singer. Ex-lead singer.
How is this happening right now? It would be an idiotic move to turn him down. My heart pounds so fast, it’s hard to keep the excitement inside.
“I’m not saying this as a slight on my work, but I’m a small studio. The only employee. Do you think I’m the best person to take photographs of a world-famous rock band, one on the brink of a life-changing moment?”
Ronan glances around the studio, to my work on the wall, then back at me.
“I think you’re perfect.”
ronan
. . .
“You gotta stop watching that,”Perry tells Grayson. “Good or bad, it’s best we don’t know.”
“How can you say that?” Grayson asks, but he tosses his phone on the seat beside him. The sound of our ex-band member spouting off a load of bullshit about us to the press cuts off.
“Easily.” Perry squirts water into his mouth from the gym bottle. When we showed up at his house, we interrupted his workout. “We knew he’d react badly.”
“Fuck knows why,” I mutter from my seat on the couch. “It’s not like it came as a shock.”
A week has passed since Christopher was fired from the band. Seven days of hell with him trying to contact us all. Management told us to avoid him, but it’s hard.
As much as he’s been a complete prick for months now, we were once close. Like brothers. I haven’t made themistake of answering, which comes with its own consequences.
Grayson is closest to him. It’s wearing on him, and in turn, making Caden apprehensive. He’s attuned to his twin’s emotions.
I’m furious at Christopher for making Caden feel like he isn’t good enough to replace him as our lead singer. The guy is already having doubts without that bullshit being dumped on him.
We can’t afford to sit back and let him keep spouting this shit. People are desperate to hear from us. It’s happening. The official unveiling, as people are calling it, of the new band line up. It’s already leaked about Caden, which is why he’s so tense.
