“Hey!” Rhys wraps his arms around me, lifting me up and swinging me around unexpectedly. “You made it!” he exclaims, over my resulting squeal.

He releases me and I pull my crop top down. I’m wearing a long-sleeved V-necked crop-top, the color deep and rich like red wine, with a matching mini skater skirt and flat black ballet pumps.

“Yeah I made it!” I put my hands up in the air and give him jazz hands. “Without the baby.”

As he laughs, I fetch my purse from the passenger seat and shoulder it, closing the door, and locking the car.

“Come on,” Rhys says, taking my hand. I follow him to a side door of the Blank Logic bar out of which spills a sliver of bright blue light. As soon as I step into the building, the electric hum of a crowd surrounds us; Rhys leads me down a narrow passageway covered in colorful graffiti and posters that go back several decades. I hear the buzz of countless conversations, loud music and drinks being poured and consumed in the main bar.

We turn, going into a large narrow room light with mellow lighting. Along the west wall is thick black curtain that stops at about three feet from the floor. I realize this is the stage, and that we’re backstage.

There’s a short, slender girl with pale skin watching me, with folded arms from a three-legged stool in the corner of the room; her mousey-hair pulled back in a French braid. A few feet away, tuning a guitar is a tall guy with stark white hair that falls halfway down his back and a long face with neat, precise features and kind grey eyes. He’s dressed in grey loose jeans and a grey sweater; and the effect is that he looks somewhat faded, but not in an unpleasant way. He’s watching Chase – Rhys’s friend from Walmart - fiddle with an acoustic guitar.

When we enter, the three of them all turn to look at us, and Chase gives me a devilish smile as he puts down the acoustic. I drop Rhys’s hand.

“This is Dylan and Janna,” Rhys says, raising his voice over the swell of noise. Dylan gives me a close-lipped smile, and I catch a flash of sliver in the snakebite piercings under his bottom lips, but Janna merely frowns, an unimpressed eyebrow going up. “Guys, this is Alyssa.”

“Hey,” I say.

“Hey!” Dylan’s smile widens. Janna just gives me a blank look, and then after a moment, murmurs a hello in response. It is swallowed by the din.

“You remember Chase.” Rhys adds, throwing a nod in Chase’s direction.

“Yeah.” I give Chase an equally evil grin.

“Where’s Jonah?”

“Won’t make it,” Janna pipes up. She throws in a tired sigh.

“We’re on in three!” Rhys exclaims. “What the fuck?”

“He said Adam is filling in for him,” Dylan explains.

“Well where the fuck is Adam then?!”

Chase opens his mouth to answer but before he can, someone says, “Right behind you.”

I turn.

The speaker, Adam, is standing in the doorway, dressed in all black. He’s Asian; with high cheekbones and almond-shaped eyes so brown they’re just two warm, black pools behind his straight eyelashes. His jet-black hair is cropped slightly longer on top of his head than at the sides and back; every now and then he combs his fingers through it to smooth it back.

His eyes sink to mine and something passes between us.

A spark.

“Hi,” he says. His right eyebrow goes up the tiniest bit; as though he’s felt it too, but he doesn’t know if he’s imagining it or not.

“Hi.” After a moment’s pause, I add, “I’m Alyssa, or A.J.”

A small smile. His eyes stay on mine and I know he felt it too. He gives a nod of acknowledgement, and offers his name in return. “Adam.” My eyes linger on the beauty spot just above his lips, and then move over his face again.

“Are you set up?” Rhys asks. Adam’s eyes break away from mine. He’s got – to put it mildly – a jaw that could cut through steel. It takes me a moment to understand what Rhys is referring to. Adam’s reply comes a moment later as well. It’s like time slowed for us but not for everyone else.

“Yeah,” Adam gives Rhys a reassuring smile. “I’m set up man.”

His voice is the beautiful. Not too deep, with a lightness I can’t place. He speaks slowly, as if to measure his words before he speaks.

“Cool.” Rhys visibly relaxes, and Adam meets my gaze again. My pulse quickens.

He steps into the room, and carefully past me to Dylan, handing him a guitar strap.

I look pointedly away, at Rhys, at Janna, at the floor and then the various bits of furniture and speakers and mic stands in the room… but my eyes keep finding his. Every time they do, there is that right eyebrow, just as mildly surprised as it was the first time.

A blonde-haired guy with a wispy clod of hair and sad blue eyes sticks his head through the curtain. He reminds me of a cherub.

“We’re going on, guys.” He says, sounding slightly breathless.

“That’s Noah,” Rhys tells me. I mean to look at Noah, but my eyes just find Adam’s eyes again. Adam twirls the drum sticks in his hands, and glances at Rhys, and then back to me and away again.

“Okay,” I say, distractedly.

“Follow Janna,” Rhys instructs, as Janna gets up.

“Okay.”

She slinks past me through the door, and with one final glance at Adam (he’s not looking this time) I follow Janna around the corner and through the hallway. Finally, we get to a door that opens to the front of the place.

Janna, elbowing and pushing past people, leads me towards the bar. It runs across the opposite end of the room as the stage, and the bartender, Sid, is keeping two stools free for us.

The guys file onto stage one by one, accompanied by several wolf-whistles and drunk cheers. Rhys; singing lead with Noah, takes center stage with Noah, whilst Chase stands on his other side and Dylan takes a keyboard next to a drum set manned by Adam. Rhys lifts a guitar strap over his head, checks the guys are all in place and ready behind him, and then adjusts the mic so its level with his mouth.

“Hi guys,” he says. Everybody cheers, and Rhys’s chuckle fills the room. “I’m Rhys, and this is Chase, Dylan, Noah and Adam. We are Fool the World and we are here every other Friday. um… yeah, enjoy the show!”

The lights go down in the bar, leaving the stage illuminated. Dylan starts on the keyboard, playing three soft notes, before he pauses.

“Her body is cold,” Rhys croons. “Conversation is cocaine… I call her snow.”

“Yeah, that’s your new nickname…” Dylan rasps, into the mic, tilting his head seductively.

Noah jumps in. “Her body is cold, conversation is cocaine… I call her snowww…”

I listen, watching Adam the whole time.

The Jon Bellion song segues seamlessly into Bow Chicka Wow Wow by Mike Posner, before moving to the Big Big Bang by Rock Mafia. Rhys then takes the lead; rapping on a cover of Rocketeer by the Far East Movement, with Chase taking the chorus. After about twenty-five minutes on stage, the boys jump back to Jon Bellion for Paper Planes.

Janna tells me they’re about to take a break as Chase closes with a cover of That’s What I Like by Bruno Mars, but she’s not really looking at me when she says it, so it’s like she’s making an announcement for anyone who might happen to hear her.

“Let’s go!” she growls, already three steps ahead. I can’t see why she’s in such a hurry, but follow her out anyway, and backstage, losing her a couple of times in the mush. When we get to the guys, I can see why we were in such a hurry. They’re surrounded by girls (and a few hopeful boys). Even through the throng of people, I can see that Adam isn’t here, and try to mask my disappointment.

Rhys, chatting up an attractive brunette, catches my eye. I give him a thumbs up and immediately feel like an old maid. It’s like I’m a proud dad watching him play a sport he’s only really mediocre at.

Rhys smiles anyway, nodding his thanks. Janna glowers at his elbow.

I look around the room. Dylan is talking to some a guy with thick, jet-black locks of hair that fall past his ears. He’s twirling drumsticks, and the way he’s standing – arrogantly, with his nose only slightly in the air while his eyes rove over the girls in the room – makes me think he’s Jonah, the guys who Adam is covering for. Even though I don’t know anything about what Jonah looks like, this guy just looks like a drummer.

I let my eyes slide away. Something makes me miss Nyla suddenly. When she was only a few weeks old, I’d build a pillow fort and put her down to sleep right next to me in bed. Sometimes it was out of pure exhaustion; she’d finally stop wailing and sleep and I’d find myself too worn out to walk her back cross my room to her crib. But other times it was because I still couldn’t believe she was all mine.

Sometimes I look and her and wonder at how quickly everything happened; because it feels like it was only yesterday that I found out I was pregnant. And yet here we are; she is starting on solid foods and can sit up by herself and crawl in a sort of scooting motion. It’s like someone picked me up when Nyla was tiny and dropped me a few months in the future.

I make it out to the side door as if she’s tuned into my thoughts, my phone buzzes with a text from Anya. It’s a picture of Nyla, passed out like a little starfish on her back; her face turned and her mouth slightly agape.

The caption reads, “Just got her down, finally!” with an emoji making an exhausted face. I slide my phone back into my pocket, and sigh, closing my eyes and inhaling deeply. When I open my eyes, I look up to the stars.

I still feel like I’m acting sometimes.

I start walking towards the car.

“Hey!” someone calls.

Although I’m pretty sure they’re not calling me, I turn, almost as a reflex. Beside to an old bench that sags tiredly against the building is Adam. He’s leaning against the wall, one foot resting flat against it. I didn’t even see him.

I stop, feeling that pull I felt earlier. For a second, I shut my eyes to savor it.

This is real, I think.

“Hey,” I respond.

“You leaving?” he asks, after a moment.

I shrug. “I don’t know yet.”

“What are you doing out here?”

I consider making something up, so I’m not the girl with the baby. I walk over to him, stuffing my hands in my pockets. “I missed my daughter.”

“You’re the girl with the baby,” he says, after a pause. It’s as if he’s confirming some theory he had; but I like the way he’s looking at me. His eyes glisten with something I can’t quite place but want to drown in. He waits for me to confirm his theory, keeping his eyes trained on mine. a smile tickles at the corners of my lips.

“Well,” Adam theorizes after a moment, his eyes moving over the stars in the sky. “You’re out here with me and you don’t seem at all upset about the fact that Rhys is currently surrounded by groupies-”

“I’m not.” I interject. He looks at me again, and his lips part into a flirty, half-smile that makes me feel breathless, because there it is… the second best thing about his smile. Not the teeth. Not the beauty spot, but the dimples.

Holy shit, the dimples…

“So that must mean you’re not his girlfriend?” he finishes.

“No. I’m not.”

“Mmm.” He makes a non-committal sound as he nods, taking this in.

“Did you think I was?”

“Janna doesn’t glower at people like that for no reason,” he explains.

“Were you jealous?” I tilt my head playfully.

“Maybe.” He admits. As I feel a deep heat rise from my core and come over my cheeks, his eyes stay on mine; as though they know exactly what I’m thinking.

He straightens up from the wall and sits on the bench. I get a whiff of him as he moves past me; something clean and delicious, like fresh laundry… body spray… I don’t even know.

“What’re you doing out here?” I ask, sitting next to him. I cross my legs towards him, and he his eyes move over my leg slowly, all way up until his gaze is level with mine. It’s a good thing he can’t see me blushing.

“Jonah’s here,” he sighs. “It’s his night; I was only covering for him. He’s the real deal.”

“That makes you the imposter.” I laugh. He shrugs. “You sounded pretty good up there to me,”

“Ah, well, you know,” he pretends to dust a piece of fluff off of his shoulder in mock-modesty. I laugh, and he smiles properly for the first time.

He’s beautiful.

“Rhys and I go way back. He wanted me in the band at first, but I said no. But sometimes I play instead of Jonah,”

“Where did you learn to play?”

“Church.”

I nod.

“You want a cannoli?” he asks.

“What?”

He reaches next to him on the bench and produces a small box. I can only just make out the logo from a bakery in town on the top.

“It’s my post-show tradition,”

“Oh,” I gape. I don’t know what to say because he’s just so intense, but in a way that I really like, and I don’t remember ever feeling like this with someone I just met. He takes a huge first bite and I quickly say “Sure!” before he finishes it.

He turns to me and brings the cannoli to my mouth. There’s something a tiny bit… intimate about letting him feed me, I note, with a wicked, delicious feeling, as my eyes glance at the pastry and then look back at him through my lashes. He brings the pastry closer.

I open my mouth and bite; cream and crunchy pastry filling my mouth. He drops the remaining crumbs into his own mouth, licking the cream from his finger without looking away. He reaches forward after a second and swipes a tiny bit of cream from the side of my bottom lip, sending shivers down my spine when he pops the finger into his mouth.

“That’s a good cannoli,” I comment.

“I know.”

“I’m a little in love with you for it,” I joke. He laughs, a short tonal sound like his voice.

We stare at each other. He brings his hand up to me, offering me something, and in the dark, I have to squint at his hand for a moment before I see what it is. An ear bud. I take it, and push it into my ear, and the opening bars of Sade’s By Your Side fills my ears.

“Close your eyes,” he says.

He closes his, and I let my eyes steal over his features before they close too. He’s a perfect stranger, and this should all feel weird, but I feel like I know him; I feel like he’s real.

I have a flash of a memory – I’m six years old and squealing with laughter, dad is swinging me around the kitchen as Sade’s voice fills the air. In the memory, and just as she does now, Sade promises to hold me tight when I’m cold. But I was happy then. So happy…

I open my eyes slowly. He’s watching me. I don’t know if he’s been watching me the whole time or if he just opened his eyes a second before I did, but I feel my heart flutter.

His face seems closer than before, and I look down at his full lips. He inches forward.

“I should go.” I murmur, turning away. The spell breaks immediately.

I hand him the ear bud robotically, feeling a little idiotic for some reason. But it’s been a year since I was with anyone; and I feel incredibly nervous all of a sudden. Adam looks slightly surprised and a little confused - whether it’s at the intensity of the moment or at my breaking it – I don’t know.

“Let me walk you,” he suggests.

“Okay.”

I stand, starting to walk to the car, and he falls in step with me. When I get to the door, I stop and face him.

“Will you at least give me your number?” he asks. “So I can call you?”

I give him my phone and he dials his number before he calls it, saving his number. When he hands the phone back, I slide it into my bag and turn to the car.

“Wait,” he says quietly. I turn, and he reaches for my waist slowly, pulling me up against him. His nose brushes mine, and then he kisses me softly. Its small and questioning, and I don’t pull away because I already feel like I never want to leave this feeling. So, he kisses me twice more, this perfect stranger, and both our lips part as his tongue begins to move gently against mine.

I touch his arms, digging my fingers into his black sleeves as he squeezes the sides of my waist in return. His hands are warm over my clothes and where they meet the slivers of exposed skin.

I imagine I can taste the dry white wine that went into the cannoli shells on his lip, and that I must be drunk on it, because I catch myself knowing with everything in me, that I’m a little in love with him for it.

He gives a small rasp of a groan, sucking on my bottom lip like it’s something he would savor, if he could, but he can’t help himself. I can feel my nipples pebble against my shirt, and I wrap my arms around his neck to let myself sink completely into Adam; into his kiss and the way it makes me feel, as Sade rings in my ears and the song attaches itself to this feeling.