Page 20 of Edge of Forever

I knew the sex, and the connection between us, would be intense.

I had no idea it would blow my mind and make me rethink everything I thought I knew about my plans for the next couple of years.

Head down, focus on the band and the music.

Release an album, tour, and make money.

There was nothing in there about falling in love.

I had no intention of going on the road with a girlfriend back home. Even if home in this case is her college in New York City.

Now everything is a mess, and I’m struggling when I get to the studio on Monday morning.

“How was prom?” Tate Jeffries, my rhythm guitarist, smirks when he sees me.

“It was awesome,” I reply. “And fuck you.”

He laughs. “I seriously can’t believe you took her.”

“If Kirsten was interested in me,” our singer, Jonny Gold, interjects, “I would’ve taken her too.”

Tate rolls his eyes, but I know he’s just fucking with me. My band is pretty great, both as musicians and as people. I wouldn’t be embarking on this journey with them if they weren’t.

“Did she have fun?” Mick Lips, our bassist, asks, perching on the arm of the sofa in the lounge of the recording studio.

“It was a good time,” I say, giving them an overview of our evening.

“Oh, nice. Cruising down the strip in a limo.” Our drummer, Angus Jeffries—no relation to Tate, they did that by design—nods. “Next time get one of the ones that has a hot tub. That’s something I’ve always wanted to do.”

“When our album goes platinum,” Jonny says, “we should do it. Maybe even do a music video with that. We’ll go old school, like Motley Crue in the eighties.”

We all chuckle.

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Sasha Petrov, our manager, comes in, her heels clicking on the tile floor. “All right, I managed to get you close to five weeks of studio time to get this album done. It’s a tight timeline, because you’ll be leaving to go on tour pretty much the following day, but you got the first song done in two days so I’m hopeful we can knock this out and release it in late July or early August. I plan to release the first single immediately, though.”

“Is that the one we’re doing with Lexi?” I ask, referring to the lead singer for Nobody’s Fool.

She nods. “Yes, ‘Living on the Edge’ will be the first single. Then we’ll test a few live and see how the crowds react. My gut says it’ll be ‘Rough Around the Edge,’ but we’ll see. You just have to get them recorded—leave the rest to me.”

“We’ve been working on and playing these songs for over a year,” Jonny says. “We’re ready to get this album done ASAP.”

“Excellent.” She looks at her phone. “All right, well, that’s all I have for you. Let me know if you need anything while you’re here. And I want you guys to come for dinner one weekend.”

“I like food,” Mick says, rubbing his hands together.

She chuckles. “I’ll be sure to make extra.”

We talk for a couple of minutes and then she’s gone and the five of us get ready to record. We have a three-song demo tape that we recorded in two days, so in theory, five weeks to do the remaining nine songs shouldn’t be hard, but everything is different when you’re in a big studio like this with an actual producer.

Sasha found him and after meeting with him, we decided he would be a good fit. After how smoothly things flowed on Thursday and Friday, I’m hoping the rest is equally easy.

“I want you guys to jam first,” the producer says. His name is Jimbo Barnes, and he’s a middle-aged guy with long, stringy, salt-and-pepper hair and a pencil mustache. He’s pretty no-nonsense but that works for me because we need this album done as soon as possible.

The opportunity to tour with Nobody’s Fool came up unexpectedly but it’s a waste of time and money if you don’t have an album to promote, so everything came together quickly.

“Let me hear you play ‘Rough,’” Jimbo continues. “Play it like you do live.”

So that’s what we did.

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