Page 46 of Once Upon a Boyband
“I don’t remember much,” I lie.
Freddie rolls his eyes. “Yeah, you do. You wouldn’t have all this in your living room if you didn’t still play.” He plays out the first few chords of “Falling Slowly,” then looks up at me. “Isn’t this the one you used to play all the time? The one from the movie?”
I don’t answer him, but I’m already tuning the guitar, my hands thankfully on autopilot because my brain is completely freaking out. I haven’t done this in front of anyone aside from Sarah and Goldie in years, but weirdly, I find I actually want to.
Freddie waits until I’m tuned and ready. When I look upand meet his eye, he nods, his hands hovering over the keys as he waits for me to strum the first chords. He joins in as soon as I do, and then…I sing.
Badly, at first. I’m not even a little warmed up. But the longer I sing, the easier it gets.
Eventually, Freddie comes in with a harmony, and our voices blend as well as they did when we were Midnight Rush. Before long, I’m not thinking about my trembling hands or how weird it is to sing in front of someone who has found as much success as Freddie.
I just let the music roll over me until it's all I can feel.
When the final notes ring out, neither of us moves, the silence settling between us for a beat, then two, before Freddie finally lifts his hands from the keys and laughs. “That was incredible.”
I lean the guitar against the couch and stand up, heading for the kitchen without a word, mostly because I don’t want Freddie to notice how weirdly emotional I suddenly am. I’ve played a lot of music over the past eight years. But only for myself. Usually when Sarah is gone, and Goldie is the only one around to listen.
I wouldn’t have guessed that playing with someone else would hit me so hard.
I take a deep breath and pull a couple of beers out of the fridge, a double IPA from a microbrewery that just opened up across the ridge. I stand there, staying in the small triangle of light spilling out of the open door until I feel a little more in control, then open the bottles and return to the music room, where I hand one to Freddie.
He holds it up and studies the label.
“It’s local. You’ll like it.”
He takes a long drink before setting it on the floor besidethe piano. “Yeah, that’s good.” He lifts his hands back to the keys and grins. “What else you got?”
We play for over an hour. My favorite songs. His favorite songs. Even a few Midnight Rush songs—including our debut single, “Curves Like That,” the one with lyrics a group of teenage boys never should have been singing.
By the time we get to the end, we’re both laughing so hard we’re practically crying.
At one point, Freddie grabs the Martin off the wall, and we play a few with both of us on guitar, then he switches over to the Gibson and I move to the piano. I’m not as good as he is, and he claims he’s better on bass than guitar, but I don’t think he’s giving himself enough credit.
He’s grown a lot as an artist, settled into a sound that’s more mature, more grounded than the Freddie I knew as a teenager. More than once, I find myself listening more than I’m singing, almost in awe of what he can do.
“For real, man. I don’t know why you aren’t still doing this,” Freddie says after we finish playing through a Lewis Capaldi song we both love. “You’re singing with a lot more of your chest voice than you used to, and your tone is legit.”
“Nah,” I say. “I don’t know about that.”
“I’m serious,” he says. “Let’s do ‘Never Say Never.’ You can do Leo’s vocals. Actually, hang on. Where’s your phone?”
I lift an eyebrow. “Why do you need my phone?”
“Because I want someone else to hear how good you sound.”
“Freddie, come on. I don’t…” I hesitate, lifting my hands to my head. “No one else has heard me sing in a really long time.”
He frowns. “Really? Not even Sarah? Or Laney?”
I huff out a laugh. “Laney didn’t even know I was Deke until you showed up on my front porch and told her.”
His eyes widen, then understanding dawns. “So that’s why she was so freaked out. I thought it was just me, but her reaction did seem a little extreme.”
“I was going to tell her, I just hadn’t gotten around to it yet.”
“Perfect,” he says, standing up and holding out his hand. “Even better. Phone, man. Come on.”
I have no idea why I pull my phone out of my pocket and hand it over. Probably because he’s Freddie Ridgefield. And nobody gets what he wants like Freddie gets what he wants. Call it charm. Or just really good intuition that tells him exactly how and when to push. Either way, the man is unstoppable. When he gets an idea in his head, you either jump on board or get out of the way.
