Page 1 of Tattoos and Heartbreak
LILA
“You’re fucking kidding me right now.”
I blew a breath out, tightened my hands on the steering wheel, and very pointedly didn’t look at my best friend—who was in the passenger seat—as she proceeded to tell the person on the phone exactly why they had to be kidding. That they couldn’t possibly know what they were talking about, and further, that they might actually be high as a kite.
The sad thing was, I didn’t think they were high as a kite. I also didn’t think they were wrong, and I was positive they knew exactly what they were talking about. Because that person on the phone was my other best friend and our stand-in manager. And she pretty much always knew what she was talking about.
The problem was, Anna didn’t like what she was saying right now. And Anna’s answer to not liking something was to pretend that it must be some sort of mistake. She’d been that way since we were kids, and getting into the music business—or at leasttryingto get into the music business—hadn’t changed it.
I had a sudden memory of her lecturing our second-grade teacher about why, exactly, recess couldn’t only be half an hour long, and felt my lips twitch.
Then she slammed her phone back into her lap and my smile died.
“Bad news?” I asked, reaching for a light tone.
“The same news it always is,” she muttered. “They like us. They love our look. Love the idea of two girls forming a band together and not needing anyone else. Think we’resotalented. But they just don’t see a market for singers like us out there in the wide world. And you know how it goes; if there’s no market—”
“There’s no second audition,” I finished for her, my hands growing even tighter on the steering wheel.
GodI was tired of this. Anna and I had been playing music since we were old enough to figure out that a piano was better for more than just random banging, and we’d formed our first band—if you could call it that—when we were fourteen. We’d been refining our sound ever since, getting stronger every year and playing in every bar and on every street corner that would have us. We were the only band I knew of that featured a piano—well, a keyboard—and guitar, and we were fucking good.
The problem was, no one we’d auditioned for seemed to agree with that assessment.
Or rather, they thought we were good. They just didn’t think we were marketable. Whatever that meant.
“Is it because we don’t have any guys in the band? Because we can add a guy. Maybe we could add drums. Or bass.”
Anna snorted. “I don’t think it’s the lack of a guy, Lila. It’s the lack of vision in the music industry itself. We need a better way in. We need to find a way to go right to the source.”
Now it was my turn to snort. “Like it would ever be that easy. Like we could just wake up one day to a sign in the sky that read ‘The Source Is This Way. Follow the Arrow, Girls.’”
Anna actually laughed at that, which was a real victory as the girl wasn’t known for laughing. “I mean if you have God on speed dial and can order a sign like that…”
“But would he actually come through?” I wondered. “Because the last time I ordered something from God he was a little bit cagey on the follow-up.”
I felt her amused glance. “When was the last time you ordered something from God? And if you have a direct line to him, why the hell have you been keeping it a secret?”
I shrugged. “I ordered a bike from him once. Took three years to get it, though, so I didn’t try again. I’m an immediate gratification sort of girl.”
“Maybe it’s time you try again. Because I’m running out of ideas.”
That was also unlike Anna, who had known exactly who she was and what she was doing for as long as I’d known her—which had been forever. We’d grown up in the same neighborhood in Nashville and had been best friends since we could walk. Before that, if you believed the stories our mothers told.
I didn’t know if I did.
I also didn’t know if I had any faith in some guy in the sky granting wishes.
But Anna and I had been trying to land a contract for years now, and she was right about running out of ideas. We’d auditioned for every agent and talent scout in the city and had zero luck, and in a town like Nashville that meant we must have auditioned for hundreds of people.
If we wanted that contract, we were going to have to try something bigger than just auditioning.
Making a wish into the sky… didn’t seem like the worst thing. I mean, it wasn’t exactly going to hurt, right?
“Right, okay. Whoever’s up there and in control, I’m officially wishing for a sign that tells us exactly how to get to the source. Or a contract, since that’s what we’re actually going for here.”
I bit my lip and paused, not knowing what to expect. What happened when you made a wish like that? Lightning? Thunder? Was the ground going to open up and swallow me for the sheer audacity of making fun of the process?
But a moment later, nothing like that had happened.
