Sleep had evaded me like that certain pencil you couldn't find when it mattered the most. On the plus side, replaying the entire concert in my head and reliving the lights and sounds felt like a good use of my time. My senses remembered pretty much everything from yesterday—something I loved about being hypersensitive. After dropping off Nora at her condo, I'd driven back to my apartment, written the beginnings of a new song, and searched the house for stock paper before realizing I'd run out of my diorama supplies. My markers had also dried out. That might have explained why I dreamt of city planners criticizing the drab colours of my paper metropolis.

Since I woke up late the next morning, it meant some frenzied hours of catching up to my regular morning routine: an outdoor walk, working on my songs, going to my Kumon workplace, and cooking tender shrimp for gỏi tôm--a quick Vietnamese salad with carrot and radish strips. Eating it with my never-ending supply of giant lobster crackers was my reward for a Friday.

And just when I thought this would be the extent of disruptions to my schedule, someone messaged me on Instagram.

PHIONA: Hello Tai. Thanks for filling in for me during the show on such a short notice. I liked your songs; I can see you made them with a vision, and I respect that. I'd be up to work with you as your music manager if you're interested. You can find information about my qualifications on my website. -Phiona

I covered my mouth, inhaling the semi-sweet and salty flavours of shrimp that stained my hand.

"They're the same person?" I asked myself dumbly. With my sticky salt-covered fingers, I compared DeFye's picture with Phiona's Instagram. But when I really looked at her face, I recognized the same hairline and shape of the eyes. It made sense though, separating your administrative career from your creative one. Brand image mattered.

Phiona—as DeFye—had sung some of her traditional soca pieces at the Elizabeth Theatre, fused in with the modern rhythms of rap. As the last performance of the show, she closed the night with bittersweet harps, guitar and drums.

Anticipation grew like a helium balloon inside me. As I took another bite of shrimp, I felt like I was on the edge of a cliff, ready to fall into the endless sea below. But for the first time, there was the possibility that I could fly, too.

—

One week and a bunch of text messages later, I was racing to the university's snowy campus to meet Rajathiran. I was thirty minutes late. Sticking to a change in my schedule was hard, and my past friendships had gone down in fire after I failed to show up on time. Over time, I gathered tools like calendars and alarms to help me, but that wouldn't change the way my executive functioning worked.

I bent over to catch my breath, cold air scraping my throat. Rajathiran was nowhere in sight. They'd been adamant about letting them introduce me to Phiona. Rajathiran promised they would be on time, but since I was already running late on schedule, I couldn't be mad at them either. That didn't make the daunting mound of unpredictability seem any smaller.

Finally the doors swung open to reveal them. In one smooth motion, they swung themselves onto the staircase rail, slid down the stairs, tumbled in a safe roll on the ground and popped back up, backpack and all. Icicles snapped from the staircase rail.

With the energy of an adventurer, Rajathiran blew strands of hair from their mouth. "I'm sorry about being late. I was cleaning my room and I found the homework that I'd been looking for a couple weeks ago, and...well, I'm sorry."

"It's okay. I was late too."

"Then let's go! Are you excited?"

"Yes."

"But you don't look excited," they said, disappointed.

"I am."

Rajathiran adjusted their backpack. We walked to my car and got in. Setting up the GPS, I wondered if there was something I'd missed. I never understood banter. Breaking the awkward silence, they continued, "I know how scary it is meeting a new person, so that's why I'm here. I haven't seen her in a while anyway."

"Don't you have exams?"

Beside me in the shotgun seat, they huffed, but their lips curved upward. "I'm a risk taker first, a student second."

They seemed content with leaving it at that, and I breathed a sigh of relief. I had to drive in comfortable silence, maybe with the wind whooshing in and the engine running, but I couldn't do it alongside talking.

Driving had its own thrill, but I missed the luxury that came with riding in the backseat. Back when my parents' places of employment switched around a lot, my dad used to drive my mom to work. This was for a couple years after moving to Canada from San Francisco. My parents said they had trouble taking care of me and my three siblings in-between work, and my grandparents had a hard time understanding my needs as an Autistic child. So while my dad was still job-hunting, he'd drive my mom to Kingston to Toronto at 5 A.M. in the morning with me in the backseat.

I loved going over the Gardiner Expressway because its elevation gave you a sweeping view of Toronto's Waterfront, The water glistening with the early's dawn rays, the buildings looming in the sky like giant Lego blocks, and the roads below that parted and looped together in the only logical manner possible kept me up for the whole drive. Sometimes. My sleep schedule was non-existent because I kept getting distracted by a bunch of stimuli. My parents found it baffling that I had a higher chance of dozing off in the car than at home. All I knew was that the gentle engine's humming soothed me.

Reaching our destination, I pulled up to a one-story bungalow nestled deep in a suburban neighbourhood. A red and black Trinidad and Tobago flag hung from inside a window. Patches of unmelted snow blanketed the wild shrubs leading up to the house's front porch, where a small sculpture of stacked ceramic jars sat. It might have been a fountain.

We approached the front door. Rajathiran rang the doorbell. I adjusted the strap of my guitar case. What seemed like ages trickled by. Phiona and I had exchanged emails where I'd sent her performance videos and she confirmed what I should bring. She told me instruments wouldn't be necessary, but experience told me they liked to hear you sing in person rather than in a video. People didn't say what they meant after all.

"Hold on, coming!" a deep voice called.

On our right, the garage door rattled. A hand appeared and lifted it up, revealing a tall woman with long wavy hair, a dark complexion and camouflage outerwear. A glossy "Stay True" slogan was printed on her shirt, and she wore a faded pair of Air Jordans, with scuff marks on the white parts.

I'd seen her before. More than once, even. But where?

"Come on in!" Phiona called.

Rajathiran skipped up to their friend, and the two shared a sequence of handshakes. They made it work despite the large height gap. I stood off to the side, thrown off by how natural it felt, as if it was greeting a friend instead of a business partner. How did the two meet, I wondered? Was Phiona a teacher or mentor to Rajathiran at one point? Another thing I'd learned was that making friends with people much older than you also had a different set of social rules attached to that. When I had tried to express that to adults in the past, they acted weird.

Phiona led us inside to her living room, which was set up to mimic an informal receptionist area with chairs and a coffee table, but I felt oddly at home. I stroked the textured sofa and pushed the tips of my shoes into the soft Persian rug. A decorative clock with reflective metal petals—were those spoons?—silently told the time on the adjacent wall. Below was a table with angular wooden carvings, where you could see the transition as the carver improved. The last one was a pair of hands holding what looked like a flute.

Phiona slowly swayed from side to side. When we made eye contact, my heart leapt in my mouth and I averted her gaze.

She cleared her throat. "To be honest, I'm probably more nervous than you. But let's get down to business. What are your goals?"

My mind went blank. "Um, can you explain what your job is actually? Do artists managers help musicians with improving their music? I thought that was the job of a music producer."

"You're right. Artist managers help you book gigs, network, manage your finances, and so on. It depends on the specifications of the client. On the other hand, music producers are the ones refining your music, giving you technical suggestions, and they ensure that your music will be successful in the current industry. But I'm familiar with the guitar, bass and drums—all the instruments I heard in your songs. I am confident in my ability to give you technical feedback without being mean.

"I need to caution you though. Although I have expertise in music as well as marketing, I'm not an instructor. Most of the things I can do are to guide you in the lyrics refinement process."

I could do nothing but nod, reassured but overwhelmed at the same time. Something stupid might come out of my mouth otherwise. Why hadn't I made a list of my goals before coming? Sitting across from Phiona, who also happened to be a rapper on the side, I was at a loss on how to further my own music career.

"Phiona, why don't you show Tai your music studio?" Rajathiran suggested.

Phiona jutted her thumb behind her. "It's the second room on the right of the stairs. Touch stuff only if you know how to use them, and return everything to the way it was, okay?"

Relieved for a chance to be alone, I thanked her and found the room. Inside was a couch, a keyboard, a microphone, a laptop, headphones, an electric guitar, and a steel drum. Everything was colour-coordinated so the objects blended together in a comforting pastel haze. I walked in and ran my hands over the walls, which were soundproofed with green fabric-wrapped fiberglass panels. When I closed the door, I couldn't hear a word of Phiona's and Rajathiran's conversation.

"Wow," I said.

This studio spoke of my future. A future I wanted anyway. Where my passions could materialize around me, where I could feel right in my comfort zone. Still, my doubts lingered.

There was a hard rap on the door. I must have spent more time here than I thought. "Did you have enough time to think it through?" Phiona asked, coming in.

Caught off guard, I fished for an answer. Phiona had her hands on her hips—so that was either a relaxed stance for her personality, or she was waiting for me to say something. I shrugged. "Is it-Is it hard being self-employed? And you're a music manager and a singer, right? How does that work?"

She twitched her lips and leaned against the wall. "For your first question, there's a lot more things to manage on your own, but overall it's easier than putting up with toxic work environments. I used to work with a bigger studio, but I got sick of the drama and left. I studied music in university and played it for my entire life. Guitar, piano, saxophone and drums are my strengths. Most of what you see here are second-hand equipment I got at discounts, so you might find that some parts aren't working, like the low C key on the keyboard. I also got help to make this room sound-proofed..." She trailed off. "I might have overdone it, but it's a nice place to rest.

"Oh, and for your second question! Well, the organizers gave me a hard time for being late," she sighed. "In the end I realized I can't balance both jobs at once, so I'm toning down my singing side. For now." Phiona crossed her arms and looked at me. "I saw you at that restaurant, didn't I? You and another friend were arguing with the manager."

No wonder she felt familiar! "And you were that singer with the harp!"

"Yep. What happened there?"

"A disagreement," I muttered, slowly backing into the nearest wall. The cold surface comforte me.

"And you're nervous that I might treat you the same way?"

My head snapped up. Did Phiona sense the truth and realized I had thought of using Shield as my back-up plan?

"It's not you though. It's me."

Phiona placed her hand against the wall. The motion reminded me of myself, though the walls didn't morph or change.

"Let me get something straight. James was picky at best, and offensive at worst. I only knew that after he asked me to change my songs because they sounded too foreign. I will never treat you like that, okay? Because I'm sick of being treated the same way. But something you got to realize is that people don't treat you proportionally to your worth as a person. This is a safe space for everyone, from anywhere, with any identity," she stressed, "and that's my founding principal as a music manager. I'm here to help. Tell me what you need, and I'll do all I can."

That actually felt...good? To have someone say that like they meant it. I swallowed.

"Okay."

—

"See? That wasn't so bad," Rajathiran remarked as they strapped on their seatbelt.

I pulled down the sun visor. It was late afternoon, but the sun was nearly setting.

They turned in their seat to face me. "Hey, about that day when Monty brought you...you don't have to be nervous around me, okay?"

My heart palpitations eased. "I'll try."

"And that goes for Phiona too. Sometimes she's blunt or says things without knowing what they mean, but you're in good hands."

Faith exuded from them. It should be comforting, but a scary thought struck me: How many times had I heard the same thing? From James, from my parents, from Monty. Believing in myself was one thing, but at least inside me, my dreams were secret. How long would it take before Rajathiran and Phiona and everyone else saw that they were wrong to believe in me? That they saw the "real" me, someone I couldn't tell apart from who I acted as around people versus the person I was in the safety of my bedroom?

I didn't know how it happened. It shouldn't have been possible since there wasn't a wall between us. But when I dropped them off and they closed the car door behind them, that must have satisfied the parameters of Shield. My car's interior flickered with fiery electrical wires that threatened to implode in fear. I watched Rajathiran hesitate, look around, before shaking their head and returning to campus grounds.

I could find patterns, make generalizations from years of observation, but there was yet to be a common symptom after people start seeing me the same way I saw myself, filled with dreams so big I didn't feel like I had the right to own them.

The theme of the story keeps changing to the point where it is slightly ridiculous, but that is the fun of being a panster. We're only in the beginning so you might notice the theme-switching thing later on, and not now. Please tell me at points where the story feels unnatural so I can save those ideas for editing. I think I have a problem of not knowing instinctively what the story is about (unlike Keychains) since Tai's story is not a self-insert of mine.

Also, here's an Easter egg: the pair of hands playing a flute is a nod to Krishna, the Hindu god of compassion.