The next day marked the beginning of many new things. The beginning of my swearing off hotel eggs forever (long story). The beginning of Dad’s switch from feeling disgruntled to being all-out offended by Alexander’s presence (an even longer story). Most importantly, it marked the beginning of Kevin’s music career. So of course I had to be in the audience to heckle him for it.

That evening, Alexander and I walked together to the front door of The Ark, the venue for Kevin’s concert. The sun was still setting, so the darkening sky was painted with stretches of red and pink. The evening set a warm sort of glow around the outside world. It would’ve been completely romantic if it weren’t for the fact that Dad was right on Alexander’s heels, practically breathing down his neck as per rule number one of Overbearing Father Mode. Oh, and if Mom weren’t blowing her nose as noisily as possible every three minutes.

Take notes, kids. These are the ways in which you can ruin the potential for a romantic atmosphere.

“Zhan Ni, slow down. You are stepping on Alexander’s shoes,” Mom pointed out, pulling her husband back. Dad had all but trampled Alexander’s shoelaces.

“Oh, really? I hadn’t noticed.” Dad’s sad attempt at feigning innocence convinced exactly no one. “Are you hurt?”

Alexander let out a nervous laugh and sent me a look full of terror. “Not at all, sir.”

“Good.” Dad turned to Mom looking oddly triumphant. “See? The boy said he’s fine.” This earned an eye-roll and another impressively loud sneeze from Mom.

My mind was stuck on Alexander’s weird response and expression. Sir? Since when had he referred to my dad as sir?

I threw Alexander a look, like, What exactly happened between you and my dad last night? The expression with which he responded clearly indicated that he was at a loss for an explanation, too. Either that or the horrific experience had given him PTSD. 

Whatever. I chalked it up to one of Dad’s all-too-familiar PMS episodes and tried to put the thought out of my mind.

At the entrance, we were greeted by the chatter of milling people and none other than Vanessa, who was accepting and selling tickets by the door. I say ‘greeted’. It was really more like ‘blankly stared at with mouth half-hung open’.

If it weren’t for the nametag, I would’ve walked right past Vanessa. I hardly recognized her; she had this really edgy, dark look about her. She’d shortened her hair to a pixie cut and was rocking dark black makeup along with a sparkly purple vest and black skinny jeans. To best honest, though, I couldn’t say for sure whether it was makeup under her eyes or bags.

“Whoa,” was the first thing I said to Vanessa as Alexander and I handed her our tickets. “On your way to a human sacrificing ritual after the performance?”

Vanessa yawned and raised her eyebrow. “Is that really the first thing you want to say to me after we haven’t seen each other for months?”

“Fine.” I rolled my eyes. “Hello. How are you?”

“Kind of stressed, actually. And exhausted. If you ask me, this concert has been way more trouble than it was wor—”

“So what’s the deal with the getup?” I interrupted. “You look like you escaped from the set of The Walking Dead. And then were attacked by the eighties.”

“Oh, good,” Vanessa said sarcastically. “I told Kevin something similar, but he said ‘that’s the point’. I’ll never understand that guy for as long as I live.”

“Trust me, you’re not alone.”

She tugged at her vest with a disgruntled look on her face. “So yeah, you have your wonderful big brother to thank for our depressing wardrobes. Along with many other things, such as the complete disaster of this concert.” Despite her attempt to pass that statement off as a joke, I could definitely detect a note of spite in Vanessa’s voice when she said the last bit.

“Is something wrong?” I asked.

Vanessa hesitated for a moment. Then her faux confidence shattered completely. Her shoulders slumped and she let out a long sigh. “Yeah, actually.

“Seriously?” I paused and narrowed my eyes. “Oh, God. Don’t tell me. Kevin did something stupid again, didn’t he?”

“No. I can’t believe I’m saying this, but your brother has actually not done one harebrained thing all evening.”

“I’m sorry. Can you repeat that again?” I smirked. “I want to get that statement on recording.”

“This is serious, Nancy.” Vanessa’s eyes darted around the small group of people still gathered around the table. Seeming to judge that the other workers could handle ticket sales, she jerked her head to the side to indicate that I follow her. I left a slightly puzzled Alexander and hurried with Vanessa to a nearby potted plant.

“Thing is,” Vanessa said quietly, “our keyboardist and guitarist had a giant fight this afternoon. It was over something really stupid, but before we knew it, they were practically at each other’s throats. The keyboardist said he’s quitting, but Kevin’s trying to talk him out of it right now.”

I gasped. “What a dick.”

“Whoa, Nancy. He's still a band member...I think.”

I blew out a breath. “Sorry. It’s just, I can’t believe he’d quit on you guys right before your big performance. Doesn’t he care?”

Vanessa’s frown deepened, and the hints of a blush rose onto her cheek. “Don’t say it like that. This performance isn’t a huge gig or anything. We’re not even the only group performing.” She bit her lip and sighed dejectedly. “Honestly, at this point, we might not even have enough of a group to perform.”

I was about to attempt to reassure Vanessa by telling her that Kevin would have the situation under control, when it suddenly occurred to me that there was no way Kevin would have the situation under control. I mean…he was Kevin.

“Where’s Kevin?” I said.

“Depends. Who’s asking?”

That voice. I hadn’t heard it in months, but I’d know it anywhere. 

I turned around slowly and found myself staring at my older brother. Only he wasn’t really my brother. Not as I remembered him. This guy was Kevin version 2.0. He’d not only lost weight, but had also put on muscle, evidence that he’d been going to the gym. As if that in itself wasn’t already hard enough to imagine, Kevin had also shed his normal sweats for a black dress shirt, a neat light blue tie, and black dress pants.

He was the picture of class and confidence. He was even handsome. I couldn’t believe how much change a few months of separation from the family had wrought into my older brother.

“Hi,” I said after a while of staring passed. “I don’t believe we’ve met, stranger.”

For a moment, Kevin was so straight-faced that I panicked and thought I’d genuinely mistaken a total stranger for my brother. Then his face morphed into that familiar goofy grin, and he reigned me in for an enthusiastic hug and slap on the back. “Hey, squirt!”

“Dude! What’s gotten into you?” I spluttered, genuinely shocked by his display of friendliness. If I remembered correctly, we hadn’t exactly parted on great terms. It was probably closer to I-Hope-You-Get-Stampeded-By-A-Herd-Of-Rampaging-Rhinos kind of terms.

“Can’t a guy just be glad to see his little sis?” Kevin demanded.

“Not unless he’s putting worms in her sandwich, no.”

Kevin’s smile faded a little when his eyes landed on Alexander, who was standing a little ways away. He looked at me and his expression hardened almost imperceptivity. “And who’s that punk?”

I paused. “Satan.”

“’Satan’ looks oddly familiar,” Kevin noted, squinting at Alexander. “Hey, isn’t that the kid you drew mustaches all over during student council elections?” His jaw dropped. “No way. You brought this twerp with you?”

“Uhhh…well, a lot of things happened since then…”

Kevin was eyeing Alexander with a slight frown that told me he clearly didn't trust the guy as far as he could throw him. “What’s your relationship with this kid?” he said loudly, probably loudly enough for a certain boy to hear.

Just as a rush of blood hit my face and I was prepare to tackle my oblivious brother to the ground, Vanessa came to my rescue by smacking him upside the head. I tell you, when the Sainthood elections came around again, this woman had my vote for sure.

“Ow!” Kevin rubbed his head and eyed Vanessa reproachfully. “What’s wrong with you?”

“You. You’re what’s wrong with me. Can you please stop wasting your breath and my brain cells with these useless questions? We have really important things to be doing,” Vanessa said shortly. She lowered her voice a little. “How’s the situation with Kris?”

Kevin exhaled and shook his head. It seemed all the positivity in his demeanor had only been an act, and it was wearing off quickly now.

“No good?” Vanessa sighed. Kevin shook his head. “Did you talk to Matt, too?”

“Yeah. Fat lot of good that did. If Kris comes back, Matt says he’ll be the one to leave. I don’t understand how in a band of almost all guys, we have more drama than a freaking Shakespearean play,” Kevin grumbled.

“Kevin, this really isn’t the time to be joking.”

“Do you see me joking? Does this face look like it’s joking?”

“Well, intentional or not, you just made a joke!” Vanessa pointed out.

“No. No, I didn’t.” Kevin ran his hand through his hair in frustration. “See, Vanessa, this is you blowing things out of proportion again. Like always.”

Personally, I thought it was incredibly brave of him to be speaking to Vanessa when she was in a mood as foul as this one. Then again, he might’ve just been incredibly stupid. Reading the mood had never been one of Kevin’s strong suits.

“Oh, I blow things out of proportion?” Vanessa snapped.

“You do. A lot. Like you did yesterday.”

“Oh, I get it. Now you’re trying to make this about the soup thing last night,” Vanessa huffed.

“I’m not, but you have to admit that having mushrooms in that soup really wasn’t as terrible as you kept saying it was.”

“You still don’t understand. I hate mushrooms. They’re like little pieces of rubbery disgustingness disguised as vegetables! They’re liars.”

“Whatever you say, Vanessa.”

“They are! And don’t patronize me.”

Why was this argument sounding more and more like a lover’s quarrel as it progressed? As bad as it sounds, I was actually highly entertained by the bickering between Kevin and Vanessa. And it appeared they’d had dinner together the night before. Just what kind of relationship did these two have?

“See? There you go blowing this out of proportion again,” Kevin pointed out.

“Well, I’m sorry for caring. And wanting our first performance to be a success. I’ll just stand aside now and watch everything go down in flames, shall I? Good luck with your performance, Mr. Bigshot.” With an angry huff, Vanessa turned on her heel to march away—only to be pulled back by Kevin, who grabbed onto her wrist.

“Hands off,” Vanessa growled.

“Make me.”

Before I could even wrap my mind around the situation, Kevin yanked Vanessa toward him and tilted his head downward to puller her into a kiss.

Uh.

What.

The.

Hell.

Those were my initial thoughts, followed by something along the lines of gah and TMI and ew ew ew ew old people kissing ew ew ew ew ewwww!

I swear, I wasn't normally so conscious of PDA, but seeing my lame older brother kissing anybody was such a gross sight that I was forced to turn away as quickly as possible before my eyeballs disintegrated.

Unfortunately, this meant I made accidental eye contact with Alexander, who’d obviously also seen the kiss and was starting to get…ideas. That made things about a hundred times more awkward than they needed to be.

On top of that, I was now more confused than ever about Kevin’s and Vanessa’s relationship. Did they always spontaneously kiss each other? Was that part of the bond of being band mates? 

After they, uh, broke it off, Kevin and Vanessa were a lot calmer than before. They’d stopped yelling and instead were looking at each other a little shyly. I decided that I’d have to take matters into my own hands if the show was to go on.

“Okay, okay, I get it,” I announced, raising my hands in surrender. “I pretended not to know why you guys were talking about your lack of keyboardist in front of me, but the jig’s up now.”

Vanessa raised her eyebrow. “What’re you talking about it?”

“Vanessa. No need to pretend anymore. You’ve included me in this conversation because you want me to play the keyboard for your performance, right?”

She looked at a loss for words. “Um…”

Kevin interrupted with a laugh that could have been a little less obnoxious, I thought. “No, Nancy. God no. Where did you get that idea?”

“Hey,” I said, a little offended, “I was a good pianist back in the day.”

“Okay, but that was when we were kids. You haven’t played in five years.”

“So?”

“So we’re kinda looking for someone who hasn’t not played in five years.” Kevin flicked my forehead, another unforeseen sign of affection that caused me to wonder which magical psychiatrist had finally fixed my brother. “You can be the keyboard bench, though. I think that’s about all we could use you for.”

“I hate you.”

Vanessa sighed and looked at her watch. I instinctively checked the time, too. There were only twenty minutes until the performances would start kicking off. “Well, it looks like we’re not going to be able to perform at this rate,” Vanessa said dejectedly. She buried her face in her hands. “Nancy, I’m so sorry you had to come all the way down here for nothing.”

I patted her on the back to let her know it was okay.

“I could try talking to the guys one more time,” Kevin offered. “Or blackmailing.”

“Kevin, what did I say to you when we started this thing?”

“‘Kevin, let’s start this thing’?”

“No blackmailing allowed under any circumstances.”

“Party pooper.”

Vanessa rolled her eyes. Then she sighed again with a sad little smile. “It’s okay. It’s no biggie. I’ll let the establishment know we’re pulling out, and some other group can take our spot.” She turned toward the direction of the ticket table but started walking extra slowly, as if hoping some magical keyboardist would approach her within the time it took to reach the table.

Wait. Magical keyboardist?

A sudden idea struck me, something so simple and in-plain-view that I was kicking myself for not having thought of it before. Obviously someone here was talented, amazing, and overall badass enough to pull off an on-the-spot keyboarding gig. In fact, he’d been showing off his keyboarding skills to me just the day before.

I was talking, of course, about Wonderboy. Also known as Satan. Sometimes also known as Alexander Lin.

After I ran this idea by Vanessa and Kevin, they excitedly beckoned him to join in on the conversation. He agreed to take over as temporary keyboardist without even hesitating.

“You sure you’re up for it?” I asked Alexander.

He winked at me and then ruffled my hair, sending electric shivers down my spine. “Don’t even worry about it. Although,” he added as an afterthought, “I’m not going to do this for free.”

I raised my eyebrow, wondering when Alexander had gotten so crafty. “You’re going to charge my brother money for this? Really?” Then I paused. “Ask him for fifty percent.”

“No, but I’m going to want some other form of compensation.”

“Other compensation?”

“Yeah. Think it over.” With an uncharacteristically sly look on his face, Alexander headed off.

Vanessa took Alexander into a practice room to try to get him as accustomed to the sheet music as possible. Kevin took that as his cue to run over to his guitarist and make sure things were okay on that end. However, before he even got two feet away from me, Kevin stopped dead in his tracks.

It took me only a second to figure out why. Standing right in front of him were Mom and Dad.

There was a moment of thick, loud, uncomfortable silence.

“What are you two doing here?” Kevin demanded. The expression on his face was stone cold. Though he’d forgiven me easily enough, it was clear that the grudge he bared toward our parents ran much deeper. And really, who could blame him after they’d put him through so much struggle for self-acceptance his whole life?

Mom rushed forward, but stopped short of embracing her son when he awkwardly dodged her open arms. “Kevin—oh, Kevin,” she said quietly, tears streaming down her cheeks. Dad didn’t say anything, just stared at his son with a nearly inhumanely expressionless look on his face.

I decided to intervene before Dad whipped out a bamboo stick and started beating his grown son with it or something. “Listen, Kevin, this is not what you think it is. Nobody’s here to ridicule you. Mom and Dad miss you and want to make up with you,” I said hurriedly.

Kevin fixated his glare on me now, which caused about half my bravado to go sailing out the window. “Don’t push it, Nancy. I haven’t completely forgiven you for the things you said to me before, either.”

That shut me up.

Focusing on Mom and Dad now, he spat, “If you two are here to laugh at my failure, do that after my band aces this performance. If you still can laugh.” Then he stormed off. He didn’t look back.

I wondered how many times Kevin had practiced saying those words to my parents in his head before.

Dad gave no indication of that conversation taking place, and he and Mom resumed conversation. Mom was wiping her eyes an awful lot, though. That was how Alexander found us fifteen minutes later—Dad talking an uncharacteristic amount, Mom pretending not to cry, and me gazing out the window seriously considering making a jump for it.

“Did I miss something?” Alexander asked.

*****

A/N - Please vote and comment if you enjoyed! We're almost at the end :O