Blue Raspberry 29, Pistachio 23: Dealing
Title: Dealing
Main Story: In the Heart
Flavors, Toppings, Extras: Blue raspberry 29 (front row seat), pistachio 23 (recuperating), malt (PFAH: Lars : slip of the tongue), brownie.
Word Count: 5000
Rating: R; involves discussion of naughty bits and a lot of f-bombs.
Summary: Five concurrent conversations on the subject of Lars' perfectionism.
Notes: For the malt challenge, over 5k division.
It was supposed to be a five-minute break, but Lars had gotten into a fight with Russell and Olivia was pretty sure it was going to go a bit longer than that. She sat down on the edge of the stage and massaged her feet.
"Hey." Jake squatted next to her, arms braced on his legs and hands dangling. "You okay?"
"Fine," she answered. "It's just been a while since I did this. My arches ache." She looked down at the silk ballet slippers she wore, the stereotypical pale pink that Lars had insisted on. The color washed her out, but then again, considering the song's subject, maybe that was for the best. "And the shoes are new. They're still a little bit stiff."
"Hmm." Jake sat down properly then, crossing his legs, and reached for her feet. "Give it here. You look wonderful."
He was lying, but he was also offering a foot massage, so she wasn't going to call him on it. She twisted to the side and put her feet gratefully in his lap. Jake glanced at Lars and Russell, who weren't yelling yet but were getting there fast, shrugged, and began to unlace the ribbons that wrapped her ankle. "He really went all out on this."
Olivia shrugged, and smoothed the loose dress she wore. She'd expected a tutu, or a leotard, or something that people actually wore to do ballet, not this pseudo-nightgown, pale pink silk to match the shoes. She'd thought it would make her look fat, instead of curvy. She'd been outright skeptical, in fact, to the tune of "you expect me to wear what."
Lars had convinced her in the end, and she'd actually been pleasantly surprised this morning, looking at herself in the bedroom mirror. Yes, the pink leached all color from her skin, leaving her curls shockingly dark against all the pastel. Yes, Lars's no jewelry no makeup policy left nothing to distract the eye from her flaws. Yes, the dress clung to every bone and curve of her body. But it didn't make her look fat, or ugly. Somehow it made her look ethereal, fragile, a ghost fluttering around the black-clad and very real band members. For a song about depression, it was a surprisingly accurate visual.
Best of all, she hadn't had to pay for a thing.
"I think it's his magnum opus," she told Jake. "Aaron said he's always wanted to do a music video. And it is his song. He's very proud of it."
Jake took off the right shoe, set it aside, and started working on the left. "Yes, well, it wouldn't have happened if it weren't for you," he said, picking at the knot. "You're allowed to claim some credit."
"I don't want any credit," she said. "It might be about me, but it isn't really about me, you know?"
"Yeah, I get that." He took the other shoe off, settled her feet more comfortably in his lap, and dug his thumbs into the arch of her right foot.
It felt so good that Olivia let her head fall back and groaned softly, flexing her foot in his grasp. She'd forgotten, in all the years she hadn't danced, how much ballet could make your feet ache. She closed her eyes for a moment and just enjoyed the pressure, the relaxation as the muscles were forced to loosen.
When she finally looked up, Jake was grinning smugly, head bent over her feet.
"None of that," she said, and poked him in the shoulder with her free foot.
He looked up with an expression of concentrated innocence. "None of what?"
"You know what," she said, biting back a grin. "None of that. I'm pretty sure Lars won't let us run off for a sex break."
"If you want a sex break, Lars is just going to have to deal," he said, but bent his head over his lap again, and switched feet.
Olivia ignored that in favor of the foot massage. Jake was really good at massages of all kinds, which, yes, had resulted in more than one sex break, but right now she just really wanted to get this nonsense over with. They'd already been filming for several hours, which seemed excessive for a three-minute song, but what did she know.
She did know that it had been a lot longer than it had to be, because Lars was a perfectionist and nitpicking everything. He was lucky someone hadn't punched him yet; if he kept going the way he was, someone would.
"What are you thinking?" Jake asked.
"Hmm?" She opened her eyes lazily, saw him regarding her with a faintly worried look. "Nothing bad. Just that Lars needs to lighten up."
He laughed. "He really does. Magnum opus or not, it won't end the world if there's a few things wrong. We all have better things to do on a Saturday."
"Well," Olivia said, and stretched her arms, "I don't."
Jake snorted, and ran a feather-light finger across the base of her toes. She giggled and curled them tight. "I can think of a few things. We could've been sleeping, for example."
"Maybe you could've," Olivia said, archly, and poked him in the shoulder again. "I could've been taking a nice long bubble bath."
"Or," he said, with commendable haste, "we could've taken a bubble bath. We still could, when we get home."
She hummed appreciation. "I like this plan. Can we have a couple glasses of wine, too?"
"Absolutely. Anything you want." For emphasis, he pressed the arch of her foot hard, and got another groan for his efforts.
"Okay," Olivia said, feeling lazy and pleased. "It's a date."
"Good," he said, bent down, and kissed the top each foot quickly. "Better get your shoes back on. I think Lars and Russell are starting to wind down."
"Ugh, really?" She glanced at them, saw Russell stalking off stage and Lars throwing his hands up. "Guess you're right. All right, give them to me."
--
"I hate this fucking piece of shit," Ivy said.
Gina, reading a manuscript for work, arched an eyebrow without looking up. "Don't hold back, Ivy, tell us how you really feel."
"Oh, bite me," she said, but she put the camera down. Which was a relief, because, piece of shit or not, it had been pretty expensive and Lars would not be happy if it broke. Regardless of whether or not Ivy was responsible.
"Why do you hate it this time?" Gina inquired, mostly out of curiosity. It was a different reason every time.
Ivy shrugged. "Zoom function sucks," she said. "I'm probably going to have to make poor Olivia run through her whole dance again just so I can get some reasonable close-ups."
"Ah." Gina sat up at that and looked at her friend, sitting on the edge of the stage with her feet in Jake's lap. She didn't look too unhappy, despite what she'd said all those years ago. "I don't think she'll mind."
"It's got to suck," Ivy said, and Gina looked at her sharply. "Doing the same thing over and over again just because we can't get our act together."
Oh. All right then. Ivy either still didn't know the story or hadn't connected it with Olivia's refusal to dance. Given Ivy's astonishing ability to pry information out of people, Gina would have assumed the latter, but it had taken Olivia nearly six years to tell her, and they were best friends. "If by we," she said, more or less at random, "you mean you and the camera, then yes."
"Bite me," Ivy said again, but she was smiling. "If Lars would buy decent equipment maybe we could all rise up to his standards in filmmaking. Damn it, I wish Aaron didn't have to drum. He's the one with the A/V experience."
Gina shrugged, and eyed the camera again. "I think he got the best he could afford," she said. "It would fit with all the effort he's been putting into this. The least we could do is to cooperate."
Ivy looked at her, suddenly serious. "What do you think I'm doing here?" she asked. "I have such better things I could be doing on a day like today."
Gina knew better than to ask 'like what,' since the answer would probably involve either Summer or sex. "But Lars asked."
Ivy nodded. "But Lars asked. This is important to him, and he's important to us. Because he's Aaron's friend, because he's Summer's... whatever they want to call it. He asked, so I'm here." She glanced at the camera again, scowled, and added, "This is not to say that he won't owe me big time, because he will. And I intend to collect. Fucking piece of shit."
"Speaking of Summer," Gina said, before the conversation could degenerate into another bout of swearing. "Where is she? I'd have thought she'd want to come and see."
"Sick," Ivy said. "Poor kid. She woke up this morning with a temperature of like a hundred and two, and Mom said she had to stay in bed. She was really upset about it, too." She sighed. "I should tell Lars, so he can go hang out with her after. That'll calm both of them down some."
And Lars would probably need it. Not that the people he'd collected to get this project off the ground were incompetent or uncooperative; he was just being an unbelievable perfectionist sometimes. She couldn't hear what he was fighting about with Russell, but it was probably something stupid. "Good idea," she said, and then, "Actually, are you going home yourself?"
Ivy gave her a rather odd look, but said, "Yeah, I think so. See how Summer's doing and all. Why?"
"I'd like to tag along," Gina said. "If you don't mind. I like Summer, and I haven't seen her in a while."
She liked all of Ivy's family, actually. Aaron, calm and easygoing, who'd signaled her first acceptance into the group (but thankfully dropped the nickname "Speedy G" not long after he'd bestowed it on her)-- his easy acceptance of Ivy's antics never failed to amuse and amaze her. Ivy's formidable mother Gail, from whom Ivy had gotten her red hair and utter fearlessness. Her father Nathan, just as easygoing as his son, who hadn't batted an eye when his daughter brought a nervous girlfriend home to dinner-- such a contrast to her own father's probable reaction. And Summer, pretty little Summer, so well loved and so carefully protected. Ivy was so careful with her, but so encouraging, never smothering, only sheltering.
Ivy would make a wonderful mother, someday.
Oh. And that was something that Gina had probably better not think right now... they hadn't even been dating for a year yet. She should not be thinking about children. Not even if she'd just realized that she wanted a fearless little girl with red hair and endless blue eyes...
No.
"You okay?" Ivy asked, sounding doubtful, and she jumped a little bit, startled.
"Oh, yeah," she said, heat rising in her cheeks. "I'm fine. Just distracted, sorry."
"Penny for your thoughts?" Ivy said, hopefully.
Not a chance. "They aren't even worth a penny," she said, laughing, and picked up her manuscript again. She had to have it read and annotated by the end of next week, and it was pretty slow going.
"You know," Ivy said, "you don't have to be here if you don't want to. You could go home, and I could call you when I'm ready to go."
Gina raised her eyebrow again. "Now why would I want to do that, when you're here?"
Ivy ducked her head fast, but not fast enough to hide a blush of her own, and Gina felt her heart contract painfully. She was not the only one in this relationship who'd been hurt-- she forgot that sometimes.
"All right," Ivy said, busying herself with the camera. "Your funeral."
"Anything but," Gina told her, and went back to work.
--
"What the hell is Lars's problem?" Danny demanded, appearing suddenly over the tom-toms.
Aaron, bent over the pedal for the base drum, hadn't heard her approaching. He jerked up and narrowly missed hitting his head on the crash cymbal. Which would have been funny, but painful. "What?" he asked, blinking.
"I said," she said, "what the hell is Lars's problem? He's getting on Russell's case and Russell didn't even fuck up. This time."
Danny did not like Russell and frankly didn't care who knew it. Aaron let it go. "I don't know," he said. "He wasn't acting up this morning. Maybe he's just stressed."
"He fucking better be," Danny muttered. "Drama-queening is just not cool. And definitely not sexy."
Aaron felt his eyebrows climb. "Sexy?"
She stared at him for a minute. "Who said anything about sexy?"
"You did," he pointed out, amusement growing. "Just now. You said, and I quote, drama-queening is definitely not sexy."
"I said no such thing," Danny said, in her end-of-discussion tone. "And if you tell anyone I did I'll tell them you were high."
Like anyone would believe that. If she said drunk, now... but Aaron kept that particular thought to himself. He filed the 'sexy' comment away for further consideration and tactfully changed the subject. "This is Lars's thing. He's wanted to make a video for one of his songs for as long as I've known him. Cut him some slack, okay?"
"I'll cut him some slack when he isn’t behaving like a little bitch," Danny said. She looked down at the drum set, and added, "Can I lean on any of these?"
"Not unless you want it and you to end up on the floor," Aaron said. "And if you break one of my drums you're paying for a replacement. These things are expensive."
"Whatever you say," Danny said. She circled the drum set and plopped down on the ground beside his stool. "Ugh. This is really boring. Can we go home yet?"
Aaron bent back down to the base drum pedal. "You probably can," he said, fiddling with it. "In fact, I'm not really sure what you're doing here at all. You're not part of the band, Lars didn't shanghai you like he did Ivy, and you're not anyone's girlfriend." Yet, if what he suspected was right. But he kept that thought to himself too.
"You saying I can't show up anyplace I damn well please?" Danny asked, a light and teasing menace in her tone.
"No," Aaron said. "Just questioning why you'd want to."
"Oh, fair enough." She shrugged. "I wanted to see if Olivia needed any last-minute alterations to her dress. And then I just sort of... stayed. Dunno why I'm still here."
"Because you enjoy watching Lars torture us?" he asked, and then heard a mental record screech. "Wait a minute, alterations?"
Danny nodded at Olivia and Jake, sitting together on the end of the stage. "You didn't think it fit her like that just by magic, did you? I pleated it in around the waist. Makes her look more breakable."
"No, I got that," he said. "What confuses me is the part where you sew."
She gave him an evil look. "And what's wrong with that? For your information, it is really fucking hard to find decent shirts that fit my tits and my shoulders at the same time. At least, not without looking like I'm wearing a sack. And in boot camp you fix your own damn uniforms."
"I'm not judging you," Aaron said. "I just never pegged you as someone who sews enough to make alterations. Hell, I can fix holes and stuff. I fixed that hole in the armpit of my hoodie."
"Oh, is that what you call it," Danny said, but she relaxed again. "I don't sew, like, professionally, but I'm pretty okay at it. Dunno how Lars found out but he asked me to make it work, so." She shrugged. "Figured it was the least I could do. Wouldn't have if I'd known he would be such a bastard about the whole process."
"He's stressed," Aaron said again, and shrugged himself. "I mean, how would you feel if you finally got a chance to do something you'd wanted to do for forever?"
She smiled. It was not a happy smile. "My lifelong dreams are a lot less complicated. All I'd need from my friends would be an alibi." She considered a moment, then added, "Or bail money, I guess."
Uh-huh. "Danny," he said, "I just want to say that, surrogate sister or not, if you kill somebody I'm not bailing you out of jail."
"Don't be an idiot," Danny said. "You couldn't afford bail for murder. I don't expect you guys to bankrupt yourselves for me or anything."
Aaron paused in what he was doing to stare at her. "You know," he said, eventually, "most people would reply to that with 'don't be an idiot, I'm not planning to murder anybody.'"
She grinned, this time in amusement, and he relaxed. "I'm not planning on murdering anybody," she said. "It'll be assault charges, maybe assault and battery. We're not talking a felony-level assault, so, like, fifteen hundred dollars, tops."
"Your familiarity with bail amounts fills me with apprehension," Aaron said, and sighed. "And I'm not paying fifteen hundred dollars to get you out of jail."
Danny twisted to look up at him with huge, innocent eyes. "Not even if I got arrested in the process of fulfilling a lifelong dream? That's mean."
"I won't pay it all myself," he amended. "I'll pass the hat, though. Between us we should be able to get you out."
"Sounds good," Danny said, cheerfully. She turned back to watch the fight proceeding, then added, "Mind you, if I haul off and punch Lars in the next five minutes I expect bail. I'd be doing you all a favor."
"To be perfectly honest," Aaron said, "if you punch Lars today we probably won't even call the cops."
"Awesome."
--
Jay held the neck of his guitar about an inch from his nose, examining it suspiciously. Penny considered sneaking up on him, then decided it was rude, unworthy of a good girlfriend, and anyway Danny had already done it to Aaron. Penny did not repeat other people's tricks.
She walked up normally, and said, "Hey. What's up?"
"My guitar sounds wrong," Jay said, answering as usual the question she hadn't asked in lieu of the one she had. "It's not mellow enough. I don't know, it just sounds wrong. I think Lars should be yelling at me instead of Russell."
Penny glanced over at their bandmates, fighting in low but epic tones, and shook her head. "No," she said. "No. Lars will run right over you. Russell gives back as good as he gets."
And also, Penny was privately convinced that someone should always be yelling at Russell. Maybe then he'd stop making poor life choices. "That boy needs a girlfriend," she said aloud, looking at Russell. "Or a boyfriend."
"Pretty sure Lars is straight," Jay said, without looking up.
"I was talking about Russell," she said, "but you know, you're right. Getting laid would improve both their personalities greatly. Maybe we should try and fix them up with someone."
Jay snorted, adjusting one of the tuning keys. "Not the same someone, I hope."
Penny kicked him-- or, well, not really kicked him, more nudged his shin with her foot. "Stop deliberately misunderstanding me," she said. "I mean different people, obviously. Unless you think they'd be into that."
"I refer you again to being pretty sure that Lars is straight," he said. "And I think Russell likes buff guys."
She blinked, then eyed her boyfriend suspiciously. "How do you know that?"
Jay shrugged. "It was late, we were drunk, we started talking about sexual preferences. That might've been when Russell came out, actually. I don't remember too much, but I know Russell said something about liking really big..." He paused, just long enough for Penny to clap her hands over her ears, grinned, and added, "biceps."
"Jerk," she said. "And what did you say?"
Fortunately for him, he knew the answer to this one. Jay put down the guitar, picked up her hand and started kissing his way up her arm. "I said slender girls with skin like silk and long eyelashes, of course."
"Good boy," Penny said, patting his head with her free hand. "For that you get a blowjob."
"You know," Jay said, raising his head, "sometimes I get the impression that you think you're training me. I can't imagine why I think that, though."
"Don't be silly," she said, patting him on the head again. "If I really was training you I wouldn't be nearly so obvious about it."
He gave her a suspicious look. "So this hypothetical blowjob..."
"Because I want to suck your cock," Penny said, serenely. "And also because you either said something nice about me or pretended you did to make me happy, and I like it when you think of me like that. Is there a problem?"
"Nope," Jay said. He leaned up and kissed her-- it never failed to amuse Penny that he was a couple of inches shorter than her, though not in a bad way. "Just checking."
"Fair enough." She looked over at Lars and Russell again, and sighed. "Of course, this whole blowjob thing is entirely dependent on whether we ever get out of here."
Jay shrugged and picked up his guitar again. "I think either Olivia and Jake or Ivy and Gina are going to bail pretty soon. Then he won't have a choice. Anyway, we're not slaves. We can walk out any time we want."
"Sure," Penny said, "if you want to fight with Lars when he's got his stubborn on. I swear, that man, give him an inch and he'll take a mile."
"I know," Jay said, and gave her a little smile. "Remember when Aaron brought me along to that first party? Lars cornered me five minutes in and demanded I audition for his band, right then and there. I don't even know how he knew I played guitar."
"Ah!" Penny said, suddenly enlightened. "That's where you disappeared to! I was looking for you, you know. I thought you were hot."
He squinted up at the ceiling the way he did when he was thinking. "Weren't you dating someone at the time? The big dude with dreadlocks?"
"Dutch," she said, "and yes, I was. I still thought you were hot. Not like Dutch cared who I talked to."
"Hence the reason he got dumped?" Jay asked, prudently keeping his gaze on his guitar.
Penny glared at him anyway. "No," she said. "His lack of jealousy was actually a turn-on. Some people trust their girlfriends, you know."
"When was the last time I got jealous over you talking to some guy?" Jay asked, rhetorically.
She ignored him. "I dumped Dutch because he turned out to be an asshole who thought of me as an accessory or something. Seriously, if you called me up at nine PM on a Saturday, would you throw a hissy fit if I had plans?"
"No," Jay said. "I'd ask to come along. Also, since when do I throw hissy fits?"
"And that," Penny said, "is why I'm still dating you." She gave him a kiss, then straightened and stretched. "Because you're not an asshole."
"I'll do my best not to turn into one," Jay said, plucking a string experimentally. "How does that sound to you?"
He was asking seriously, and not about assholishness, so Penny leaned down and listened. "Pretty good," she said, at last. "In tune, anyway. I don't know what you're looking for in tone, so I can't help there."
"Good enough," Jay said, and slung it over his shoulder. "Hey, the fight's breaking up. Should probably get back to your post."
"Here we go again," Penny said, rolling her eyes, and trotted back to her electric piano.
--
"Tell me something, Russell," Lars said, pinching the bridge of his nose. "Why is it so hard for you not to fuck things up? Really, I want to know."
"Hey, man," Russell snapped, straightening up, his hands tightening on his guitar. "I'm doing my best, okay? This is a tough bit."
Oh, like hell he was going to take that. "Then how come Jay and Aaron are handling it fine? How come Penny's managing on an instrument she started playing like, last month? Why is it just you?"
"Maybe because the others have been practicing all month," Russell said, with undeniable and infuriating logic. "You just gave this to me last week, man. I got a job and a life outside of the band, okay? In fact, I'd like to be living it right now!"
"No," Lars said, clenching his fists. "Not okay! You said you'd help me out here! You have to stay until we're done. All of the rest of us are, so what makes you so special you get to leave early?"
"Stop putting words in my fucking mouth," Russell said. He reached out, put down his guitar with exquisite care, then stood up and faced Lars, nose to nose. "I didn't say I wanted to leave early, I said I wanted to be done. Maybe if you weren't being such an asshole about this whole thing we'd be done already."
"Maybe if you weren't so fucking incompetent we'd be done," Lars snarled. Goddamn. Why the fuck couldn't anyone understand how important this was to him? "But no, you just have to keep fucking up."
Russell gritted his teeth, a muscle jumping in his jaw. "Fuck you, man," he said. "I'm doing my fucking best. I can't do any better than that. You want someone to deal with your craziness, maybe you should go find yourself a whole new guitarist."
Well, fuck. Was he actually quitting? Fat chance of finding somebody new, especially with the wannabes flooding New York. He'd have to pick through all of the idiot kids with a guitar and big dreams to find one with even a modicum of Russell's talent, and then he'd have to convince the kid to join a band that emphatically did not want to make it big. Lars deflated abruptly. "No, Russ, I don't want a new guitarist. I just want to get this right."
"Then fucking apologize, and be satisfied with what you get," Russell snapped. "We're all doing this as a favor to you, you know that? We're here on a Saturday afternoon when there's so much other shit we could be doing, because this is a big deal for you and you asked nice. We're not here to get screamed at because we can't meet your insane standards for this thing."
"Wanting the best performance I can get is not insane," Lars said, temper rising again.
Russell rolled his eyes. "No, it isn't. Acting like I'm fucking Gary Moore and just slacking off 'cause I'm not perfect? That's insane. And by the way? Olivia's not fucking Anna Pavlova, Aaron's not fucking Ringo Star and don't even get me started on Penny and Jay. We're doing our best. Stop taking that for granted."
"I'm not--" Lars began, then bit it off and took several deep breaths. "Okay. Look. This song is my baby, okay? It's the best thing I've ever written. I want it to have a good video."
Russell sighed, and looked very suddenly almost pitying. "Look, dude, a word of advice? It's never going to look as good in real life as it does in your head. It just doesn't. It always loses something in the translation. Doesn't mean it's not still awesome."
"Fuck that," Lars said, but he said it uneasily. "This is going to be perfect. I won't let it be anything else."
"You go for perfection, you're just cruising for a letdown," Russell said, and shrugged. "Or a beating. Or both. You're tap-dancing on my last nerve here, dude, is all I'm saying."
"Sure," Lars said, throwing his hands in the air. "Fine. Whatever. Take five, and when you come back do your fucking best."
Russell rolled his eyes. "Whatever, man. Can't help it if you don't listen." He stalked off stage, towards the bathrooms.
Lars turned back and surveyed the rest of his motley crew. Olivia sat on the edge of the stage lacing her ballet slippers, Jake leaning over her shoulder. Ivy fiddled with the camera way in the back, with Gina reading something beside her. Penny was just walking away from Jay tuning his guitar, Danny and Aaron had their heads together. Overall they looked pretty happy, or at least not on the verge of rebellion, which meant that Russell was just talking bullshit.
Didn't it?
It almost went against the grain to think that Russell of all people could have good advice. It definitely went against the grain to think that this song, this song that he had been working on since he'd met Olivia and seen the sadness in the back of her eyes that she tried so hard to hide, this song that he loved like a child, the best thing he'd ever written-- he couldn’t think that it could be anything less than perfect. That just didn't compute. He wouldn't let it happen.
Still. Olivia was grimacing as she got to her feet, even with Jake's arm around her waist, supporting. Ivy looked frustrated, everyone else exhausted. Maybe they'd benefit from a break. The manager of the theater was a buddy of his-- he could probably get it again some other Saturday. It would cost, but...
Well, like Russell had said, everyone was doing him a favor. And he did love this song, enough to want everyone to be their best. People weren't at their best when they were tired and frustrated. That was just common sense.
"Okay, everybody," he called. "Let's call it a day. We can finish this some other time."
Main Story: In the Heart
Flavors, Toppings, Extras: Blue raspberry 29 (front row seat), pistachio 23 (recuperating), malt (PFAH: Lars : slip of the tongue), brownie.
Word Count: 5000
Rating: R; involves discussion of naughty bits and a lot of f-bombs.
Summary: Five concurrent conversations on the subject of Lars' perfectionism.
Notes: For the malt challenge, over 5k division.
It was supposed to be a five-minute break, but Lars had gotten into a fight with Russell and Olivia was pretty sure it was going to go a bit longer than that. She sat down on the edge of the stage and massaged her feet.
"Hey." Jake squatted next to her, arms braced on his legs and hands dangling. "You okay?"
"Fine," she answered. "It's just been a while since I did this. My arches ache." She looked down at the silk ballet slippers she wore, the stereotypical pale pink that Lars had insisted on. The color washed her out, but then again, considering the song's subject, maybe that was for the best. "And the shoes are new. They're still a little bit stiff."
"Hmm." Jake sat down properly then, crossing his legs, and reached for her feet. "Give it here. You look wonderful."
He was lying, but he was also offering a foot massage, so she wasn't going to call him on it. She twisted to the side and put her feet gratefully in his lap. Jake glanced at Lars and Russell, who weren't yelling yet but were getting there fast, shrugged, and began to unlace the ribbons that wrapped her ankle. "He really went all out on this."
Olivia shrugged, and smoothed the loose dress she wore. She'd expected a tutu, or a leotard, or something that people actually wore to do ballet, not this pseudo-nightgown, pale pink silk to match the shoes. She'd thought it would make her look fat, instead of curvy. She'd been outright skeptical, in fact, to the tune of "you expect me to wear what."
Lars had convinced her in the end, and she'd actually been pleasantly surprised this morning, looking at herself in the bedroom mirror. Yes, the pink leached all color from her skin, leaving her curls shockingly dark against all the pastel. Yes, Lars's no jewelry no makeup policy left nothing to distract the eye from her flaws. Yes, the dress clung to every bone and curve of her body. But it didn't make her look fat, or ugly. Somehow it made her look ethereal, fragile, a ghost fluttering around the black-clad and very real band members. For a song about depression, it was a surprisingly accurate visual.
Best of all, she hadn't had to pay for a thing.
"I think it's his magnum opus," she told Jake. "Aaron said he's always wanted to do a music video. And it is his song. He's very proud of it."
Jake took off the right shoe, set it aside, and started working on the left. "Yes, well, it wouldn't have happened if it weren't for you," he said, picking at the knot. "You're allowed to claim some credit."
"I don't want any credit," she said. "It might be about me, but it isn't really about me, you know?"
"Yeah, I get that." He took the other shoe off, settled her feet more comfortably in his lap, and dug his thumbs into the arch of her right foot.
It felt so good that Olivia let her head fall back and groaned softly, flexing her foot in his grasp. She'd forgotten, in all the years she hadn't danced, how much ballet could make your feet ache. She closed her eyes for a moment and just enjoyed the pressure, the relaxation as the muscles were forced to loosen.
When she finally looked up, Jake was grinning smugly, head bent over her feet.
"None of that," she said, and poked him in the shoulder with her free foot.
He looked up with an expression of concentrated innocence. "None of what?"
"You know what," she said, biting back a grin. "None of that. I'm pretty sure Lars won't let us run off for a sex break."
"If you want a sex break, Lars is just going to have to deal," he said, but bent his head over his lap again, and switched feet.
Olivia ignored that in favor of the foot massage. Jake was really good at massages of all kinds, which, yes, had resulted in more than one sex break, but right now she just really wanted to get this nonsense over with. They'd already been filming for several hours, which seemed excessive for a three-minute song, but what did she know.
She did know that it had been a lot longer than it had to be, because Lars was a perfectionist and nitpicking everything. He was lucky someone hadn't punched him yet; if he kept going the way he was, someone would.
"What are you thinking?" Jake asked.
"Hmm?" She opened her eyes lazily, saw him regarding her with a faintly worried look. "Nothing bad. Just that Lars needs to lighten up."
He laughed. "He really does. Magnum opus or not, it won't end the world if there's a few things wrong. We all have better things to do on a Saturday."
"Well," Olivia said, and stretched her arms, "I don't."
Jake snorted, and ran a feather-light finger across the base of her toes. She giggled and curled them tight. "I can think of a few things. We could've been sleeping, for example."
"Maybe you could've," Olivia said, archly, and poked him in the shoulder again. "I could've been taking a nice long bubble bath."
"Or," he said, with commendable haste, "we could've taken a bubble bath. We still could, when we get home."
She hummed appreciation. "I like this plan. Can we have a couple glasses of wine, too?"
"Absolutely. Anything you want." For emphasis, he pressed the arch of her foot hard, and got another groan for his efforts.
"Okay," Olivia said, feeling lazy and pleased. "It's a date."
"Good," he said, bent down, and kissed the top each foot quickly. "Better get your shoes back on. I think Lars and Russell are starting to wind down."
"Ugh, really?" She glanced at them, saw Russell stalking off stage and Lars throwing his hands up. "Guess you're right. All right, give them to me."
--
"I hate this fucking piece of shit," Ivy said.
Gina, reading a manuscript for work, arched an eyebrow without looking up. "Don't hold back, Ivy, tell us how you really feel."
"Oh, bite me," she said, but she put the camera down. Which was a relief, because, piece of shit or not, it had been pretty expensive and Lars would not be happy if it broke. Regardless of whether or not Ivy was responsible.
"Why do you hate it this time?" Gina inquired, mostly out of curiosity. It was a different reason every time.
Ivy shrugged. "Zoom function sucks," she said. "I'm probably going to have to make poor Olivia run through her whole dance again just so I can get some reasonable close-ups."
"Ah." Gina sat up at that and looked at her friend, sitting on the edge of the stage with her feet in Jake's lap. She didn't look too unhappy, despite what she'd said all those years ago. "I don't think she'll mind."
"It's got to suck," Ivy said, and Gina looked at her sharply. "Doing the same thing over and over again just because we can't get our act together."
Oh. All right then. Ivy either still didn't know the story or hadn't connected it with Olivia's refusal to dance. Given Ivy's astonishing ability to pry information out of people, Gina would have assumed the latter, but it had taken Olivia nearly six years to tell her, and they were best friends. "If by we," she said, more or less at random, "you mean you and the camera, then yes."
"Bite me," Ivy said again, but she was smiling. "If Lars would buy decent equipment maybe we could all rise up to his standards in filmmaking. Damn it, I wish Aaron didn't have to drum. He's the one with the A/V experience."
Gina shrugged, and eyed the camera again. "I think he got the best he could afford," she said. "It would fit with all the effort he's been putting into this. The least we could do is to cooperate."
Ivy looked at her, suddenly serious. "What do you think I'm doing here?" she asked. "I have such better things I could be doing on a day like today."
Gina knew better than to ask 'like what,' since the answer would probably involve either Summer or sex. "But Lars asked."
Ivy nodded. "But Lars asked. This is important to him, and he's important to us. Because he's Aaron's friend, because he's Summer's... whatever they want to call it. He asked, so I'm here." She glanced at the camera again, scowled, and added, "This is not to say that he won't owe me big time, because he will. And I intend to collect. Fucking piece of shit."
"Speaking of Summer," Gina said, before the conversation could degenerate into another bout of swearing. "Where is she? I'd have thought she'd want to come and see."
"Sick," Ivy said. "Poor kid. She woke up this morning with a temperature of like a hundred and two, and Mom said she had to stay in bed. She was really upset about it, too." She sighed. "I should tell Lars, so he can go hang out with her after. That'll calm both of them down some."
And Lars would probably need it. Not that the people he'd collected to get this project off the ground were incompetent or uncooperative; he was just being an unbelievable perfectionist sometimes. She couldn't hear what he was fighting about with Russell, but it was probably something stupid. "Good idea," she said, and then, "Actually, are you going home yourself?"
Ivy gave her a rather odd look, but said, "Yeah, I think so. See how Summer's doing and all. Why?"
"I'd like to tag along," Gina said. "If you don't mind. I like Summer, and I haven't seen her in a while."
She liked all of Ivy's family, actually. Aaron, calm and easygoing, who'd signaled her first acceptance into the group (but thankfully dropped the nickname "Speedy G" not long after he'd bestowed it on her)-- his easy acceptance of Ivy's antics never failed to amuse and amaze her. Ivy's formidable mother Gail, from whom Ivy had gotten her red hair and utter fearlessness. Her father Nathan, just as easygoing as his son, who hadn't batted an eye when his daughter brought a nervous girlfriend home to dinner-- such a contrast to her own father's probable reaction. And Summer, pretty little Summer, so well loved and so carefully protected. Ivy was so careful with her, but so encouraging, never smothering, only sheltering.
Ivy would make a wonderful mother, someday.
Oh. And that was something that Gina had probably better not think right now... they hadn't even been dating for a year yet. She should not be thinking about children. Not even if she'd just realized that she wanted a fearless little girl with red hair and endless blue eyes...
No.
"You okay?" Ivy asked, sounding doubtful, and she jumped a little bit, startled.
"Oh, yeah," she said, heat rising in her cheeks. "I'm fine. Just distracted, sorry."
"Penny for your thoughts?" Ivy said, hopefully.
Not a chance. "They aren't even worth a penny," she said, laughing, and picked up her manuscript again. She had to have it read and annotated by the end of next week, and it was pretty slow going.
"You know," Ivy said, "you don't have to be here if you don't want to. You could go home, and I could call you when I'm ready to go."
Gina raised her eyebrow again. "Now why would I want to do that, when you're here?"
Ivy ducked her head fast, but not fast enough to hide a blush of her own, and Gina felt her heart contract painfully. She was not the only one in this relationship who'd been hurt-- she forgot that sometimes.
"All right," Ivy said, busying herself with the camera. "Your funeral."
"Anything but," Gina told her, and went back to work.
--
"What the hell is Lars's problem?" Danny demanded, appearing suddenly over the tom-toms.
Aaron, bent over the pedal for the base drum, hadn't heard her approaching. He jerked up and narrowly missed hitting his head on the crash cymbal. Which would have been funny, but painful. "What?" he asked, blinking.
"I said," she said, "what the hell is Lars's problem? He's getting on Russell's case and Russell didn't even fuck up. This time."
Danny did not like Russell and frankly didn't care who knew it. Aaron let it go. "I don't know," he said. "He wasn't acting up this morning. Maybe he's just stressed."
"He fucking better be," Danny muttered. "Drama-queening is just not cool. And definitely not sexy."
Aaron felt his eyebrows climb. "Sexy?"
She stared at him for a minute. "Who said anything about sexy?"
"You did," he pointed out, amusement growing. "Just now. You said, and I quote, drama-queening is definitely not sexy."
"I said no such thing," Danny said, in her end-of-discussion tone. "And if you tell anyone I did I'll tell them you were high."
Like anyone would believe that. If she said drunk, now... but Aaron kept that particular thought to himself. He filed the 'sexy' comment away for further consideration and tactfully changed the subject. "This is Lars's thing. He's wanted to make a video for one of his songs for as long as I've known him. Cut him some slack, okay?"
"I'll cut him some slack when he isn’t behaving like a little bitch," Danny said. She looked down at the drum set, and added, "Can I lean on any of these?"
"Not unless you want it and you to end up on the floor," Aaron said. "And if you break one of my drums you're paying for a replacement. These things are expensive."
"Whatever you say," Danny said. She circled the drum set and plopped down on the ground beside his stool. "Ugh. This is really boring. Can we go home yet?"
Aaron bent back down to the base drum pedal. "You probably can," he said, fiddling with it. "In fact, I'm not really sure what you're doing here at all. You're not part of the band, Lars didn't shanghai you like he did Ivy, and you're not anyone's girlfriend." Yet, if what he suspected was right. But he kept that thought to himself too.
"You saying I can't show up anyplace I damn well please?" Danny asked, a light and teasing menace in her tone.
"No," Aaron said. "Just questioning why you'd want to."
"Oh, fair enough." She shrugged. "I wanted to see if Olivia needed any last-minute alterations to her dress. And then I just sort of... stayed. Dunno why I'm still here."
"Because you enjoy watching Lars torture us?" he asked, and then heard a mental record screech. "Wait a minute, alterations?"
Danny nodded at Olivia and Jake, sitting together on the end of the stage. "You didn't think it fit her like that just by magic, did you? I pleated it in around the waist. Makes her look more breakable."
"No, I got that," he said. "What confuses me is the part where you sew."
She gave him an evil look. "And what's wrong with that? For your information, it is really fucking hard to find decent shirts that fit my tits and my shoulders at the same time. At least, not without looking like I'm wearing a sack. And in boot camp you fix your own damn uniforms."
"I'm not judging you," Aaron said. "I just never pegged you as someone who sews enough to make alterations. Hell, I can fix holes and stuff. I fixed that hole in the armpit of my hoodie."
"Oh, is that what you call it," Danny said, but she relaxed again. "I don't sew, like, professionally, but I'm pretty okay at it. Dunno how Lars found out but he asked me to make it work, so." She shrugged. "Figured it was the least I could do. Wouldn't have if I'd known he would be such a bastard about the whole process."
"He's stressed," Aaron said again, and shrugged himself. "I mean, how would you feel if you finally got a chance to do something you'd wanted to do for forever?"
She smiled. It was not a happy smile. "My lifelong dreams are a lot less complicated. All I'd need from my friends would be an alibi." She considered a moment, then added, "Or bail money, I guess."
Uh-huh. "Danny," he said, "I just want to say that, surrogate sister or not, if you kill somebody I'm not bailing you out of jail."
"Don't be an idiot," Danny said. "You couldn't afford bail for murder. I don't expect you guys to bankrupt yourselves for me or anything."
Aaron paused in what he was doing to stare at her. "You know," he said, eventually, "most people would reply to that with 'don't be an idiot, I'm not planning to murder anybody.'"
She grinned, this time in amusement, and he relaxed. "I'm not planning on murdering anybody," she said. "It'll be assault charges, maybe assault and battery. We're not talking a felony-level assault, so, like, fifteen hundred dollars, tops."
"Your familiarity with bail amounts fills me with apprehension," Aaron said, and sighed. "And I'm not paying fifteen hundred dollars to get you out of jail."
Danny twisted to look up at him with huge, innocent eyes. "Not even if I got arrested in the process of fulfilling a lifelong dream? That's mean."
"I won't pay it all myself," he amended. "I'll pass the hat, though. Between us we should be able to get you out."
"Sounds good," Danny said, cheerfully. She turned back to watch the fight proceeding, then added, "Mind you, if I haul off and punch Lars in the next five minutes I expect bail. I'd be doing you all a favor."
"To be perfectly honest," Aaron said, "if you punch Lars today we probably won't even call the cops."
"Awesome."
--
Jay held the neck of his guitar about an inch from his nose, examining it suspiciously. Penny considered sneaking up on him, then decided it was rude, unworthy of a good girlfriend, and anyway Danny had already done it to Aaron. Penny did not repeat other people's tricks.
She walked up normally, and said, "Hey. What's up?"
"My guitar sounds wrong," Jay said, answering as usual the question she hadn't asked in lieu of the one she had. "It's not mellow enough. I don't know, it just sounds wrong. I think Lars should be yelling at me instead of Russell."
Penny glanced over at their bandmates, fighting in low but epic tones, and shook her head. "No," she said. "No. Lars will run right over you. Russell gives back as good as he gets."
And also, Penny was privately convinced that someone should always be yelling at Russell. Maybe then he'd stop making poor life choices. "That boy needs a girlfriend," she said aloud, looking at Russell. "Or a boyfriend."
"Pretty sure Lars is straight," Jay said, without looking up.
"I was talking about Russell," she said, "but you know, you're right. Getting laid would improve both their personalities greatly. Maybe we should try and fix them up with someone."
Jay snorted, adjusting one of the tuning keys. "Not the same someone, I hope."
Penny kicked him-- or, well, not really kicked him, more nudged his shin with her foot. "Stop deliberately misunderstanding me," she said. "I mean different people, obviously. Unless you think they'd be into that."
"I refer you again to being pretty sure that Lars is straight," he said. "And I think Russell likes buff guys."
She blinked, then eyed her boyfriend suspiciously. "How do you know that?"
Jay shrugged. "It was late, we were drunk, we started talking about sexual preferences. That might've been when Russell came out, actually. I don't remember too much, but I know Russell said something about liking really big..." He paused, just long enough for Penny to clap her hands over her ears, grinned, and added, "biceps."
"Jerk," she said. "And what did you say?"
Fortunately for him, he knew the answer to this one. Jay put down the guitar, picked up her hand and started kissing his way up her arm. "I said slender girls with skin like silk and long eyelashes, of course."
"Good boy," Penny said, patting his head with her free hand. "For that you get a blowjob."
"You know," Jay said, raising his head, "sometimes I get the impression that you think you're training me. I can't imagine why I think that, though."
"Don't be silly," she said, patting him on the head again. "If I really was training you I wouldn't be nearly so obvious about it."
He gave her a suspicious look. "So this hypothetical blowjob..."
"Because I want to suck your cock," Penny said, serenely. "And also because you either said something nice about me or pretended you did to make me happy, and I like it when you think of me like that. Is there a problem?"
"Nope," Jay said. He leaned up and kissed her-- it never failed to amuse Penny that he was a couple of inches shorter than her, though not in a bad way. "Just checking."
"Fair enough." She looked over at Lars and Russell again, and sighed. "Of course, this whole blowjob thing is entirely dependent on whether we ever get out of here."
Jay shrugged and picked up his guitar again. "I think either Olivia and Jake or Ivy and Gina are going to bail pretty soon. Then he won't have a choice. Anyway, we're not slaves. We can walk out any time we want."
"Sure," Penny said, "if you want to fight with Lars when he's got his stubborn on. I swear, that man, give him an inch and he'll take a mile."
"I know," Jay said, and gave her a little smile. "Remember when Aaron brought me along to that first party? Lars cornered me five minutes in and demanded I audition for his band, right then and there. I don't even know how he knew I played guitar."
"Ah!" Penny said, suddenly enlightened. "That's where you disappeared to! I was looking for you, you know. I thought you were hot."
He squinted up at the ceiling the way he did when he was thinking. "Weren't you dating someone at the time? The big dude with dreadlocks?"
"Dutch," she said, "and yes, I was. I still thought you were hot. Not like Dutch cared who I talked to."
"Hence the reason he got dumped?" Jay asked, prudently keeping his gaze on his guitar.
Penny glared at him anyway. "No," she said. "His lack of jealousy was actually a turn-on. Some people trust their girlfriends, you know."
"When was the last time I got jealous over you talking to some guy?" Jay asked, rhetorically.
She ignored him. "I dumped Dutch because he turned out to be an asshole who thought of me as an accessory or something. Seriously, if you called me up at nine PM on a Saturday, would you throw a hissy fit if I had plans?"
"No," Jay said. "I'd ask to come along. Also, since when do I throw hissy fits?"
"And that," Penny said, "is why I'm still dating you." She gave him a kiss, then straightened and stretched. "Because you're not an asshole."
"I'll do my best not to turn into one," Jay said, plucking a string experimentally. "How does that sound to you?"
He was asking seriously, and not about assholishness, so Penny leaned down and listened. "Pretty good," she said, at last. "In tune, anyway. I don't know what you're looking for in tone, so I can't help there."
"Good enough," Jay said, and slung it over his shoulder. "Hey, the fight's breaking up. Should probably get back to your post."
"Here we go again," Penny said, rolling her eyes, and trotted back to her electric piano.
--
"Tell me something, Russell," Lars said, pinching the bridge of his nose. "Why is it so hard for you not to fuck things up? Really, I want to know."
"Hey, man," Russell snapped, straightening up, his hands tightening on his guitar. "I'm doing my best, okay? This is a tough bit."
Oh, like hell he was going to take that. "Then how come Jay and Aaron are handling it fine? How come Penny's managing on an instrument she started playing like, last month? Why is it just you?"
"Maybe because the others have been practicing all month," Russell said, with undeniable and infuriating logic. "You just gave this to me last week, man. I got a job and a life outside of the band, okay? In fact, I'd like to be living it right now!"
"No," Lars said, clenching his fists. "Not okay! You said you'd help me out here! You have to stay until we're done. All of the rest of us are, so what makes you so special you get to leave early?"
"Stop putting words in my fucking mouth," Russell said. He reached out, put down his guitar with exquisite care, then stood up and faced Lars, nose to nose. "I didn't say I wanted to leave early, I said I wanted to be done. Maybe if you weren't being such an asshole about this whole thing we'd be done already."
"Maybe if you weren't so fucking incompetent we'd be done," Lars snarled. Goddamn. Why the fuck couldn't anyone understand how important this was to him? "But no, you just have to keep fucking up."
Russell gritted his teeth, a muscle jumping in his jaw. "Fuck you, man," he said. "I'm doing my fucking best. I can't do any better than that. You want someone to deal with your craziness, maybe you should go find yourself a whole new guitarist."
Well, fuck. Was he actually quitting? Fat chance of finding somebody new, especially with the wannabes flooding New York. He'd have to pick through all of the idiot kids with a guitar and big dreams to find one with even a modicum of Russell's talent, and then he'd have to convince the kid to join a band that emphatically did not want to make it big. Lars deflated abruptly. "No, Russ, I don't want a new guitarist. I just want to get this right."
"Then fucking apologize, and be satisfied with what you get," Russell snapped. "We're all doing this as a favor to you, you know that? We're here on a Saturday afternoon when there's so much other shit we could be doing, because this is a big deal for you and you asked nice. We're not here to get screamed at because we can't meet your insane standards for this thing."
"Wanting the best performance I can get is not insane," Lars said, temper rising again.
Russell rolled his eyes. "No, it isn't. Acting like I'm fucking Gary Moore and just slacking off 'cause I'm not perfect? That's insane. And by the way? Olivia's not fucking Anna Pavlova, Aaron's not fucking Ringo Star and don't even get me started on Penny and Jay. We're doing our best. Stop taking that for granted."
"I'm not--" Lars began, then bit it off and took several deep breaths. "Okay. Look. This song is my baby, okay? It's the best thing I've ever written. I want it to have a good video."
Russell sighed, and looked very suddenly almost pitying. "Look, dude, a word of advice? It's never going to look as good in real life as it does in your head. It just doesn't. It always loses something in the translation. Doesn't mean it's not still awesome."
"Fuck that," Lars said, but he said it uneasily. "This is going to be perfect. I won't let it be anything else."
"You go for perfection, you're just cruising for a letdown," Russell said, and shrugged. "Or a beating. Or both. You're tap-dancing on my last nerve here, dude, is all I'm saying."
"Sure," Lars said, throwing his hands in the air. "Fine. Whatever. Take five, and when you come back do your fucking best."
Russell rolled his eyes. "Whatever, man. Can't help it if you don't listen." He stalked off stage, towards the bathrooms.
Lars turned back and surveyed the rest of his motley crew. Olivia sat on the edge of the stage lacing her ballet slippers, Jake leaning over her shoulder. Ivy fiddled with the camera way in the back, with Gina reading something beside her. Penny was just walking away from Jay tuning his guitar, Danny and Aaron had their heads together. Overall they looked pretty happy, or at least not on the verge of rebellion, which meant that Russell was just talking bullshit.
Didn't it?
It almost went against the grain to think that Russell of all people could have good advice. It definitely went against the grain to think that this song, this song that he had been working on since he'd met Olivia and seen the sadness in the back of her eyes that she tried so hard to hide, this song that he loved like a child, the best thing he'd ever written-- he couldn’t think that it could be anything less than perfect. That just didn't compute. He wouldn't let it happen.
Still. Olivia was grimacing as she got to her feet, even with Jake's arm around her waist, supporting. Ivy looked frustrated, everyone else exhausted. Maybe they'd benefit from a break. The manager of the theater was a buddy of his-- he could probably get it again some other Saturday. It would cost, but...
Well, like Russell had said, everyone was doing him a favor. And he did love this song, enough to want everyone to be their best. People weren't at their best when they were tired and frustrated. That was just common sense.
"Okay, everybody," he called. "Let's call it a day. We can finish this some other time."