Page 16 of Backstage

“Fame allows me to have this,” I say to her, raising my hand, indicating my surroundings. “I’m willing to pay a small price for what I’ve earned,” I tell her honestly. I just have to be grateful to this life for getting me out of poverty.

“It’s not a small price if it takes away a little bit of your freedom every time.” The look in her eyes makes me hold my breath. I can’t lie to her, I can’t get away with a joke, she doesn’t fall for my bullshit like everyone else. She sees past my words. She gets right to the point, like at Evan’s office the first day we met.

“It’s not like they’re putting me on house arrest. I just have to be a little more careful when I go out.” I play it down, embarrassed.

She stares into my eyes, looking deep in thought. When she’s not frightened or defensive, she’s someone who gives herself time to think, to give weight to her words. “And when they won’t stop at the doorstep anymore? How much will you be willing to give them? When will it be too much for you, when will it be time to say enough? Where’s the limit to your fame, Damian?”

I’ve known her for less than a week, and her words come in like a hurricane, messing up my chest. I feel naked in the face of her honesty. For the first time in my life, a woman has totally disregarded the rockstar facade and sunk the blade into the man’s chest behind it. She can’t know that there will never be any feeling someone can put a leash on. But there is a limit, even for someone like me.

“When I can no longer play the music I want... That’s my limit.”

She stares at me with a stern look for what seems like an eternity, and I hold my breath as if I’m waiting for a verdict. Strange as it may seem to me too, I find myself wishing I’d given the right answer, the one that wouldn’t disappoint her, because this was by far the most honest conversation I’ve ever had with a woman, and it was liberating.

She nods, holding a smile when a message on my cell phone breaks an almost electric moment of tension on this couch. “Fame must also allow you to afford a big fat heating bill. It’s ridiculously hot in here,” she says, erasing the seriousness of before.

I burst out laughing.

“I like to be comfortable and barefoot when I’m in the house,” I explain as I get off the couch. “You make yourself comfortable, I’m going to take off these shoes. They’re killing me.”

I go put on a pair of tracksuit pants and a light T-shirt. When I go back to the living room, the spectacle in front of me immediately makes me regret not having worn a pair of boxer shorts, since blood directly flows in places that should be dry in such a situation. Lilly is sitting cross-legged on the carpet, barefoot, holding the guitar and playing it, down to just a pair of jeans and a white tank top that clings to her small yet well-proportioned physique. It seems almost impossible that she is the same person as in the photos she showed us. Lilly must have struggled a lot to lose all that weight, and, if I were in her place, I would show the whole world the result. Why is she hiding that body under her giant sweaters?

She’s gathered her hair in a loose bun on her head, held in place by a simple pencil. The light coming in through the windows next to her underlines her slender neck covered in pale skin. With those enormous glasses that particularly suit her, she looks like something straight out of a man’s naughty fantasies: the perfect mixture of intelligence and sexiness that makes my blood flow from my brain to my pelvis in less than zero seconds.

I have a hard time putting myself back together, but I move in closer, grabbing my guitar next to the sofa, and sit in the armchair next to her. I hold the instrument more to cover my semi-erection than to really play something.

“How do you want to start?” she asks with a sincere smile, losing her sarcasm in favor of something that clearly makes her feel good: playing music.

“Do you want us to try a version of ‘Jude’?” I ask, since I already know what style she does the song in.

She giggles, amused, and her cheerful reaction floors me. It’s the first time I’ve heard her laugh at something I say, at ease in my presence. “Aren’t you tired of hearing it?” she asks, cheered by my proposal.

I start laughing too. “You have no idea, I swear. But the version you do has nothing to do with the original. I wish I’d written it myself.” I sincerely admit it.

She tilts her head to the side, showing the details in her neck that I can’t take my eyes off. She studies me for a few seconds. “But you wrote it.”

The naivety that transpires from her observation makes my eyes dart towards hers and lose myself in their intense green. I need to answer, but my mouth goes suddenly dry. “The interpretation you give it, as if it were a letter you recite to someone, sweet and at the same time desperate, makes it sound like a completely different song.”

She nods without speaking, as if that explanation is enough; as if I’m worthy enough for her to accept the clarification as absolute truth. Her eyes linger on mine long enough for me to realize that she sees me, for real, not the glossy rock star facade. It’s a new sensation that makes me feel significant but not in the flattering way I’m used to. It makes me feel like a real person, which has never happened to me outside my close circle of friends.

Luckily, she starts playing the first chords and singing, leaving me the space to concentrate on our rehearsals, so I join her voice in harmony. It’s something that goes beyond any experience I’ve ever had, any duet I’ve ever had with more or less famous singers. Her melodious and clean voice matches with mine, a hoarser and dirtier voice, but it’s not so much a matter of technique, which she has mastered, it’s a matter of tuning that makes the air between us almost electric. At this moment, with our voices fitting perfectly and our eyes not letting go for a moment, I realize I’m fucked.

If I think back to how I saw Damian’s existence until two weeks ago, it was like scenes in a movie: parties, models, concerts, glossy magazines—a fairy-tale life. Playing with him every day in preparation for shows, I discovered him to be professional, meticulous, and sometimes perfectionist to the point of exhaustion. Working with him is a continuous cycle of rehearsing songs and getting the stage training our young band lacks.

It isn’t enough for Damian to see me perform a song perfectly. He wants me to be able to control any unexpected stage problems without panicking. Until now, playing in small venues in Brooklyn, we never needed fancy equipment; just our instruments, sometimes amps if we didn’t already have them at the venue, nothing else. We had never tried, for example, to play with earphones when the acoustics on stage are not the best. Concert venues are designed to sound great for the audience, not on the stage, so musicians have to wear earphones that allow them to hear what they are playing. It’s a strange feeling to get used to, listening to yourself through earpieces rather than your surroundings, and I’m grateful to Damian for letting me try it before the show.

When Damian stops acting like a rock star and more like a professional, the days have a tight rhythm in which we try a lot and chat little. He’s a guy who gives orders with an authority that often makes me flush. He’s sexy as hell when he demands that you try the song again because, in the last verse, we still haven’t found the right interpretation. He’s a person who leaves nothing to chance.

I understand why they’ve reached such high rockstar status: they’re not just gifted with uncommon skill and charisma, they also work without ever taking a break, without ever feeling they’ve arrived, always trying to improve and without taking their success for granted. It’s what has kept them on top for years.

I have to admit that if I’ve grown more professionally in these fifteen days than in the twenty years I have been alive, I’ve also tripled my daily dose of coffee. Despite Damian’s reproaches, I do it to stay focused when fatigue takes over. Damian, on the other hand, is a fervent supporter of supplements and physical activity. His theory is that by filling up with vitamins, combined with serotonin produced during exercise, your body can withstand greater stress loads without giving in. Being around him has made me aware of more varieties of vitamin B than a scientific documentary could cover. I was naïve to think that rock stars only preferred illegal drugs!

Honestly, when he explains the benefits of serotonin produced during physical training, my mind goes to only one exercise with him. The image my brain conjures is so naughty I blush hard and can’t hide it. When he goes on to say, with that full laugh of his, that it’s called the “good mood hormone,” I’m certain that I would wake up with a smile from ear to ear after a night between the sheets with him.

Today, however, I’ve been waiting for Damian to pick me up like he has every day for two weeks, but in a different mood. By now, it has become customary for me to drive up to the garage a block away from his apartment and send him a message. I usually enjoy taking different routes to confuse the paparazzi or die-hard fans. I’ve learned that when he wants to let it be known that he’s not home, he goes straight out with the driver, Max, from the underground parking lot under his apartment with the tinted windows.

I took the direct route, hiding inside my scarf pulled up to my eyes, my cap to cover me from the freezing wind and icy weather that has been blowing over New York City since the other night. It’s a clear sign from the universe telling me that today I should have stayed at home, wrapped in my duvet, with a hot chocolate in my hands and a good book to read. I shouldn’t have even tried to walk the streets of Manhattan. But tonight is the first concert, and I already have anxiety early in the morning.

“Where the hell did you come from? Alaska?” Damian asks when he approaches me in the garage corridor in a T-shirt, jeans, and sweatshirt.

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