Fall, Month 8

Talk about her second album started a week after Olivia returned to LA. A week after returning home from opening for the Faded Relics. It had only been five months since her first album was released and already Jon was acting as if they were behind schedule. They were certainly behind his schedule.

That first week back was the longest Olivia had spent in any one place in over three months. Her body wasn't used to the solidness of her bed. Her ears missed the constant hum of a tour bus engine lulling her to sleep. It didn't help that the new place Jon had rented for her was cold, bare, and lacking all personality. Luckily, Olivia was busy enough she spent only her sleeping hours in the new apartment.

She had three weeks. Three weeks between her first-ever national tour as an opening act and her first headlining tour; a tour that would take her to arenas all over the world. Olivia's brain didn't even try to comprehend exactly how fast everything was moving because it knew that it wasn't worth the energy. Maybe talk of her second album had started too late. Maybe they were behind schedule.

When Olivia finally left Jon's office, her eyes were wide and her mind was overloaded. She had spent the past four hours seated at the head of the table to Jon's right, with an entire staff of people who mapped out every day of her life for the next year and a half. It was all there. They even had a physical calendar with each day marked up with something new. Tour mostly, but there were radio stops, photoshoots, studio time, everything mapped out perfectly with absolutely no wiggle room.

And everyone kept looking to her. Ideas for the theme of the next album. Thoughts on music video treatments for songs that weren't even written yet. Album titles. Cover shoot spreads. All of them passed down the table to land in front of her.

Jon helped simplify things, put them in layman's terms for her. His words were words she had understood until that point but the order in which he used them made their meanings foreign to Olivia. She had never felt so stupid. Phrases like 'market saturation' and 'target demographic' were tossed back and forth like a volleyball between Jon's creative team. And every time the ball was passed to Olivia, she missed her shot and fell flat on her butt.

"Bottom line..."

Olivia let out her first breath all evening as Jon turned to face her, his eyes revealing just a hint of the sympathy and understanding he had for her situation. Olivia's deer-in-the-headlights look was one he had seen many times before. He wasn't shocked it was showing up now. Reality was settling in. Olivia's dream was becoming her career.

"Bottom line. You need to write. Everyday. Starting now. We'll reconvene after the holidays, compile what you've got, and go from there. Worst comes to worst, we'll hire someone to write for you. Jayden's already offered. I'm sure he'd be happy to step in."

"No. I'll do."

Jon smiled at the fierceness that broke through her haze. Her fighting spirit was back. He had touched on a subject he knew she would never budge on.

"Then write. If you need help, someone to help motivate you, we can send someone with you on the road. Capitol had this new position they've created called an 'Artistic Liaison'. Apparently, she helps artists find peace and space while traveling so they can write. Can you do this, Reeve?"

Olivia was nodding her head before he finished talking. The thought of anyone else stepping into her rule made her stomach turn. It was empty and begging for food so it would have turned on its own regardless.

"Then that's everything. Meeting adjourned."

Jon gave Olivia a nod and then was out the door before the rest of the team had gotten the chance to stand from their seats. Olivia hadn't even gotten to the list of questions she had brought to the meeting to go over with him. At that moment she couldn't quite remember what they were but at least she had sneaked in her question about Jayden's whereabouts before the meeting.

As Olivia hit the sidewalk, gulping down large lungfuls of fresh air, breathing out the stale office environment, all she could think about was Jayden. She hadn't seen him in months. He had stopped by after her LA show but that was at the beginning of tour. She hadn't reached out to him but the silence was a two-way street.

Olivia pressed a button on her car keys and the vaguely familiar car parked down the street replied. Just like the new apartment, the car was new. Olivia was thankful at least for the familiarity of LA streets as she headed west out of downtown.

Only half of her conscious brain was paying attention to the road. The other half was swirling in a whirlpool of stuff to do, things to think about, ideas to digest. Slowly her brain returned to normal operating speeds, returning with each mile Olivia put between herself and the board room she had just left.

She opened the windows to let the air rush in when her mind flew back to the large calendar, each day with something new, a scant few weeks of freedom next summer, and then nothing else until Christmas. The Christmas of next year. It was only October.

Olivia could feel herself breathe easier the second she grabbed her guitar case from the back seat. Every day since returning from tour, Olivia had had a monster list of details to attend to for the upcoming tour. If it wasn't costume fittings, it was hair touch-ups or trying on a million different shoes to find the one that would become HER shoe for the tour.

Gone were the days where she wore on stage what she had for the rest of the day. This was her tour, her show. There would be costumes and lights and guitar changes and a grand piano. The costumes would resemble a nicer version of what she usually wore and the guitar would mostly be acoustic but ones that she had had to pick out. And the piano was next level. Things were stepping up for Olivia Keller.

Her lights had to adjust as she entered the building she had just parked in front of, the rehearsal space was dark, with black curtains hanging down over all four walls to cover up the soundproof padding. There was a low stage a single step up from the carpeted floor that took up half the room. The second half was filled with an array of old couches that looked like they had gotten lost on their way to a thrift store and ended up here.

The equipment was already set up. The microphones in place. But Olivia was the first of the band to arrive. She dropped her bag and her guitar case of the furthest couch and pulled her hair up out of her face. She started vocal warm-ups waiting for the nerves to set in.

But they never did. In fact, Olivia found herself excited to meet her new band. She had seen them on paper, watched videos of their auditions, and picked them out herself but in-person was a whole different ball game. But Olivia's soul was yearning for fellow musicians, people as obsessed with music and performing as she was. People the complete opposite from those she had just spent the day with.

Bradley entered and brought a train of people with him. Olivia greeted her friendly tour manager with a hug and extended her hand to each band member that entered.

She felt like she was meeting celebrities. She had done her research thoroughly, spending hours online while the tour bus rolled her from one city to another. She had to do it while pretending to be asleep in her bunk so her other band wasn't aware that she was in the process of replacing them.

"Olivia, this is Yvette and Troy Whitfield."

The married couple that had been working as a duo act all over LA was prettier in person than they had been in their photos. Troy grabbed Olivia's hand with a firm shake but Yvette wrapped Olivia up in a warm hug, her long black hair falling over Olivia's shoulder.

"It's so nice to meet you."

She held onto Olivia's shoulders, keeping eye contact to solidify their connection.

"You too. Thank you so much for coming. I'm excited to work together."

"As are we."

Both of them talked in soft tones and never seemed to loosen up the soft smile on their faces. They left Olivia to greet the rest of her new band, Yvette taking her place behind the keyboard and Troy inspecting his drums.

"And this is Gage Sanders," Bradley said.

Where Troy had been tan, broad, without a hair out of place, Gage was tall and gangly, pale, with hair several inches too long that he kept sweeping out of his face with his free hand. But one inspection of his guitar cases told Olivia everything she needed to know and made her take an instant liking to the kid.

The acoustic guitar case slung over his shoulder was worn but clean, neat. Any tears had been painstakingly repaired. There wasn't a stain on its black canvas body.

And his electric guitar case in his hand was just as tidy. The leather was worn at the edges and the mechanisms holding the handle were different shades of silver, one having been recently replaced. But there wasn't a single sticker on the whole thing. Here was a musician that took pride in his instruments and took care of them. Olivia held out her hand with a warm smile.

"It's so great to finally meet you. I'm excited we get to work together."

"Me too."

And a man of so few words. Conner and his long tirades about how badly Olivia was leading the band were long gone from her memory, his entire existence almost completely erased with each second Olivia spent with Gage.

With a "Let's get started" from Bradley, the musicians took to the stage and rehearsals began.

They played as if they had been playing together their whole lives. If anyone had walked in on them working through the setlist, they wouldn't have been able to understand that these four people had only met an hour before.

They followed Olivia's lead and without question. Gage was officially her band leader but they soon found an easy partnership. He looked to her for when to start and she looked to him for ideas on arranging, ways to freshen up the songs, make them more exciting to perform.

Olivia didn't believe Bradley the first time he called time. They had spent three hours rehearsing and it had flown by in the blink of an eye.

Yvette and Troy didn't linger long as they had a gig they had to get to on the other side of the city. Olivia pleaded with them to let her know if they had another show before tour started as she would love to hear them play live. Bradley asked Olivia to close up behind her on his way out.

Gage was putting his electric guitar away, making sure to wipe down the neck before stowing it away, when he looked over to find Olivia making herself comfortable on the couch she had claimed at the beginning of the night.

"Do you live here?"

Olivia allowed a laugh as it was the first joke Gage had uttered so far.

"No. I was just gonna use the space to try and get some writing done."

"Have you eaten yet?"

Just as Olivia was about to claim that yes, she had, right before rehearsal, her stomach grumbled. Gage smiled and nodded towards the door.

"Come on. There's a taco place down the street. You can't write on an empty stomach. Well, you can but I promise you, it won't be anything good."

His argument was airtight and so Olivia followed him out of the studio and down the street. She felt much better with three tacos in her. With their plates clean, they finally had a free mouth to talk. Their first natural topic of conversation was the upcoming tour and Gage's raised eyebrows were his tell of surprise hearing that Olivia had only just returned from tour.

"When?"

"A little more than a week ago."

"And we leave in..."

"Fifteen days. Yeah."

Gage sat up straight from where he had been leaning forward over the chipped picnic table between them. The warm night and the lack of indoor seating at what was more of a taco shack than a restaurant kept them outside. Cars raced past along the avenue only a few yards from where they sat. Bugs flew around the fluorescent lights overhead.

"That's a busy life," Gage said.

Olivia's eyes widened as she nodded her head, the board meeting from earlier that day coming back to her in full force. That calendar flashed once again in her mind.

"You have no idea. And it's only getting busier."

"I'm guessing your manager has you on that 'one album a year' plan."

"How did you know?" Olivia asked.

"It's been the trend recently. It's to saturate the market. You never give the people a chance to forget you. If they forget you, then your finished. Or so the marketing people say. They don't have much faith in fan loyalty."

"I barely have fans so I can understand where they're coming from."

"You've got enough to sell out a few arenas."

"I guess."

Olivia hadn't had the time to stop and contemplate her own fan base. They had always seemed like overflow from Jayden or Wes and his band. But the people who were selling out her shows were coming to see her. She was the headliner. Olivia was on the verge of getting hit with another wave of overwhelm.

"That's why you wanted to stay behind write?" Gage asked.

"I'm supposed to be writing a song a day. I don't know how I'm going to find the time."

"How did you use to write?"

"Between shifts at my job at a coffee shop back home. While I was waiting for an order to get filled. My waitressing notepads were more lyrics than they were coffee orders."

"And now you have to travel the world, performing your songs in front of people who paid to hear them, literally living your dream."

Put that way, Olivia felt her cheeks blush with shame. But when she met Gage's eyes, there was no shame. No condemnation.

"You figured out how to get yourself signed, right?" Gage asked.

Olivia nodded.

"I'm guessing you can figure out how to write on tour."

Gage's smile was infectious and so was his belief. Olivia felt herself loosening up and even smiling. The whirlpool was slowing down. There was only a low level of anxiety left.

"How about I come help you? Back at the studio. I don't have anything else planned. Maybe we can write together."

"That would be great!"

"Let's go."

They threw away their trash and headed back to the rehearsal space. There had only been two cars in the parking lot when they had left but now there was a third. It was flashing, like Olivia's but somehow seemed more expensive. As they approached the door leading into the building, they found someone waiting for them.

"Hey, Killer. I heard you were looking for me."

"Jayden! Hi!"

Olivia felt herself rush towards him, her heart racing unexpectedly, her mind filled with excitement at the sight of him. The whirlpool was gone. The racing thoughts, the anxiety, dispersed.

"You busy? There's this thing going on downtown. I could use a date."

"No! I mean..."

Olivia looked back over her shoulder to where Gage had stopped near his car.

"Can I get a rain check on that songwriting session?"

Gage nodded but after a long moment of meeting Olivia's eyes.

"Sure. I'll see you around."

Gage climbed into his car, his instruments already stored in the back and drove away.

Olivia watched his car disappear and suddenly felt a pang of guilt. But Jayden was talking and so she was distracted once more.

"You ready?"