“Why’d you bring the Becky home. You lose a bet?” Fozzie asks as I trudge down the stairs later that morning. I crashed so hard after Liz left, it’s almost as if spending the night with her was a dream.

It seems really cliché to roll my eyes, but that’s exactly what I do as I pass by and head straight to the kitchen. I open the cabinet to grab a coffee cup. Empty. Of course it is. Every cup or glass we have is all on the counter or on the table, or scattered all over the house, because the guys had people over last night. I’d dragged Liz past them without stopping to respond to any questions or dickhead comments. But I knew I’d have to face it.

My roommates are good guys, but they have annoyingly strong opinions of “Becky’s and Chad’s” which is what they call girls who only care about their appearance and keeping up with the latest trends and guys who are stereotypical frat-boy types. Otherwise known as basic people who look down on people who aren’t like them. Classism at its finest. But, as long as there are such huge gaps in wealth, there will always be the haves and the have-nots.

When I was a kid, my mom made me watch some of the classic John Hughes films that she grew up on. I really connected with The Breakfast Club and Pretty in Pink. They’re different stories, but classism is the common link in those classic films from the 80’s, and is still relevant today.

I feel like the place I work, The Usual Market, is the “poor kids” courtyard outside of the high school. But it’s not necessarily about finances. It’s about a different way of thinking and way of life. I hang out with a ton of creatives—artists, writers, musicians. Some of them have day jobs. Some of them make ends meet however they can. They don’t care about a big house or expensive cars. Not saying none of them dream of a time when they don’t live paycheck to paycheck, but they’d still keep the same mindset. Non-conformist.

“You’re drooling,” I say, swiping my fingers at my mouth and my chin. “Take care of that.”

“You never answered my question.”

“I saw a girl at the show I wanted to fuck. I brought her home. We fucked.” My chest tightens, as if warning me that I shouldn’t be throwing shit like that into the universe when I know there’s much more to my connection with Liz.

“Bull fucking shit.” He chuckles. “I’ve known you for seven years and you’ve never brought home a girl like that.”

“A girl like what?”

“Like she was spit out of a Brooks Brothers catalog.”

“What the fuck does that even mean?” I ask with a laugh, forgetting to defend Liz for a second, because the random comment is funny as shit. But only partly true. Sure, Liz is perfectly put together, but that dress she had on last night was super sexy, light-years away from the bougie-casual Brooks Brothers attire.

My mind flashes back to the very first thing she did on my bed—flip around so we could go down on each other simultaneously—and that solidifies the fact that she’s no model for an over-priced vanilla clothing line. She’s got a wild side. I just need to figure out how to get her to let it out more often.

“She must’ve been good, bro, ’cuz you’re licking your fucking lips,” Fozzie says, his voice shaking me out of my memory. “Ahhh! I get it now!”

“Huh?” I say wiping my mouth, unaware of my subconscious response. “Get what?”

“This isn’t just random pussy. She must be your new muse.”

“I wouldn’t say new.”

“Old flame?”

“She’s the girl from the accident.”

“Wait? What?” Fozzie stops grinding his weed and leans closer to me.

“Yeah. When I saw her in the crowd, she caught my eye, but not in the normal way. She looked familiar, but I couldn’t place how. Then I saw her profile on IG and figured it out.”

He swipes his hand across the table and sweeps the herb off the edge into the open palm of his other hand. “Fuuuuuuck! Does she know you wrote a song about her?”

“No! You want me to creep her out?”

“I can’t believe it. That’s random as fuck.”

“Yeah, I know. And even more random—it’s EmVee’s sister.”

“Oh. My. God. You’re in love with like, the Queen of Beckys.”

“I’m not in love.”

It can’t be love—it’s just a crush and lust. A lusty crush and an intense connection that tricks my brain into feeling like love.

Jesus.

The only thing I can think about is the next time I can be with her—which we didn’t even discuss. I don’t even have her number, but I gave her mine. That means she has to make the next move. Unless I beg EmVee for her digits.

When I look up, Fozzie’s staring at me. I fucking hate him.

“It’s not love! It’s infatuation.” I lean back and stretch out, resting my feet on the coffee table.

“You sound like a fucking girl.” He lifts his eyes quickly as he sprinkles weed onto rolling paper.

“I refuse to accept your ignorant gender-stereotypical comment. Having feelings for someone doesn’t make me any less of a man.”

“Oh my God. Get a grip.”

“Did you know Liz was EmVee’s sister?”

“Nope. I don’t know Em’s family.”

Fozzie and EmVee have been friends for years, so I’m slightly surprised he doesn’t know her family. Then again, he’s got this way of never getting too close to people, yet knowing everything about them. He must be soaking up every piece of information people put into the world when he doesn’t seem to be paying attention.

“Did you know they’re rich?”

“Yup.” He lifts the paper up, rolling it in his fingers expertly.

“Why didn’t you ever say anything?”

“One, it’s never come up before. Two, it’s not my place to say anything.” Fozzie brings the joint to his mouth, licks the edge, then seals it. “And three, Em has been out of their house and off that money for years. So it’s not an issue.”

I shrug. “It’s not an issue at all. I was just wondering.”

“Have you heard from Nelson?” Fozzie changes the subject abruptly. Which isn’t even odd. He never talks about his relationship with Em. I don’t even know if I should call it a relationship. They’re more than friends, but not together as a couple.

“Yeah. We’ve been figuring out the final details about the Mars tour.”

After years of working our asses off trying to do everything for ourselves, Fozzie and I hired Nelson to manage the band. When Open Your Heart started getting a ton of satellite-radio play and YouTube streams, we realized we needed some help. Nelson is a good friend of ours and he’s been in the music industry for years. He’s got a ton of connections and a great business mind. He’s taught us so much and helped us up our game.

“Being out with them is gonna be epic,” he says during an inhale.

“Right?” I hold my fingers out for him to pass me the joint. Nelson worked his ass off getting us set up with Walk on Mars.

He hands it over immediately. “Shit is blowing up, homie. Did you see the Alt chart this week?”

I nod, unable to answer because I’m holding my inhale. “Number seven,” I say in an exhale.

“Unreal.”

“My mom keeps texting me every time she hears it. It’s phenomenal.” I return the joint to Fozzie. “Is Tim still here?”

“Yup. He was wasted so I let him crash in Q’s room.”

Tim was too wasted to get home? There’s a huge surprise. I can’t think of a time where he hasn’t been wasted. Good thing our third roommate, Quinn, is rarely home. He practically lives at his girlfriend’s place. But he still pays rent, so we don’t care.

“Why the fuck was he banging on my door last night?”

“’Cuz he was high out of his mind,” Fozzie says. “He started talking about always wanting to fuck a Becky and then he got on this kick about having a threesome with you and Liz. Marissa jumped in and said they should knock on your door to see if you guys would have an orgy.”

“Fuck that.”

“I figured you wouldn’t share.”

“Not Liz.”

And not with them.

Orgies aren’t even on my radar. That doesn’t get me off.

Threesomes aren’t my thing. Years ago, I had a few encounters with two women. I wasn’t opposed to another guy in that situation; it just happens that my experiences were with two females. I barely trust Tim enough to have him in the band, so I’m not sure why he’d think I’d want to fuck someone with him.

If I’m in a relationship, it’s just me and my girl in bed. I have zero interest in sharing. I’m not gonna hate on what gets someone else off sexually—to each their own—but I want to concentrate on one person during sex. I want to put my all into her. Nothing feels better than the connection and intimacy with one person. Being with the right girl allows me the comfort to open my mind to explore and try new things.

“Hey! I’m sorry I jumped on your bass last night. I wasn’t thinking. Just going with the energy.”

“It’s cool. We talked about it in New York.”

“I know, but we didn’t talk about it beforehand and you didn’t have that bracket on it. I—”

“Dude,” Fozzie interrupts me. “It’s all good, man. I love when you get that energy. The crowd loves it. No harm to my drum. I’ve actually been thinking about a new setup where we can incorporate that more if you want. More brackets to make an industrial look around the drums. May have to wait for a headlining tour, though, ’cuz it’ll be a bitch to take down between sets.”

I nod.

“We really need to talk about Tim, though,” Fozzie says. “How many times is that fucker not going to show up to soundcheck? He didn’t set up his shit and was high as fuck when he got there last night.”

When Fozzie uses the term “high as fuck”—he doesn’t mean pot. We both know Tim does some harder shit. We just don’t know what it is. We’ve already talked to him once about it and how we don’t want that type of use in the band. He obviously doesn’t give a shit about our concerns, but if he keeps it up, he’s gonna get his ass kicked out.

“Jimmy knows all our songs and slays the bass. He’s already been on tour with us and knows how to set everything up. We should talk to him about taking over for Tim.”

I nod again. We have to figure it out soon, because going on tour with Walk on Mars means we’ll be playing arenas. We can’t even wrap our heads around that size crowd. The exposure is going to be ridiculous. Both Fozzie and I have been on edge, alternating between extreme excitement and extreme stress, ever since Nelson told us. Being heard by new listeners is the way to grow. That’s how this becomes a career and not just a hobby. And that’s the ultimate goal. I just hope we can get our shit together before then.