In the summertime, the Old Port is one of the most Instagram-ed locations in Montreal. Busloads of tourists walk the waterfront in shorts and baseball caps. Ben and Jerry’s cones melt in kids’ fists as their parents stroll behind them, taking in the views of Jacques Cartier Bridge and the distant, curving lines of the roller coasters at La Ronde.

In late April the place is more desolate. Only a few souvenir stalls have dared to open up under the white plastic canopies, and there’s a nasty edge to the wind coming off the water. Matt and I stroll the length of the path that runs along the river anyways, our shoulders hunched against the chill.

“So, tell me again why we couldn’t just go straight to my apartment?” I ask him.

“I thought this might be nice.”

“Oh yeah? What do you think about it now?”

He laughs and shivers at the same time. “Maybe not so nice.”

“Come on.” I tug on his arm. “I can think of a few ways to get us warmed up.”

“Wait.” Instead of letting me lead him, he uses my grip on him to steer us towards a nearby bench. “Can we talk first?”

No good conversation ever started with, ‘Can we talk?’

“Sure?” My answer rises up a few octaves higher than I intended as we take a seat.

Matt leans forwards and rubs his mouth for a moment, his other hand tapping out a beat against the wood of the bench. He doesn’t look like he’s going to break the ice, so I try a joke to start things off.

I look pointedly over both my shoulders. “Careful,” I whisper, “there might be violent drug dealers around you’ll have to defend me from, as your innocent and helpless female fan.”

Thanks to a photo of Ace becoming a minor sensation on the internet, the story of what supposedly happened last Friday night is getting way more attention than it should. The version Sherbrooke Station—or more accurately, their PR team—is putting out is that Ace got in a fight trying to protect a fan he was talking to when a jealous guy got pushy. The cops showed up and fond out said jealous guy was actually loaded with drugs.

It’s a painfully obvious cover-up and I don’t buy it for a second, but I do find the whole thing just a bit funny and I thought Matt might to. Judging by the grunt he gives in answer, I was wrong.

“That whole story is ridiculous,” I say lightly.

Matt’s head snaps up. “That’s because it’s a lie.”

The sharpness of his voice startles me. He notices and softens.

“Sorry. I’m just...stressed. In case you couldn’t tell.”

He has seemed off today. I’ve had to repeat half the things I’ve said. We sit and watch the waves for a moment before he asks me if I have my phone.

“Yes?” I answer, taken aback. “Most people usually have their phones with them.”

“Can you take it out and record what I’m about to say next?”

“Like...an interview?”

“Yes, exactly like an interview. Let’s do an interview right now.”

His tone is clipped, movements jerky with agitation. I’m tempted to ask if he’s all right, but I already know the answer. He’s not, and he seems too fixated on what’s going on in his head to talk about anything else.

“Okay.” I pull my phone out and set up my recording app. With all the wind and background noise, I doubt it’ll capture much. I hold it up between us so we won’t have to shout.

Matt starts to speak again, only now he sounds calm and almost distant. He’s steady, like he’s made up his mind to go through with this—whatever this is.

“I don’t know what I want anymore. I thought I wanted sold out arenas, world tours, platinum records—everything we’re on the path to getting. I know no one will believe this, but for me, it’s not about fame. It’s not a glory thing. It’s knowing our music has made a difference to so many people. It’s having one person come up to us at the end of a dingy bar show in some no-name small town and tell us our song made them feel alive, only multiplied a million-fold.”

He’s like a ghost right now, sitting so still I’m scared he’ll disappear if I touch him.

“I thought everything that came with that would be easier to ignore: all the publicity, the partying. Sure, it’s fun. It’s a perk, but that’s it. I never wanted it to be who we are. I’d rather no one even knew or cared what our names are, if it meant they were more focused on what we do on stage than what we do off it. Lately I haven’t felt like it’s my music that’s had an impact on anyone. That’s what this was all supposed to be about: connecting to people with our songs, making moments.”

You’re wrong, I want to tell him. Your music connected with me.

“But that’s not what it’s about. It’s all just a sick game. I lied to people. I let my best friend say something that wasn’t even true to a bunch of reporters. Is that what our lives are becoming? Is that—”

“Matt.” I cut him off and lower my phone down. “We don’t have to record this. We can just talk.”

“I want to record it,” he insists. “I want you to use whatever you need. If it means they have to kick me out of the band, then fine.”

“Matt, you don’t mean that.”

“I mean it.” He twists on the bench to face me. “I don’t know if I can do this anymore.”

I blink at him. “You mean you’d walk out?”

“No. No, they’re my best friends.” I don’t think he even realizes what he’s doing as he reaches up to rub where I know there’s a metro sign inked on his arm. “This just isn’t how it was supposed to be. We talked through this stuff before we signed the deal. We said we wouldn’t let this happen. Now we’re just the Atlas Records show horse, and once they make us drop Shayla things will only get worse.”

“You’re firing Shayla?” I can’t keep the shock out of my voice.

“That’s what Atlas wants, and none of the guys will stick up for her. I can barely be in the same room as them anymore.”

He lapses off into fuming silence. I try to stop myself from asking my next question, but the sense of curiosity that’s part of my job description wins out.

“So what really happened on Friday night?”

He spends the next few minutes giving me a story that’s much more in line with my suspicions than what they fed all the other reporters.

“It doesn’t matter that he didn’t even buy the shit,” Matt concludes. “He was being a drunk asshole like he always is. He would have punched somebody over way less. He will punch somebody over way less, and he might not get off so easy.”

“Have you confronted him about it?”

“I don’t know what to say to him. The Atlas PR people have basically given him immunity. He’s their ticket to a huge cash out. He is the band and he knows it.”

He shakes his head, staring past me.

“I love him like a brother. I’ll admit that to anyone. He’s been through some shit, shit you can’t even imagine, and I forgive him again and again when he fucks up, but I don’t...I can’t...”

Fuck the interview. I switch my phone off and put it away before reaching to place a hand on his shoulder.

“Sometimes you have to draw a line, Matt. That doesn’t make you a bad friend. It actually makes you a good one.”

He draws me into his arms, and I let myself forget that we’re on a public pathway. I let myself forget that there’s a dangerous ache in my chest when I see him hurting like this. I just squish in closer while he holds me.

“I can’t abandon them,” he murmurs into my hair.

“You can’t abandon yourself, either.”

I reach under his jacket and breathe in the scent of laundry soap on his shirt.

“You don’t have to decide overnight,” I tell him, “and anyway, maybe it’s not as black and white as just one choice.”

“Yeah.” His palm traces circles over the small of my back. “Who knows? Maybe your article will save us all.”

The bottom of my stomach drops out. It’s like the weight of his trust is pressing in on me from all sides.

“Yeah. Maybe.”

“So,” he ventures, as the circles on my back move lower, “I think you mentioned something about knowing a few ways to get us warm?”

His hand slips down to squeeze my ass.

We’re on the next metro to Verdun ten minutes later and on my bed naked twenty minutes after that.

* * *

“Please. Oh, please.”

I beg over and over again as the stubble on his cheek brushes the insides of my thighs. His lips trail along the bottom of my stomach, across my hip bones, down to the tops of my knees. He kisses me places I didn’t even know could feel erotic, places that are currently setting the rest of my body on fire.

“Lick me, Matt. Please. Use your tongue.”

He lets out a dark chuckle. “Kay Fischer, saying please. I’ll never get tired of that.”

“I won’t be saying please for much longer if you keep taking your time. I’ll be putting your face between my legs myself and keeping it there of the rest of the night.”

“So tough,” he teases, “but I know you’re all talk. Lucky for you there’s nowhere else I’d rather have my face all night than here.”

I’m so desperate for him that even his breath between my legs is enough to make me jerk on the mattress. He hovers there for a moment and then just the tip of his tongue traces up the length of me.

“Fuck, Kay. You taste so good.”

All I can do is murmur something that sounds like ‘more.’

He flattens his tongue and does the same thing again, pressing hard as he licks all the way up and over my clit. When he shifts to slide a finger inside me I moan and arch my back, lifting myself onto my elbows so I can watch him work on me.

He breaks contact for a moment, but doesn’t look up. “You like to watch me do this, don’t you?”

“Mhmm.” I almost hiss.

This time he does lock eyes with me. “You filthy girl.”

In the next second he’s on his feet, resting his hands on his thighs as he sizes me up. I’m too busy being caught between petrified and mesmerized by the possessive look in his eyes to complain about the loss of his tongue.

“Turn around,” he orders, his voice raw. “Get on your hands and knees.”

I do as he says, shifting so I’m facing away from him, my arms trembling underneath me as I wait to feel him thrust inside me.

Instead, I find myself letting out a yelp as he grabs a fistful of my hair and pulls hard. He leans over me until his breath is hot on the back of my neck. His other hand cups my ass and squeezes as he growls his next words out just an inch from my ear.

“This is how filthy girls like you get their pussies licked.”

I don’t have time to react before he’s bending down behind me, gripping my ass with both hands as he goes back to using his tongue. This time there’s no teasing involved; he licks and sucks and moans against me, exactly where I need to feel him.

There’s something so primal, so...filthy about being bent over like this that it has me shuddering with the beginnings of an orgasm in minutes. We’ve dirty talked before, but nothing like the obscene encouragement he’s now giving every time he takes his mouth off me.

“You like getting eaten out from behind, don’t you? You like how bad it makes you feel?”

“Yes,” I whimper, sinking my teeth into my shoulder to bite back a moan. “Yes, I like it.”

“That’s my bad girl. That’s my dirty, dirty girl.”

He slides one of his hands lower and trails his thumb along my slit before thrusting it inside me. I’m just registering the pleasure of the pressure when he takes it out and brings the pad of his thumb, now slick with my own wetness, up to rest against the tight hole he’s only barely gone near before.

He pauses, waiting for permission.

“You want it?”

My answer comes out on a single desperate breath: “Yesyesyesyes.”

He goes back to licking me, pressing his thumb in as he does, and I want to last longer, want to let him take me even higher than the almost dizzying height I’ve already reached, but every muscle in my body tenses up, coiling in on itself. I let out a strangled cry as the release hits and rock back against him. The convulsions hit me over and over again until I collapse onto my pillow, still moaning into the fabric as Matt finally starts to slow down.

“Fuck,” he mutters. He sounds hoarse with desire. “You have no idea how sexy you are when you come.”

He straightens up and gives my ass a slap that makes me squeal in surprise.

“Let me know when you’re ready for round two,” he announces. “I could do this to you all fucking day.”

“Nuh-uh.” I flip over onto my back so I can face him. “Just give me a minute to recover here, and then I’m getting on my knees to return the favour.”

He grabs me by the ankles and drags me to the edge of the bed.

“This isn’t about favours.” He leans over and settles himself between my legs, caging my head between his forearms. “This isn’t give and take. This is me, wanting you, just because I want you.”

“Why?” The question slips out as he brushes a lock of hair from my forehead. “Why do you want me?”

“Because, Kay, when I’m with you I feel like...like everything’s going to be all right. You make me feel stronger, just by being around.”

My heart is trying to kill me right now, pounding so hard I know he must be able to hear it. His words are a rooftop and I’m dancing way too close to the edge. I make a strangled sound somewhere in the back of my throat, but no other answer comes out.

Matt doesn’t seem to need one, though. He leans down to whisper in my ear. “Also, you make me so fucking hard and your pussy tastes better than candy.”

* * *

I don’t even get out of bed to see him to the door when he leaves. I’m pretty sure my legs would be such a trembling mess they wouldn’t support me if I tried. After that first orgasm I thought I was done coming for the night, but Matt proved me wrong. He refused to stop until I literally had to push him off the mattress for fear of him doing nerve damage to my overworked clit.

“You sure you don’t want to go again?” he calls from the doorway, one foot already in the hall.

“Get out of here before you break me,” I order, “if you haven’t done that already.”

After he’s gone, I turn to look at the alarm clock on my bedside table. It’s after nine already. I should drag my ass out of bed to shower and actually stand a chance of getting a decent eight hours’ sleep before work tomorrow, but instead I just lie there, pulling the sheet up over me when the sweat on my naked body starts to leave me with a chill.

I wonder how much warmer I’d be if Matt was still here beside me, if I’d let him stay and hold me until morning, if I’d made us both breakfast tomorrow and headed for the metro with his hand in mine. Part of me shrinks back from the idea like it’s poison, a dangerous acid that will sear my skin with just one touch.

I do things alone. I live alone. I wake up alone. I get where I need to be and I do what I need to do alone. I certainly don’t have fantasies about eating toast in bed next to guys I wasn’t supposed to get in bed with in the first place.

Another part of me, though, a tiny part that lives deep in the cavity of my chest, clutches at the thought of Matt’s body curled in a curve around mine and locks the feeling away somewhere I can’t push it out. I know, however small that part might be, it will rise up in revolt against me if I ever do anything to hurt him.

He trusts me with the blind faith of a child. I don’t know if it’s innocence or ignorance or just plain stupidity, but it’s not something I can let myself betray. If there’s a way for me to write Sherbrooke Station out of whatever shit storm they’re currently caught in, I’ll try to find it for him.

After all the information he gave me today, I know I could write the kind of article La Gare wants. Marie-France thinks unleashing the floodgate of bad press that’s already started to pile up on the band is the best way to make waves, but I don’t agree anymore. The only problem is I know she’s too stubborn to give her idea up. She’ll cling to it until I’ve at least tried writing the kind of article she wants, so that’s what I do.

I stay up until well past midnight, pounding out an article that’s exactly what Marie-France is expecting. I tear Sherbrooke Station to shreds and make them out to be the shallow amateurs I thought they were. I write it as well as I possibly can, but even to me it sounds like a cheap shot, straight out of a gossip magazine.

I send it off to her with an email explaining that I know I can write something much better, if she’ll trust me. These past few months, I’ve seen something in Sherbrooke Station that takes my breath away, something I never saw in all the dozens of bands I interviewed for Last Bastion.

These guys have more than the potential to be good. They have the power to be Great. When they’re on stage, I feel like I’m witnessing history. They even roped a sceptic like me into rooting for them, and I know that if they can get their act together they’ll be headed towards something big.

I get my answer from Marie-France the next morning. She wants to see what I’ve got, and I’m ready to show her. I’m ready to show everyone.