The knock on the dressing room door startled him, he’d been so lost in thought. Zoning out before a performance didn’t bode well for his abilities out there. The first song went well, the single that had come out over the summer and climbed the charts as the label predicted. But this second song, he’d fought tooth and nail to have the studio okay it for the performance tonight. He needed her to hear it. He needed her to know.

Following the production assistant in the headset through the twists and turns back to the stage, he took a deep breath. Singing the most personal song he’d ever written for the first time, standing in front of an audience full of people and even more at home had his palms sweating. Wiping them on his jeans, he climbed the stairs to the stage.

He stood up on the stage, cameras all trained on him. He hoped she was watching. In her texts, before she stopped sending them, she told him where she’d be. Told him about joining the new tour and being in New York that night. This was the performance of a lifetime, not only because musicians would kill to be able to perform on this late-night show, but because he needed Keira to see this. He needed her to know that she was the one for him and he wasn’t going to back down. After nearly a notebook of pages shredded and burned, he’d come up with what he needed to say to her. What he needed the world to know about her.

* * *

The crowd chanted for another encore, the second of the evening. All the dancers were wiping themselves with towels and chugging bottles of water, some dumping them over their heads. The poor dudes in the shark costumes had it the worst. They shook their heads flinging water all over everyone backstage.

Standing backstage at Madison Square Garden, in the shadow of one of the biggest pop performers in the world, Keira lifted her camera to take more shots of the entire moving organism that made up Matty’s production team. This should have been the most amazing experience of her life, but everything glowed less, shined less and dulled without Eric by her side.

“Come on,” came cries from everyone in the vicinity. Some dancers ran back to the dressing rooms, finished for the night, but others would be back on the stage in under a minute. The choreography of leaving the stage only to return for another energetic song still made her smile. The fans ate it up and although she knew there were, in fact three planned encores, if the fans chanted loud enough, the planned spontaneity was a testament to the acting and energy of the entire crew who put this thing on.

Knowing where everyone would be, also meant that she got great shots night after night because she knew exactly where to be. Perched on the edge of the stage, practically on top of one of the amplifiers, she lifted her leg up to get the right angle to capture Matty, her dancers and some of the fans in the front few rows. They’d love that shot. Scrambling off the amplifier and around behind the drum kit, she took an over the drummer’s shoulder picture to get as much of the crowd as possible into the shot, spotlights shining, looking out over everyone’s shoulders. They’d feel like they had been up on stage with Matty throughout the show.

Capturing that magic is what made Eric’s photobook so successful. She hoped she’d be able to replicate it here and with other tours. Proving to everyone, herself included, that it wasn’t a fluke, just because she was involved with him. Because she was in love with him. Is still in love with him. Leaving his tour hadn’t meant that she’d left him behind. As much as she may have wanted to make that pain go away, he stuck with her every second of the day. If that was the only way she could be close to him, she’d take it. Even in that moment, after finishing with her shots for the night and walking to the dressing rooms, his melody and rhythm rang in her ears.

Opening one of the many dressing room doors, there were several dancers who’d finished earlier staring up at one of the flat screen TVs mounted on the wall. The man who haunted her dreams up on the stage, playing his heart out as he always did. The door slammed shut behind her and the dancers watching the tv turned, her roommate spotted her, screamed, and ran over to her grabbing her arm, pulling her to the TV.

“Didn’t you say you were on tour with Eric Newcastle before you came here?” Jenna asked, practically bouncing.

“Yes, just a couple of weeks ago.”

“Pause it!” she shouted. “Someone get the remote and rewind it. Oh, my god, I can’t believe it.” A flurry of bodies, still in costume, shot across the dressing room, all searching for the remote.

“Believe what? What is going on?”

“You’re not going to believe it!”

“Got it!” someone called from the far end. The song that had been playing stopped abruptly and the picture zipped backward. They stopped when he stood in the middle of the stage with the lights down. The lights came up, shining across the camera and he stared directly into the camera.

“I wrote this for Keira because I didn’t have the right words to tell her how I felt.”

He’d written her a song. A sinking pit formed in her stomach. What had he said about writing a song about someone? Once he wrote it, it exorcised that person from his life. He could put things behind him. She’d left him and that was the deal breaker for him. Somehow, she’d hoped that they would be able to find their way back to one another sometime later, once the pain and hurt of what she’d done had worn off. But now it seemed he’d moved on from her. Hanging her head, the beat of the song filtered through her heartbreak and tears welled in her eyes.

“Keira, honey, listen to what he’s saying,” Jenna placed a hand on her knee, squeezing it. She looked up at him playing.

…You have my heart and soul..

…My eyes only search for yours…

…I’ll hold your hair back until we’re old and gray… She laughed at that lyric. The tears welled up in her eyes, threatening to spill over. His love for her shined through in the song and it welled up in her chest. She still loved him, but was this a song he needed to write to get her out of his head? Out of his heart? Were these feelings he had felt for her before. Did he still feel the same way? Or once that last chord played would he walk away from her like he’d been able to walk away from his ex.

A string quartet joined him for the rest of the song, building to a crescendo, which would be the end. The end of them and then, nothing. Everyone in the room froze as the song stopped abruptly right at the crescendo. Looking directly into the camera, he held onto the mic.

“This is my song for you Keira. And I don’t want to end it. I don’t want it to be over.”

“Holy shit,” someone called out from behind her. Jenna shook her and she sat on the edge of the couch staring at the screen frozen, unable to breathe as her brain cycled through just what the hell this meant He hadn’t finished the song!

“That place where he’s filming is like, ten blocks from here,” Jenna said. Keira turned and stared at her in a daze. “You have to go!” she said, jumping up and down, pushing her to stand. Her limbs moved like she was in quicksand and everything was in slow motion. “Someone order this girl a taxi,” she shouted.

“He’s talking about you, isn’t he?” Another dancer said, entering her view. “Oh, this is so romantic.” Swooning, whipping his hand onto his forehead and falling backward onto the couch.

“I…I think so,” she said, standing. “I need to see him.”

“Duh, that’s what I’ve been saying!” Jenna pushed her toward the door, just as it swung open. Matty walked in with a towel, chugging a bottle of water. Pausing at all the chaos going on backstage she looked around at everyone.

“What did I miss? Did someone hook up in my dressing room again?” she said, hands on her hips.

“NO,” the whole room answered in unison.

“But, Ms. Keira here seems to have made a real impression on Eric Newcastle. He sang a song for her tonight. A song about how much he loooves her.”

“Awe, really?” Matty said, eyes twinkling as she set her water bottle down. “That’s so romantic,” she said, gripping Keira’s hands. “He sang a song for you on tv? I want to see! I want to see,” she said, as someone rewound the recording and Matty held onto her hands as they all rewatched it again.

“It’s good to be with a guy who’s not afraid to let you know how he feels. Who’s not afraid of what other people might say. You’re really lucky, Keira.” Matty said, staring dreamily at the screen. The recording continued to play and they all watched further than they had before. As the song abruptly ended, he whipped the guitar off over his head and jumped down off the stage. A murmur went through the now packed dressing room.

“Where the hell is he going?” someone called out.

“I bet he’s coming here,” Jenna said, standing next to Keira. Her head whipped around as she gaped at her.

“You think he’s coming here?”

“Why the hell not? He knows where you are. He knows the concert would be over now.” Her heart sped up and she didn’t know what to do first. Camera still slung around her neck, she started to the door, the sea of dancers parting as she reached the door her hand shook as she turned the knob. Leaving this room meant starting a new chapter in her life, she hoped she was right.

“Wish me luck,” she said over her shoulder.

“Good luck!” the whole room responded in unison. Opening the door and taking a step out into the hallway, she came face to face with a sweaty and out of breath Eric.

Cries of “oh my god,” “this is so romantic,” “he must have run all the way here,” rung out from the room behind her as the door slammed shut.