I’d had less than a minute to appreciate and analyze the situation I was in, more than enough time for my brain to spin through about a million alternative courses of action, even if my body wasn’t listening to anything my mind was telling it.

The stage lights felt like the surface of the sun. As I looked out into what I knew was a sea of people, I regretted the tight sundress I wore and wished I’d opted for almost anything else in my closet. Anything that covered more of my still winter-pale flesh. Something to hide the fact that Shelby and I had made, and shared, an entire peanut butter pie two days earlier (Hey, it was my mom’s recipe. Making it is one of my favorite ways to keep her alive in my heart. I don’t feel guilty, not even a little bit! And we really did intend to save a piece for my dad. Honestly. It’s just so damn good…)

As Travis finished his line and turned to me, I took a deep breath and closed my eyes, sending up a fleeting prayer. I needed all the help I could get.

I stepped forward, stiffly, toward the front of the stage, as Travis receded into the background. I tried to convince myself that the stage at Charlotte’s Music Pavilion was just like the one I’d grown up on at New Tazewell High. Aside from the one at my school topping out around eight hundred, they were identical, right?

My first note would set the tone. Sharp, flat, or otherwise off-key, I’d have my one at-bat in the Major Leagues, swing, miss, fall on my ass, and disappear into the obscurity of the minor leagues forever.

Or…

I could fucking kill it. Send the crowd into a delirium by smacking the first pitch over the wall in straightaway center field to win the game.

I chose the latter.

Fearless was a song I’d performed in my bedroom, in the shower, in Shelby’s car, so many times I could sing it in my sleep, something Shelby claimed I’d done at sleepovers.

More than once, she’d shaken me awake at my house or hers, to tell me to stop talking in my sleep. It scared the shit out of her. Sometimes, she claimed that I even sang in my sleep.

Hey, I’m a weirdo. I admit it.

I sang my heart out, and by the second line, my nerves had evaporated completely. If Travis left the stage at that point, I’d have been more than happy to finish the concert on his behalf. I danced like nobody was watching and I sang like a whole host of angels had commandeered my throat.

I sounded good. And I knew it. Against my better judgement, since I knew what I’d laid down was too heavy for him to pick up, I handed the song back off to Travis at the same spot we’d swapped in the dressing room before the show. He did his best, but the song, the Music Pavilion, the night, were mine.

I cranked the bridge to a place I’d never taken it before, finding an octave in my range that I didn’t know I had.

Travis had a look of bemused joy on his face that told me I’d done even better than he’d hoped I could. He took a gamble on me and struck gold.

I laughed, the only thing I could think to do, once the song ended. Travis hugged me, and stepped away, pointing at me. “Lia Morris!”

I sheepishly waved and headed back for the side of the stage so I could climb back down to my friends.

“You forgot something.”

I stopped and realized I was still holding the wireless mic. I walked back over to hand it to him, but he put his hands up, refusing to touch it.

“That’s a murder weapon,” he joked. “I’m not getting my fingerprints on it!” As the crowd laughed, he covered his mic and said, just loud enough for me to hear, “Drop that shit, babe!”

I turned to the audience and held it up in the air for a triumphant moment before dropping it to the floor, to thunderous applause.

I was welcomed back to my seat like a conquering hero. Shelby, Isaac, and Jesse swarmed me, along with the rest of our entire section.

Smiling had never been so painful, but I just couldn’t stop.