I really have to piss.

“Ace!” I shout, to where he’s walking ahead of me with his arm around Stéphanie. “I really have to piss!”

He looks back over his shoulder, tilting his head down so he can glare at me over the top of his Ray-Bans. I too am wearing Ray-Bans, only Ace’s came from the Ray-Ban store, and I got mine out of a bargain bin at a thrift shop. That’s also where I got the muscle shirt I’m wearing, which has a picture of some eight pack abs printed on the front.

When I walked into the park today, Ace said I was an embarrassment to the human race. I, on the other hand, like to think that the human race is lucky to have me, and this stylish and hilarious shirt is just one of the many reasons why.

Perspective, my friends. It’s all in the perspective.

“How is that relevant to my life right now?” Ace calls back to me.

I stop and think about that for a moment, then shout, “Stéphanie! I really have to piss!”

She stops walking, forcing Ace to stop too. When she turns around, she’s laughing and shaking her head. I have that effect on most women.

“Is that relevant to my life, JP?” she asks, beaming at me.

She beams at most things. She’s like a human flashlight, this girl. The last person any of us expected Ace to get it on with was a smiley blonde ballet teacher with a thing for meditation, but almost a year has passed now, and the moody son of a bitch is still prancing around after her like she’s the reason the sun shines.

“Ouais,” I answer her. “Est-ce que je peux utiliser votre toilette, Madame?”

Stéphanie is Québécois like me, but even though Ace can understand us perfectly—fuck, his French grammar is better than mine—she still answers my request to use her bathroom in English. We’re only a block away from her apartment building now.

“Of course. Just don’t break anything, okay?”

I put a hand to my chest. “Madame! Are you saying you don’t trust me?”

Ace throws me some more shade over his sunglasses. “You broke Youssef’s showerhead at his birthday party last week when you decided to present him with the gift of a ‘sexy shower show’ at two in the morning.” He looks at Stéphanie and whispers, “Don’t let him in.”

I mean, the shower show was pretty fucking sexy.

“You have permission to use the toilet and sink,” Stéphanie tells me. “The shower is off limits.”

“Fair enough.” I glance up the street to where Stéphanie’s building is now in view. “Vraiment, though, I have to piss like a motherfucker. You mind if I run ahead? It’s apartment twenty-four, right?”

Stéphanie nods, and I hear Ace ask, “What does ‘piss like a motherfucker’ even mean?” as I take off sprinting up the street.

Running does not help with the Needing-To-Piss situation. We met up with some of Stéphanie’s dance friends in the park, and one of them brought a six pack to go along with the pizza we picked up. Gotta love the Montreal Picnic Law, which states that you can drink alcohol ‘consumed in a park with a meal.’ Since Stéphanie and Ace don’t drink, I had to do my gentlemanly duty and down two beers to save the poor girl from having to lug the bottles back home. After that, I had to down a litre of water to save me from dehydrating in the heat.

That’s what needing to ‘piss like a motherfucker’ means.

“Esti,” I swear, as I pull the door to the building’s lobby open. I still have to make it up a flight of stairs.

Even by Montreal standards, the place is shabby and cramped. The ‘lobby’ is the size of a walk-in closet and has just enough room for a wall of mailboxes before it leads to the sloping staircase with worn-out carpeting that I’m now climbing two steps at a time.

I make it down the creepy hallway where someone’s blasting death metal behind one of the doors. I recognize the Amon Amarth song and throw up some devil horns in respect as I pull open the door across the hall and step into apartment twenty-four.

The only time I’ve been in here was to help carry up a couch Stéphanie bought. I head to the first room on my left, hoping it will turn out to be the bathroom.

“Let’s see what’s behind Door Number One...” I mutter. If it isn’t something I can take a leak in, I’m in trouble.

It turns out that behind Door Number One there is a bed with a half-naked girl on it, lying on her stomach with her tank top riding up and her only-half-covered-by-her-underwear ass facing my way. In any other situation, this would be a very good thing. Right now, this is a very bad thing.

The chick whips her head around at the sound of the door opening. Her eyes go wide and her mouth drops open, but she doesn’t make any noise. I wave at her.

“Desolé,” I apologize. “Thought this was the shitter.”

I back out of the room and try the next door, hopping from foot to foot the whole time. I find myself looking into what has to be Stéphanie’s room and let out a bunch of curse words as I bolt for the last door in the place. I finally make it into a bathroom so tiny I don’t think I could fully extend my arms between the walls.

I don’t have time to find out if that’s true. I yank on my belt and drop my shorts to the floor. The ‘Hallelujah’ chorus starts playing in my head and I sigh as I raise my eyes to the ceiling, thanking the Piss Gods for getting me here in time.

“Tabarnaaaaak,” I groan in relief a minute later, as I’m pulling my shorts back up.

That’s the good thing about Quebec swear words—they’re very versatile. You can use them to get your point across in pretty much every situation. You can also combine them with other Quebec swear words to make even bigger swear words: tabarnak can become esti de tabarnak, which can become câlice d’esti de tabarnak, which can then become câlice de criss d’esti de tabarnak.

Get more than one Québécois person in a room and suddenly you’ve got yourself a competition to see who can make the biggest chain of offensive language. It’s a very rich and vibrant culture we French Canadian people have.

I figure Stéphanie and Ace will be up here any minute, so I take a seat on the light blue couch I helped carry up here and wait. The place is so tiny that the living room is basically inside the kitchen, but with the couch facing towards the bedrooms, you can at least pretend there’s enough space to call this a different section of the apartment.

Door Number One is still cracked open, but I can only see a fraction of the room from where I’m sitting. There’s no sound coming from inside.

Did she leave?

I retie my hair into its topknot and then run my hands over the collection of tattoos that cover my arms, craning my neck to take another look around the apartment. I’ve just started to realize how hot it is in here. It’s not so bad outside—the final hit of summer September brought with it is nothing compared to the crazy heat waves last month—but being in this room feels like sitting in a sauna.

That would explain why the girl on the bed was in her underwear. Then again, if I had an ass like that, I’d walk around in my underwear all the time. Even through the haze of needing a bathroom, I couldn’t help notice how perfectly curved and smooth it was. There’s a reason the peach emoji means ‘butt,’ and it’s because of asses like hers. It was peach-fection.

I slump down even further on the couch and close my eyes. It’s almost too hot in here to be thinking about anything sexy, but I keep picturing her anyway, expanding my mental image beyond her butt and remembering the way her body sloped down to the curve of her waist, just peeking out underneath her shirt. She had her feet up in the air behind her, ankles crossed, her toes flexing and pointing in a teasing kind of way that would make any dude in their right mind want to give that ass of hers a good smack.

The floor creaks, and I open my eyes just in time to see the top of a curly-haired head duck back behind the bedroom doorframe. That’s when I realize who this girl must be: Stéphanie’s little lapin. The rabbit girl.

That’s what Stéphanie calls her at least, and Ace has taken up the habit too. Apparently she hardly ever speaks and disappears into her room whenever anyone but Stéphanie shows up at the apartment. One of the few things Stéphanie knows about her is that she’s a huge Sherbrooke Station fan, and Ace confirmed the fact when he walked out of the shower here one morning and almost killed Rabbit Girl with the shock of seeing him shirtless. We all laughed about it, but I couldn’t help feeling bad for the chick. It’s got to be a pretty fucking awkward situation.

“You can come out if you want,” I call to her. “I’m not here to murder you.”

There’s a pause, and then the floor creaks again as she appears in the doorway. Her curly brown hair is so puffed up by the heat it looks like a lion’s mane and reaches almost down to her elbows. Unfortunately, she’s now got jean shorts on over her underwear, but I take in the sight of her exposed thighs. They’re pale as hell, considering it’s the tail end of summer.

“What’s up?” I ask, popping the ‘p.’

“Umm...” she mutters, before giving a little laugh. Her eyes dart between me and the floor.

“Your Stéphanie’s roommate?” I ask.

She nods at the floorboards.

“Sorry for barging into your room like that,” I apologize. “I really needed to piss.”

The floorboards get another nod.

“What’s your name?”

She looks up and makes that nervous laughing sound again before clearing her throat and coughing. I sit there waiting as she blinks at me a few times.

“It’s, um—Sorry. It’s Molly. My name is Molly.”

I scratch my chin. “You sure about that? You don’t sound so sure. Are you trying to hide your identity from the crazy man on your couch? I already know where you live, so I think it’s a little late for that.”

More nervous laughing. This time the sound is almost frantic. Right now I don’t know if she’s scared I’m going to stab her, or if I should be scared she’s going to stab me.

I decide to try putting her at ease. I get up from the couch and walk towards her, extending my hand.

“Forgive me for being rude, Madame. I am Jean-Paul Marc Joseph Bouchard-Guindon.” My hand hangs in the air between us. I wait until she looks up at me and then I smile. “But you may call me JP.”

Her eyes have gone wide—like, crazy person wide—but I can still appreciate how damn pretty they are: a steely kind of blue that’s almost grey. They make me think of sheet metal, rippling with silver strands.

“This,” I tell her, glancing between her face and my hand, “is something that most people call a handshake. Have you heard of it?”

I was hoping the joke would make her feel more comfortable, but Molly keeps staring at me like she’s some kind of woodland creature deciding whether or not she should make a run for it.

Okay, let’s take this step by step.

“This is the part where you put your hand in my hand,” I prompt her, “if you want to, that is.”

She finally seems to snap out of whatever trance she’s in and her cheeks flush red as she raises her hand to mine and limply takes hold of it, watching our fingers wrap around each other’s palms.

“R-right,” she stutters. “Right. Shaking hands. Got it.”

“You ready for part two?” I ask, still hoping she’ll find the joke funny. “Now we’re going to move our hands up and down a few times, and then we’re going to let go.”

Her hand is barely clinging to mine. I make a few exaggerated shaking motions and then go still. She loosens her grip right away and draws her hand back.

“Look at you!” I encourage. “You’re a pro. A natural talent. You are the OG of hand shaking, Molly.”

She looks the opposite of encouraged. She’s staring at the ground again, and I see her hand flex and contract at her side a few times before she balls it up into a fist. Her bottom lip is shaking, and she sucks it into her mouth before taking a deep breath in through her nose and starting to speak.

“Sorry,” she murmurs. “Sorry for being so awkward. It’s just, I, um, I really like your music.”

Well that explains things; she already knows who I am. I figured she was just one of those Ace Turner Forever Sherbrooke Station fans, the ones who worship Ace’s sorry ass like he’s some kind of fertility god. I swear there has to be an Ace Turner cult out there by now, where women gather and pray that the spirit of Ace will visit them in their dreams to get them pregnant.

Truth be told, we’ve all got our share of crazy fans to deal with, but Ace is the face of the band. He’s the one magazines want to put on their covers. In the media’s eyes, the rest of us just show up and look pretty in the background, which is totally fine by me. Showing up and looking pretty is my speciality, and I wouldn’t want the kind of pressure Ace has to deal with. Plus, now that he’s spoken for, I do have a lot of broken-hearted Turnerheads to console.

Yes, they actually call themselves that.

“Well, thank you,” I tell Molly. “Are you talking about Sherbrooke Station, or my solo side project as Quebec’s premium francophone rapper?”

Her eyes spark. I’m definitely getting some crazy fan vibes here.

“You have a side project?” she asks, like I’ve just given her some kind of top secret government information.

“Yeah, it’s dope shit,” I tell her. “I wear a raccoon hat and a bandana. My first hot single is dropping soon.”

I pose like a gangster with my arms crossed and shoulders hunched, raising one hand in a fake gang sign. I lift my chin at Molly.

“Word,” I say gravely, “to your mother.”

She stares at me for a moment and then her face splits into a smile for the first time.

“You’re joking.”

I pretend to be offended. “Ouch, Molly! Tu me blesse comme ҫa.”

She squints at me. “I’m not great at French. That means, ‘You...?’”

“It’s means you’re killing me, girl. Mortally wounded.”

She smiles again, and we both turn towards the sound of the door as Ace and Stéphanie step inside.

“Molly!” Stéphanie calls out, sounding surprised. “Was JP begging you to give him food or something?”

“I was just getting to that part,” I tell her, then turn back to Molly. “Molly, now that I’ve distracted you with my skills as a rapper, I’m going to steal all of the food from your fridge. Okay?”

Her smile is gone now and her eyes are going back to their almost impossibly wide and round state. She glances around the room like she’s looking for an escape route, and then makes that same nervous laugh in the back of her throat.

“I, ha, yeah, I—Studying. I should study. Bye, guys!” she squeaks.

She backs away from me gives a spastic little wave before pulling her door closed.

“It speaks,” Ace announces, after a moment’s pause.

Stéphanie shushes him with a pointed look at Molly’s door. Ace drops his voice.

“What?” he asks. “We’ve been together for almost a year now, and I’ve never heard your roommate talk before.”

“Don’t be rude, Ace,” she whispers back. “She’s just shy.”

“You’re the one who calls her lapin.”

“Shhh!” Stéphanie hisses.

“Hey, guys,” I cut in, “I was serious about taking all the food, you know. You got anything to eat, Stéphanie? I’m starving.”

“You just ate, like, half your bodyweight in pizza and drank two beers!” Ace protests.

“Yeah, but then I had to run all the way here to take a piss, and now I’m hungry again. Have you got any ham, Stéphanie, ma belle?”

I’ve yet to find a problem in this world that a ham sandwich couldn’t solve.

“I don’t eat much meat,” she replies. She takes the two steps from the apartment door to the kitchen and grabs something out of the cupboard. “Here. Take this.”

I catch the foil-wrapped bar she tosses at me just as Ace groans. “If you feed them, they keep coming back.”

“Protein Punch,” I read from the label. “Twenty-four grams of protein in each serving packs a real punch!”

I rip the foil off and take a bite. Not bad.

“You all done extorting my girlfriend?” Ace asks. “Can we go now? We’ve got rehearsal.”

“It ’oo ’ot,” I complain around a mouthful of Protein Punch.

Ace glares at me. “How many times do we have to go over this? Chew, swallow, then talk.”

I finish my bite and grin at Stéphanie. “Does he tell you to swallow too?”

“Christe alors!” Ace shouts, throwing his hands up in the air.

Stéphanie just laughs. “He doesn’t have to tell me that.”

I point my protein bar at her. “I like this one, Ace. You picked a good one. She’s far too good for your sorry ass, man.”

His voice goes soft. “Yeah, I know it.”

He steps up beside her in the kitchen and grabs her waist, pulling her towards him for a kiss.

“Vraiment?” I demand. “Right in front of me? I believe you, okay, Stéphanie? I don’t need a demonstration of the swallowing.”

“Chien,” she chides, her attention still fixed on Ace as she calls me out on being a dog.

I don’t really think that’s fair, given the way they’re tongue fucking each other against the counter right now.

“I’m out, bitches!” I call.

Neither of them answers me as I make my way out of the apartment. I guess Ace will be catching up with me in a few moments.

Amon Amarth is still going strong in the unit across the hall, and I hum the tune of the song as I exit onto the street. It’s a bit difficult to hum the sound of gravelly man-screams, but I am, after all, a gifted and talented professional musician.

I finish the protein bar and toss the wrapper into a trash can, making my way up the few blocks from Stéphanie’s apartment to Sherbrooke Station. Our rehearsal space is in the basement of a building just across from the metro stop, which is how the band ended up getting its name. My uncle’s realty firm owns the building, and when we were first looking for somewhere to rehearse all those years ago, he said we could use the basement whenever the firm wasn’t open.

As a platinum selling band who used to be signed to one of the biggest record labels in Canada, we’ve kind of outgrown the place, but it feels like home for our music. I don’t know if any of us will ever be ready to give it up.

I take the outside staircase two steps at a time and find Matt already down in the basement, tuning up his drum kit. The room smells like sweat, second-hand furniture, and delivery food left sitting out for way too long. If I could bottle that smell, I would. It represents everything we’ve worked for, and everything we’ve done to get it. To me, that’s what music is: hard work, good times, and great people coming together to make something the world won’t ever forget.

And cheese. You can’t make good music without eating a lot of melted cheese, preferably on a pizza that also has ham.

“Ҫa va?” I greet Matt.

“Ҫa va,” he answers, making a face as he twists one of the lugs on his snare. “Snare’s being a little bitch today, but other than that, ҫa va. You?”

I flop down on one of our old, beaten up couches while we wait for Ace and Cole to arrive. That’s one of the benefits of playing the electric keyboard and the harmonica: you never have to tune them.

“Just came from Stéphanie’s place. I met the Rabbit Girl,” I tell Matt.

“That’s her roommate, right? The one who’s obsessed with Ace?”

He taps the drum with his stick and stares at the tuning app on his phone, then swears and goes back to twisting the lug.

“Yeah. She’s pretty cute,” I admit.

“You think anything with an ass is cute. Did you even look at her face?”

Yes, my friends, I am an ass man, and I am not ashamed. I would shout my love for les fesses from the rooftops of Montreal without hesitation. I have actually done that twice already.

“I did look at her face,” I insist, “after I looked at her ass. She didn’t have pants on.”

Matt looks up from his drum.

“I thought her room was the bathroom,” I explain. “I had to piss.”

He shakes his head. “I don’t even want to know.”

Ace stomps down the staircase a few minutes later with Cole, our bassist, trailing along behind him.

“Fucking hell,” Ace mutters, falling into the armchair across from me.

“Stéphanie really went to town on you, huh?” I ask.

He glares at me. “No. There was a paparazzi ambush waiting outside Sherbrooke Station for me. Cole saw and had to come drag me out before I fucking punched one of those assholes. They ask the most insulting questions.” He slides his hands down his face. “They wanted to know if I’d gone back to drinking. Honestly, if I have to deal with their shit any longer, I just might.”

The rest of us all freeze.

“Jesus Christ, guys. I’m kidding.”

I hear Matt blow out a sigh of relief. Ace’s previous issues with alcohol and generally fucked up behaviour are the reason we got dropped by Atlas Records, the mega-label who signed us and took our career to the next level. Truth be told, the people at Atlas were all sneaky corporate bastards and I know we’re better off without them, but having their huge bank accounts to back us up didn’t hurt.

We’re with a much smaller label now. Metro Records is run by our old manager, Shayla, and we’re the first band she signed. Now all of our expenses come out of our own pockets, which means that even though our latest album crushed pretty much every chart there is, it will still be awhile before the whole ‘rich as fuck rock stars’ thing actually happens.

I’m okay with it, though. My mansion can wait. I’d rather we’re all happy and enjoying our lives.

“This paparazzi shit is getting crazy,” Cole grumbles.

Grumbling is Cole’s default setting. So is lurking in corners and intimidating people.

“They know where I live now,” he continues. “I don’t like it.”

“Yeah, neither does my uncle,” I admit. “He told me they’re bothering the firm.”

“We can talk to Mona about it at our meeting tomorrow,” Matt offers, referring to our current manager. “Maybe she’ll have some tips on what to do.”

We get down to business after that. Matt finally gets his snare in order as Cole tunes up his bass. Ace slings his guitar strap over his neck and starts doing the weird vocal warm-ups we all used to give him shit for until he beat our asses into laying off about it.

“What’s that one called?” I can’t help asking, as I switch my keyboard on. “The dying seagull?”

“It’s called the dying JP,” Ace warns.

Point taken.

Without having to discuss it, we launch into the first track of our current set list. Everything else fades away the second we start to play. This is the one of the only things in my life that makes me feel like I can just be still for a moment, like I can pour everything I have into one goal instead of bouncing around in five thousand different directions all the time.

I’m not focused on being the most entertaining person in the room. I’m not searching for my next punchline or the next prop I can do something stupid with to make people laugh. I don’t have to worry about holding people’s attention when I play music, because I know that I do. I know that when me and these three guys come together and play, the world stops. When we play, the world listens.