I don’t know. But Mom will say the right thing. She always does when it comes to Reid, my dad, and their music. I exit my bedroom and make my way downstairs toward her office in the hopes that her door is open. It’s a gig night for my dad, where he puts on his fedora and goes to town on the clarinet for a sixty-minute set with Lincoln Street Blues at Melville’s. The perfect opportunity to unload my complicated feelings.

So I am not expecting the sound of my father’s voice at the end of the hallway.

I inch toward the office, each step careful not to cause a sound.

“I just… don’t know what we’re going to do, Michelle,” Dad says.

“This pressure? It’s extremely helpful,” Mom says, sarcasm dripping from her voice.

“It’s not pressure! It’s just… shit…” Dad’s voice trails off. My heart starts beating double time in my chest. I am accustomed to Aaron Jacobson’s stress voice, but his panic voice is less familiar. “If Tara is right, if the rumors are true, I don’t even know what we’ll do.”

Tara… Mrs. Westfield? My English teacher?

“I’ll start freelancing again. Or teach extra classes.”

“But you’re writing!”

“Well how else am I supposed to respond to this hypothetical situation?”

“The layoffs are hypothetical, but our Melville’s gig getting cut is now very real.”

Layoffs? Lost gigs?

“We’ll figure it out if and when it’s all real, Aaron. We always do.”

“I feel like an easy target,” Dad says, and my stomach drops to the floor with this admission. As many complicated feelings as I have about the band, having these feelings is a million times better than the alternative! “The Harvest Festival was a disaster. How do I make up for that?”

“I mean, Melted. Right?”

“At this rate I’m not sure there will even be a Melted.”

“Maybe if you talked to them. If they understood—”

Dad cuts Mom off. “No. They’re kids. I don’t want to worry them over a rumor.”

“Then you should stop worrying over a rumor,” Mom stresses.

“It just feels so out of my control. I stuck my neck out for Melted, but now—”

I back up from the door, from the conversation.

It’s too much to process. I don’t understand. I didn’t think of the repercussions of my Harvest Festival prank gone wrong beyond a botched concert. Dad has always seemed so untouchable. I guess that’s not true.

It reinforces what I have always known. No art is safe.

Dad has never projected anything other than confidence and security, so hearing the vulnerability in his voice rattles me. It must feel dramatic to listen to kids bicker over the legitimacy of a fictional character when your career is at stake.