We went through the revolving doors and debated the merits of the different restaurants at LA Live, finally settling on a brewery that blasted rock music and had good burgers. Perfect for a casual dinner with a friend, and since it was popular with people from the show, we’d definitely be seen together. A part of me hoped Jared would stumble back from the studio and catch me with Sean, run to my arms and kiss me in front of everyone, and say he didn’t care who knew about us as long as we could be together. Yes, that level of cheese actually ran through my head. What could I say—I was running on four hours of sleep.

Though Jared never showed up to offer declarations of love, I still had a good time with Sean. We laughed about what a bad mentor Angel was, and he told me she’d shown up completely wasted for all her rehearsals this week.

“I have no idea how our song with her is going to go tomorrow,” he admitted.

I whined about how the producers had changed our song at the last minute, but he didn’t seem surprised. He said they’d denied his band from doing “Some Nights” by fun. for the first live show and that he’d heard about bands having other problems, too. Recording times getting switched without notice, interviews getting cancelled at the last minute, photo shoots that just never happened. We were lucky we had Dan keeping on top of these things for us, but it sounded like the other mentors weren’t quite as hands-on.

Sean and I argued over which band on Team Lance would make it to the finals, since it was obvious Fairy Lights would be the last band on Team Lissa. I told him all about how Lacey had stolen my glasses and probably leaked that photo of us, but I wasn’t sure he believed me. She’d been perfectly friendly with him, so maybe it was only me she hated for some reason.

Being with Sean was easy, and there was no need to sneak around or lie to anyone about spending time together. I had zero romantic feelings for him, but it was a relief to talk to someone going through a lot of the same things I was. I hadn’t realized how much I needed to spend time with someone who wasn’t in my band either. I loved the guys like family, but after spending every waking minute with them, I also kind of never wanted to see them again.

After our meal, we walked back toward the hotel but were stopped by a small group of people.

“Oh my god, you’re the guitarist who fell off the stage!” one of them said, and the others chimed in with, “Yeah!” and “Whoa!”