By the first few bars of my song, he appeared in the doorway. His arms were braced high over his head, biceps flexing under his black t-shirt.

I wasn’t running away. I didn’t care what he thought. I sang defiantly, staring right back at him.

Did he think I was scared? Or that I’d run away because he was watching? Not this time, not ever. In the hallways maybe, but here I could channel and funnel the power of my voice into something unstoppable, even for me. With the guitar in my lap and my fingers on the strings, I felt fearless and bold, something I’d never been before.

Our first meeting. The hateful words he spewed at me. The way he’d stared at me.

My stomach burned with a fire recapturing that moment and harnessing all the emotions stirred up by Dare to get it all out.

I don’t know how long he watched. But I could feel his gaze on me. Could he hear my words? Did he know what they meant?

Without looking up, I grabbed my guitar and ducked back inside when my fingers felt seconds from falling off. As much as I wanted to pretend I didn’t care, I looked back. Dare left the door open. His body moved across the space, working on the car he’d restored from a rust bucket during junior year. I had a begrudging respect for the bright red Camaro. He hadn’t been gifted it by his parents. He’d put in the work over time to make it a beautiful car.

That didn’t mean he wasn’t still an asshole.

Inside the house, I massaged my fingers to soothe the slicing burn of warmth returning to my hands. I peeked out the back window, making sure I didn’t move the blinds.

My phone buzzed in my pocket, scaring me straight out of stalker mode.

“Hey, Bay.”

“Freddy, what’s up?”

“Can you come in earlier tonight? Our session guitarist can’t make it. Do you want to give it a shot?”

I glanced at the instrument resting against the wall. A thrill rushed through me.

My mom would be doing the handover for her shift by now.

“Do you need me to bring my Martin?” I took the steps two at a time back to my room with my fingers wrapped around the guitar neck.

“If you want, but we’ve got a full set of electric acoustic you can play, if you need to.”

I nibbled my lip. Riding my bike with my dad’s guitar would be risky.

“How soon can you be here, kid?”

“Half an hour?” I slipped the guitar into the safety of the case and latched it. “I’ll use one of your guitars.”

“Sounds good. Got to go. See you in a bit.”

I changed and layered up. I flexed my fingers in my gloves and snapped on my helmet. Opening the door, a blast of frigid air pushed me back. Was it ever going to warm up?

The lights were on in the house and I triple checked the locks. I probably looked like I was about to break in from how many times I checked over my shoulder.