Ember pov:
Leia clutched at my hand in a way she hadn’t since she was probably four or five.
“Mom, I thought it was just gonna be a few people.”
With every ounce of motherly strength I could muster, I hid the fact that I, too, was terrified.
“It’s not that many people, honey.”
It was so many people.
“You won’t even notice them once you’re on stage.”
Nothing I could say would make her feel better. It took Baylee squealing and grabbing Leia excitedly to turn the nerves into excitement.
“Leia, it’s just like when we’re playing at home, only you get to be a real rockstar this time!” She sighed dramatically, then giggled. “Remember me when you’re famous!”
Leia turned red but her gap-toothed smile peeked shyly across her face.
“She’s been begging all morning to go onstage and sing while Leia plays,” Kelsie muttered in my ear. “If she asks, I checked with you and you said the guitar teacher said no.”
I nodded, my face stony.
Ten kids, jimin had said. They’d all be at her level, he had said. It was just a small showcase to promote a local music school, he said. Mostly grandmas and grandpas and parents sitting in the food court at the mall, waiting for their own precious kid to get onstage and ignoring the rest of what was happening, he said.
Jimin as so full of shit I was almost more angry at myself for believing him.
There was a stage set up on one side of the food court. Lights and microphones were being put on the stage, a bunch of chairs were set up in front of it, and people were milling about already. Not just grandmas and grandpas and parents, but people who looked like they knew what they were doing. They were there for a reason.
Leia and Baylee walked ahead, Leia clutching her guitar to her chest as she scanned for any sign of jimin. Her hair was French-braided into two shiny, tight pigtails that had taken me the majority of the morning. She had steadfastly refused to wear a dress, which was a good call on her part since it was just my own nervous anxiety at what the other mothers would think if I sent her up there in jeans and a T-shirt.
“That bastard,” I muttered to Kelsie. “He told me this was a small thing.”
“It’s going to be fine,” she muttered back. “It’s not that huge a thing.”
“Look at all these people!”
Yeah, and did you see the big poster board over there or were you too busy freaking the fuck out?”
She tilted her head in the direction of said poster.
“I can’t even see that from here.”
She snorted. “It says the beginner level kids will be onstage from 4 to 5. I’m assuming that’s Leia’s group. I very much doubt that they’re expecting a full house for a bunch of seven-year-olds. It’s probably to make sure the mics work and everything.”
I glared at her sidelong. “Since when do you know so much about music recitals?”
“Dude, I played piano for like thirteen years. I’ve been in shit like this.”
“Namjoon never did shit like this.”
“Namjoon didn’t exactly have the standard upbringing, either.”
I didn’t have time to respond before Leia whirled around.
“Mom, he’s not here yet,” she said, ignoring Baylee’s excited chatter. “And Mom, neither is Uncle Namjoon.”
YOU ARE READING
NO STRINGS ATTACHED #Jiminfanfic (COMPLETED)
Fanfiction[Completed] Haunted by the past, can a legend & a single mom find love? . . "I have concerns about this," he mumbled, but he didn't stop kissing me. "They don't seem too pressing," I murmured back. "Em ... Ember." I stopped what I was doing and lo...
