* * *
The band was headlining at a bar called Connie’s, where they played so often the customers had started referring to them as the house band. Layla had majored in music, with an emphasis on performing, and she’d met the other three band members when they were still in college. Kevin played drums, Rick played bass guitar, and Sam played the keyboard. Layla played a variety of instruments, but she was the band’s lead guitarist, and handled most of the vocals. What had started as a drunken jam session at Kevin’s off-campus house her junior year had slowly and steadily turned into a viable source of income. There hadn’t been much Layla could do with her music degree unless she wanted to teach somewhere, and she absolutely did not want to do that. Layla wanted to be the lead singer in a band, and that was exactly what she’d become. She dyed her shoulder-length hair a vibrant shade of neon pink and stood before the microphone front and center, basking in the glow of the lights. She had been born with a natural flair for performing, completely devoid of anything resembling stage fright. The others, who enjoyed the band perks like free beer and an endless supply of adoring women almost as much as they enjoyed playing, were happy to let her take the lead, and she capitalized on it, because under the spotlight was where she shined.
One year after graduation, the four of them—now known collectively as Storm Warning, their nod to Minnesota’s frequent inclement winter weather—had started rising through the ranks of the local music scene. Layla also gave guitar lessons on the side, and her earnings, combined with her cut of the band’s profits, were enough to live on. It wasn’t a great living, but it was enough for a twenty-three-year-old to get by on if she was frugal, which she was.
The crowds had gotten bigger, more enthusiastic, which only fueled her desire to keep on doing it. Her parents had not been thrilled, and they told her it was time to get serious about finding a real career before it was too late. Her friends were the only ones who were supportive, but that was mostly because they didn’t quite have their lives figured out, either.
Layla refused to be swayed by anyone’s opinion of what she should have been doing with her life, and there wasn’t a lot anyone could say, since the money she earned paid the rent on her studio apartment with just enough left over to cover her basic needs.
She had her guitars and she had her freedom and that suited Layla just fine.
That night at Connie’s, the crowd cheered when she launched into the opening riff from Eric Clapton’s “Layla.” The band seldom performed the actual song, but Layla loved how the crowd understood why she played the iconic intro. When their first set ended, a sea of enthusiastic fans—most of them male—surrounded her. One thrust a beer into her hand; another asked her to pose for a picture, and he slung his arm around her shoulders as she looked into the camera and smiled.
Liam had bumped into her as she was making her way back from the bathroom. “Oh, hey. Sorry,” he said, placing his hands on her shoulders to steady her. “Great set.”
“Thanks,” she said.
“You’re really talented,” he said, resting his arm against the back of a nearby barstool, creating a protective little bubble around her. “I’m Liam.”
“Layla.”
“Ah, now I get it,” he said. “I’ve never heard you play before. Clearly I’ve been missing out.”
“Well, we’re about as local as you can get. I think we’ve played every bar in this zip code.”
“I just moved back home. Graduated from Colorado State a month ago and started a new job. I’m in sales.” In time, Layla would learn that it had taken him five years to graduate. He’d flunked out his sophomore year and had had to return home with his tail between his legs and work for a year while he saved up the money to return to school after his parents refused to pay his tuition. “Show us you can pay for it yourself and we’ll reconsider,” they told him. Liam could be very successful when he wanted to be, and he’d shown them all right. He’d worked at a used car dealership for nine months and had made so much money he seriously considered not going back to school at all. But the hours were long, and Liam had his sights on selling something a lot more glamorous than used cars. The big money, he told anyone who would listen, was in medical devices, software or telecommunications, and pharmaceuticals.
“So, were you named after the Clapton song?” Liam asked.
Layla smiled and shook her head. “No. I was named after my dad’s sister. She died when my dad was—”
Something had caught his eye and he turned away abruptly. “Oh, hey, I’ve gotta run,” he said.
“No problem,” she replied as she watched him take off like a shot toward the exit. His sudden departure didn’t bother her in the least, because good-looking guys in a bar were a dime a dozen, and besides, Layla wasn’t interested in starting a relationship with anyone. At twenty-three, she could have her pick but was having too much fun to care about finding another boy who she would later find out was only masquerading as a man. She was tired of the beer-can pyramids in their apartments, their filthy disgusting bathrooms that seldom had any toilet paper, and their obsession with video games.
“Who will you take to weddings as your plus-one?” her friend Christine had asked one Sunday morning when they’d met for brunch. It was the height of wedding season in their friend group, and every weekend seemed to be filled with a wedding shower, a bachelorette party, or the wedding itself. Christine’s own wedding had occurred three months before, and she had not stopped espousing the benefits since. Layla liked Christine’s husband well enough, but being married mostly sounded like Christine never had to worry about whose name she’d write down for the emergency contact on her medical forms, or who would take her to the airport when she was flying solo. Christine was a couple of years older than Layla, and it had seemed like she’d been in an awfully big hurry to settle down, which Layla found perplexing. What was the rush? Weren’t people supposed to be marrying later now?
“When is the last time you actually saw me at a wedding?” Layla said. She had, unfortunately, missed a lot of the weddings—although not Christine’s—because the band was almost always booked on Saturday nights. “I’d rather be playing weddings than attending them on the arm of some guy who’ll probably worry that a wedding will put ideas into my head and have me pining for a ring for my own finger. Please.”
“Famous last words,” her friend Noelle said. “Everyone knows that the minute you swear off men, you’ll meet the love of your life. That’s how it works.”
Layla laughed. “That sounds like total bullshit to me. Besides, I only have eyes for my music. It never lets me down.”
Christine and Noelle laughed then, too—whether with her or at her, she didn’t know and didn’t really care.
The truth was that, although her music had never let her down, Layla wanted to break into the Minneapolis bar scene so bad she could taste it, and a boyfriend would more than likely complicate things. They were “paying their dues” and would conquer Minneapolis “in due time,” according to their manager, a guy named Scotty who was short on personality but some kind of shark when it came to keeping them booked on a regular basis. A boyfriend would be distracting, and besides, she was having the time of her life and it certainly wasn’t due to the presence of a guy. Layla was an artist, a musician. For her, performing was as necessary as oxygen. If she had no one to play for, was she even really playing?