It happens past midnight, in a fluorescent-​­lit room. I’m shaky with adrenaline and not a little bit sweaty. I’m having trouble hearing.

“Louisa,” Nate says, an edge to his voice like he’s repeating himself. “What did you honestly expect?”

Not this, honestly. Not Nate, who’s only ever called me Lou, pulling out Louisa like a weapon. Certainly not the mottled bruise along the­ sweat-ringed neckline of his T-shirt, evidence of someone else’s mouth.

“We’ve been so scared to call this what it is, but it’s actually obvious, right?” He keeps talking, the end of every phrase turned up like a question he expects me to agree with.

I let his voice haze out, become wordless as I watch his lips move: the freckle just­ off-center of his Cupid’s bow, the thin white scar from his near-feral childhood cat. He raises a hand to scrape his fingers through his hair, fidgety, then tugs at the leather bracelet slung around his left wrist. I made it when I was­ twenty-three and briefly consumed by handicraft.

Bad timing, I think he says. Less than ideal. He starts fiddling with things on his dressing room desk: a haphazard stack of picks, a tin of cinnamon breath mints. The set list is taped to the mirror, Purple Girl (Acoustic) highlighted yellow. He opened with it tonight, not making eye contact with me where I sat in the VIP section, and for once I didn’t sing along.