Page 27 of Two Hit Wonder

They played it again. It was worse.

"The bridge isn't working," Ellie said, which was the most words she'd said all morning. "It doesn't build anywhere."

Maeve's jaw tightened. "The bridge is fine."

"It's a bit…" Iona trailed off, seeming to search for a diplomatic word. "Static? Like, we're waiting for something to happen, but then it doesn't."

"The song builds through restraint," Maeve said. "It's meant to feel like that."

Iona tilted her head, considering. "What if we changed the progression here?" She pointed at a measure. "Something that opens up a bit. Gives you somewhere to go."

"The progression is what makes the song work."

"I'm not saying it's bad, I'm just—"

"You're saying I don't know how to write a song."

Iona smiled. It was the most infuriating smile Maeve had ever seen. Patient and warm and utterly unrattled. Typical bloody Iona. "I'm saying maybe we could try it a different way. Just to see."

"The song is finished. It doesn't need to be tried differently."

"Fine." Iona shrugged, picked up her guitar, and started playing the altered progression anyway. Softer, gentler, with a melodic lift that opened the whole thing up.

Maeve stared at her. "I said no."

"I heard you." Iona kept playing. "I just thought I'd show you what I meant."

"That's not…you can't just…" Maeve sputtered to a halt, which was not something that happened to her. She was eloquent. She was articulate. She did not sputter.

Cam was already nodding along, tapping out a new rhythm on the edge of her snare. "Oh, that's nice. That's actually really nice. Ellie, can you—"

"Already on it." Ellie's fingers found a bass line that threaded through Iona's guitar like they'd rehearsed it for weeks.

Maeve stood there, microphone in hand, watching her song get hijacked by people who apparently thought "collaboration" meant ignoring everything she said. The worst part was that it sounded better. She could hear it. The progression Iona had suggested opened the song up, gave it room to breathe, made the restraint she'd built feel intentional rather than stuck.

She hated it.

"Well?" Iona looked up at her, still playing, still smiling that ridiculous smile. "Want to try singing it?"

"No."

"Maeve."

"I said no."

Iona's smile didn't waver. "Alright. We can wait. Take your time."

Maeve had forgotten that. Forgotten how Iona didn't fight. How she didn't back down. She just stood there being aggressively pleasant until you ran out of things to push against. It was like trying to argue with sunshine. You couldn't win because sunshine didn't know it was supposed to lose.

Maeve took a breath. Then another.

"Fine," she said. "Once."

They played through the revised version. It still wasn't perfect. There were rough edges, moments where they stumbled over each other, but there was something there. A spark of potential. Which Maeve refused to acknowledge out loud.

"Better," she said grudgingly.

"See?" Iona beamed at her. "Collaboration."