Page 386 of End Game

And once I start, I can't stop.

Micah joins me.

Then Griffin.

Even Ronan finally gives in.

Four naked people completely wrecked in my bedroom, laughing like idiots.

Dex would be fucking furious he missed this.

And that thought doesn't make tonight lesser.

It just makes it ours.

Chapter thirty-three

Away From the Table

Dex

Four weeks in Chicago teaches me several important things.

One: Austin Fletcher considers “one more pass” a legally binding agreement to remain in a recording studio until somebody's organs begin shutting down.

Two: people who make multi-platinum albums are still just music nerds. They have bodyguards, nicer equipment, and assistants who bring them coffee, but they will absolutely spend forty-five minutes arguing about whether a snare sounds too emotionally secure.

Three: I am apparently very fucking good at writing songs for other people.

That one takes longer to accept.

Apparently I had proficiency in this shit the entire time and just assumed I was bullshitting the roll.

The first week, I'm positive everyone is going to figure out Austin accidentally invited a bartender from Denver into a professional writing room.

By week two, I'm arguing with Signal Saints' bassist over an instrumental arrangement like I pay rent there.

Week three, Austin hands me a lyric sheet at eleven in the morning and tells me the second verse sucks.

It does.

I fix it.

Then I rewrite half the chorus.

Then we lose six hours.

By the end of the month, I've written lyrics on two songs, contributed enough to several instrumentals that lawyers and publishing percentages are now involved, and somehow written an entire fucking song by myself.

Not a Grave Intentions song.

That's the weird part.

It doesn't sound like me fronting my band.

It sounds like Signal Saints.

Big.