Page 101 of Top Shelf

A realization cracks open inside me with painful simplicity. Fuck.

As the song ends, Chase leaps onto the stage. “You can’t perform *NSYNC without balance,” he declares. “Backstreet Boys response performance.”

“Run.” Heidi grabs my arm and tugs me off the stage.

Chase ignores her and starts scrolling.

“Zoe,” Heidi says. “Control your husband.”

“Jokes on you, babe. He’s not my husband.”

“Yet!” Chase calls, winking at her.

Then he picks his song, points at me, and demands a duet.

“I already sang.”

“That was a mating ritual with your *NSYNC-loving wife. And now it’s war. Get back up here, Vik!”

I glance at Heidi, and she looks happier than I’ve ever seen her. So I turn back toward the stage to sing the Backstreet Boys with Chase Walton.

“And now,” Chase says, selecting “Everybody” from the song chart, “we restore order.”

“Dedication?” Reid calls.

Chase lifts the microphone solemnly. “I dedicate this to every Backstreet Boys fan who discovered tonight that Sweden has been interfering in American affairs since 1995.”

“That is not historically accurate,” I say.

“Sing, Ikea.”

“Call me Ikea again and I will put you through the table.”

He beams. “That’s the spirit.”

Chase is much better than me and much more dramatic. I provide the low notes, and Heidi sits in the front of the booth with both hands over her mouth, laughing so hard she has to lean against Lulu. Every time I look at her, she looks more delighted. Every time she looks more delighted, I fall harder.

By the time we return to the booth, Chase is flushed with victory, and Heidi is wiping tears from beneath her eyes.

“You,” she says, pulling me down next to her, “are full of surprises.”

“I sang poorly.”

“You sang with absolutely no shame. It was hot.”

My eyes meet hers, crinkling at the sides as she smiles at me again, and the noise dims around me. Across from us, Lulu and Carina are arguing about the next song. Charlie orders another basket of fries. Logan and Eli are debating whether Jake can be forced to sing power pop against his will. Zoe and Chase are at the bar ordering a round of shots.

And Heidi’s hand finds my thigh under the table. I look at her, but her face is turned toward the table. Her fingers flex on me, high enough that my body responds before I can breathe through it.

“You should not start that here,” I say quietly.

Her thumb moves. “I’m not starting anything.”

“No?”

She glances at me then, lipstick still red, eyes warm from laughter and tequila. “I’m appreciating my Swedish contributions to pop culture.”

I catch her wrist beneath the table and still her hand before I lose the thread of public behavior entirely. Her smile turns slow.