Catch My Breath (6 page)

They were all staring openmouthed when Chris finished. He’d sung a love song, something original Elliot was betting, since it sounded like nothing he’d ever heard before. Romantic but not corny, totally unique. He loved it.

“Your voice is perfect,” Elliot whispered. He didn’t even try to keep the awe out of his tone. “Every time.”

Chris smiled shyly and shook his head, raking his hand through an unruly, spiky mop of bright blond hair. “Nah. But I love to perform, you know? I never feel happier than when I’m on stage. It’s like… freedom, I guess.”

Elliot nodded. “I haven’t really been on stage except when I auditioned, but I get what you mean. Once I let go of the fear, it was like love at first… whatever. I wanted to do it again and again.”

Danny, who sat beside Elliot on one of the smaller couches in the wide, comfortable den, bumped his shoulder and grinned at him sideways. “You’ll get your chance. We all will.”

“I can’t wait,” Reece said excitedly. He strummed his guitar and smiled. “I’ve been working toward something like this for years. People always assumed I’d want to do country, but that was never my thing.” He chuckled and added, “’Course, I never thought I’d end up in a boy band either. ” He rolled his eyes, but he grinned at the same time.

They all laughed at that, and Elliot shook his head. “I know what you mean.”

“How did you get your contract?” Tate asked Chris, who’d relaxed back into his plush chair with his guitar in his lap.

Chris smiled. “I actually got discovered by this rapper in a club in LA. Trace Evans, you heard of him?”

The five of them nodded. Of course. The guy was a huge name in hip-hop.

“I moved down here from Seattle last year when I turned twenty-one,” Chris continued. “I started doing gigs in bars and clubs, small festivals—wherever they’d let me perform. I can beat-box too, and I have a few more hip-hop tracks. I started getting a following, and eventually, I landed a gig at Trace’s club. Afterward, he approached me backstage, offered to hook me up with a couple of producers. I got signed by Revolution a couple of days later.”

Tate looked impressed. “Wow. And how long ago was that?”

“Almost three months. Trace told me about this show a few weeks later, said he’d mentioned me to the creators, and they wanted me to be involved. I said cool.”

“Cool,” Danny repeated with a grin. Chris was so casual about everything, like it were no big deal. It was almost funny how easily he took it all in stride. Elliot couldn’t help but smile too.

Cool.

O
NE
thing they could all agree on: it was going to be hard to get used to having the cameras around almost constantly. The only things that were off-limits were bathroom breaks, showers, and bedtime. Aside from that, they’d be watched. Constantly. All areas of the house besides the bedrooms and bathrooms had mounted cameras, and the deck area of the pool outside as well. They’d been warned that the cameramen could and probably would follow them into the bedrooms during daytime hours, and that in general they should behave like they were being filmed most of the time unless they were away from the house.

With his parents being absent the majority of his life, Danny was used to privacy. Sharing a house smaller than his own with thirteen other people and a bunch of cameramen was going to be weird. As excited as Danny was to be there, the idea was a bit off-putting. But he’d have Elliot and the other guys. Already they were starting to feel like their own little band of brothers. Well, everyone except for Elliot. He felt like… something new and indefinable and maybe even a little scary. Not like a brother at all. Danny didn’t want to examine his feelings for Elliot too closely.

“Hey, it’s getting late. Maybe we should go pick beds and unpack.”

Almost as one, the four of them turned to look at Tate. Danny glanced down at the watch on his wrist and then arched a brow. “It’s 9:45. You are
so
lame.” He flashed Tate a smile, though, to say, “I still love ya.”

Tate flushed a bit. “Well, yeah, but Valerie said the crew will be here at eight. I want to be up so I can shower and stuff before they get here.”

Reece snorted and turned his attention back to the video game he and Webb were playing. Chris had tried to play with them at first. Tried. Chris might have been brilliant with his guitar, but he was total shit at video games. He’d given up with a good-natured smile before going upstairs hours before.

Danny liked Chris’s low-key presence, and the girls from The Pixies were sweet. The jury was still out about Isaiah and the OCD guys, who all seemed like they thought they were too cool to hang with the likes of a boy band, but it was still too early to tell. Danny sighed.

“Okay, guys,” he said. “Let’s listen to Papa Bear. Probably a good idea not to have our bags lying all over when the camera crew is trying to get around in the morning.”

Elliot smiled and got to his feet. “Yeah, probably, but I doubt I’ll be able to sleep tonight anyway.”

Danny shrugged. “Me either. I guess we can just come back down here when we’re finished if you guys are up for it.”

Reece didn’t take his eyes from the television screen. “Just pick a bed for me. I don’t care. I can sleep anywhere.”

“Same here,” Webb said.

“’Kay,” Danny said. “We sharing?” He glanced at Elliot. As far as he was concerned, it was a foregone conclusion. Why wouldn’t he and El be sharing a room? Out of all the guys, they’d gotten closest with each other.

“Okay.” Elliot gave him a shy smile.

“Let’s go get our stuff put away, and we can come back down.”

Elliot nodded, stood, and followed Danny to the stairs.

T
HE
next morning, Danny was up by six. Elliot was just a lump under his covers when he went into the bathroom to take a quick shower. He heard stirring in the bigger room just as he was finishing up his hair, making sure it swooped artfully off to the side and didn’t have any weird pieces sticking up. Katie was always giving him crap about how much he loved his hair… but hey. A guy had to look good, right?

Thinking of his girlfriend made Danny cringe. He’d meant to call her the previous night to let her know how he was settling in, but he’d gotten so caught up in talking to Elliot after they unpacked that he’d completely forgotten about it. That was getting easier and easier to do the more time he spent with Elliot and the guys. It made Danny feel guilty, even if it should have been understandable that he’d be distracted with everything that was going on. As soon as the cameras started rolling, they weren’t supposed to really call out anyway.

I’ll text her tonight…. If we have time.

A sudden knock at the door startled him into dropping his comb. “Hey, you almost done in there? Some of us have to use the bathroom, you know.”

Danny grinned at Reece’s sleep-roughened voice. Fresh out of bed, Reece’s accent was thick enough he was nearly impossible to understand. “I’ve barely even started,” he teased through the door. “I still need to manscape.”

“Aww, c’mon, man, that’s disgusting! I don’t wanna hear about that shit.” Danny heard a thud against the door. Maybe Reece’s forehead. Maybe a shoe telling both of them to shut the hell up.

Danny laughed and unlocked the door to find Reece standing there with a raging case of bedhead and wearing a matching flannel pajama set, of all things.

“Did your mommy buy you those for Christmas?” Danny asked with a snort, then dodged when Reece took a halfhearted swing.

“Asshole,” Reece muttered. “You probably used up all the hot water too.”

“Dude, there are fourteen people in this house. You can’t blame me.”

“Sure I can.” Reece grunted and brushed past him. “You better head out unless you’re planning to watch.” He started to unbutton his top.

Danny snorted and crossed the bathroom to the door that led to his and Elliot’s room. “Tempting as that is, I’ll pass. I’m not trying to go blind.”

“Blind from the greatness,” Reece drawled. “They don’t call me anaconda at home for nothing.”

Danny couldn’t help it. He burst out laughing, but still pulled the door shut behind him hurriedly, wheezing and muttering “Anaconda” under his breath.

“Hey,” said a sleepy voice. “What’s so funny?”

Danny looked over to find Elliot sitting up in bed, his hair a rumpled mess but still oddly adorable. “Reece and his massive anaconda.”

Elliot blinked at him. “What? Ew.”

Danny grinned and shook his head. “Never mind. You gonna take a shower after Reece? I’m getting hungry.”

“I’m pretty much always hungry. But I need to get ready. There are
cameras
out there.” Elliot waved at himself.

“It’s cool.” Danny walked over to his own bed, which was directly across from Elliot’s, and flopped down on top of it. “I’ll wait for you. Probably should call Katie anyway.” He didn’t want to look like he was reluctant to talk to his girlfriend. But he was.

W
HEN
Elliot finally got into the bathroom, he took his time showering. He tried to tell himself it was because he was nervous. Truth was, he didn’t want to hear Danny talking to his girlfriend. Little couple moments, I love yous, that kind of stuff made her more real. And as much as Elliot hated himself for it, he wished Katie didn’t exist. As long as he didn’t have to hear Danny with her, he could pretend she didn’t.

When Elliot got back into the room, showered and changed, Danny was standing at the window, gazing out at something Elliot couldn’t see, his phone in his hand at his side.

“Everything okay?” Elliot asked.

Danny turned and looked at him, his preoccupied expression easing into his familiar wild grin. “Yep. Fine. Just getting a little nervous, I guess.”

Elliot returned the smile. “You’re so, like, confident. I didn’t think anything would scare you.”

Danny shrugged, his shoulder lifting beneath the fabric of his expensive polo. “You’d be surprised.”

“Did you get a hold of Katie? It’s still kind of early, isn’t it?”

“Yeah, we talked for a minute.” Danny looked out the window again. “She never sleeps past seven. Morning person like me, I guess.”

Elliot looked down at the carpet and scuffed it with his foot, trying hard not to hate that Danny knew when and how Katie woke up in the morning.
Don’t be an asshole.

“Cool,” he forced himself to say. “Want to go grab some breakfast? I think better on a full stomach.”

Danny chuckled softly and shoved his phone into the drawer by his bed. “I think we all do. Come on. Let’s go see what the other guys are doing.”

T
HE
five of them got downstairs to find that breakfast had been set up buffet-style on a long sideboard against the wall in the dining room. Elliot got in line between Reece and Danny and watched, horrified, as Reece piled his plate high with scrambled eggs, bacon, sausage, toast, and even some biscuits and gravy.

“How can you eat all that?” Elliot asked. He’d been hungry in his room, but the moment he’d stepped out of it, a thick ball of tension had started forming in the pit of his stomach. He didn’t think he could eat much more than a piece of toast and some fruit.

Reece shrugged and chomped into one of his sausage links. “I get extra hungry when I’m nervous,” he said around a mouthful of food.

“You’re extra hungry all the time,” Webb muttered. Reece elbowed him in the side.

“Jerk.”

“Douche.”

“
Guys
….” Tate glanced significantly toward the camera.

Elliot shook his head and plopped a croissant and two slices of cantaloupe onto his own plate. He looked up, the tension in his stomach mounting when the door to the kitchen swung open. He expected to see the director and maybe a few cameramen. Instead, an older woman walked into the room, holding a white carafe in one hand and a tray of big, gooey cinnamon rolls in the other. She smiled at them and set both items on the table instead of carrying them over to the sideboard.

“Hey, boys,” she said. “I’m Josephine. Help yourself. These are fresh from the oven. And this is a pot of dark roast, but there’s decaf over on the sideboard if you prefer.”

Elliot drew in a shaky breath and tried to collect himself enough to return her greeting. Luckily, the other guys jumped in, their introductions and compliments about the food covering a typical awkward Elliot moment. Still, his face burned, and it was a struggle to stop himself from squirming in his seat.
Jesus, man. Chill out.

Under the table, a hand settled on his knee and squeezed gently.

“You’re going to be okay,” Danny whispered near his ear. “They’re going to love you.”

Elliot shot him a grateful smile and reached down to cover Danny’s hand with his own. Danny’s skin was soft and warm beneath his fingertips. For a second, Elliot wished he could lace their fingers together and hang on for dear life. But somehow it helped just to have Danny’s solid presence at his side.

And Danny was right. He would be okay. Because he had his new best friends. Because he had Danny. There wasn’t any need to be scared.

“Thanks,” he whispered back.

T
HE
first day of filming wasn’t anything like Danny expected. Mostly the camera crew hovered in the background while everyone in the house settled in. The Band Campers were instructed to set up promotional Twitter accounts and spent a while doing that. Twitter was another way they could entertain the fans they would supposedly have, and they were told to “Keep it fun,” whatever that meant.

After lunch, they were instructed to go out to the pool and “act natural” so the camera crew could get some candid shots for the show’s opening credits. Danny stood next to Chris at the edge of the pool for a while, watching as the OCD guys tossed a couple of the girls from The Pixies into the water. It looked like fun and everyone was laughing, but the only reason Danny had focused on them was so he wouldn’t stare too hard at Elliot. Elliot with his damp, dark curls and wet, clingy board shorts, his smooth bare chest, and all his pale, creamy skin dripping wet and perfect. Shit. Danny wanted to touch. Badly.
Really
badly. So he carefully avoided looking… save for the few times he couldn’t help it.