If This Gets Out(84)

Zach lowers his phone and steps forward. “We’ve only got to get through the rest of the tour. Then it’ll be back to normal.”

“Normal?” Angel spits. “When’s it ever been normal?”

“Before. It wasn’t so bad.”

“Before.” Angel runs a hand through his sweaty hair, and glances around us to check for spies. He looks afraid. Terrified, really. “Three years ago I was called Reece.”

“Angel—” I say.

“I was called Reece,” he shouts, his face contorting. “They took my name from me! And you think they’re going to let you come out on your own fucking terms? You’re both fucking deluded!”

A door slams with a heavy clang of metal behind us. The three of us snap our heads up. Beyond the rows and rows of cars are Erin, Jon, and four guards.

“No,” Angel says, turning on his heel.

Zach, who was still catching his breath, lets out a frustrated sigh as we give chase again. “I’m gonna kill him in the morning,” he pants to me. “Making me … jump off a fucking balcony … run laps around a freaking garage…”

We round a corner, and suddenly an exit sign comes into view. Erin’s yells echo through the garage as she pleads with Angel to slow down. Angel stumbles through the door, and Zach and I follow him. Erin’s voice is abruptly cut off as the door swings closed.

The night air has a fierce bite to it. Not cold enough for snow, but the wind still stings my cheeks, and I can feel my breath as it travels down my chest, the frigid air scraping against my lungs. I button my coat with prickling fingers and brace myself against the chill. Zach hugs his arms to his chest and stands behind me to take shelter from a gust of wind.

Angel’s not wearing a coat. I doubt he feels the cold at all. His eyes dart around rapidly, then he rushes toward the street. Toward light.

I don’t like where this is going.

“Angel,” I say urgently. “Not this way. That’s the main street.”

He ignores me.

“There are people camped out here.”

“We can hide in the crowd. Yeah. We’ll … they won’t be able to find us in the crowd.”

“No, we’ll get mobbed by the crowd.”

Angel’s voice is shaky, desperate. “Shut up.”

“He’s right, Angel,” Zach says.

“SHUT UP!” He starts to run again, and takes a right onto the street.

The others are outside, too, now, and they’re running. They’ll catch up to us before anything too bad happens. We just have to make sure we don’t lose Angel.

Zach groans as I pick up speed. As I predicted, an ocean of fans are surging and swarming toward Angel. When they see Zach and me round the corner, their screams of excitement and surprise turn into a roar. Angel runs toward them, and they run toward Angel, and they collide. And he’s engulfed.

It’s like they’ve consumed him.

Zach and I exchange glances, wary. I want to take his hand so I don’t lose him. He needs to be tethered to me for safety, in case something happens.

But I don’t. I don’t, because there are cameras, and witnesses, and because Geoff and Chorus said not to. And even in this moment of sheer panic, with this mounting fear, and the crowd about to hit us, I don’t disobey Chorus.

Maybe I’ll never be brave enough to. Maybe I only want to think I am.

So, when the crowd hits us, I find myself standing alone, surrounded by dozens of strangers.

Ruben.

Ruben.

Ruben.

Ruben.

There’s no malice in their eyes. There’s only love in their touches. Admiration in their voices. But they press against me until they’re breathing my air. Their hands, dozens of hands and hundreds of fingers, claw at my body wherever they can touch me. My neck, hair, lips, arms, legs, chest. A hand slips inside my coat. Moist lips press against my wrist.

My name gets louder, and louder, and LOUDER.

Some try to push the others back from me.

Give him some space.

Back up, guys.

He can’t breathe.

Their voices are swallowed up, though. Just like I am.

“Please, let me get through,” I beg. “Please. I need to go. I need to move. Please. Just—just let me, move, let me go, I need to get THROUGH!”

Someone hears me. Hands take mine. A small group of them pulls me, and the group grows as the word spreads. I need their help. I need them to save me from themselves.

The sea starts to move, and it’s like being dragged through quicksand, but, gradually, its grip on me loosens, and I’m collectively yanked out before I can be sucked back in the depths.

And the freezing air is back on my face. And lights. Blinking, flickering streetlights, headlights, neon lights on storefronts. I’m chanting thank you, thank you, to everyone and no one while I search for Zach, Angel, Jon.

“Ruben!” Zach finds me first, tearing his way from the crowd. He throws himself at me, and I grab his upper arm, because that’s okay, I think, that’s safe, and I need to touch him, I can’t not. The crowd is still there, and it’s still swarming, but it’s split in two. The half trying to reach us, and the other half holding it back. It wrestles with itself, seething, crushing.

“Angel!”

It’s Jon, standing with his feet planted firmly apart, fifty feet away from us. I follow his eyes and find Angel, hovering at the edge of the crowd. Angel’s skin flashes orange and white as he stares at the lights around us with unseeing eyes. The traffic is thick and furious. Even though it’s night, the city is alive and blaring. The shouts, and the crowd, and the blinding headlights whipping and whipping and whipping past, must be disorienting him beyond belief.