Chapter Three

"I'm just going to be me," I finish singing as I strum the last chord on my guitar.

The audience starts to go wild, cheering and clapping. I don't think I'll ever get used to that many people being excited to hear me sing, and I'm glad. I don't want that to ever get old. I take a quick bow and wave to the crowd, a smile beaming on my face.

I let my guitar go and push it towards the back of my body as I walk off stage, waving as I go. Willow is waiting just offstage, a serious look on her face. I try not to let that bother me as I walk towards her, wanting the fans to see me smiling.

"What's wrong?" I ask as soon as I'm out of view from the audience.

"You need to see this," Willow says, concern coating her voice.

"I'm going to go out for an encore in a few seconds. Can it wait?" I ask, grabbing a drink of water.

Willow glances to the side quickly then looks back at me. That serious look is still plastered on her face.

"Is someone hurt?" My heart drops.

"No, everyone's fine," Willow quickly answers.

"Okay, then can you tell me once I'm done for the night? If it's bad news, I'd rather not have to go out and perform right afterwards," I push.

"I totally understand that, but your team wants to figure out their action plan right now. I think you should know what's going on before they do that. I know this is terrible timing, but sometimes your encores last like twenty minutes so I'd rather not wait," Willow says in one breath.

I turn to the stage. I can hear the crowd chanting my name. They're getting louder by the second, trying to get me to come back out. I look back at Willow whose face is still set in that stern expression.

I guess if she's pushing this, then I should hear her out about whatever it is she needs to tell me. She wouldn't be so insistent if it wasn't important.

I turn towards one of the stagehands. "Can you slowly start dimming the lights and play a soft beat from one of my songs, that way they know I'm coming back out? I'll be right there."

The stagehand nods at me and then walks away towards the controls. I face Willow giving her my full attention.

"Okay, what is it?" I ask. "You have like two minutes."

Willow nods. "Plenty of time."

She grabs her computer off of a small table and turns it towards me. She has a video loaded up on the screen. She clicks play and a soft melody comes through the speakers. I look down at the screen and see a guy strumming a guitar. He plays a few more chords before he starts singing the first line of a song. I'm not going to lie, I'm impressed. His voice is amazing. I listen for a few more seconds before looking up at Willow.

"Okay? You wanted me to listen to a good looking guy who clearly has an amazing vocal range sing a song I assume he wrote? That's the emergency?" I try to keep the anger out of my voice. I'm not really mad at her, just kind of confused and frustrated. I'm not sure why this couldn't wait until after I was done for the night.

"Listen to what he's singing. The words," Willow says as she points towards the computer screen again.

The crowd outside is getting louder. I can only pick out a few words here and there from the song. I try to really focus, tuning out all of the noises surrounding me. I need to get back out there and that's not going to happen until Willow gets out whatever she needs to say.

I close my eyes and listen for a few lines. It's not a song I recognized, but it's somehow oddly familiar. Then, it hits me. "Um, is this a response to one of my songs?" I gasp out.

"Yup, he wrote?—"

"Shhhh!" I cut Willow off, trying to hear more of his lyrics. "Are you kidding me? Oh no he didn't! He did not just try to twist the whole story behind that song and make it seem like it wasn't the guy's fault. Oh absolutely not!"

I look up at Willow whose eyes are locked on me.

"He can't do that, can he?" I ask.

She hesitates, biting her nail. "Well, technically, he didn't do anything wrong. His song and lyrics are completely original. It's just obvious that he wrote this as a response to your song. The ‘other point of view' as he calls it. Legally though, he's one hundred percent clear."

I open and close my mouth a few times like a guppy trying to breath out of water. "Well, I don't like it. How do we get rid of it? That song is a favorite amongst my fans. So many people have told me how much that song has resonated with them. I don't want his song ruining that."

"That's the thing, we can't get rid of it. Like I said, he technically didn't do anything wrong." Sorrow takes over Willow's eyes as she says this.

"That's fine then. It's not like a lot of people are going to see it anyway, right? Usually original songs don't get a lot of views on YouTube until the artist gets really popular from doing covers, right? I've never seen or heard of him before, so it's fine," I say, trying to calm myself down.

"Well, that's the thing. The video has . . . um . . . it has . . ." Willow stutters.

"Just tell me," I say, afraid of what's about to come from her mouth.

"It has over one million views," Willow finally blurts out, saying it all in a rush as if that will make it hurt less.

My mouth drops open. "Over one million views? When was it posted?"

Willow pauses again. I grab the computer from her and scroll down to the information box.

"Last night!" I shout. "This video got over one million views in less than twenty-four hours!"

Willow grabs the computer back from me and sets it back on the table. "Listen, Ali, it's fine, the team is going to figure . . ."

I throw my hand up to cut her off. "I have to go back out there. We'll talk about this when I'm done."

Willow nods but doesn't say anything else. I spin my guitar around on my body, gripping the neck for dear life. I head back out there to give the fans the performance they deserve even though my stomach feels like it's taken a never-ending ride on the world's worst rollercoaster.

The second I'm back in my room, I head straight to my laptop that's sitting on the table. When I open it, the video of the song is already loaded up. Willow knew I'd want to see it again.

I sit there for another twenty minutes just watching it over and over again, analyzing the lyrics this guy has written. The more I listen to it, the more I'm convinced this is a response to my song, and I don't like it.

I grab my phone and call Willow.

"Already on my way over," she says without waiting for me to say anything. "I'm bringing Stephen with me."

I nod my head in response, but by the time I realize that she can't see me, I've already hung up the phone.

I press play on the video again, rewatching it until I hear a knock. Willow doesn't even wait for me to open the door before walking in.

"He's clearly overstepping. We have to go after him, ask him to take this down and give an apology. I know some people probably don't think it's a big deal, but I don't like that his song might interfere with the integrity of my song. It's not right. What are we going to do?" I ask, raising my chin and directing my gaze towards my manager, Stephen.

"Well . . ." Stephen pauses, looking at Willow with a wrinkled brow. Willow is biting her lip as she wrings her hands at her waist.

"Just tell me," I answer, tired of people trying to sugarcoat things tonight.

"You're going to tour with him," Stephen blurts out.