Patreon LogoYour support makes Blue Moon possible (Patreon)

Not Your Average Teen Pop Star (DarkDreamer9110 x MsBloom)

Reader mode
Cassie smiled as Ellie verified that her dysphoria had been a lifelong thing. When Ellie walked over to Dusty and hugged him, Cassie noticed Sabrina step forward as well, handing Dusty her business card with a smile and nod.

The session continued, with the only notable moment being when (inevitably, Cassie realized in hindsight) someone had brought up the question of trans people (particularly trans women) in sports. Cassie had sighed, and then decided to open up some eyes.

"1936 Berlin Olympics. Helen Stephens and Stella Walsh, two female athletes, were subjected to gender verification exams under accusations they were male. Stephens was found to be biologically female. But she was hit with the accusations anyways because how dare a woman be so good. The fact is, people pretend there's this acceptable range of female performance and body types, but it's all just misogyny. Everyone's different. And you can't tell me that naturally tall basketball players don't have a "biological advantage." But nobody bans tall people from basketball for being tall. It's all about standards and control. People love to discriminate for all kinds of BS reasons.

"Walsh's case is more complicated; she was intersex. And interestingly, there's actually a recent case where that issue is relevant. Caster Semenya. She's intersex, and look what they demanded of her, that, after having already been cleared back in 2009 to compete as a female after she was forced to undergo sex testing, now there's some bullshit law saying her testosterone level is too high.

"Finally, Lia Thomas. People really threw a fit about her. You want to claim "biological advantage," take a look at her time before and after and then eat your fucking words. She's not standing out in her times at the top of the charts in the women's competitions.

"Let's be honest: "biological advantage" is used as a shield for transmisogyny, racism, and the continued efforts by cisnormative standards to police women's bodies and identities. It's all BS. You want to enforce specific criteria for sports eligibility, go ahead and write up minimum and maximum ranges for every physical attribute for every sport. And then enforce those for everyone. Stop acting like it's about "fairness" when it's about oppression, when it's about policing people who are different."
 
Ellie absolutely loved how assertive Cassie was when speaking about these things, how confident, as if she had done nothing else but speak out about trans rights. She wrapped her arms around her girlfriend and rested her head against her shoulder.

The informal Q&A lasted about an hour after which the girls retreated back to the locker room, changed back into their regular clothes and washed off their elaborate make up. They packed up their equipment and having unpacked it again back home they took Ellie's car out to a secluded place where they parked to have some alone time together, to debrief. It had been a very emotional evening but a good one, an absolutely amazing one. It was well past midnight when they arrived back home and climbed into Cassie's bed together, falling fast asleep in each other's arms.

The next afternoon they went round to where Dusty lived and it didn't take Ellie more than a quick run through of Heart of a Dreamer before she made up her mind. It was the way Dusty about half way through the song started making suggestions on how to improve the flow of the rhythm, the interaction between the guitar lines and the drums, added accents where Ellie had not thought to add them. It was obvious to her that Dusty had a lot to contribute to the band.

With just a few weeks left of school and finals coming up the girls'knew their schedule would be rather tight and Andi had understood, booking them for a first set of sessions on Tuesday and Wednesday of that week and then holding back until after the start of the summer holidays.

"So, for today," Andi said as they all sat in the control room of her small studio having coffee.
"I was thinking that we could just run through some songs with the three of you playing together as a band. I gather that you play quite a bit of bass on your home recordings," she elaborated and looked at Cassie with a smile.
"So for today you are a power trio and then we can add keyboards and stuff later."

The girls hadn't had much time to rehearse with Dusty but the auditions that Sunday had turned into a rehearsal session with them adjusting some of the songs as Dusty kept suggesting rhythmic ideas and additions. They were perhaps far from ready to perform even their old songs as a trio without all kinds of hitches but at least Ellie figured that was the point of keeping their first studio session rather loose, to give them a chance to rehearse now that they were no longer a duo.
 
Not really sure what to expect from Andi's studio or what to expect from Andi during their first session in a professional studio Ellie had packed everything she had in the way of instruments and musical gadgets, her guitar, amp and multi-fx-board, bass with amp and fx-board, and the electronic drum pad. She had almost packed her midi keyboard as well but figured that if there was one thing she could count on Andi having in her studio it was a midi keyboard, so instead she packed her lap top where all the synth-modules and sound libraries were stored along with the actual home demos.

Similarly Dusty had brought his drum kit and now that everything was set up in the recording room the three of them decided to start with an uptempo song the girls had performed at the charity event; Outside In, about how people tend to judge others by the outside rather than the inside and also about being on the outside looking in. Ellie counted them in after they had listened to the song a few times to get a feel for it. It was Ellie on guitar, Dusty on drums and Cassie on bass and of course she also sang lead with Ellie doing harmonies and back up. It had been discussed whether Dusty too would sing or not and they had decided to try it. It had actually been Andi's suggestion.

The first three attempts broke down along the way as they either got lost or made mistakes but the fourth take they got all the way through it and encouraged by Andi they kept going, recording somewhere between 10-15 versions of the song before Andi called for them to join her in the control room to listen to the results. The versions differed quite a bit as they grew more confident with playing together the three of them and eventually they chose three of the later versions to continue working on, to add keyboards, guitar and vocal overdubs to.

The end result was three versions of the song that sounded like nothing Ellie could imagine having created with her Logic Pro software. It sounded more the way she had imagined it in her head and still so very different due to the more dynamic sound of live drums played by an actual drummer. She had added some percussion to the song using her drum pad but apart from that it was all Dusty and it made such a difference, which she was not late in telling him. Listening back to the last of the three versions for maybe the tenth time she closed her eyes and imagined what might happen if the keyboard riff between the two middle choruses was played by real horns. Perhaps a bit too much to ask for for a demo session but she did bring it up for a future reference.
 
Cassie had been similarly impressed with the performance Dusty gave, and his suggestions seemed to definitely impress Ellie, so Cassie had no problem welcoming Dusty into the band.

They had spent a bit of the time afterwards rehearsing, mostly acclimating to live drums and getting a feel for having another member. Nevertheless, by the end of that impromptu rehearsal, Cassie felt that at least they wouldn't be making fools of themselves in the studio session, even if there was still definitely room to smooth out their new dynamic. But it was clear that Dusty brought a great deal of potential for them all, and there were just the little touches, the slight variations a human touch could add to the sounds, that added just a little more depth.
The day of the first demo session arrived, and as Andi suggested they start with Cassie on bass, she nodded. She could do enough to get through the songs competently.

The first few false starts were expected, but by the time they had finished up a few good versions of Outside In, they were definitely getting into the rhythm of it.

She nodded as Ellie spoke. "Definitely worth looking into." She agreed, nodding. They had put out a call for auditions, and Andi had said she might go over her current prospects after their first demo sessions to see if anyone she was working with or looking into would fit the developing dynamic.

She looked at Ellie. "So, babe, which one should we work on next? I know you've got a few you'd kill to do while we're here."
 
They had discussed what songs to record over the first half of the week, Heart of Dreamer was of course one of them as it was so far their most popular song, judging by the number of unique views on their YouTube channel and of course they would work on it but apart from being their most popular song so far it was also their most complex song so far and might take a bit more rehearsal to get right, with the added live drums and perhaps also better to attempt once they had included a fourth member into the band who could do the keyboards live with them. Instead Ellie had another plan.
"I know all we have is a riff sequence and some basic programmed drums but how about we see if we can do something with Down on Me?" she suggested and brought up the basic demo on her laptop.
It was only about 25 seconds long but even halfway through it Dusty was already beating out a rhythm to match the guitar on his thighs. That was all the confirmation she needed to grab Cassie byt the hand and lead her into the recording room.

"Now the riff goes like this," she said and showed her girlfriend how she positioned her hands on the fret board before repeating it while also calling out what to play on the bass, a slow bluesy groove to match the guitar, suggesting after a third repetition they could perhaps add a hint of fuzz to the bass as well.
"Maybe a bit more reverb as well," she said and once she was satisfied that Cassie had it she nodded for Dusty, who had been playing along with the last three or four repetitions to start them off.

Dusty did so with an elaborate roll across the toms before settling into a groove that closely followed the bass line, adding tiny but effective highlights every four bars. With each repetition of the 25 second sequence the song grew a little and soon Ellie called them to a halt and looked at Cassie first and then Dusty.
"So that's the verse, got any lyrical ideas yet babe," she said turning back to Cassie.
 
Cassie caught on quickly to Ellie's instructions, and soon agreed that they could add the fuzz and reverb to the bass. As they gathered to touch base on their input so far, Cassie smiled. "Yeah, babe, I've got an idea. Hell, I've got a whole verse and ideas for more in mind. But into the control room with you for this." She said.

Once they were ready, she hit the intercom. "Okay. Go ahead and queue up the last set of instrument tracks. I want to see how it would sound with the full set of instruments so far. And I think you all should listen to it like that as well."

With that settled, headphones on, she closed her eyes and signaled for them to start the music.

The verse she had conceived was simple, from the perspective of a girl in high school daydreaming about her best friend and questioning her sexuality. It would be pretty clear that she was putting some of her own experience crushing on Ellie into it.
 
Ellie gave Cassie the thumbs up and she and Dusty both left the sound room to join Andi in the control room where Ellie quickly engaged herself in mixing the tracks the way she had heard them in her head as they played. Andi corrected her a few times, made suggestions, added to and subtracted from some of the post-recording effects Ellie had chosen.
"You have to leave room for her voice to come through," Andi explained.
"Even if you mix it low it still needs to be clear but you also don't want it to drown out the instruments."
Ellie nodded and made a mental note of it. This was something she had usually never really thought about when mixing their home demos. She had simply mixed it until it sounded good but once Cassie started singing over the backing tracks she realised she had not done her girlfriend's voice justice with those mixes. It came through so strong, so perfectly embedded in the music that it was almost as if Ellie heard it for the first time, heard it at its full potential.

Andi encouraged Cassie to do a few different takes, recording each of them on separate tracks and after the fifth take Elle was rocking i her chair, her eyes closed and a big smile on her face. She could almost feel the song's potential for becoming a hit. Of course the lyrics didn't exactly escape her either and they only made the song that much better, even if it was just a verse. They would need a build up to the chorus and of course a chorus as well.

When Andi called cut after another few takes Ellie literally jumped out of her seat, rushed into the sound room and threw herself at Cassie, kissing her with tears of happiness messing up her mascara.
"That was ... I dunno, did you hear yourself, of course you didn't you only heard the music, come, you have to hear this. I've like never heard you sing like this before, well I have but not Like This ..."
She took Cassie's hand and barely gave her time to take off the headphones before dragging her back into the control room.
 
Cassie had been toying with the lyrics in her head throughout the session, and she had very much been focusing more on the feel of the music, and, with her eyes closed and only the sound to guide her, she sang. It was clear that, while Andi and Dusty were also there, Cassie had been singing to Ellie specifically. Into it she poured the years of confusion and longing she had felt looking at Ellie and daydreaming about her. How she had been worried about saying anything for so long.

Cassie had wondered how Ellie would react, and her teary-eyed rush into the room at their break and excitedly rushing her to the control room to listen was plenty of answer. Cassie smiled, tugging Ellie back just for a moment to embrace her and kiss her with a murmured "I love you, babe," before letting herself be dragged into the room to listen to it. She didn't remember the last time she had seen Ellie so ecstatic about a song. "So I take it you loved it." She said with a playful smirk.
 
"Loved it?" Ellie said.
"Are you hearing yourself?"
She was literally pulling Cassie onto her lap, wrapping her arms around her, perhaps a bit inappropriate given the situation and the fact that they were not alone but she was just so ecstatic about what was coming out of the speakers, almost like an excited child on her birthday as she starts to unwrap that special present she has been nagging her mum about all year, or at least since Christmas. Whether it was Cassie or the song that was the present was perhaps less clear.
"I love you more, but only just," she said and kissed Cassie which had Dusty blushing for a moment before he perked up and pointed out Cassie's timing in between his little highlights on the drums.
"I know. It is almost as if she planned it that way," Ellie said and nodded.
"Now listen to what she does with the guitar line here ..."

And so the three of them began discussing the different versions as Andi had queued them up one after the other. Ellie already had a head full of ideas for what to do next, how to build up to the chorus, what the chorus should be, something to break against the verse but still keep that slow sensual groove going. Perhaps something like a harmonica except she didn't know how to play a harmonica. It would have to be done on keyboards, unless of course Andi or Dusty played the harmonica. She made a pensive face and kept the idea to herself for the time being. First they needed to write the chorus.
"Y'know I think you might have something here," Andi said after the last of the vocal takes cut out with Cassie holding the last note just half a bar more than the instruments.
"Now what's next?" she asked and looked at them in turn.
 
Cassie had, upon hearing the full setup, smiled and nodded. It had been amazing. She nodded as Ellie commented about if she'd heard herself. "I just sang it to you. It's vicariously exorcizing the years I repressed how I felt." She said. "I guess letting such deep, personal feelings into the performance like that really just let me feel the song."

Another nod as Ellie commented on how it was almost like she planned the vocals around the accents Dusty added. "I did. I was planning the lyrics as we went, adjusting them as the song grew and changed. So of course I worked with your additions. It's about synergy."

She looked at the others as the subject shifted to what to do next. "Well, I figure we can work on the chorus to it, or maybe polish up one of our other pieces. You've probably seen most of our catalogue, Andi. Which one do you think we should do?"
 
"That's what is going to make it a hit," Ellie said and nodded seeking support for this suggestion from Andi who just smiled in return.
"I think you have done some impressive work here today," she said and suggested that it was better that they continued working on Down on Me while they were in the zone.
"Tomorrow though, I do have a specific song of yours that I was going to suggest for your second session."
She looked at them all in turn and to Ellie that moment of silence felt like those exaggerated drawn out pauses you see on reality shows where one is going to be either announced the winner of a specific challenge or sent home. It even felt as if there was a break for commercials before Andi finally spoke again.
"Talking to the Moon," she said.
"Another song, from what I can understand from the words, about keeping a secret from your best friend in fear of losing said best friend."
 
Cassie nodded as Andi suggested they keep at Down On Me if they were in the zone on it. She glanced at Ellie as Andi took a long, dramatic pause before revealing the song she had in mind for them to try the next day. She immediately grinned from ear to ear. Talking To The Moon was one that they had done during the charity event (which had ended up being more successful than they had dared hope), the slow song featuring Cassie on piano. And it was a fairly recent addition, only a couple of months old. But the lyrics were, as Andi had surmised, very much about keeping feelings secret out of fear of losing a friendship.

"It really is." She said, glancing briefly at Ellie. The song had been very much drawn from Cassie's own experiences, many nights spent sitting in the open window talking to the night, the moon, and no one in particular about her feelings and her fears about Ellie. Many of the lyrics were, in fact, directly based on, if not verbatim, things Cassie had said during those nights.

"But anyways, yeah, I've got a few ideas for the chorus of Down On Me. I definitely think we can get at least a good bit of it done." She said, changing the subject awkwardly.
 
Of course Ellie had been aware, when Talking to the Moon was written, that the lyrics were about having a secret crush on a friend not daring to tell said friend about them out of fear of losing the friend. What she realised the moment Andi said the words and Cassie confirmed them was that it had perhaps been Cassie's first attempt at letting Ellie know how she felt. She had perhaps written the lyrics hoping that Ellie would understand on her own, perhaps even hoping that once she did she would take the first step.

She imagined the scen in her head, perhaps in a similar fashion to how Cassie had imagined it. The two of them up in Ellie's room, Cassie doing one last vocal take and Ellie looking up at her, eyes lighting up with realisation, standing up once Cassie finished singing, walking over to her and giving her a kiss saying something cheesy like: "I feel that too but I was afraid I'd lose you if I said."

Now of course that wouldn't have been true at the time, at least Ellie didn't think it would have been. She wasn't entirely sure though. There was a very thin line between the intimacy they had shared as BFFs and what they shared now as girlfriends. Sex being that line, but apart from that. How many nights had they not spent sleeping in the same bed, cuddling and spooning each other. How many times had they not practised kissing on each other all through their teens. There had even been times, in the last year or two, when they had masturbated side by side, but it had ended there, at least for Ellie it had.

As she returned to the sound room with Cassie and Dusty to keep working on Down on Me she took a quick inventory of her feelings and began wondering whether or not she felt differently about Cassie now than she had before prom, from a strictly emotional point of view. Did she love Cassie more as a girlfriend than she had as a BFF? Was sex the only distinction between the two states.

"Alright," she said, shaking her head free of those thoughts, and looked up at Cassie.
"I really liked the last vocal take where you kept that note after the music stopped, so here's what I was thinking for the build up and the chorus."
She turned to Dusty.
"Leave a full bar empty for Cassie to do her thing then a half bar roll on the snare. Bass comes in with an upwards slide up to an A."
She turned back to Cassie showing her where to start sliding her finger up the fourth string.
"Then I come in on the guitar and we go to a D7. You do what feels right Dusty and then another verse, and instrumental chorus for a solo and then one more chorus."

She gave Andi a thumbs up through the small window separating the sound room from the control room.
"From the top," she said and counted them in.
 
Talking To The Moon had come about after Cassie had talked to her mom and Sabrina about her feelings for Ellie, and so she had written it hoping that Ellie would realize that the emotional depth of the lyrics wasn't something that could be written without having personal experience with those emotions. It had been a disappointment when Ellie hadn't responded with the eye-opening realization Cassie had hoped for. And it had only made Cassie's heart ache more that her best friend seemed so oblivious to the depth of Cassie's feelings.

As Ellie explained how she wanted it to go, Cassie nodded. As she got into the song, moving past the lyrics they'd already done, she started up with the next lines she'd worked out, and soon they had a few takes that at least got it through to the instrumental chorus section. Cassie had kept up the idea of focusing purely on the idea she was singing to Ellie, the emotion flowing freely as she did so.

When they regrouped to discuss it and go over the takes, Cassie smiled at a few of them. "Damn. Even better than I expected." She said.
 
There was an almost instinctual flow as the trio went through take after take of Down on Me, complete with the added chorus and the extra verse. Ellie even added a second instrumental passage and Dusty suggested a brief drum solo, like maybe two bars inbetween the instrumental passage and the instrumental chorus where Ellie would do a solo. It was becoming a group effort more than just Ellie spitting musical ideas. Ellie even hummed the melody she had imagined to be played on the harmonica on some of the later takes.

"It's like we actually had it all planned out, and like har rehearsed it for a few weeks," Ellie agreed as the last take cut off with a quick rhythmic figure on the hi hat and the crash and ride cymbals.
She nodded and had a big silly smile all over her face. There was no doubt that she was having the time of her life, that she loved every second of it.
"Now for the final verse and chorus I think we should change it up a bit. So far it's been pretty slow and like seductive how about we crank it up a bit at the end, a quicker tempo perhaps, more intensity, like I dunno ..."
She closed her eyes and touched her temples as she often did in situations like that, when she was making music in her head rather than actually playing it.
"I mean imagine the first two verses and chorus to be like foreplay, the seduction and then for the third verse they actually go at it with complete abandonment, like primal lust. We could do like a call and response with me mimicking your vocal phrases," she explained and leaned her head against Cassie's shoulder.
"Either on guitar or some other instrument, like your voice and the responding instrument are two lovers that just cannot get enough of each other."
 
Cassie nodded as Ellie spoke about how well they'd worked together. "It really does." She agreed. As Ellie suggested upping the tempo and intensity of the final verse and chorus, she smiled, nodding. "Sounds great. Just finally giving in and going at it. I love it." She agreed.

The suggestion of a lyrical call and instrumental response got another nod. "Let's go ahead and see how the call and response idea sounds like that." She said, mind already working on the lyrics for the final verse. Something passionate, lusty, suggestive but not outright explicit, and that would work well with the transition of the music from the slow and sensual foreplay and seduction to the faster-paced unbridled passion. A fitting climax for it, and as she constructed the verse, eyes closed as she visualized the words against the, she realized she was once again envisioning herself and Ellie in the roles.

When she was ready, she looked at the others and quickly went over the lyrics she had thought of with Ellie so that she would be able to start thinking on how to instrumentally mimic Cassie's vocal prompts.
 
It took a few attempts to get the flow exactly right between the second chorus and the last verse, the slight increase in tempo being the main issue and in the end Dusty just said: "Ok, just follow my lead," and then he moved his short drum solo to that section and made it a full four bars through which he suggested Cassie and Ellie could just make a lot of noise until the last verse began.
In a way the solution was rather brilliant as if gave them four bars where they didn't necessarily have to be in perfect sync as long as they came out of those bars together and on the second take they did and even before they listened back Ellie just felt it in her gut that it was just perfect.

The call and response section took much less effort to get right. On some of the early takes Ellie hummed her responses intending for them to be played on the harmonica but by the third attempt she just did them on the guitar because she realised that since Cassie was singing about them the responses had to come from her and they had to sort of be done together. She also realised that with her Wah Wah she could almost get her guitar to moan.

At the very end of the last chorus Ellie had suggested for the last take that maybe she and Cassie should just cry out the last note in some sort of simulated orgasmic noise and then have Dusty cut it off with a cymbal crash. This was the version Ellie liked the best when they listened back.

By the time they had listened through all of the full takes of Down on Me it was starting to get late and it was after all a school night so the girls had promised to be back home by 8. Since they were going back the next day they decided to leave their equipment at the studio.
"Before you go," Andi said as they were getting ready to leave.
"I'd just like to say great work and I knew you wouldn't disappoint."
She also confirmed what Ellie had become increasingly certain of through the session. Down on Me had every potential to become a monster hit.
 
Dusty's solution had ended up being far more effective than anything Cassie and Ellie had considered, and the final version, complete with orgasmic finish, had her fervently agreeing with Andi that they were onto a smash hit.

She nodded. "Thanks for giving us the chance. I'm glad we didn't disappoint you." She said.

When they returned home, their parents had of course been waiting to hear how it had gone, and Cassie and Ellie eagerly gushed about it, Cassie quite excited to go back the next day. When she mentioned that Andi was planning on them working on Talking To The Moon the next day, Madison smiled, glancing at Ellie. "I imagine you were able to guess where Cassie got the inspiration for that one from now." She said, nodding.
 
When the girls finally got back home with a few minutes to spare they first stopped at the Clayton's where Ellie found her mum having coffee with Madison while Eric was in the kitchen preparing a late meal of grilled cheese sandwiches, and if Cassie was excited about Funhouse Sweethearts' first studio session Ellie was even more so. The afternoon had been like a day of unrestricted fun at her fantasy playground. She had learned so much, she said, just from watching Andi in the control room and from having been given the opportunity to try her hands at a real mixing table, not to mention the experience of recording live in the studio with real drums rather than having to adjust to pre-programmed drums or having to imagine them in her head as she played. She skipped from detail to detail and at times barely made sense, barely even spoke in complete sentences.

She talked for almost half an hour about the subtleties of balancing the mix between vocals and music, between bass and guitar and how not drown out the drums while not letting them dominate too much, how to make sure every track could be heard.
"And like you should've heard Cassie singing. I mean with the right mix and like the right amount of the right effects I mean shit in a can it was like I dunno hearing her sing for the first time. She was like totally owning it."

Even after the Spencer's had left to go home Ellie kept talking her mum's ears off and when she got to bed after having waved good night to Cassie through their bedroom windows and blown her a kiss she was too excited about going back the next day to record Talking to the Moon, which she had admitted to Madison she really should have picked up on when they were writing and recording it. In hindsight it was so obvious where Cassie had gotten the inspiration from, about whom she talked to the moon.

There was one line in particular that was as good as Cassie spelling it out: "I see her across the yard, every night and dream of her lips on mine."
 
Cassie had enjoyed watching Ellie positively gush like a babbling brook about how much she'd loved being in the studio. Through much of Ellie's enthusiastic rambling, Cassie had been staring at her with an admiring, lovestruck expression. It brought her so much joy to see her girlfriend so excited and passionate, and Cassie figured that the look she was giving Ellie was probably similar to the look Ellie got watching Cassie stand up for trans rights. While one could not dispute that Cassie's borderline hyperfocus and passion for trans rights was far more serious than Ellie's musical fixation, as music did not often, if ever, have lives hanging in the balance, it made little difference to Cassie. She loved Ellie all the more for it, and didn't doubt that Ellie held the same view towards Cassie's fervor regarding trans rights. An Ellie who didn't love music wouldn't be the Ellie Cassie knew.

She had blushed as Ellie gushed about Cassie's performance, merely responding that Ellie had similarly been performing at the top of her game, and promised that she would see about bringing a copy of the demo recordings home to show their parents.
The next morning, as Cassie was getting ready for school, she got a notification from her Twitter account, and upon checking it out, she raised an eyebrow quizzically and briefly debated not opening it when she saw who had done it. However, she also realized that not responding would be going against what she had said about the importance of adding her voice and not remaining silent.

When she did open it, as she took in what was being said, she felt her blood boiling, hands shaking in rage. It would have been one thing if the bitch had just gone after her. But this ... This wasn't just attacking her.

Pushing her anger down, she walked out of her room and downstairs. She saw her dad getting breakfast ready and her mom sipping at a cup of coffee.

"Mom, Dad, you guys should see this. And Sabrina should, too." She said.

"What is it, honey?" Madison asked.

"Rowling. It seems she caught wind of my jab at her. And she opened her damn mouth about it. Listen to this: 'What kind of parents would do this? Encouraging their son's delusion and taking advantage of it to make him a famous singer. This young man needs help. His therapist should be investigated for malpractice. And his parents need to be charged for abuse. #justiceforaustin.'"

Madison and Eric stared in silence for a moment, and then Madison went over to embrace Cassie as Eric scowled. "That bitch." He said softly.

Madison hugged Cassie. "Are you okay, dear?"

"I'm pissed, Mom. It would have been one thing just going after me. But to accuse you, Dad, and Sabrina like that ..."

Madison nodded, and Eric walked over to place a hand on Cassie and Madison's shoulders. "So what are you gonna do?"

"She just made this personal. She just earned herself a spot on my shit list. She's my nemesis now, and I am gonna drag her through the mud. I'm gonna take my time on a response, and then I am gonna go to fucking WAR on that FART bitch."

Eric nodded. "We're here for you, honey. You do what you have to."

Madison chuckled. "It's funny, though. All she's done is ensured that more people will see you. She's just done more to make you famous than we ever did."

When Cassie met up with Ellie, filled her in on the situation, and warned her that they were probably gonna be seeing waves of transphobic attacks on their platforms.
 
The next morning as her alarm went off she was tired as fuck but her first conscious thought was that she was going back to the studio after school and that had her smiling from ear to ear as she showered and got dressed. There was even an excited bounce in her step as she came downstairs to a pot of freshly made coffee, which she surely needed despite the excitement.
"I'm so happy Mum," she said as she had sipped her coffee a few times.
"I don't think I have ever been this happy, like ever. Cassie, the music and everything."
Joan leaned against the kitchen counter and nodded at her daughter.
"You're about to be late though so maybe put some of that energy into getting yourself off to school."
She took a sip of her coffee and scrolled through something on her work phone. This was a regular part of Joan Spencer's daily routine, checking her work emails and her calendar for the day.
"Have you heard from your dad by the way?" she asked and looked up.
"He just texted me asking if you're going to drive up or if he should come and pick you up."
Ellie shook her head. She hadn't heard from her dad. The truth was that they didn't really have any regular communication, birthdays, Christmas and a few calls in between, that was it. The truth was that Cassie's dad was much more of a father figure to her than her own dad. She had texted back and forth with her two younger sisters though about the gig and making plans for the weeks they'd spend together.
"I suppose I could drive up. I mean I was thinking of asking Cassie to go with me to meet the other half of my family in her capacity of my girlfriend so we could take her car, unless there's a set of car keys waiting for me on my birthday that is."
She smiled and winked at her mum.
"That sounds like a good idea but perhaps you should tell him to expect you both rather than just showing up."
"Right. I should probably do that yea," she said and downed the last mouthful of coffee, grabbed her backpack and headed for the door.
"See you at eight then," she added and walked over to Cassie, expecting to find her waiting by the car.

When Cassie wasn't there she went into the house without ringing the bell as she often did to find her girlfriend in the kitchen with her parents quite clearly upset about something.
"Hey what's up?" she asked and walked right up to Cassie giving her a tight comforting hug.
She didn't comment on any of what Cassie said but merely nodded and held her close, not until they were both seated in Cassie's car.
"It's a good thing then that we have as many supporters as we do, right? But like what the fuck is the bitch's problem. She thinks Eric and Madison allowed you to be who you are just to make you famous. Like I mean you're far from the first transperson to become a famous singer."

When they got to school Adrienne had discovered the Rowling tweet on Cassie's feed on her own and met them in the parking lot suggesting the could have a good old-fashioned book burning, if Cassie wanted to hit back adding that she had hoped to the end that Hermione and Ginny would end up together rather than with Ron and Harry.
"I mean can you imagine how hot that would have been?"
 
Cassie had been grateful that Ellie had simply immediately walked over and hugged her. She returned the hug, staying like that for a bit until they left.

She nodded as Ellie mentioned it being a good thing they had such a large supportive fanbase to handle their detractors. "And I'm grateful for that support base. But this is ... She made it personal. She went after my parents and Sabrina for doing the right thing for me. I just ... Fuck her."

At school, she smiled as Adrienne suggested a book burning, then shook her head. "No. I'm vengeful, not petty." She said, then glanced down. "I loved those books. I remember reading Chamber Of Secrets, and as soon as Polyjuice Potion was mentioned, I immediately saw a possibly trans-affirming thing. The same with the idea of trying to go to the girls' dormitory and the stairs not turning into a slide to keep me out." As she mentioned this, her dour expression brightened and she smiled. "Oh, that's a good angle to go with. Her misandry and sexism."
 
It wasn't long before the news spread all over school and soon everyone knew about the tweet, most of course were sympathetic to Cassie but there were also those, mostly fans of Keith, who gloated, liked the tweet and made a point of letting Cassie know they had.

As the girls sat down for lunch with Adrienne the athlete leaned in.
"That thing about not letting the boys into the girls' dormitory and her BS about single sex bathrooms and changing rooms ..."
She left the sentence hanging while stuffing her mouth with spaghetti, chewed and then continued.
"My freshman year, that must've been the year before you two started here, one of the seniors on the track team, I mean she was a senior then not now, got raped in the changing room, by our coach, a woman, if that was indeed how she identified. It must've been planned too because she used a strap on. That's how safe it is to not let the boys in."
Adrienne scoffed and rolled up another mouthful of spaghetti, stuffed it into her face and gave Cassie a nod.
"Feel free to use that story against the bitch. I'll even give you the girl's name if you want to talk to her yourself. She gave up track along with her athlete's scholarship to UCLA after but she still lives around here."

When the school day drew close to an end Ellie had texted two big notes, one about them looking for another musician to fill out the band, preferred instrument being keyboards with a side of bass to free up Cassie when playing live. The other note was more like an interest check for the LBTQ club they had decided to start after the summer holidays. She had even made a specific email where people could announce their interest to avoid her own getting overloaded.

After the last class they met up with Dusty outside the school and went back to the studio for their second session. Ellie had been thinking quite a bit about Talking to the Moon after Cassie had explained the inspiration behind it. She had been coming up with a whole new set of guitar lines to accompany the piano, they were more longing, more ... melancholy to match what Cassie must have felt confessing her love for Ellie to the moon. She had also begun scribbling down words in her song note book, words that were not musical annotations but perhaps the beginning of a song lyric, a sort of response to Talking to the Moon.

In the studio Andi had set them up with Cassie on the piano suggesting that they could try running through the song with Ellie going back and forth between bass and guitar between takes.
 
Cassie had expected that some of those who still supported Keith would respond the way they did. It didn't make it any easier. And most of them were smart enough to avoid deadnaming or misgendering her, which made any chance of action against them less than likely to succeed.

At lunch, as Adrienne related the story of a lesbian rape that had taken place at the school the year before Cassie and Ellie had arrived, Cassie had nodded somberly and shrugged at the suggestion of reaching out to the young woman. "I don't know. I don't want to drag up painful memories for her. Especially if it screwed her life up that badly." She had said, but offered that Adrienne could reach out and see if it would be okay for Cassie to talk to her.

Cassie had, for her part, reached out to Principal Hardinger and Ms. Harrison about the club, suggesting that Ms. Harrison could be the supervisory teacher. The suggestions had been met with enthusiastic support, and it was agreed that if Cassie could show there was sufficient interest and support to warrant it, they would be allowed to start it up the next year.

At the recording session, Cassie had nodded her approval at being put on piano for the takes. She was decent enough (and Talking To The Moon was one of the songs Cassie could do well on it), and the the song indeed had a very heavy emphasis on the piano for the melody.

As they went over the first few takes, Cassie smiled, glancing at Ellie. Dusty had added a soft yet insistent drumbeat during the verses where Cassie was talking, one that, as he explained, was meant to reflect the anxious, yearning heartbeat of the song's viewpoint girl as she spoke of her desires. Hearing that, with Ellie's guitar and bass lines and her own piano notes, made the song feel even better.

"You know what would be awesome, though?" Dusty asked. "If we had a song that provided the other side of the story, the best friend's response. Pair them up as A and B sides. Give a complete narrative."
 
As impressed as Ellie had been the day before at Dusty's contributions to the band she was even more impressed with how he used tiny variations of some beats to emote on the drums, something that was not an easy thing to do. His soft, yet driving rhythmic patterns fitted the song perfectly, much more so than anything Ellie herself had tried to create on the drum sequencer. She made sure to tell him this and even suggested they could do an instrumental section where they explored the idea even further with another sort of call and response but with the drums calling and the other instruments responding. Though as she thought about it perhaps for another song, something more along the more complex, almost progressive, songs they had been working on lately, Not Your Average Teen Girl and the follow up that Cassie had showed her on the first day back in school after Junior Prom. After having let this distract her for a while, trying out a little of what she had in mind with Dusty until Andi reminded them they were working on Talking to the Moon she decided that perhaps they could meet up that weekend and work through both those songs.

When Dusty suggested a follow up to Talking to the Moon after they had listened through the recordings Ellie blushed but a smile crept over her face as well.
"Fact is," she said and pulled out her note book showing it to Cassie.
The fragmented lyrics on the pages (and there was plenty of them), at times annotated with musical terms and chord sequence, were apologetic and focused around what seemed to be the basis for a chorus: "I never knew, How could I not?"
Watching Cassie read she hummed out musical phrases to give them all an idea of what she was thinking.
 
Reader mode
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom