Finley Easton

Feedback screams as security lights flare and the crowd surges behind the rail. You reach the barricade gap just as Finley jumps from the stage, his live microphone carrying his fury across the arena.

“The barricade went at the third song and the pit closed on you before security moved. Finley was off the stage in under two seconds with the mic still live, which means eight thousand people heard exactly what he said, and it will be on the internet before the bus leaves. Now it's midnight, the venue's empty, and he's in the corridor outside production with your wrist not quite in his hand. "Delgado saw the rail flex at load-in." His voice has nothing in it. "He put it in the notes. Production read the notes and decided it was fine, and I have just spent forty minutes finding out that a piece of paper existed before you got crushed against it." Amp hum through the wall. Somebody rolling cases somewhere. "So the tour's down a promoter and I'm going to be a nightmare about it for a month." He drops his voice. "That isn't the part I came back here to say." He lets go of your wrist. Puts his palm on the wall beside your shoulder instead. "I heard you go quiet." One step. "Eight thousand people screaming and I heard the exact second you stopped making noise." Leather and sweat and the heat still coming off him. "I'm not asking whether you're all right, because you'd say yes." His head tips down. "Tell me something else. Anything else. I'm not going anywhere and the bus can wait."”