Out of Tune

Chapter Twenty-Three

Taylor leaned in close as the class started to fill up. Some of their classmates were casting Lennon and Taylor curious glances as if debating to come over and begin chatting. Thankfully, their teacher announced the start of the period and asked everyone to their seats.

Still, Taylor took the opportunity to say, "Well are his eyes really as green as they look in the Glory Days trailer?"

"Shut up!" Lennon exclaimed in a whisper, but she was laughing too.

It seemed so ridiculous. Lennon McCormick – wannabe musician – and Jay Dawson – Hollywood dreamboat. There was no way that would ever come to fruition. Not like Lennon even wanted it to happen.

Jay had been nice, sure, but she didn't even know him. They'd spent no more than five minutes together and the conversation had only been friendly and polite. Lennon had gotten the sense that he was someone used to the fame, prepared to have people fawning all over him, and that he'd been a bit surprised that she hadn't. He probably would have been completely comfortable with the way that the entire Los Altos High student body was acting.

Lennon wasn't sure it was something she could get used to. Not as a few sophomores tracked her from Spanish to history class, shouting questions about Jay Dawson and Diane Furley and what it was like to be on television at her as they went. She was relieved to hear that both Spencer and Charlie, who shared her second-period history class, had been dealing with the same sort of insanity that she had been all morning.

Of them all, Charlie was perhaps the most thrown off. His shyness and social anxiety had made the entire morning dreadful for him. He'd been working on it, Lennon knew, and was fine when performing since he had the band supporting him, but having people follow him through the halls had been a shock to his entire system.

At the very least, Lennon was sure that things would begin to calm down in a day or two. The excitement of seeing classmates on television and having baseless media stories claiming that she and Jay Dawson were an item would no doubt would blow over. Though she was glad for the attention the band was receiving as a result of this insanity. It reaffirmed to Lennon that she had made the right call in going to New York, in spite of her mother's misgivings about the whole situation.

The band and Taylor converged in the music room for the lunch hour, avoiding the throngs of people in the cafeteria.

"This is absolutely insane," Spencer said as he sat on the floor between Lennon and Miles. He folded his legs beneath him and pulled a sandwich out of his backpack. Around a mouthful, he added, "I really didn't expect this."

"People have been trying to talk to me all morning. I was almost late to my English class." Zeke's tone suggested that he was less than thrilled, but there was a gleam in his eyes that made Lennon think that perhaps Zeke didn't hate the attention.

"Your social media following has exploded, by the way," Taylor interjected. She stabbed at her salad with a fork, waving around a piece of lettuce. "And I do mean exploded. Diane's show posted the clip of your performance and interview online last night and it's already got hundreds of thousands of views. People keep sharing it and tweeting about it."

"That's crazy," Miles said.

"Your videos on YouTube are also still blowing up. I scrolled through some of the comments earlier and people want you to record more of your songs and do more videos about who you are. The people are interested in your lives now, not just your music."