Nora leaned forward, propping her elbows on Willow's kitchen table and pushing her hands through her hair. Well, it was official: she was an idiot.

"What's up?"

She looked away from her laptop—one of the Macs her school handed out at the beginning of each school year. Willow sat in the seat adjacent, her own laptop in front of her. Done with a preliminary layout of the pre-production schedule ("Very basic," she'd said. "Literally just guessing what phase we'd be in week by week."), she was now busy looking through the private Facebook she'd created after their meeting this afternoon. She'd asked everyone to post any known schedules—whether they be work, social, or general life responsibilities. Not that any of them knew where they would be come the end of June, which was when they all agreed filming could realistically begin.

"I was looking up how much mics cost," she said. Dumb. She knew it even before she typed anything into Google. Why spend more money than absolutely necessary on a project she shouldn't want to succeed? But...if she was paying Nolan, she might as well make it the best video it could be. So, she'd Googled. And now she was even more stressed.

She was looking at one-hundred dollars—and that was the cheap option. Basically, the entire freaking budget.

"How much do they cost?" Erin asked. She was at Nora's opposite side, jotting in a notebook.

Nora twisted the laptop. Erin grimaced.

"It's not...too bad?" she tried.

Nora grinned despite herself. "Thanks," she said.

Erin laughed. "You're welcome."

Nora could just record on her phone. That would cost literally nothing, and it wasn't like the microphone installed in her phone wasn't adequate. But...

No matter how hard she tried to fight it, she couldn't deny it: she wanted the video to be good—as professional as it could be, anyway. Did she deserve a professional video that people would love? No. Did she want one?

She bit her lip.

"What's with the long faces?" Nathan asked, moseying into the dining room with a cup of coffee.

"Everything's so expensive," Nora said. She groaned, because she was in the mood to be a little dramatic.

"Whatcha looking at?" He rounded the table and peered over her shoulder, sipping at his coffee. "Oh! Mics?"

She nodded.

"Hmm." His expression brightened. "Oh, you know what? I'm actually friends with Mrs. Gendron, the media teacher. She should have recording equipment."

The girls perked. "Music recording?" Nora asked.

"Yeah. She deals with all sorts of media—music, digital art, photography, film production. I can give her a call."

You don't deserve it.

"That would be amazing," she said. "Thank you so much."

He smiled. "Of course, kiddo."

✝

"Okay, so, I think I have an idea of what we could do for the screenplay," Erin said the next day, at their picnic table. She wrung her hands.

Nora gave her encouraging smile. "I'm sure whatever you've got is amazing."

"One-hundred percent," Andy said. He wrapped an arm around Erin's shoulders and tugged her to him. Her cheeks, already flushed with nerves, grew a feverish red.

"Don't get your hopes up," she said softly.

"Hey."

They all turned.

"Hey!" Nora said, eyes widening with delight. Nolan shifted from foot to foot. "You here to join the party?"

"If that's okay."

"Of course!" She scooted down to give him more room, and Max did the same. "Erin was just about to tell us about her idea for the screenplay."

Erin bit her lip. "I don't know if it's any good..."

"We're sure enough for you," Andy said.

She smiled. "Okay, so, I went along with the theme of pain, desperation, and hope."

"Already sounds good," Andy said.

"Aw, thanks." She grinned and shook her head. "I was thinking maybe we have this girl who goes through life dealing with this voice inside her head telling her she's not good enough. We see her doing things with friends and still feeling alone. And to represent the inner voice, we could use text messages—like she's getting texts from her anxiety, or whatever, telling her she's useless."

"You're worthless."

Nora's stomach clenched, but she smiled through the discomfort. "That sounds great. What kind of things would she and her friends be doing?"

"I was thinking either group hangouts around the house—save on money—and maybe one or two public outings?"

Nolan nodded, his gaze distant. Was he visualizing places they could use, too?

"Would one or two public places be okay, do you think?" Erin asked, aiming the question at Nolan.

He nodded again. "I'm sure we can find somewhere."

"How about the text messages?" Andy asked. "Are those workable?"

Another nod. "I know how to do it," he said.

He did. Nora had seen it in one of his videos on the night she first found his channel. She'd shamelessly binged quite a few—they were just so dang entertaining.

"When do you think you can have the screenplay done?" Nolan asked.

"I can try to have a draft done by tonight," she said.

"Don't you have to study for your anatomy final?" Andy asked, cocking an eyebrow.

She waved his question away with her hand. Nora laughed. "That's what morning cramming sessions are for."

They laughed. Even Nolan cracked a small smile.

"Well, I love your idea," Nora said.

"Of course, you do," Andy said. "It's amazing."

"True that," Max said.

Erin hid her blush behind a gulp of chocolate milk. "Thanks, guys."

"Oh, hey, before I forget," Nora said, turning to Nolan. "Willow made a Facebook group, and she needs you to request her as a friend and post any known schedules in the group once you've been added." She tacked off the tasks with her fingers.

Nolan faltered. "Oh," he said.

"Is that okay?" she asked. "I can ask her to figure out some other way to—"

"No," he said. "It's fine."

She searched his face, but decided it best not to press. "Okay," she said.

"Were you coming with us after lunch?" Max asked, leaning behind Nora so he could regard Nolan properly.

Nolan's eyebrows creased. "What?"

"Nathan got in touch with the media teacher, and she's letting us record the song in her studio," Nora explained. Since they had half-days this week because of finals, it was the perfect time to stay after school and get it done.

"Oh," he said. "That's cool."

"Yeah." She smiled. "You're more than welcome to join if you want. She also has some film production equipment. You won't be able to rent over the summer or anything, but maybe there's some stuff she can help you with."

He paused to eat a fry. "I'd need to pick up Caleb after school, and I don't have a car," he said. "Or a license."

"They go to Fern?" Andy asked.

Nolan nodded.

"I can bring you," he said.

"It's o—"

"I have to pick up my brother and sister anyway," he said. "So, it'd be on the way."

Another pause. Nora waited. Would he agree? She didn't think so, but, he'd surprised her before.

"You're sure?" he asked.

"Yeah, of course, dude."

"Okay." He gave Andy a small, appreciative smile. "I just need to call Fern real quick."

"Oh, shit, me, too." Andy hopped up from his seat, following Nolan to a tree a few feet away from the cluster of tables.

Nora smiled softly as she scooped some chocolate pudding from her tray. Her feelings about this entire project might have been a convoluted, entangled mess, but there was one thing she was sure of: she had a good feeling about him. Nolan. She didn't know what it was, or why the feeling sprang on her, but as he brought his phone to his ear and replied to something Andy said, Nora couldn't shake it—the notion that they maybe, just maybe, had gained another member of the fine fam from alabam.

✝

After they had dumped their trays and school was officially let out at noon, Nora and the others made a beeline for Nathan's classroom. They found him lounging at his desk, feet kicked up on the tabletop, eating a Tupperware dish of pinoy pork chops with rice and watching a video on his laptop. He sat up. "That time already, huh?" he asked.

"Yup," Nora said. She peered around, scanning the bookcases, inspirational posters, and empty desks. "Uh, where's Willow?"

He was supposed to pick her up during his lunch break so she could be there for the recording session. But, when Nathan lurched and let out a panicked, "Oh crap!" it became very obvious that he'd forgotten.

"Oh boy, you're never gonna hear the end of this," Andy said.

Nathan's eyes turned haunted. They laughed.

"Okay, let's get you guys up to the media room so I can get my undoubtedly furious daughter."

The trip to the media room was a quick one. It was actually pretty close to the ceramics room, in a hall Nora had passed numerous times but hadn't thought much about. A stout, smiling woman was there to greet them at the door. "Who's the singer?" she asked.

Andy, Max, and Erin jutted their fingers toward Nora. She smiled sheepishly.

"Awesome, awesome," the woman said. She held out her hand. "I'm Mrs. Gendron."

Nora shook her hand. "Nora."

When introductions were out of the way, Mrs. Gendron led the way into the media room. Nora gaped. At first glance, it looked like their computer lab, except with more shelving, cabinetry, and a small room boxed in the corner. But, there was something else—something glorious—that set this room apart from the computer lab. Instruments hung on the back wall, stood on stands. There were guitars, violins, violas, flutes, trombones. A piano. Drums. Holy crap.

Why didn't she know this place existed? Why hadn't she ever taken a class in here, instead of taking stupid statistics? Okay, statistics weren't stupid. But they definitely weren't interesting.

"You'll be using the recording booth today," Mrs. Gendron said.

Nora's mouth dropped. "Recording booth?" This is so cool.

She attempted to smother her excitement. This was just a means to an end—emphasis on an end. This wasn't for her.

"Yup!" Mrs. Gendron led them to the small room and opened the door. A microphone waited for Nora. "Once everything is set up, you'll sing into that."

"How have we never heard about this place?" Erin asked, wide-eyed. "I wanna live here."

"It's Narnia," Nora said.

Mrs. Gendron laughed. "Best description I've heard."

After Mrs. Gendron ran through how to use the equipment so they could record and download their track, it was time to sing. Nora headed for the recording booth, and, just before closing the door behind her, caught sight of Mrs. Gendron leading Nolan over to one of the cabinets on the far wall.

The recording booth even had a window, like the ones in the movies. This is so cool!

Stop it.

She cooled herself and stepped up to the microphone. A Sennheiser.

Through the window, Max, a headset over his ears, gave her a thumb's up. She returned the sentiment, and then she started to sing.