Chapter 2

I didn't leave my apartment for three days.

Marcus called, texted, then finally showed up and banged on my door until I let him in.

"What the hell is going on, Leo? First you pull your best song, then Caleb releases the same damn thing? Did you sell it to him? Did someone leak it?"

I shook my head. "It's more complicated than that."

"Then un-complicate it for me!" he yelled, pacing my small living room. "People are starting to talk. They're saying you copied him and got cold feet."

I knew I had to prove this wasn't a leak. It was something else. Something impossible.

"I need to run a test," I said.

I went to my closet and pulled out a dusty box. Inside was my old Tascam 4-track cassette recorder.

No Wi-Fi. No Bluetooth. No connection to anything.

"I'm going to write a new song," I told Marcus. "Right here. On this. You're the only one who will know about it."

He looked at me like I was losing my mind. Maybe I was.

"Okay, Leo. A test. What's the plan?"

"I write it. I record it. We wait."

For the next two days, I poured all the rage and confusion from my first life, from this new one, into a song. It wasn't my usual indie-folk style. It was loud, aggressive, a raw piece of rock music. The lyrics were about being a ghost, a voice stolen from the air.

I recorded it on a single cassette tape. I didn't write the lyrics down. I didn't hum it in the shower. It existed only in my head and on that magnetic tape.

I gave the recorder to Marcus.

"Keep this," I said. "Don't let it out of your sight."

He nodded, his face grim. "I'll be back in a few days."

I felt a strange calm. Now, all I could do was wait for the other shoe to drop.