It was an unusually muggy night in St. Louis, and the venue was pure chaos.

The backstage area was cramped, the loading dock was a bottleneck, and two separate opening acts were trying to fight over limited floor space. Gabriel had already tripped over the same power cable twice, Thane was knee-deep in a faulty input patch that refused to speak to the snake box, and Jonah was muttering to himself in double-time as he helped Rico drag the drum riser into position.

In the middle of it all, Emily stood frozen near the gear wall, clipboard clutched in both hands, eyes darting from crew member to crew member. Someone had just handed her a printout of the patch list, and now a stagehand was asking her—loudly—where the DI box for the acoustic guitar had gone.

She swallowed hard. “Uh… I think… it was with rack six? Or maybe… maybe the fly case by the cable spool?”

The stagehand huffed and rolled his eyes, muttering something under his breath as he walked off.

Emily’s ears were hot. She turned, backing out of the way of a dolly full of mic stands, and nearly tripped into a lighting rack. Jonah appeared just in time, steadying her by the elbow.

“You okay?” he asked, gently.

“I… I don’t think I’m helping,” she whispered. “Everyone’s busy. I keep messing things up. I shouldn’t even be back here.”

Jonah blinked, then quietly motioned her to follow him to the side of the stage, out of the way of the chaos. The muffled thump of a bass test rumbled through the floor.

“Can I tell you something?” he said, crouching beside a crate.

Emily nodded, still on the verge of tears.

“I used to throw up before band competitions in high school,” Jonah admitted, brushing his hair back. “Like, every single one. Even when I knew the routine. Even when I nailed every fill in rehearsal. I’d still sit behind the bleachers and think I didn’t belong.”

Emily looked at him, surprised. “But… you’re you.”

He smiled. “Yeah. But it took a while to believe that meant something.”

He stood again, pulling a folded diagram from his pocket. “You know what this is?”

“Stage plot?” she asked softly.

“Yep. But look closer.” He handed her the patch list—the same one she’d been given earlier. “Half of this doesn’t match what’s actually onstage. The labels are wrong. The routing is flipped. Wanna impress everyone?”

She hesitated.

Jonah leaned in. “Grab a pencil, and fix it.”

Emily blinked, then took a breath.

And did.

She moved fast—quiet, steady, but determined. She traced every box and rack she could find. Noticed that Rack Six had been swapped with Rack Four. Found the DI box buried under a coiled extension reel near the fog machine, exactly where no one thought to look. She double-checked the snake inputs, relabeled the patch sheet by hand, and ran it straight to Thane mid-wiring.

Thane took one glance, looked back at her, and raised a brow. “You did this?”

Emily nodded, heart in her throat.

“Nice work,” he said simply, and waved her to follow him as he adjusted the gain structure.

Ten minutes later, Gabriel found her coiling cable and handed her an espresso with a little sticky note stuck to the side. It read:

💡 Not an intern. Field Engineer in Training. – G

She laughed out loud.

Later that night, just before the show, Jonah found her again, sitting just inside the bus with her feet up, finally breathing again.

“You good?” he asked.

She nodded. “Better. Still nervous. But better.”

He smiled. “You ever hear the beat of a song where it feels like it’s not quite in sync—but you know if you just wait one more bar, it locks in perfectly?”

She tilted her head. “Yeah.”

“That’s what you’re doing,” Jonah said. “You’re syncing up. That feeling? It’s not fear. It’s the downbeat.”

Emily beamed, pride finally outweighing the doubt.

Then Gabriel stuck his head in the bus door and yelled, “FIELD ENGINEER, YOUR PACK SUMMONS YOU. IT’S ALMOST SHOWTIME!”

She stood up.

Ready.