THE GATEKEEPER

Chapter 4

“Mind telling me why you decided to run?” Drake panted, pulling Alice over to a nearby park bench and sitting them both down on it.

Alice panted for a few moments before smiling at Drake. “Just because I felt like it,” she wheezed.

“I swear, girls really are complicated,” Drake moaned as he leaned back on the bench. “I can never understand what’s going through that head of yours.”

Alice pouted. “Well, at least I’m not socially awkward,” she retorted.

“I’m not, though. I have my reasons for keeping to myself,” Drake reminded her, taking off his sunglasses. “Anyways, I thought we were going to the talent show venue. I hope you didn’t forget that in your sudden need to run around the city.”

“Of course, I didn’t!” Alice shot back. “This park is actually a shortcut over to the venue; you can see the building from here, see?”

Drake followed the direction Alice’ fingers were pointing in and did see the talent show venue on the other side of the park from them. Walking there from the station would’ve taken fifteen minutes, but they arrived at the park within five minutes, so after a few more minutes of walking, they would arrive at their destination.

After another minute or so, Drake and Alice stood up, and it was at that moment that Drake realized he was still holding Alice’ hand. He released her hand and opened his mouth to apologize when Alice grabbed his wrist again, dragging him along with her. They spent the next few minutes in silence until they approached the venue for the talent show and entered the building.

Both of them had forgotten about the pair of sunglasses left on the park bench.

11:59 am

“Are you ready for this, Alice?” Drake asked, standing backstage where contestants waiting for their turn in the second Annual Atlantis City Talent Show were. Both had a mic attached to their shirt collars. They were up next after the current performers, who were somehow doing a juggling trick with flaming bowling pins while riding on unicycles. The performance seemed to be received well.

Alice sighed as she curled her hands into fists. “I think I am,” she replied, not looking Drake in the eye.

Drake noticed that her hands were trembling slightly. “Are you getting nervous now?” he inquired.

Alice shook her head. “No, not really. I think it’s the exact opposite.” She suddenly smiled. “I’m actually getting excited about this. I’m looking forward to having some fun on stage with you.”

Drake returned the smile and placed a hand on Alice’s shoulder. “Good,” he said. “That’s the perfect mindset to have when you go on stage. Just go out there and have some fun. If you perform just the way you did when we first met each other, it’ll be just fine; I promise.”

Alice opened her mouth to say something, but at that moment, her watch beeped to signal the hour had struck noon. Almost simultaneously, the three judges on the judging panel had the jugglers end their performance. They bowed and walked offstage amid applause from the audience.

“Next up are contestants Alice Tyrion and Drake! They will be singing--”

“That’s our que,” Drake remarked. He stepped aside and motioned for Alice to go ahead. “Ladies first. Besides, you’re the main act.”

“Thank you,” Alice said, smiling as she walked past him and onto the stage, with Drake close behind her.

As they walked out to the middle of the stage, Drake could pick up the whispering coming from the audience. “Alice Tyrion​? ​That​ Tyrion?”

“What’s the mayor’s daughter doing in the talent show this year?”

“Who knows? But I bet she has no talent at all. She’s probably one of those stuck-up rich pricks who just wants some time in the spotlight.”

“Yeah, and since her dad’s the mayor, she’ll probably win this year if he pulls some strings for her.”

Drake heard all of this; the acoustics in this room left no one to be unheard. He bit down his annoyance, though, and took a harmonica out of his pocket while Alice adjusted the mic. Alice was originally never going to participate in the talent show; it was his idea for her to sign up for it. After weeks of convincing her, she finally agreed only when Drake promised to perform with her. The plan was for her to sing while he played along with his harmonica.

His harmonica once belonged to the woman who ran the orphanage he grew up in. After she passed away, the orphanage was shut down due to insufficient funds, and Drake, the only orphan left there, was sent to several different foster families over several months until the government gave him a place to stay himself and money to provide for himself. It was then that a box came in the mail containing the harmonica and a letter explaining that the woman running the orphanage directed that it was to be given to him in her will.

He had many fond memories of listening to the woman play the harmonica for him. When he had nightmares, she would come in and start playing it until he calmed down and fell back asleep. It was made of polished mahogany, with ivory plating and a gold plaque on the top with a stylized double D engraved in it.

Drake brought the harmonica to his mouth while Alice closed her eyes and took a deep breath. After a moment her eyes snapped open and she looked up at the sound booth operator behind the audience. The operator gave the signal that he was starting the music. Alice nodded, and as soon as the music started, Alice and Drake began.

As soon as they started to perform, a lime green ring appeared on the screen above them, and a 100% was displayed on the inside of the ring.

Alice and Drake were performing a song while doing an audio test. The audio test would take their performance and compare it to the official song. Pitch, volume, notes; everything was compared and graded. The closer you performed to the real song, the higher your score. You start with 100%, and as you make mistakes, the audio test would start tallying off points, reflecting in the grade shown on the screen. It really took a lot of guts to do this in performance live on television; now everyone, even those who don’t know the song, will know exactly how well they did. Also, they were singing a song that wasn’t in their native tongue; they chose to sing a Japanese song that played during the credits of an old anime about an orange-haired teen who fought spirits. It so happened to have a harmonica playing throughout its duration, as well as a solo, so it suited them both perfectly.

Two minutes into their performance, Drake realized that his solo was coming up, and got prepared. The moment Alice stopped singing it would be his turn. It came, and he stepped forward to do his part.

He had played the harmonica growing up, but he admitted that this solo was extremely difficult. In the three months between deciding on the song to perform and the actual performance, he only started to make actual progress on it in the last two weeks.

Since I’m the reason why we’re even here in the first place, I’m going to give it my all and do my best.​ He was normally the type to avoid attention because of his eyes, but he wanted others out in the world to hear Alice, so he ended up getting involved in this to help her reach more people with her voice.

Drake was nearing the end of his solo when he suddenly had an idea on how to improve the performance. He took the harmonica away from his mouth and stuffed it back into his pocket while he tried to catch his breath during the short time Alice had to sing one line before the last chorus. He then grabbed both her hands and pulled her out closer to the edge of the stage.

Alice was surprised for just a split second, but then she immediately understood Drake’ intention and smiled. She continued to sing without missing a beat while she and Drake did a simple dance. Drake was also singing, matching Alice word to word, beat to beat. They were completely in sync, and they were all smiles the whole time.

They started to repeat the chorus one last time, and Drake began to spin around on the spot, swinging Alice along with him. Putting the strength to carry around steel I-beams alone to good use, at the height of the chorus, he threw Alice high up in the air, both still singing. Alice did several full rotations during her flight. When she finally came back down at the end of the song, Drake caught her (princess carry fashion), and Alice held her hands up to the crowd.

Both were looking out at the audience, panting hard after their performance. After a few moments of silence, one person began clapping, and it gradually grew into thunderous applause, almost deafening the pair onstage. Drake put Alice down and they waved out at the audience a bit before walking off the stage.

As soon as they made it off the stage, Alice suddenly clutched Drake’ shoulder and almost collapsed on him.

“Woah, Alice?! Are you okay?!” he exclaimed, attempting to hold her up. He instantly received a sharp slap across the face. Stunned, he let go of Alice and put his left hand on his now bright red cheek while Alice backed up a few steps before falling to her knees on the floor.

She finally looked Drake in the eye, and Drake saw that Alice’s eyes were watery.

“D-don’t ever do that to me again!” she cried.

“What?” Drake asked, dumbfounded.

“Don’t throw me that high!” Alice exclaimed. “I could almost touch the curtains, with how high you threw me!”

“What?” Drake said, disbelieving. “No way. You’re exaggerating.”

“I’m telling the truth!!” she yelled, getting back on her feet and hitting Drake in the chest. He didn’t feel that. “If you don’t believe me, then you’ll see in the replay later this afternoon!”

“Alright, alright,” Drake soothed. “I’ll treat you to some of that iced tea again to make up for it, deal?”

Alice looked away and made a pouty face. “It better have extra cream.”

Drake laughed and agreed. Then a thought suddenly occurred to him. “Alice, are you. . . afraid of heights?”

“Yes, I am! I have vertigo! So what?!”

Drake' face went slack and he just looked at Alice with a blank, almost bored, expression on his face.

This is coming from a girl who lives in the highest penthouse in the city...

“What?!” she snapped. "Why do I get the feeling you're mocking me right now?"

“Nothing, it’s nothing. Come on, let’s go find some seats to watch the rest of the performances.”

“Oh, wait, what did we score?” Alice suddenly asked. Drake couldn’t give her an answer, and so they both looked back out on the stage just in time to see their score before the screen was cleared off for the next contestants.

99.8%