Then Chase performed two songs from his latest album. He moved between the piano and the front of the stage, telling stories about hard work, perseverance, and giving children a chance. The crowd loved him, and Zara understood why. His lower singing was genuinely beautiful, and the warmth in his stories felt sincere enough that she found herself wishing she had misunderstood what she heard earlier.
During the final introduction, Chase looked toward the school choir. His expression changed when he spotted the little girl standing at the back beside Naomi. He paused, tilted his head, and said something to his stage manager that made the woman's smile disappear. Aaron's hand flew toward his console as a new microphone cue appeared on his screen.
The audience barely noticed the delay. Chase turned back to the crowd, laughed easily, and talked about the importance of giving children the spotlight. "Sometimes the biggest voices come in the smallest packages," he said, drawing warm applause. He made it sound like kindness, and almost everybody believed him.
Zara looked down at her blouse and smoothed a wrinkle from the sleeve. She was thinking about her mother, who had promised to call as soon as her hospital shift allowed, when Chase pointed directly toward her. He called her forward with the words she would remember for years, making an insult sound like an invitation. By the time he reached the risers, Zara knew that whatever happened next would not be part of Ms. Johnson's carefully rehearsed program.
In the spotlight, Zara could see almost nothing beyond the first three rows. Chase took a step away from her as the band settled into the opening bars, leaving a careful distance between his polished stage shoes and the scuffed flats her mother had bought two years earlier. He wanted the comparison visible. The audience was expected to understand the joke before the child had even made a sound.
"Whenever you're ready, sweetheart," he said into his microphone. The familiar warmth returned to his voice, though Zara had heard what he whispered when he believed only she could hear. "We're all rooting for you."
Zara swallowed and turned toward the sound desk. Aaron Fields stood under a faint blue light, his hand resting near the controls that had transformed Chase's failed high note at rehearsal. Behind him, a screen showed the livestream climbing beyond two million people. The number looked impossibly large, but Zara knew even one person could remember an unkind word forever.
She thought of Ms. Johnson teaching her how to stop when a note hurt. She thought of her mother counting cash at the kitchen table after a twelve-hour shift. She thought of the way Chase had touched her shoulder without asking. Those memories brought no courage at first, only the sharp realization that she did not want to sing as part of his punishment.
"Mr. Hendricks?" she said.
"Yes, darling?" His smile stayed fixed. "What is it?"
"Could you turn off the backing track, please?"