“Apollo?” Felicity repeated, lost in just about the same amount of shock as I was—though for different reasons. “You want us to get Apollo in—”

“Why not?” Lottie replied nonchalantly, like she had suggested interviewing the manager of the campus bar and not one of the biggest artists in Australia right now.

“How do you suggest we—”

“In the same way we’d get anyone in for an interview. We email. We call. We email again. We call again. Until we’re so annoying they at least have a chat with us.”

“Okay, okay. I’ll play. Say we get through to his manager. How do we convince him to interview at our small publication of all other publications here—including radio—on his tight tour schedule?”

And that’s when she grinned. “This is why it pays to turn news notifications on when something is written about specific people. Apollo—or, rather, Frazer Young—is from here.”

“I know he is—”

“And apparently he’s staying in town for a while, visiting family and whatnot.”

With Lottie’s sudden revelation, my whole body tensed up, and my ears tuned in to every syllable she uttered. What does she mean by a while? He’s not just passing through? It’s not just a weekend?

“Meaning we could arrange something. If we could snag an interview, maybe he could even play at the uni bar.”

Here? I thought.

“Maybe he could do a signing event.”

She wants to bring him on campus? 

“Maybe we could even host a livestream via our social media where we get him to help us promote our—” 

She wants more than one person on the team to meet him?

“But why would he do that? He has no affiliation with our university. He started his career in his final year of high school,” Felicity countered.

Exactly. There’s no way he’d care—

“I know,” Lottie said. “But if we position it as a charity gig, I’m sure his publicist would eat that up. ‘Popstar reinvents a dying publication, led by students’. ‘One sector of the Arts saves another’. Blah, blah.”

Surely his marketing team wouldn’t be that desperate… There are better charity events. And he doesn’t need to improve his reputation or anything.

Felicity nodded, but we could all see she didn’t buy it. “He’d be big enough to attract readers, sure. And you’re more than welcome to have a crack at it. But I don’t see how you’ll even get through.”

While I was still on edge slightly, the knot in my stomach had loosened at Felicity’s reassurance. There’s no way Frazer would agree. No way he’d come to campus. No way I’d have to see him again, even if he was in town for a while. As long as I stayed here or home, I’d be safe.

But then Jared said, “Wait. Emilia, didn’t you go to Town High?”

My eyes widened that he knew that about me, but as I turned to look at him, curious about the sudden question, I noticed he had his phone out with something on it piquing his interest.

“Yes…” I hesitated.

“What year did you graduate?”

Please don’t tell me this is going where I think it’s going. “Last year.”

“Then, according to his Wikipedia page, you were at the same school as Frazer Young and in the same grade.”

All heads in the room—even of those not involved in our conversation—turned my way at once. The room grew quiet with suspense as the team anticipated my response.

Feeling my throat going tight, I tried to swallow past the lump, though it only made the situation worse. Which was why my voice squeaked slightly when I said, “Yeah. I was.”

And then a plethora of questions came my way.

“What was he like?”

“Do you have contact with him?”

“Did you share any classes?”

“Was he smart?”

“Were you friends?”

“Was he as dreamy then?”

“Did you ever get to talk to him?”

“Could you get him to interview with us?”

“Can you get him to save our website?”

“Oh my gosh,” Lottie whispered from beside me. “Why did I never put two and two together?” She turned to face me with wide eyes. 

What did she put together? She couldn’t have possibly figured out anything… Surely not.

“I’m like a big fan of his, and I never realised you know him?”

Shaking my head, I held my hands up as I said to her and the room, “Just because I went to school with him doesn’t mean we are close. Far from it, actually. Frazer Young… he’s a stranger to me.”

Shoulders slumped, people sighed, and the attention diverted back to people discussing their networks, trying to figure out if they knew anyone who went to school with Frazer who could possibly ask a favour.

But I couldn’t help feeling Lottie’s gaze still locked on me. Reluctantly turning to meet her, her eyes were narrowed as she studied me with doubt etched into every crevice on her face. 

◁ㅤ ❚❚ ㅤ▷ 

When your father is a single parent of two kids, it’s hard to find time around work to get everything in. Which was why I still didn’t have my licence—I had ten night hours I needed to tick off, and with my brother needing to be supervised still, it was hard to find opportunities to take me on night drives.

Luckily for me, Lottie lived not far away from us, so she often drove me home.

Though that day, I couldn’t catch a break from Frazer Young.

Sitting in Lottie’s white, peeling, 2012 Suzuki Swift with the aircon cranked up, the radio station played quietly in the background while we discussed the bullshittedness that was our news site’s shut down. 

We were five minutes away from my place when the radio presenter announced, “Up next is Apollo’s latest song, ‘Can’t Forget’. But before we play it, we have a special guest joining us to talk about its meaning. It’s Frazer Young from Apollo!” 

Groaning, my hand extended to change the station, but Lottie slapped it away before barking, “Don’t even think about it, woman. You’re welcome to dislike his music—even though it’s utterly absurd to me that you do—but you do not get to prevent me from hearing his new song in my car.”

“But I—” I tried to interject.

“Shh!” she hushed me, turning the volume up louder.

As his hypnotic, husky voice resonated through the vehicle, it sent with it a medley of memories that messed with my heart. “Thank you for the lovely praise and for having me on the station.”

“It’s our pleasure, Frazer. Everyone is super excited not only for your upcoming tour—the tickets sold out in less than an hour, can you believe—but that you’re also back in town for a while before that!”

“Yes, yes. I’m glad to be back. It’s been too long. I haven’t seen enough of my mum since… well, since I got signed, really. I also have some friends I’m dying to catch up with.”

“I can imagine! The past year has been one crazy ride for you! Starting as the winner of Unearthed High, graduating school, getting signed to one of Australia’s biggest record labels, touring the US for some shows, and even recording some songs with The Kid Laroi, Justin Bieber, and many others! We have so many questions, but unfortunately not enough time to ask them all. So let’s get into the important stuff. This new song of yours, which no one has heard yet… tell us about it. What inspired it?”

“Well… I knew I had a gap in my schedule coming up and that I was going to fill it by coming back here. And that really got me thinking about the people who I’ve been excited to see again and who got me to where I am, really. My first fans and dearest friends who supported my music when I first started, just strumming on my guitar in my room, or playing on stage for the school. ‘Can’t Forget’ is a dedication to all those people, of course, but… I wrote it with one person in mind in particular. They inspired most of my early music, including the first song I recorded after winning Unearthed High.”

“Wasn’t that song a love song though?”

“I think you could interpret it in many ways.”

“Of course, of course… but this person… is it a girl? A boy? Possibly an old girlfriend or boyfriend?”

He chuckled. “They are someone really special to me. Someone I could never replace or forget. Someone who… who I know will always be there for me, no matter how busy my life gets.”

“Well, they sound like an amazing person, Frazer! And I just can’t wait any longer to hear this new song of yours. So, without further ado, this is ‘Can’t Forget’ by Apollo.”

“Oh I remember | Remember the day | The day you and I sat on that park swing.” 

As the lyrics washed over me like a wave of knives, I found myself whispering, “Can you please pull over?”

“Hmm?” Lottie asked as she swayed her head to the song, hands tapping on the steering wheel.

“Do you remember?”

“Can you please pull over,” I repeated, a little more loudly this time.

“Remember the night.” 

“What? Why—”

“The night I said I hope you’ll always be in my life.”

“Lottie! Pull over.”

“Oh I know | I put too much distance between us.”

With a sigh, she tapped her indicator and swerved into the shoulder of the road, the safety strips rumbling under her tyres. 

“And oh I know | I should have called you when you asked.”

The moment the car had come to a stop, I unbuckled my seatbelt and flung the door open.

“And don’t I know | You deserve to be frustrated.”

“Where do you think you’re going?” Lottie demanded.

“But just know |  I can’t…”

Though I ignored her as I went around to the backseat to grab my backpack.

“Emilia!” she demanded, turning the music down.

“I’m going to walk home,” I gave her as I closed the door, muffling the noise.

She wouldn’t have it as the final answer though. Winding the window down, she leaned over the passenger seat—the music still faint in the background, and his voice still haunting my ears—before she said, “Get back in, you drongo. I’ll drive you.”

“And I hope that you’ll say…”

“Sorry. I can’t.”

“At the end of the day…”

“Why?”

“That you also can’t forget me.”

“I just…” I thought of explaining it to her, but it meant going back to the past I had tried so hard to bury before she turned up and brought some resemblance of happiness back. I couldn’t have this new life tainted by those feelings again. So I shook my head and said, “I just feel like walking. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

She continued to shout at me to get back in, but I simply placed one foot in front of the other as I made my long trek home.