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It’s not that Fig’s complaining.
Because she has no issues complaining when the situation calls for it. It’s one of her favorite hobbies, especially when there are cameras around, especially when Riz is on babysitting duty. There’s a compilation floating around Youtube, Top 10 times Fig Faeth made Sig Figs Manager CRY DURING INTERVIEW!!!!!! Fig and Gorgug can both quote it from memory.
But it’s not like she’s trying to give Riz an aneurism, at least not actively. It’s just, being outspoken has gotten her a lot she wouldn’t have otherwise. If she’d stayed quiet early on she’d probably still be going by Figueroth, lip-sync queen of pastel pop and not much else. Adding a drummer and her bass guitar? That was her. Gorgug and Zelda going public? Her. Even the mullet, questionable as it might be, was only won after three intense stand-offs between her, management, and her stylist (who honestly was more on their side than she would’ve liked). She’s privately encouraged more than one up and coming singer to complain early and complain often, and just see how far that gets you.
But Fig isn’t complaining now.
This is full on war.
“I don’t see what the problem is!” Riz has his hands thrown up in the air. If Fig knew how to paint this is how she would memorialize him, probably in oils - tight shoulders, furrowed brow, the mangy cardigan he’s worn for half a decade (Gorgug thinks he has a closet full of them, Fig says he pays someone to recreate it every year, holes and all). It’d be a good parting gift, a good way to say thank you for your years of hard work and dedication, you are absolutely fired.
“Of course you wouldn’t see the problem, you are the problem!”
They’re standing outside of the recording studio; the new person can probably hear them, but Fig doesn’t care. Or, well, she cares: they’re just a byproduct of Riz and management’s tangled schemes to ruin her life, and they just happened to get caught in the crossfire. But there’s a solid door between her and whatever expression might be on this new person's face, and so she doesn’t think about it. Instead, she draws herself up to her full height (5’9.5”, according to her latest Vanity Fair profile) and glares down her nose at Riz (5’5”, according to the measuring tape they found on the tour bus).
Riz glares back at her much less effectively. “This isn’t asking a lot, Fig! I know I’ve asked you to do a lot of stupid stuff over the years-”
“So you finally admit it!“
“-But working with someone else just once is- It’s maybe the most reasonable request I’ve ever had! It’s not like, I don’t know, I’m not asking you to break up the band-” He waves his hands in front of her face, cutting off the outrage he knows is coming, “It’s one song - just one song! ”
“It always starts like that. ‘Just one ballad, Fig, and then you can choose the next single!’ ‘Just one tour without a band and then the whole next album can be rock! You’re not good at lying, Gukgak.”
“You got all of those things! ”
Gorgug, who has never once been in her corner and is above all things a coward and a traitor, puts a hand on her shoulder. “Fig, I totally see your point.”
Riz looks like he’s about to combust. “Gorgug-”
“But,” Gorgug continues placidly, “maybe we can look at it as, you know, an opportunity to help a friend. Adaine’s totally swamped with the album, she won’t have any time for us until it’s done. It’ll probably make her feel a lot less guilty if we’re not totally relying on her, right?”
Fig glowers at the frosted glass, hating that his point is as clear as her reflection is muddled. Adaine has been more tense than usual - always texting them at 3am to see how they’re doing, promising that she’ll try to be in the studio next week, she just has a few more things to finish up, stretching herself so thin Fig feels like she needs to have a breakdown out of loyalty. Adaine’s been their main producer ever since the Sig Figs got started, and while she’s the best Fig’s ever worked with she’s never tried to hide her aspirations. Fig was all ready to start knocking heads when management asked Adaine to produce the Seven Maidens debut album, but Adaine surprised her by agreeing without hesitation; she’s stressed, but having more fun than she has in a long time. Fig has no right to throw a fit just because she misses her best friend.
Doesn’t mean she doesn't want to.
"And," Riz offers tentatively, "you've been saying you're having trouble with lyrics... Maybe a change of pace could help..."
Right as she’s about to concede that, yeah, okay, they both might have points, the studio door crashes open, and the most beautiful person Fig’s ever seen walks out.
“I think,” says the most beautiful person Fig’s ever seen, “there’s been a mistake.”
She’s wearing a pair of thin golden glasses that have slid to the tip of her nose. It’s inappropriate to touch people without their permission, Fig’s been told, and that almost certainly holds true when the person in question is a complete stranger who you’ve just been screaming about in public. Besides, she’s not sure she would want to obscure the view of her eyes - those eyes! Gold, and red, and shooting star bright. Could that be a song? Probably not.
The woman still speaking, Fig realizes, when her gaze strays to her mouth (almost as good as the eyes). “- Said that it would be a favor, but most favors I’ve performed don’t involve this much yelling. I want to help, but I don’t want to be yelled at. You should speak to Adaine. I should go.” Then she stops talking. Fig hates that.
“Please, Miss O’Brien, Fig’s not usually this… Well, she is, but,” Riz is doing the thing with his hands he does whenever he gets flustered, which is almost every conversation, “but you shouldn’t quit just because of that.”
Miss O’Brien tilts her head to the side a little, expression blank. “Is there a better reason for me to leave? This one still seems good.”
No. No, no, no, this cannot happen. If Fig was determined to get rid of the introluper before, she’s triply determined to keep her around now. Where did the sudden change of heart come from? Who could say. (She’s so tall. Fig is so weak.)
“Wait,” she interjects. They all turn to look at her, Riz and Gorgug and Miss O’Brien. “I’m sorry. That was really rude of me. I wasn’t mad at you, I promise, just, you know, the abstract idea of you.” She can tell from Gorgug’s wince that this wasn’t the best excuse she’s pulled. “Wait, I mean. Before you go. Can I hear your work?”
It’s hard being under Miss O’Brien scrutiny, because she’s looking at Fig, really looking at her, like she can see bone and sinew and her heart, and she’s really hot, too, and Fig doesn’t know how to handle any of that.
“I came here to let you listen to me, and then you started screaming. I don’t know what changed. I’m very confused.”
“So am I,” says Fig, because she is.
“Hey,” Gorgug says, “I’m Gorgug,” because he is.
“Hello, Gorgug,” says Miss O’Brien, “I’m Ayda.” And apparently she is.
“I’d really like to hear your stuff, if that’s chill,” Gorgug says. “You don’t even have to let Fig in, if you don’t want. But Adaine said you’re even better than her and I gotta hear that.”
Ayda blinks at Gorgug. “The whole point of me coming here was to let Figueroth hear me play.”
Gorgug gives that big dopey grin, the one that’s won People Magazine’s ‘Best Celebrity Smile (Male)’ award three years in a row. “That’s awesome, let’s go!” And then somehow he’s ushered them all into the recording studio before anybody can get another word in; he coaxes Ayda behind the computer, and pulls Fig into the one comfy chair they always usually fight over. He even gets Riz to pull the stick out of his ass long enough to sit delicately on the armrest, although his posture is still tense enough that he would probably shatter with one touch.
Ayda’s hands hover over the keys; she looks from Gorgug to Riz to the spot between Fig’s eyes. “Adaine sent me the vocals from the last song you were working on. I added my own instrumentals and mixed it. If you don’t like it, please tell me immediately, because otherwise I won’t want to keep playing it. That won’t hurt my feelings.” For some reason that’s the thing that makes Fig feel most like an asshole more than anything else.
“Go ahead,” Gorgug says, and Fig nods.
Ayda hesitates. Ayda looks down at the keyboard. Ayda presses play.
Two minutes and thirty-eight seconds later, Ayda looks up.
As the last note leaves her ears, Fig leans forward, her hands on her knees. “Please,” she says, supplicant, begging, “please, please, please work with us.”
And then Ayda smiles. The war is conceded. Riz Gukgak has won.
They were approached about a week ago by one of Arthur Aguefort’s charities, Riz explained, who are putting together an awareness campaign about - heartworms or heatstroke, or something compound word that begins with ‘h’. A bunch of other popular artists are contributing singles, and all of the proceeds will go back to the charity - and while it wasn’t implied that they’d be the biggest assholes on the block if they were the only ones that didn’t contribute, it was outright stated in an email from Aguefort himself.
The demo Ayda mixed was already earmarked for the new Bond movie, but she says very casually that she has a few others that should be sufficient, like the half-finished songs kicking around deep in her harddrive are good enough for billion dollar film franchises (Fig’s heard them; they are). It’s sexy and brash and a little weird, and Fig loves it from the first note. Any of her initial hesitations about Ayda are discarded as the ravings of a lunatic: that was the old Fig, the stupid, infected-with-brainworms Fig. This new Fig has heard Ayda O'Brien speak, and so obviously, she's all in.
“Where have you been hiding?” she asks, leaning around Ayda to stare at all of the colorful tracks dotting the Logic landscape. Ayda doesn’t bat her away, but she kind of goes stiff around her shoulders and in her wrists. Fig moves back.
“I work in the background,” Ayda says, highlighting and dragging a region seemingly at random. “I don’t make music for publicity.” Which should sound like an insult, but it doesn’t coming from Ayda.
(Fig looks her up, because of course Fig looks her up. She learns that Ayda is the only reason anyone’s ever heard of Tracker O’Shaughnessy; that the Owlbears have made a point of working with her on every one of their albums; that fucking Fabian Seacaster has gone on record crediting Ayda for the success of the Hangman’s first album. The only reason Fig hasn’t heard of her is that Ayda doesn’t seek out attention - she seems to actively detest it. My songs speak for themselves, she’s quoted as saying in one of her few professional interviews. I won’t add to the noise.
Fig is more famous. She definitely has more fans. She definitely has more money. But it’s undeniable that if Fig’s a flame, Ayda’s the kind of spark that sets wildfires blazing.)
Riz and Aguefort’s marketing guy, who’s somehow almost as tetchy (Fig suggests that they should date and have little angry babies, Riz weirdly chooses not to respond) get together and figure out a whole rollout plan; because they’re the Sig Figs, they’ll obviously be the centerpiece of this enterprise, which means the single has to be good. And because they’re the Sig Figs, it obviously will be.
“That’s a lot of pressure,” Fig says. She thinks about their last single. She thinks about the singular Reddit comment she keeps going back to over and over again, luuuuuv the sfigs obviously!!!!! but lately does anyone think that the lyrics are kin dof.....idk kind of boring? or inauthentic??? STILL LOVE U FIG!!!!! AND GORGUG!!!!! (12 downvotes.)
“If you can’t handle it,” Riz says, hand going for his phone, “I can always call and…”
Fig grabs his phone and holds it high, high over his very short head. “Your weird psychology tricks won’t work on me, Gukgak.” But still, she goes to work.
Before Fig was Fig, she wrote all of her lyrics in the margins of her school notebooks, cascading lines of agony and heartbreak and the occasional sunshine kiss fighting for space with Calculus formulas and half-hearted Wilde critiques. Now she mostly jots down lyrics on her phone, but the fundamentals are the same: she writes best with distraction, droning teachers and tour bus chatter, stagehands yelling and Gorgug singing. The studio has always been her favorite place. Her and Adaine’s friendship was forged through multiple overnight sessions, Adaine swearing at Logic Pro while Fig lay belly-down on the carpet, trying to figure out the best rhyme for such cruel heartlessness (high school artlessness? Perfect, said Fig. I will not let you put those lyrics into my beautiful song, said Adaine. Adaine won.)
One of Fig’s chief concerns about bringing on a new producer was the loss of that most sacred space - but it turns out she didn’t have to worry. The first time Fig knocked on the door - nervously, when was the last time she was nervous about a girl - Ayda had opened it, looked down her nose at Fig (tall! Good!) for a beat too long, and then stepped aside with a quiet, “Bring coffee next time.”
(Ayda, it turns out, has a preferred coffee order - black with half a packet of sugar, she measures it out and then folds the packet over itself and puts it in a drawer for later. When she brings it up to her mouth to drink she holds the mug in both of her hands, her fingers filling in the spaces the other hand makes, and she pauses right before she swallows, like she’s savoring the bitter, and also the sweet.
Fig’s productivity has definitely taken a nosedive. Her imagination hasn’t.)
They’re in the studio now, Ayda and Fig, Fig and Ayda. Fig’s stretched out on the armchair, tapping out what she’s hoping will be the lyrics to Ayda’s song (even though they're all coming out wrong, why can't she write anymore?), while Ayda sits at the computer doing whatever producers do. She’s turned away from to Fig, which gives Fig ample time to admire the back of her head and the slope of her shoulders, and also the way her hand so caresses the mouse, it’s so delicate, so intimate-
“Figueroth,” Ayda says. “Please stop staring at my hands, it’s very distracting.”
Fig looks at Ayda, guilty. Ayda looks back at her, her sin-free soul radiating like a saint’s. Fig takes one last longing look at Ayda’s fingers - those fingers! - before dutifully gluing her eyes back to her phone screen. Ruby rose lips and solar eclipse? She’s gonna be laughed out of the recording booth. They’re gonna take back her Grammy. Ayda is gonna be disappointed in her.
The initial attraction hasn’t passed. Ayda is still one of the most gorgeous people Fig has ever seen. But beyond that, more than that, she’s absolutely fascinating - from the way she laughs to the way she carries herself to the way she talks, spitting out each sentence as if it was stuck in her teeth like a popcorn kernel. She’s like nobody Fig has ever met, and Fig’s met a lot of people. She’s interesting. Fig’s always been a sucker for interesting.
Another hour passes in relative silence, Fig only occasionally covertly glancing at Ayda’s hands, or her neck, or her ankles crossed beneath the desk, but mostly keeping her nose to the proverbial grindstone. It’s kind of autopilot at this point - she’s written so many songs she’s stopped thinking that hard about anything other than the title. She’s trying to figure out how many metaphors she can fit into one stanza before she starts looking like an MFA reject when a soft, self-conscious cough pulls her out of her reverie.
“I was wondering,” Ayda says, and then stops. She looks down, and then resolutely up once more: “I was wondering if you would like to take a break to get coffee with me.” She still has her hand on the mouse, as though she’s already anticipated and internalized Fig’s refusal and is determined not only to be fine with it, but to be the one who actually didn’t want to anyway, shouldn’t they get back to work? She is so successful, and has all of the talent in the world stored up in her beautiful brain, and she won’t meet Fig’s eyes.
Fig wants to burrow into the couch cushions. She wants to scoop Ayda up and hold her so close that all of the warmth collected in her chest can burn Ayda up from inside out, too.
“Yeah,” she says instead, “coffee sounds great!” She hopes that the light in Ayda’s eyes is at least a little more excitement than relief.
Coffee breaks become their ‘thing’, the same way that dunking on Riz is with Gorgug and only half-ironically crying over K-dramas is with Adaine. Ayda doesn’t really talk in the studio, but she’s bemusedly happy to entertain all of Fig’s questions during the 8 minute walk to and from the Starbucks in the lobby. Yes, she likes being a producer, no, she doesn’t have any pets, yes, she has a favorite Sig Figs album, no, she won’t say which one. Fig learns that Ayda can play four instruments, speak three languages, and grew up traveling the world with her parent, a touring musician who now lives on a houseboat with their boyfriend and girlfriend who Ayda tentatively thinks of as her aunt and uncle. She doesn’t like chocolate but she’ll drink hot chocolate, she would rather have flight than invisibility, and she has no opinions on trip hop. She laughs rarely, but when she does it’s what Fig wants all of her love songs to sound like. She smiles rarely, but often around Fig.
Fig is in love.
“I’m in love,” Fig announces.
Neither Gorgug or Adaine react.
Fig tries again. “Hear me, hear me. I, Figueroth Faeth, am in love.”
Adaine picks up and inspects a dumpling. “Gorgug, are these vegetarian?”
“I think so?” Gorgug studies the receipt, looking way more concerned than the situation warrants. “Let me try one- yup, that’s a whole lot of vegetable.”
“Oh, good, because last time we ordered here, you remember that they-”
“Mixed up the delivery, yeah, I know, I think I just mumble on the phone? I’ve always been a mumbler.”
“People!” Fig slams a carton of egg fried rice on the table, sending grains scattering. Adaine looks pained. “Are you not listening?”
Adaine, who is the worst best friend in the history of the term, disinterestedly nudges a paper towel roll at Fig. “You’re my favorite person - sorry, Gorgug - but you’ve been in love three times in as many years. I don’t know if it deserves a ‘hear me hear me’ anymore.”
“Yeah,” Gorgug says, “I mean, I’m really happy for you, but-”
“But?” Fig demands in a very reasonable tone of voice.
“But when was the last time you followed through?” Adaine puts her chin in her hand, looking up at Fig, who’s slouching back into Gorgug and Zelda’s couch as if hoping it will eat her. “All of your crushes end up just sort of… dying out within the week. I’m not saying it’s not good that you have these feelings, but it’s just… also not that exciting?”
Fig is stung, but, reflecting later, she realizes that Adaine is right in her own blunt, kind of mean way. Fig goes through true loves like other people go through Brita filters. Not that they’re disposable - every time she sings a song inspired by that erstwhile soulmate, she feels a warm and satisfied glow remembering the first time she screamed into a pillow at the thought of their smile, or the way they smiled at Fig from the audience, eyes lit up and wanting. But she’s always liked the idea of people more than the people themselves, and more than that she’s liked the ideas that people inspire, that beautiful spark of inspiration a lingering smile can ignite.
But Ayda is different. As the composition becomes finalized and Fig continues to struggle with the lyrics, as their joint work sessions become longer and quieter, as the song becomes just that, Fig still finds she can’t look away. A crush would have burned itself out weeks ago, Ayda quickly paling in comparison to whatever hot new thing came around to replace her in Fig’s attentions, but Fig doesn’t have eyes for anybody else. Nobody but Ayda.
“Figueroth,” Ayda says, “you’re staring again.”
“You can’t even tell,” Fig says, “you haven’t looked away from your computer in thirty minutes.”
Ayda’s voice is rumbly in its amusement. “How would you know without looking? I think, Miss Faeth, that I’ve caught you.”
She isn’t wrong.
fig (sig figs): how do i confesssssssssss
gorgug (sig figs): sorry, I’m taken :)
gorgug (sig figs): by Zelda
gorgug (sig figs): haha
adaine (prod): Use your words?
fig (sig figs): words are harddddddddd
adaine (prod): You have two Grammys for songwriting
fig (sig figs): ugh
fig (sig figs): you guys are useless
gorgug (sig figs): I h avent even suggested anything
fig (sig figs): EXACTLY
adaine (prod): Well, what does she like?
fig (sig figs): music
fig (sig figs): coffee
fig (sig figs): space travel
adaine (prod): One of those sounds like it could be a viable vehicle for a confession!
fig (sig figs): ill take her to venus
adaine (prod): Bzzzz, try again
riz (mngmt): Please remove me from this GroupChat, I’m in a meeting and my phone is stuck on full volume.
3 people are typing
Here's the problem: Fig can't write.
Well, objectively, she can. It's just, she's been a superstar for, what, 10 years? And in that time she's had so many number one hits she can't even remember half their names, which is an incredibly arrogant thing to say but it's also true. But here's the deep dark secret Fig holds at the very bottom of her soul, locked up tight, all keys melted down and reforged into something actually useful like a bottle opener or a key for a much better box: for all the love songs she's written, she's never really... understood what she's written about. It's easy to write a cliche. It's easy to write a cliche and make people believe that it isn't a cliche. But the actual truth? The real life, do-or-die reality of love? Fig doesn't know how to write that.
Or she does, and the thought of writing it, and of getting it wrong, is too much to deal with.
(Because lately there are lyrics flitting around the edges of her brain. Different then she's ever written; softer, and sweeter, and so deeply truthful they make her want to hide and never, ever come out. She can't put that in a song. Can't show that to anyone. Least of all...)
But the song is due soon, and Ayda is waiting, and the humiliation of explaining what's happening is too much to even think about. So Fig sits down and she does what she does best: she lies.
Even after a Red Bull-fueled night of panic-writing, the lyrics aren’t ready yet, but Ayda wants to record a scratch track before they get any further just so that she can see what needs to be changed. Gorgug would normally be on backing vocals, but Zelda is borrowing him for what they call a ‘rage weekend’ (Fig has never and will never ask), and so it’s just them in the studio. Her sanctuary, her favorite place. She’s never been more nervous.
“Should I just, uh, go ahead and start?” she asks, adjusting the microphone down to her level. On the other side of the glass, Ayda gives her a short nod before counting her down, three, two, one … Fig grips her headphones, and closes her eyes, and begins to sing.
When she opens her eyes again there’s silence in the recording booth and, she’s guessing, in the studio, too. She looks over to see Ayda examining her, much in the same way Fig has spent the last few weeks staring unabashedly her way. Fig is used to it. She’s a rock star, an icon; her life is practically dedicated to standing on a pedestal, arms outstretched, demanding that the world look at her and only her. But when it’s Ayda - when it’s Ayda she wants nothing more than to crouch beneath the partition and hide until it’s safe, until there’s no chance that this beautiful, talented, strange woman could perceive and understand and find Fig wanting.
Ayda’s mouth is moving. Ayda is talking. Fuck.
“- Final lyrics?”
“What?”
Ayda pauses, and then repeats herself: “Are those the final lyrics?”
“Yes? I mean, maybe? Uh. What do you think?”
Ayda pushes her glasses up her nose. They promptly slide back down again. “What I think doesn’t matter. Well, it does, I’m a sentient human with emotions and ideals, but here my input is irrelevant. You’re the songwriter, Figueroth. The question wasn’t a judgement or an insult. I was simply wondering if those are the final lyrics.”
Fig looks down at her phone. She has three minutes of longing and saccharine love. Three minutes of yearning and heartbeats and utter predictability. She has three minutes of the same song she’s written a thousand times.
Fig looks up, at Ayda. “No,” she says. “No, they aren’t.”
Ayda looks almost… proud, for all her talk of subjectivity. Fig feels a curl of both delight and shame shiver up her stomach and into her throat. She wants Ayda to keep looking proud. To keep making her smile, like that, just for Fig.
“Most of the lyrics are fine,” says Riz, “but this part here, isn’t it a little… cheesy?” Fig flicks a straw wrapper at his head. “ Hey.”
“Maybe cheesy’s just where Fig’s at right now,” Gorgug says supportively, looking up from the lyrics long enough to give Fig a big thumbs up.
“Thanks, Gorgug. Riz, you’re fired.”
Riz puts a hand to his temple. “Fig, I’ll show you the contract again, you cannot fire me for saying that the line ‘you’re like a solar eclipse of the soul, you make my broken heart feel full’ isn’t… the best thing you’ve ever written. It sounds like the b-side to a b-side.”
Fig draws herself up to her full height, which is still much, much, much taller than Riz. “Those are my true feelings. From my soul. Please don’t call my soul a b-side.”
“Fig… Did someone break your heart?” Riz looks concerned, which is terrifying, but also kind of heartbreaking. Fig regrets throwing the wrapper.
She slumps into her seat, crumpling up the lyrics sheet into a tiny ball, which it deserves. “No. I’m fine.”
“Fig is in love and doesn’t know how to express it,” Gorgug explains to Riz as Fig slides further and further towards the floor. “She's never had to write about really being in love, and it scares her a lot, and I totally understand. Fig, you're strong, and you're great.”
“Thanks, Gorgug,” Fig says, blinking. Gorgug gives another thumbs up. God, he’s good at those.
Riz drums his fingers on the table. His silence seems thoughtful. Fig doesn’t care about Riz or his thoughtfulness or anything, really. She just wants to go back to the studio and be around Ayda some more. She doesn’t even want to look at her or talk to her, just, be near her. Fuck.
“I have it bad,” she says quietly.
“You have it bad,” Riz says at a normal volume.
“What do I do ? Seriously, Riz. What do I do?”
“I don’t know, Fig.”
They look at each other silently. There’s no answer in Riz’s expression, just quiet, sad sympathy. It’s nice, but not like, super helpful.
Fig scraps all of the lyrics. She locks herself in her house - away from the noise, and from the distractions, and from Ayda - and sits on her yoga mat in her bedroom, and she thinks. Mostly about Ayda, but mostly mostly about the parts that make up Ayda, the woman who bites her lip so hard it almost bleeds when she’s really concentrating. Who tips 35% on everything and gets flustered whenever Fig points it out. Who texts her parent every night at 10, just to say she’s thinking of them and that she hopes they’re doing well.
Who looks at Fig like she could rule the world if she put her mind to it. Who creates the most beautiful music Fig’s ever heard, but refuses even a particle of the spotlight. Who makes Fig want to be the best person she could be, if only she could get another one of those strange and wonderful smiles directed her way.
If this goes wrong - if Fig bares her soul, and writes how she feels, how she really feels, and Ayda- if people don't like it, Fig's going to get hurt. Publicly, and privately, and brutally.
If it goes right...
Fig writes. And writes, and writes, and writes. When she’s done she picks up her phone.
fig (sig figs): finished
ayda (prod): Good.
They record it that weekend. Gorgug calls it the best song they’ve ever made. Riz says it will sell well. Ayda says, “What were you thinking about when you wrote this?” Fig doesn’t answer, but she doesn’t look away from Ayda, and Ayda seems thoughtful. The song is called Firebird, and it stays at number one for 16 weeks. Aguefort is thrilled. They don't end up curing heartburn, but they get a certificate thanking them for their efforts in the fight.
The Seven Maidens ask Adaine to stay on as their producer full-time. Adaine is white as a sheet when she tells Fig, and makes a soft, quiet sound when Fig envelops her in her arms as tight as she can get, and rests her head in the hollow of Fig’s collarbones as Fig tells her how proud of her she is, how she’s gonna be amazing, how she’d better give them some Best Album competition because the playing field right now is weak. (Penelope Everpetal ends up winning, and they both agree that the system is rigged. Adaine wins the year after that. Fig cries through the whole speech.)
Riz is the one who asks Ayda to stay, mostly because Fig doesn’t know how to have that conversation without inadvertently asking her to marry her as well, not that that would be bad, she just doesn’t want to make it seem like that’s a condition of employment, be our producer AND my wife or else, buster! Riz asks her to talking like a 50s mafioso any time she’s nervous. Fig politely demurs.
Ayda apparently agrees, because the next time Fig comes into the studio she’s still sitting there in the chair that’s now hers, frowning at Garageband like it just insulted her parentage. She doesn’t seem to notice Fig come in, but when Fig leans over her to see what she’s working on, she doesn’t flinch away. She leans in, instead, as if drawn by the warmth of Fig’s body.
“So,” Fig says, looking down at her, “I guess you’re our new producer.”
Ayda blinks rapidly. “That’s what the terms of my contract say.”
“I’m glad,” Fig says softly. “I’m glad you’re staying with us. With me.”
"If you make more songs like this one, Figueroth, I hope that I can stay for a very long time."
Fig reaches out, telegraphing her every movement before tentatively putting her hand atop Ayda’s. Her fingers are delicate and soft, and they tremble for just a moment before Ayda turns her palm to interlace them in Fig’s. There’s no question in the gesture, just quiet assurance, and a clear choice.
Ayda’s weight is a solid presence against Fig’s, grounding and real and perfect. She squeezes once, twice, before drawing her hand away and nodding to the computer, where the tracks are lit up and waiting for their input, their music, their song.
“Let’s get started,” Ayda says, and so they do.