Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing | emo!borhap boys au
Incipient mutiny | Persephone
“But a wolf in sheep’s clothing is more than a warning!” Cody’s voice echoed through Ben’s room from the record player on top of his dresser.
“Turn that goddamn record off!” Joe pounded on Ben’s door. “That is the hundredth time you’ve played that this week. Please stop. We get it. You are sad and angry and hurt over y/n. You’re writing about it. But please, for the love of all that is holy and good in this god forsaken shit hole dumpster fire of a universe, turn off the damn record player! I’m trying to focus on something, and I can only take so much of Cody and the Offs.”
“You hear that once from a photographer and you never shut up about it,” Gwil rolled his eyes, emerging from his bedroom. “Ben, seriously mate. Turn off the bloody record player before we pick your lock and turn it off ourselves.”
“It helps me numb the pain,” Ben grumbled through the door. “You know my favorite songwriter contributed to this album.”
“You are a broken record, Hardy,” Joe sassed. “You need to stop. Turn your pain into art and write songs to channel your emotions. Listening to words someone else wrote can only do so much.”
“You don’t even know who Persephone is,” Gwil tried reasoning with the blond drummer. “No one does. She’s just a woman in a flower crown and a mask on stage and in interviews. Voice modulator too. All her microphones. Except when she sings. Non disclosure agreements are a requirement when working with her. I heard through the grapevine. Her true identity is a secret as well kept as the MCU. Well, unless Tom Holland is around. But there is no equivalent for Persephone.”
“You’re forgetting about the wardrobe malfunction during one of her performances,” Rami pitched in, arriving upstairs after grabbing water from the kitchen. “Her lace mask started to slip during a dance break, so she turned around while her background dancers moved in front of her to distract everyone. It was the most elegant response to a wardrobe malfunction I have ever seen. And my grandmother had me watch dancing with the stars whenever I was with her.”
“I’m the one who introduced her to you!” Joe squeaked. “I saw her first! She’s my celebrity crush. Actually, she’s on my freebie five list.”
“Shut up you wanker,” Ben shouted. “She’s on mine.”
“If you two children are done arguing over who gets the girl,” Gwil interrupted and stopped them from continuing. “We should go over the new song idea. I came up with another riff I think would go perfectly in the chorus.”
“I was playing around with background vocals and harmonies,” Rami admitted.
“I wish we could work with Persephone,” Joe muttered.
“Me too,” Ben replied, but the other three couldn’t hear him through the door. Ben wasn’t speaking loud enough. He didn’t want to. He felt like Joe would outshine him if they ever did meet Persephone. He was the outgoing and funny one in their dynamic duo friendship.
Ben only got the girl in his dreams. He was currently numbing the pain of losing the girl. Years had already passed, but writing about it again rehashed old wounds and emotions.
Maybe he needed to purge out the sadness, anger, hurt, and other negative emotions in order to make room for positivity. He needed to focus on the hope of becoming a famous pop punk band. Of meeting Persephone. Of touring the world. Of writing with Persephone. Of hitting number one on the charts. Of performing with Persephone. Of hearing his songs on the radio. Of kissing Persephone.
Wait. Did he really just think that?
Did he actually fancy a musician he never met?
Was he back in secondary school?
No, he wasn’t. He didn’t have you now like he did back then.
But he had Persephone’s words.
“You and I both know that this song is about me,” I tell my best friend Julie after we finished listening to “Dial Tones” for the first time. “Ben totally wrote that about us and there’s no denying it. We played telephone tag at first, only missed calls and no voice messages. Only dial tones. He must have heard about how miserable I was through my mother. Since, you know, she is best friends with his mother. Sometimes it sucks when your mom is best friends with your former best friend slash ex boyfriend.”
“But you wrote plenty of songs about him,” Julie replied. “I remember one about wanting to kill him? Maybe one with pigs flying? Threatening to cut him out completely? And then one about wanting to go back about how things were.”
“I didn’t actually want to kill him,” you argued for what felt like the millionth time since writing the song. “It was just a way to let my anger out. My perfect fairytale endgame was over. I needed to vent. Cody and I wrote an amazing song. He killed it with Beckett. Cody and I both had to deal with lying jerks. We wrote some kickass songs. Working with the summer set was surreal and it was nice to pretend and reminisce.”
“You also wrote ‘almost forgot’ with Chrissy, right?” She continued to play devils advocate against you. “How you went through so much pain?”
“It was based on both of our experiences!” You reiterated for, again with the big numbers, the millionth time since your close friends and teammates found out that you helped write that song. “I never moved in with Ben. And besides, I also wrote ‘nihilist blues’ with Ollie. Not all my songs are love songs or about Ben. You sound like the critics that attack Taylor swift for only writing breakup songs.”
“You do realize a few articles have compared your writing to hers?” Julie mentioned. “You’re the pop punk equivalent, but better according to one of the articles. They think you will take over the world and help get pop punk the credit it deserves.”
“Those are fan articles from really small accounts. They don’t mean much. They made me smile, but those articles don’t count in the grand scheme of things. I need to focus on the articles that help boost and make my career. Alt Press. Rock sound. Kerrang. I don’t need to worry about some random Wordpress site’s article about me. Cathy (your publicist/public relations manager) alerts me whenever we need to take something seriously. Like if I’ll ever reveal my face to the public. Or if someone says they want to work with me. Not some fan fangirling or fanboying or fanpersoning or whatever you want to call it. Not some troll bashing me for shits and grins. I need to focus on the here and now and what makes me a better me. Not the negatives there’s already enough of that in the world. So let’s pick a show to binge and get wine drunk.” You were ready to relax, but ranting to your best friend was always helpful.
Tagging: @13-taylor-swift @asphalt-cocktail @cherries-n-rocknroll @carolinemathildes @daniellesimagines @freddiesaysalright @joemazzmatazz @jd-johndeacon-or-jackdaniels @johndeaconshands @kurt-nightcrawler @doing-all-write @rogerinahardy1 @thesadstoryofme
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