One of the world’s biggest boy bands. A secret love. What happens if the world finds out? A queer YA boy band romance from Sophie Gonzales and Cale Dietrich, perfect for fans of Only Mostly Devastated and What If It’s Us.
Intrigued? Well read on to discover the synopsis and an excerpt for Sophie Gonzales and Cale Dietrich’s new release, If This Gets Out!
SYNOPSIS
Eighteen-year-olds Ruben Montez and Zach Knight are two members of the boy-band Saturday, one of the biggest acts in America. Along with their bandmates, Angel Phan and Jon Braxton, the four are teen heartbreakers in front of the cameras and best friends backstage. But privately, cracks are starting to form: their once-easy rapport is straining under the pressures of fame, and Ruben confides in Zach that he’s feeling smothered by management’s pressure to stay in the closet.
On a whirlwind tour through Europe, with both an unrelenting schedule and minimal supervision, Ruben and Zach come to rely on each other more and more, and their already close friendship evolves into a romance. But when they decide they’re ready to tell their fans and live freely, Zach and Ruben start to truly realize that they will never have the support of their management. How can they hold tight to each other when the whole world seems to want to come between them?
ONE
RUBEN
Almost plummeting to my death before a stadium full of screaming people is a warning sign, in an endless parade of warning signs lately, that I need more sleep.
We’re performing the last concert for the American leg of our Months by Years tour when it happens. I’m about fifteen feet above the stage, on a raised platform illuminated to look like a city skyline. It’s time to gracefully lower ourselves to sit on the edge to croon the start of our last song, “His, Yours, Ours,” but instead of gracefully lowering myself, I overshoot my step, overcorrect, then start lurching over the edge.
Before I can lean too far into thin air, a hand clasps my shoulder and steadies me. Zach Knight, one of the other three members of Saturday. His hazel eyes widen the tiniest bit, but otherwise he acts unruffled. Nothing to see here.
I don’t have the luxury of pausing to acknowledge or thank him, because stage smoke—intended
to represent either clouds or city pollution, I never did figure it out—is engulfing us, and the opening chords of the song have started. Zach keeps his hand on my shoulder while he sings, as though it was all part of the choreography, and I lean into my off-balance pose, totally collected. At least, outwardly.
After twenty-seven and a half consecutive shows this year alone, this isn’t exactly the first time one of us has had to smoothly cover up a trip or choreo mistake. It is the first time one of those mistakes almost caused me to plunge fifteen feet onto solid ground, though, and my heart’s probably never
pounded quite this hard, but we’re a show.
To be clear: we aren’t giving a show: we are the show. And the show doesn’t take two minutes to compose itself after almost breaking its neck.
The show is suave, and in control, and it meant to do that.
When Zach’s lines are over, he gives my shoulder a quick squeeze—the only acknowledgment the whole ordeal is likely to get for now—then drops his hand while Jon Braxton chimes in for his verse. Jon always has the most solo parts. I guess that’s what you get when your dad also happens to be the manager of your band. We don’t really have a leader, but if we did, it would be Jon. When we have eyes on us, anyway.
By the time Jon’s finished and it’s my turn to sing the song’s bridge, my breathing’s more or less steady again. Not that it matters—every song, without fail, I get given the simplest solos without a high note in sight. Frankly, I could pull them off with a sock stuffed in my mouth. They don’t care that I have
the highest range out of all four of us. For reasons they’ll never care to explain to me, they prefer me bland. “They” being our management team and, to a lesser extent, our record label—Chorus Management and Galactic Records.
And god forbid I push against those cramped boundaries with a vocal run or tempo change. We’re meant to sound just like we do on the master recording. Planned, packaged, and neatly presented.
Still, inhibited vocals or not, the crowd seems to explode with energy when I sing—the blinding camera flashes that dot the vast blanket of the crowd become frenzied, the technicolor glowsticks are waved with more abandon, and the hundreds of marry me, ruben montez posters are raised up higher.
It’s only my perception, I’m sure, but when I’m singing solo, everything locks into place. It’s just me and the crowd, vibrating at exactly the same frequency.
Right now, I could stand here forever, singing the same, safe line on repeat, hearing the same screams, seeing the same signs, and forever would feel like a moment.
Then Angel Phan takes the song’s pre-chorus line in his husky, breathy tone, the backing music drops to a whisper, and the stage is plunged into darkness. Like we’ve done dozens of times before, we get up in unison and stand on our assigned glow-in-the-dark Xs as the skyline platform is lowered back down to the stage. As soon as I step off and my feet are back on level ground, I relax.
It’s short-lived. Suddenly, laser lights rip through the darkness as the chorus instrumental, with its upbeat tempo change, booms. They illuminate us and the audience in crisscrossing lines of fluorescent green and blue, and we launch into the chorus half-dazzled. In a cruel joke to us, this final song has the most demanding hip-hop-inspired choreo of the night, which we’re expected to nail while also holding a four-part harmony. I was in shape to begin with, pre-tour, and it still took me two weeks of singing on the treadmill last year to get my lung capacity up enough to pull this one off.
We make it look easy, though. We know each other to our bones. Even though I’m not looking at them, I know what they’re all doing.
Zach’s got his serious-face on—even after all these years he gets nervous during the more intense choreo—and shifts straight into concentration mode.
Jon’s closing his eyes for half the chorus—his dad’s always lecturing him for that, but Jon can’t help getting lost in the emotion of everything.
As for Angel, I’d bet anything I own he’s eye-fucking the audience, adding in little pelvic-pop
movements and half-kicks at the end of his steps, even though he’s not allowed to.
Our choreographer, Valeria, is constantly calling him out in our post-show notes meetings for that. “You’re standing out too much,” she says. But we all know the real problem is that our management team has spent two years branding him as the virginal, innocent guy girls would want to take home to
their parents, when really he’s anything but.
After the chorus, we move into our next positions, and I catch a glimpse of Zach. His chestnut-brown hair is plastered to his forehead with sweat. They have me and Zach both in jackets, a bomber for me and leather for him. Let me tell you, with the lights bearing down on us and the smoke
clogging the air and the body heat from the audience packed into the enclosed stadium, it’s over a hundred degrees up here at the best of times. It’s a miracle our onstage mishaps haven’t
included heatstroke yet.
Zach catches my gaze and shoots me a brief smile before turning back to the audience. I realize I’m staring, and I quickly tear my eyes away. In my defense, our hair and makeup artist, Penny, a curvy woman in her mid-twenties, has him growing his hair out for this tour, and it’s the kind of length that’s made to scream sex when it’s slick with sweat. I’m only noticing what most of the audience has already noticed. In fact, the only one who doesn’t seem to notice how good Zach looks is Zach.
I let my mind go blank and allow the music to sweep me into autopilot, spinning and stepping and jumping in a dance my body knows by heart. The song finishes, the lights sign off in a blaze of orange and yellow, and we freeze, panting, as the crowd leaps to their feet. Zach takes the chance to push
his damp hair off his forehead, tipping his head back as he does so to expose his throat.
Shit. I’m staring again.
I force myself to focus on Jon making his way center stage, where he directs the crowd to thank the musicians, and the security team, and the sound and lighting team. Then it’s Thank you so much, Orlando, we’ve been Saturday, good night! and we’re waving, and the cheering is so loud it drowns itself
out into near silence, and we’re jogging backstage.
And that’s it. The American leg of the Months by Years tour is done, just like that.
Erin, a tall woman in her forties with a rounded figure and long auburn hair, meets us as we step off the stage onto the gray concrete of the backstage area. “Congratulations, guys!” she says in her booming voice, holding a hand up to high-five us all in turn. “I am so proud of you! It’s a wrap!”
As our tour manager, Erin’s kind of the stand-in for our absent parents when we’re on the road. She’s responsible for our schedule, our rules, disciplining us, congratulating us, remembering our birthdays and allergies, and making sure we’re where we’re supposed to be all day, every day.
I like Erin enough as a person, but, as with all Chorus Management employees, I never let my guard down around her completely. Chorus Management might be the team that markets, promotes, and organizes us, but they’re also the team that molded us into the shape we take today. The team
that strictly enforces who we speak to, and what we say, and what freedoms we have.
As far as freedom goes, there isn’t a whole lot of it. So, I try not to give them reasons to limit it further.
We all do.
Zach falls into step beside me as we pass various stage crew. His hair’s fought its way free again, hanging in unruly waves over his still-damp forehead. “Are you okay?” he asks beneath his breath.
My cheeks warm. I’d forgotten about slipping. “Yeah, fine, I don’t think anyone noticed,” I whisper.
“Who cares if people noticed, I just wanna know you’re okay.”
“Yes, forget about it.”
“Why wouldn’t he be okay?” Angel asks, forcing his way between us and throwing his arms around each of our shoulders. Given Angel’s half a head shorter than me, while Zach clears six feet, this isn’t an easy task for him. “We’re done. We’re going home tomorrow!”
“For four days,” Jon says wryly as he falls into step with us.
“Uh-huh, thank you, Captain Obvious, I can count,” Angel says, side-eyeing Jon. “A, I’ll take the four days of downtime if I can get them, and B, within those four days will be the biggest event of your lives.”
“Oh, is your birthday party bigger than the Grammys, now?” I ask.
“And the Billboard Music Awards?” Zach adds, throwing me a smirk.
“Both,” Angel says. “There’s gonna be peacocks.”
Jon snorts, and wipes the grin off his face when Angel shoots daggers at him. “I can still withdraw your invitation,” Angel says.
“No, please, I can’t miss the peacocks.” Jon flips around so he’s walking backward, clasping his hands together toward Angel.
“Thin. Ice. Braxton.”
We reach the dressing rooms, where our team is waiting to undress us. Surrounding us are four portable clothes racks, and as we’re systematically stripped, the clothes get tagged and placed in the right order on the hangers to be dry-cleaned. It’s on them to keep meticulous track of the dozens and dozens of outfits, which of the four of us wears what outfit, and when. They make their jobs look as easy and seamless as we do ours, but I don’t envy them the headache.
As someone who grew up performing in musical theater, I’m used to stripping off costumes after a show. The difference here is that while we’re on tour, it’s out of one costume and into another: we don’t get to dress ourselves anytime a camera can see us. Chorus Management chose our roles years ago. When our stylists aren’t juggling the conveyer belt of ensembles for the shows, they’re compiling and purchasing casual outfits for us to keep us on-brand whenever we’re on duty. And we’re always on duty.
Essentially, our clothes—our costumes—tell the story of our personalities. Just not our real ones.
Zach’s something of a bad boy: leather and boots and ripped jeans and as much black as they can cover him in. Angel’s the fun, innocent goof, which means lots of color and prints, and nothing too tight-fitting or remotely sexy—much to his chagrin. Jon’s the charismatic womanizer, so the golden rule of dressing him is show off those muscles on pain of death.
As for me, I’m the inoffensive one with the pretty face, approachable, safe, and unremarkable. Most of my wardrobe is filled with crew-neck sweaters and cashmere in warm neutrals designed to make me seem soft and huggable. And, of course, there’s no point looking safe and unremarkable if you don’t act it, so my guidelines are clear. No mention of my sexuality in interviews, no showing off onstage, no strong opinions, and definitely no public boyfriends. I’m the blank canvas that fans can paint their dream personality onto. The wild card option for those whose tastes weren’t satisfied by the other three.
The opposite of everything I was raised to be.
As curated as we are, though, the interesting thing is our most devoted fans often see straight through it. The ones who watch and consume everything involving the four of us. I’ve seen them describe our personalities online in a way that’s much closer to the truth—referring
to a sensitive, sweet Zach, or a type-A, cautious Jon. A wild, hilarious Angel, or a perfectionist, darkly sarcastic me. I’ve seen them get into arguments with other fans online, as both sides insist they know the real us. None of them know the real us, of course, because they don’t know us at all, no matter how much they wish they did.
But some see us more clearly. They see us, and they stay. They see us, and yet they seem to like us more than anyone does.
Go figure.
