That just left one more problem. One that was growing more urgent than ever.

The band name.

"I'm still amazed you guys never named yourselves," Elise remarked, shaking her head at her bandmates. "How long have you been together now?"

"Couple months," Shine answered. "Not that long."

"Long enough," she said with a sigh. "I get that it's hard, but still…"

"Hey, you know I'm not a words-y person," Jen remarked. "Felix started this band, it should be his job to name us!"

Felix blinked at her in a mixture of bafflement and slight betrayal. "Hey, hey, don't put me on the spot like this!"

"It's true though," Shine answered. "This whole thing was your idea, so where's our name, Mr. Founder?"

Felix turned helplessly to Zahir, but the guitarist only shook his head with an apologetic look on his face. "I'm not a permanent member," he said quietly. "I shouldn't get to decide."

Not permanent? Elise wanted to ask, but right now there was more important business to take care of. "Maybe it would help to narrow it down a bit," she offered instead. "I mean—it has to fit us, so what kind of vibe are we looking for? Plus, there's the practical stuff," she added. "We can't have the same name as another band, and it has to be easy enough to Google."

With that, she decided, she had been more helpful than the rest of them combined so far, so hopefully now the others would figure out the details.

"Fit us," Jen muttered. "What kind of vibe we're looking for…the same as our music." She frowned. "What kind of vibe is our music?"

"And what's it trying to be?" Elise added. "I mean, we have to keep it for the future too. Unless a placeholder name's fine for now?"

But Jen shook her head so violently her hair whipped all over the place. "If we could get signed there, we can't have a placeholder!" she burst out. "Do you have a clue how that looks like?"

Elise squirmed slightly at her intense reaction. "Okay, okay."

There was a pause. None of them seemed to have any ideas.

"Maybe we can use the band history," Elise kept musing. "You know, like how The 4AM named themselves after the time when they were founded." She sounded like an obsessed fangirl, she thought and hastily added, "Or something."

They all looked at Felix, who made a series of funny faces before settling on extremely sheepish. "I don't really remember when I founded the band," he admitted.

"It's okay! You brought us in one by one anyway," Zahir said at once. "So there's no one date, right?"

Shine laughed. "You lucked out, Fee," he said. "But hey, we still got our practice days. How's Saturday Tuesday sound?"

The others exchanged a glance, their faces lighting up. Elise whipped out her phone to look up the band name. "It's great!" she said. "Let me just check something…"

Googling for Saturday Tuesday mostly brought up an absurd amount of opening hours. But when she searched for Saturday Tuesday band, her face fell.

"Taken," she said.

Jen was at her side at once, peering over her shoulder at the screen. Elise pointed at the search results. "Here, see?" she said. "They've got all the social media profiles taken. And Soundcloud and Spotify," she added. "Unless we get them to hand it over somehow…"

"We could try—"

"No."

Jen made a face.

"But that brings us back to square one!" she groaned. "Come on, you idiots! Have some ideas!"

"You have some ideas!" Shine answered. "You're the frontwoman!"

"Actually, that's me and Ellie, so—"

"Guys, stop!" Zahir interrupted them before they could start arguing. He opened his mouth to make a suggestion, then faltered, squirming under the weight of everyone's gazes falling on him.

"How about we practice first?" Elise suggested before further trouble could arise. "Maybe we can find a good band name while playing, or something."

Zahir shot her a look of endless gratitude. Jen pursed her lips, pondering the suggestion up, down and sideways, then she sighed and gave a nod. "Okay," she said. "Ellie always has good ideas, let's try that."

All the same, the unresolved question of the band name kept hanging in the air, putting a damper on their practice session. Jen in particular seemed distracted, sometimes spacing out mid-song, forgetting her lyrics or forgetting that she was supposed to perform while singing. Elise wished she could get her to focus somehow, but she had no idea what could possibly help with that.

Until it was time for something new. Literally.

"Okay," Elise said when they had played their way through most of the set list, each member thinking too hard about the band's feeling and possible names to truly play their best. "Should we unleash…our secret weapon?"

Like a camera zooming into focus, Jen snapped back to attention.

"The what? Oh, right!" she burst out, her eyes widening and lighting up with the unique glee of presenting an audience with something you knew would drive them wild. "We're presenting it now?"

"Can't think of a better time," Elise answered with a smirk. "It's done, right?"

"Our part, yeah. Okay, boys!" Mic still in hand, Jen spun around, grinning up at the instrumental trio with glittering eyes. "Are you ready for our breakthrough hit?"

~ ~ ~

The song worked just as well as they had hoped, and then better.

Felix tried to sing along by the second chorus, ignoring the death glare Jen sent him for it. By the third chorus, Shine joined in, and even Zahir was getting increasingly into it. When it was over, all three of the guys cheered louder than ever before, even louder than when they had first presented Welcome To My World.

"Hell yeah!" Shine shouted so loudly Elise and Zahir actually winced at his voice. "This one's fire!"

Jen and Elise exchanged a triumphant smile. "We did it!" Jen exclaimed, beaming, grinning from ear to ear, grabbing Elise by the hands and squeezing them harder than her small, slender hands should be able to. "We've created our hit, Ellie!"

"Yeah!" Elise couldn't show her excitement quite as strongly as Jen, but she could feel it, the swelling of pride in her ribcage, almost strong enough to burst. "Now all we need to do is arrange it!"

"That's right!" Letting go of Elise's hands, Jen marched up to the guys, who were now quickly shrinking back before the maniacal glee on her face. "You three better play as well as it sounds in my head!"

The three gulped audibly. Jen began to deal out instructions, rapid-firing them out like they were coming from a machine gun; Elise, meanwhile, withdrew from the scene. The musical vision was Jen's and not hers; and she didn't think she had anything helpful to contribute when she could barely tell a guitar from a bass.

(A bass had fewer strings, Shine had explained to her. But who could be bothered to count strings all the time?)

Taking a gulp from her water bottle, she sat down beside her bag, watching the others as they tested out chords and harmonized with each other. Every so often Jen would try singing over their instrumental, only to stop mid-line and dish out bullet lists of every single thing they still needed to work on.

But thankfully, this time, it didn't take as long as usual. Maybe there was something about the song's clear vision, its ear worm quality, that showed the boys exactly what they needed to do; and soon enough it was starting to come together, even in Jen's ever-critical eyes.

Finally Jen took her place in front of the band, picking up the mic for a test run. Elise knew she should probably join her; but even stronger than that knowledge was the sudden urge to sit here for another moment and be her audience once more.

Jen's eyes met hers. She held out an inviting hand, but Elise shook her head and smiled. For a moment confusion crossed Jen's face; then it was quickly replaced by understanding, and she gave a thumbs-up. Elise wasn't sure what exactly she had understood. But hey, if she could sit here and watch for another moment, she wouldn't complain.

And boy, was it worth it.

Standing beside her, singing her own parts, it could be easy to forget just how good Jen was at this. Her voice, powerful as ever, carried the song to another level. Her performance, furious and unrestrained, truly brought home the point of the lyrics while inviting Elise to jump up and sing along, move along, no matter how hard she was trying to watch and listen.

Jen was alone in front of the band again, singing and performing her heart out in front of an audience consisting only of Elise. There was no one else here, but Jen didn't care. She had never cared about such things. Jen was the kind of person who would sing at full power even for one single person, all in the hopes that her voice would carry out into the world.

Just like back then. An uncaring building block. People passing by without taking notice. Dull gray concrete, the sound of footsteps and chatter and car engines.

And in the middle of it all, a voice strong enough to drown out all those noises.

"Voice in the Crowd," Elise mouthed soundlessly. She didn't even realize her lips had moved until Jen finished the song and turned to face her.

"Did you say something, Ellie?" she asked.

Elise gave a start. "What?"

"You looked like you had an idea, and then you mouthed something." Jen tilted her head in question. "What was that?"

"Oh, uh…"

And there it was again. As brilliant as the idea had sounded a moment ago, now that she had to explain it to others, it suddenly felt stupid.

"It's…I mean, it's just a thought. For a band name," Elise explained. "We don't have to use it or anything. But it's just…watching you reminded me of the first time I saw you. The first impression I got, so…"

Jen leaned forward.

"Tell me."

And Elise took a deep breath and answered, out loud this time,

"Voice in the Crowd."