"Now here you go again, you say you want your freedom
Well, who am I to keep you down?
It's only right that you should play the way you feel it
But listen carefully to the sound of your loneliness"

"Dreams" by Fleetwood Mac

With the concert looming ever closer, the Crumbs were like ants scattered around the boat.

Bash was currently on the radio, Kathy was helping Jim set up the electrical inputs, and Syl sat with Smiley on the piano in a rare quiet moment.

She'd learned some piano from her mother in Russia. She'd never taken to the instrument, but she knew enough to get by, and now she and Smiley had to figure out their modified parts together.

Smiley had been killing himself trying to regain the same level of skill he'd had before the accident. It had taken a while for him to realize that sounding the same would be impossible.

With three days left before the concert, he and Syl were rewriting and simplifying his parts to all their songs.

Syl could tell it physically pained Smiley every time they had to drop a harmony or completely scrap a solo, though he'd sworn not to complain.

"This could go like this instead of this," Syl suggested, plucking a few keys.

Smiley groaned miserably. "But that'll make your bass line weaker and we need that to carry into the chorus."

"Then keep it the same, just drop the harmony."

"But then Bash won't know when to come in!" Smiley buried his face in his good hand.

"Kathy and I will keep the rhythm going."

Smiley looked like he wanted to argue, but refrained. There was nothing to argue, anyway. The fact remained that he was playing a two-handed instrument with one.

"You're sounding great," Bash said, hopping onto the stage. "Baba O'Reiley" played in the background as Bash leaned against the piano.

Syl found herself a little mesmerized by him for a moment, with the way his hair was tied back from his face and the eager expression he wore as he looked at the music, before inwardly scoffing and wondering what on earth she was doing.

Then Bash slid onto the bench, squishing Syl in-between the brothers.

"I can change the guitar part," Bash suggested, "if it makes it easier for you, Smiles. Tell me what you think of this."

Bash began playing, taking Syl by surprise. She didn't know he was proficient on the piano. He was nothing compared to Smiley, but still...

His arms reached across her as he played and Syl could smell the salt and warmth of his skin.

She stood up suddenly. "I need to go check something in the wheelhouse."

Bash and Smiley exchanged a glance.

"It's okay," Bash said quickly, averting his eyes. "I–I'm leaving. Gotta get back to the radio."

As if on cue, the song began to wind down and Bash got off the bench to go back to his desk.

Syl sat back down slowly, shifting her focus to the piano.

She was about to play but felt a pair of eyes staring at her.

"What?" she asked flatly.

"What's going on with you two?" Smiley asked. "You've barely been talking to each other and maybe I'm mad but that was strange just then, wasn't it?"

"I don't know what you mean." Syl pointed to the keys. "Do that last line again and I'll play along so we can make sure it's right."

"Whatever you say."

As Syl retrieved her bass, she had to take a deep breath. Ever since that day in the bathroom, she'd felt flustered every time she was near Bash.

It wasn't the type of flustered that preceded the batting of eyes and flushing of cheeks. It was the type of flustered that made Syl unsure whether or not she wanted to cry or stab the object closest to her.

Confusion made Syl angry and the fact that Syl didn't exactly know why she was angry at Bash made a rather annoying paradox that constantly swirled in her head.

He acted as if that day had never happened while Syl was unable to forget it. It was stupid, after all, to think Bash would ever...

Syl shook her head. She kept reminding herself that they were all teenagers living on an unsupervised ship together. The fact that none of them had ever kissed each other out of boredom was almost a statistical impossibility.

That was what their almost-kiss was: Boredom. Curiosity. A silly almost-mistake.

The idea that Bash viewed Syl as anything more than a sister was outrageous. Who would want a broken orphan that didn't know how to show emotions and ran to the Russian mob at the first sign of trouble?

Syl was too messy. Too difficult to figure out. Bash needed someone to match his sunshine. Someone who saw the world the same way he did; a world where peace was a possibility and love was greater than all evils. Syl was not that person.

These things were resolved in her head, but her heart was where it found difficulty. No matter how many times Syl did her best to crush it, there was a tiny, girlish voice that whispered, maybe, maybe, maybe.

"Shut up," Syl muttered.

Smiley squinted at her. "You just told me to play."

Syl shook her head. "Sorry, not you. If you're ready, I'll count us off. One, two..."

They played until they had a rough outline of Smiley's new parts. They arranged and rearranged what felt like a million things, but once they got into their own rhythm, they began constructing new things that might have sounded better than they did before.

As Smiley had to drop most of his left-hand playing, Syl had to work double-time to cover for the bass lines.

At one point, after a long hour of playing straight through the setlist, Smiley said, "I must admit I didn't know how talented you were, Syl. You're a bloody brilliant bassist."

Syl smiled a real, genuine smile before they got back to work.

As the sun began to set, the song they'd just played through for the final time came to an end.

A moment of silence followed the dwindling echoes of the piano and they regarded each other with tentative grins, unsure whether or not they should be as hopeful as they were.

Syl couldn't exactly tell, but she thought she saw relieved tears in Smiley's eyes.

"I think it'll work," he said. He released a sigh that seemed to come from the deepest parts of his soul. "I didn't muck up the concert."

Syl put her hand on his shoulder. "You never mucked up anything, Smiley Gibbs."

Now she was sure she saw tears in his eyes, which he dashed away, pretending they weren't there.

He just swallowed hard and nodded his thanks.

"Dinner!" Kathy yelled from the wheelhouse.

"Oh no," Smiley and Syl groaned at the same time.

Kathy's turn for dinner meant burned beans and half-baked toast.

Nonetheless, Smiley and Syl went upstairs and sat with the other Crumbs, which now included Jim.

Kathy proudly served their meals and everyone turned their grimaces into smiles as they thanked her.

"How's the piano man over there?" Bash asked.

Smiley looked at Syl, unable to contain his joy, before announcing, "We've got it."

Everyone applauded wildly at the news.

"And tomorrow we'll have our soundcheck," Jim said. "I got all of the wirings figured out and plugged in."

Syl flinched at that word. Our soundcheck. She still wasn't comfortable with the idea of a Mad Teddy aboard their boat, but she didn't have any reason to suspect him. Yet.

"Soundcheck," Bash murmured wistfully. "It makes it feel so real."

"It is real," Smiley stated. "In three days, for better or worse, we're finally playing a real show."

Everyone seemed to pause after his words.

With desperation motivating all of their recent decisions, none of them had stopped to realize that, in some ways, their dream was coming true.

Regardless of the reason, the fact remained that they were going to be headlining their own concert. With their own music. The Crumbs and their instruments and a crowd of people.

For the first time, excitement buzzed through the air like an electrical current.

When Bash and Smiley acquired Wolgemoth & Sons, they'd never dreamed of being in the radio business.

In the early days, it was just the two of them playing piano and guitar until four o'clock in the morning. For them, it was a way to remember their parents. A way to feel close to them.

It was from this first love that the radio even came to fruition.

For Kathy, music was the only thing that made her feel less lonely. When her parents were ignoring her, she had her record player. She would lay on the floor beside it, feeling the beat against her cheek as it reverberated through the wooden floorboards.

And for Syl, music remained a symbol of freedom. She felt most like herself when she was around music as if it were the key that allowed her to take a deep breath.

And now here they were, The Crumbs, about to share pieces of themselves with strangers who were all different and all the same.

It was a dream that came with consequences, but it was a dream nonetheless. And they could only hope that it wouldn't turn into a nightmare.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Hey guys! Hope you enjoyed this chapter!

~Are you glad Syl and Smile figured things out?

~Any predictions for the concert?

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