The quiet of the backstage lounge was a sanctuary, a soundproofed bubble in the heart of the roaring, glittering beast of the awards show. The muffled, rhythmic thump of bass from a distant performance was a constant, almost soothing reminder of the world they had temporarily escaped. Here, in the soft, indirect lighting, the crushing weight of their public personas seemed to lift, allowing for a conversation that was startlingly, refreshingly real.
"That's a heavy crown to wear," Olivia's words still hung in the air, a simple, profound acknowledgment of the mission he had described.
Alex just nodded, a sense of quiet gratitude settling in his chest. He felt seen, understood in a way he hadn't expected. To change the subject, to pull the focus away from the raw, still-healing wound of his own story, he turned the conversation toward the one thing he knew they both genuinely loved, the thing that had brought them both to this strange, gilded cage in the first place.
"It is," he agreed, his voice quiet. "But the music… the music helps. It's the only place it all makes sense." He looked at her, his curiosity genuine. "How about you? I mean, with your show. The songs on there… they're huge. My cousin is obsessed."
Olivia's expression shifted. A flicker of something complex and hard to read passed through her eyes. "Oh," she said, her voice a little brighter, a little more performative, the actress momentarily resurfacing. "Yeah, they're fun. Really catchy. The writers are incredible."
The conversation had turned to her work, and she had instinctively, professionally, deferred to the team behind her. Alex recognized the move. It was a well-practiced deflection, a humble pivot he had seen a hundred times. But he also heard what was underneath it.
"Do you like singing them?" he asked, a simple, direct question that seemed to catch her off guard.
Her energetic, on-camera confidence faded slightly, replaced by a shy, almost hesitant vulnerability. She broke eye contact, her gaze dropping to the arm of the plush velvet couch, her fingers beginning to trace an invisible pattern on the fabric.
"I mean… I love singing," she admitted, her voice quieter now, more real. "It's my favorite part of the job. But the songs for the show… they're fun to perform, but they're… they're not mine, you know? They're for the character. They're part of the script."
She continued, the words tumbling out in a soft, confidential rush, as if she were confessing a secret she had held for a long time. "I write little things. On my own. Poems, mostly. Sometimes just… ideas. Sometimes I'll sit at the piano in my house, late at night when everyone's asleep, and I'll find a little melody…" She trailed off, a faint blush rising in her cheeks.
She looked up at him, her expression a mixture of embarrassment and a deep, wistful longing. "But I'm not a real songwriter," she said, the words punctuated with a small, self-deprecating shrug. "Not like you. You're… you. I'm just an actress who can sing."
The statement, delivered with a casual, practiced air of humility, was one of the most honest things he had ever heard. It was a perfect, heartbreaking articulation of creative imposter syndrome. The ghost producer inside him recognized it instantly, a clinical diagnosis of a common ailment among multi-talented artists struggling to define their primary identity. He'd seen it in his other life, in brilliant session musicians who were terrified to write their own material, in gifted lyricists who insisted they couldn't sing.
But the sixteen-year-old boy, the friend, the one who remembered with a startling, painful clarity the feeling of sitting in his own dark room, terrified that his own sad, quiet songs were worthless, saw something else. He saw a genuine, untapped passion. He saw a creative soul trapped behind the bars of a successful, pre-packaged brand. And he heard the echo of his own early doubts, the ones that had been silenced only by Leo's loud, unwavering, and absolutely essential encouragement.
He leaned forward in his seat, his own weariness forgotten, his expression serious and intensely sincere. He wasn't the label head now. He wasn't the tragic icon. He was just another artist, talking to a fellow traveler.
"That's not true," he said, his voice quiet but firm, cutting through her self-deprecation with a gentle, undeniable force. "That's the biggest lie the industry tells people. That there's a special club, that there are 'real' songwriters and then there's everyone else. It's not true. You either do it or you don't. And it sounds like you do."
Olivia stared at him, her eyes wide, her mouth slightly agape. She looked like someone who had just been spoken to in her native language in a foreign country for the first time.
Alex didn't offer to write with her. He didn't ask to hear her secret melodies. That would have been an act of validation from him, from Alex Vance, the Grammy winner. He gave her something far more valuable, something that had nothing to do with him at all. He gave her permission. He gave her a starting point.
"The hardest part isn't writing the song," he told her, the words coming from a place of deep, hard-won experience, a lesson learned by both the boy and the ghost. "It's not finding the right chord or the perfect rhyme. The hardest part is giving yourself permission to write a bad one. And then another one. And another one after that."
He saw the flicker of recognition in her eyes. He was speaking a truth she already knew but had been too afraid to accept.
"Just… write it down," he urged, his voice a low, encouraging murmur. "All of it. The messy parts, the cheesy parts, the lines you think are too simple or too dramatic. Don't judge it. Don't think about who's going to hear it or what they'll think of it. Just make the thing. For you. The first hundred songs are just for you. They're you learning how to speak your own language. The good ones will come. I promise. But they can't come until you get the bad ones out of the way first."
He was planting a seed. He was giving her the key to a door she had been standing in front of, convinced she wasn't allowed to open. He was empowering her to see herself not as an actress who could sing, but as what she already was: a creator.
Olivia just looked at him, her eyes shining with a mixture of surprise, relief, and a gratitude so profound it was humbling. No one—not her parents, not her managers, not her castmates—had ever taken her secret musical ambitions this seriously. They saw her as a successful product. He was the first person to see her as an untapped potential.
It was a foundational moment, a quiet, seismic shift in their friendship. It moved from a casual, circumstantial connection to something deeper, more meaningful. He wasn't just a peer anymore. He was the first person to see and encourage the artist she was terrified and desperate to become.
The quiet, intimate moment was shattered by the sound of the lounge door swinging open. It was Claire, her expression a professional, apologetic mask. "There you are," she said, her gaze flicking between Alex and Olivia. "They're about to announce your category, Alex. We should get back."
The real world had found them. Their brief, beautiful escape was over.
As they stood, the shared, easy intimacy of their conversation lingered in the air between them. They walked back out of the quiet, soundproofed sanctuary and into the loud, chaotic, concrete corridors backstage, the muffled roar of the show growing louder with every step.
Just before they reached the bright, overwhelming light of the main arena, Olivia turned to him, a new, determined light in her eyes. "Thank you," she said, the two words carrying the weight of their entire conversation. "Seriously."
"You got this," he said, a simple, firm statement of his belief in her.
They shared a final, knowing look. They had a secret now, a small bubble of authenticity in a world of performance. As they re-entered the glittering, roaring chaos of the awards show, stepping back into their designated roles, they were both fundamentally, quietly, and permanently changed by the conversation they had just had in the silence.