Page 47 of I Fell for an Alien Popstar

I watched from the side stage, perched on a road case with my sketchbook open across my knees.

I’d seen the set a bunch of times by then. I could move along to every transition, knew exactly when the lights would drop for the bridge, and felt the bass shift a second before it hit.

But it still knocked the air out of me every time.

Zhari opened with the up-tempo run—chromeskin catching the lights in hot pink and silver, the crowd already screaming before she hit the first note. She crossed the stage as if gravity didn’t apply.

Hair whipping. Hips hitting the downbeat.

“Satellite superstar,” she sang. “Shining where you are—”

The dancers locked in behind her, sequins and platform boots flashing through sharp arm lines.

“Beaming from the sky like a neon avatar—”

Confetti cannons went off on the chorus. The whole place filled with glitter.

My pen moved across the page. I caught her mid-spin, one arm out and light threads flaring white. Then her outline against the crowd. Then her face from memory—

“Calling out your name through the radio waves…”

I looked up.

“Dancing in the dark like we’re lost in space…”

That part always shifted something. It was quieter, but not softer. Like she stopped performing for a second.

I kept drawing. That expression—eyes half-closed, mouth slightly open, as if she’d forgotten anyone was watching.

That was the one I kept.

I used to think I knew her—every line of her face, every angle of light on her skin—as if I could capture her if I just kept trying.

But the stage changed all the math.

She was motion and heat and gravity. She wasn’t something to draw anymore.

She was something that drew you in.

Even after so many of the same concerts, I couldn’t get tired of it. Not the spectacle, though that was unreal.

Her.

The way she changed up there. The way she gave everything to a room full of strangers and made it feel like it landed on you.

I’d drawn her a thousand times from screens, photos, and magazine spreads. Watching her live ruined all of it.

Nothing flat would ever be enough again.

The encore was chaos. She stretched the last chorus, pushing it longer than it should have gone, her voice rough at the edges. Lyn threw her head back behind the kit. The monitors clipped. The crowd got louder instead of burning out.

“Satellite superstar—don’t you fade away—”

They screamed it back at her.

Again.

Louder.