# Chapter 5: Blue Eyes
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Three weeks had passed since Michael sent out his queries, and the rejections kept trickling in.
Nine for *The Martian*. Three for *17 Again*.
Every form letter felt like a punch to the gut, but Michael kept going. Keep working. Keep grinding. Keep believing.
But he needed something else. Something he could control, something that didn't depend on gatekeepers and agents and people who might never give him a chance.
Music.
Michael sat in his tiny room on a Saturday morning, staring at his laptop. He'd been thinking about this for weeks, planning it out, but actually doing it felt different.
He was going to record a song.
Not just any song—"In the End" by Linkin Park. In his original timeline, it had been released in 2001, become one of the defining songs of the early 2000s. Nu-metal meets hip-hop, that piano riff that everyone recognized, lyrics about trying so hard and getting so far but in the end, it didn't matter.
It was perfect. Emotional, memorable, and completely non-existent in this world.
But there was a problem: Michael couldn't record it properly in his room with just his laptop's built-in microphone. It would sound like garbage, and first impressions mattered.
He needed help.
---
"You want to what?" Jake asked, pausing mid-bite of his Big Mac. They were on break in the McDonald's parking lot, sitting on the curb in the October sun.
"Record a song. Just one, to start. You said you knew some audio engineering people, right? I thought maybe..."
Jake swallowed and grinned. "Dude, you're full of surprises. First the screenplay, now music? What are you, some kind of creative genius?"
Michael felt his face heat. "I just... I've got this song in my head, and I need to get it out there. See what happens."
"What kind of song?"
"Rock. Piano-driven. Kind of alternative."
Jake nodded slowly. "Okay, yeah. My buddy Carlos has a home studio setup. Nothing fancy, but better than whatever you'd do on your laptop. He owes me a favor—I helped him move last month. Let me call him."
---
Two days later, Michael found himself in Carlos's garage-turned-studio in Van Nuys.
Carlos was twenty-five, tattooed, with the kind of confidence that came from actually knowing what he was doing. His "studio" consisted of a computer, an audio interface, a decent microphone, and some foam padding on the walls to kill the reverb.
"Jake says you've got a song?" Carlos asked, adjusting the mic stand.
"Yeah. I'll play it on piano, sing over it. It's pretty straightforward."
"You got sheet music?"
Michael tapped his temple. "All up here."
Carlos raised an eyebrow but didn't question it. "Alright, man. Let's hear what you got."
Michael sat at Carlos's keyboard—a Yamaha digital piano that was way nicer than anything Michael could afford—and placed his fingers on the keys.
He closed his eyes and let the muscle memory take over.
The opening notes of "In the End" filled the small space. That distinctive piano melody, melancholic and driving at the same time. Michael had played it hundreds of times in his original timeline at piano bars, at open mics, alone in his apartment when he needed to feel something.
His fingers knew every note.
After eight bars, he started singing. His voice was rough at first, nervous, but it found its groove quickly. The lyrics about time, effort, failure, loss—they resonated differently now. In this second life, trying so hard to make something of himself, these words meant something deeper.
When he finished, there was silence.
Michael opened his eyes to find both Jake and Carlos staring at him.
"Holy shit," Carlos said finally. "That's... dude, that's really good. Like, *really* good. Did you write that?"
Michael nodded, the lie sitting heavy but necessary. "Yeah. Been working on it for a while."
"We're recording this. Right now. Jake, you're my witness—this kid's gonna be famous."
---
They spent three hours recording.
Carlos had Michael play the piano parts multiple times to get clean takes, then recorded the vocals separately. They layered harmonies, adjusted levels, added a subtle beat that Carlos programmed on his computer.
Michael didn't have the full band arrangement from the original—no guitars, no live drums—but what they created was a solid piano-driven version. Raw, emotional, stripped back.
In some ways, it was better. More intimate.
When Carlos played back the final mix, Michael felt something shift in his chest.
This was real. This was his voice, his performance, his introduction to the world.
"So what are you gonna do with it?" Carlos asked.
Michael had been thinking about that. "Put it online. iTunes, if I can figure out how. Maybe some forums."
"You need a name. Artist name."
Michael thought about it. He couldn't use his real name—not yet, not until he knew if this would work. He needed something memorable, something that connected to who he was.
Blue eyes. The trait everyone noticed. The thing that made him stand out.
"Blue Eyes," he said. "I'll release it under Blue Eyes."
Carlos nodded. "Simple. Memorable. I like it."
"How much do I owe you for studio time?"
Carlos waved him off. "First one's free. You blow up from this, you remember who recorded your first track. Deal?"
"Deal."
---
Getting the song onto iTunes was harder than Michael expected.
He spent two days at the library researching digital distribution. iTunes had launched in 2003 and was still relatively new, but there were services—aggregators—that would get your music onto the platform for a fee.
CD Baby was one. TuneCore was another, though it had just launched this year.
Michael chose CD Baby. It cost $35 upfront plus a 9% commission on sales. Money he barely had, but it was an investment.
He filled out the paperwork, uploaded the track, created simple album art using free software—just the words "In the End" and "Blue Eyes" on a dark blue background. Nothing fancy.
Then he waited.
Three weeks for the song to go live, they said.
---
Meanwhile, Michael needed more visibility.
He couldn't just upload a song and hope people found it. He needed to perform, to build an audience, to make people care.
Street performance.
Michael had done it occasionally in his original timeline when money was especially tight. Santa Monica Pier, Venice Beach, anywhere tourists gathered and might throw a few dollars in a guitar case.
He didn't have a guitar, but he had his voice and a portable keyboard he'd bought at a pawn shop for $80—his entire week's tips from McDonald's.
The keyboard was old, scratched, half the buttons didn't work, but it played all 88 keys and that was enough.
Michael set up at the Third Street Promenade in Santa Monica on a Saturday afternoon. The spot wasn't officially sanctioned, but plenty of other street performers were there and nobody seemed to care as long as you weren't blocking foot traffic.
He put out a baseball cap for tips, powered on the keyboard, and started playing.
Cover songs first. Stuff people knew. "Wonderwall" by Oasis. "Clocks" by Coldplay.
People walked by. Some stopped to listen. A few threw money in the hat.
After an hour, Michael had made $23.
Then he played "In the End."
A small crowd gathered. Ten, fifteen people, swaying to the music. When he finished, they applauded. Several people asked what the song was called.
"It's called 'In the End.' I wrote it. I'm Blue Eyes."
"You on iTunes?"
"Soon. Should be up in a couple weeks."
"I'll look for it," one girl said, dropping a five in his hat.
Michael played for four hours that day and made $87. More than a full shift at McDonald's, and infinitely more satisfying.
---
**Three Weeks Later**
"In the End" went live on iTunes.
Michael checked obsessively from the library computers, refreshing the page over and over until suddenly there it was: his song, his artist name, $0.99 to download.
He stared at the screen for a long moment, then did something impulsive.
He searched Yahoo forums for music discussion boards. Found a few—alternative rock, indie music, singer-songwriter communities. Places where people shared new discoveries.
Michael created a throwaway account and posted:
*"Found this new artist called Blue Eyes. Song called 'In the End'—piano-driven, really emotional. Just dropped on iTunes. Anyone else heard this?"*
It felt weird, promoting himself anonymously. But he needed *something* to get the ball rolling.
---
**Week One After Release**
Sales were slow. Four downloads in the first week.
Michael made $2.80 after CD Baby's cut.
Not exactly a fortune. But it was something. Four people in the world had paid money for his work.
He kept performing on the streets, kept mentioning the iTunes release, kept posting on forums under different accounts to create the illusion of buzz.
Slowly, the numbers ticked up. Ten downloads. Twenty. Thirty-five.
The Yahoo forum posts got responses:
*"This is actually really good. Where'd this guy come from?"*
*"That piano riff is stuck in my head. It's been days."*
*"Blue Eyes? Weird name but the song slaps."*
Michael read every comment, feeling something he hadn't felt in a long time: momentum.
---
**Week Three After Release**
Michael was cleaning the McDonald's grill on a Thursday night when Jake found him.
"Dude. DUDE. Your song is blowing up."
Michael looked up from the grease trap. "What?"
"Someone posted it on MySpace. It's getting shared around. People are talking about it."
MySpace. Michael had forgotten about MySpace—it was huge in 2005, way bigger than it would be in a few years when Facebook took over.
That night, after his shift, Michael went to the library and searched for his song on MySpace.
Sure enough, there it was. Someone had ripped the audio from iTunes and posted it on their profile. "Check out this amazing new artist nobody's heard of yet" the caption said.
It had 200 plays and counting.
The comments section was full of people asking where to find more music by Blue Eyes, saying they'd bought it on iTunes, saying this song hit different.
Michael's hands were shaking as he scrolled through the responses.
This was working. It was actually working.
---
**Week Four After Release**
Sales jumped. Fifty downloads in one day. Then eighty. Then a hundred and twenty.
Michael checked his CD Baby account and saw the number climbing: $347.16 in total sales.
It wasn't life-changing money. But it was *something*. Proof that his knowledge could translate to success in this world, that people responded to these songs the same way they had in his original timeline.
He kept performing on the streets. Kept engaging on forums and MySpace. Kept building the Blue Eyes persona.
And then, on a Tuesday morning, everything changed.
---
Michael was walking to his McDonald's shift when he checked his email at the library—something he did once a day with his free Yahoo account.
There, sitting in his inbox between spam for cheap mortgages and penis enlargement pills, was a message with the subject line:
**Re: Your Query - THE MARTIAN**
Michael's heart stopped.
The sender: **Anderson Literary Agency, New York**
His hands shook so badly he could barely click the mouse.
The email loaded slowly, line by agonizing line.
*Dear Mr. Carter,*
*Thank you for querying us with THE MARTIAN. I read your sample chapters with great interest. Your protagonist's voice is fresh and engaging, and the premise is exactly the kind of smart, accessible science fiction I'm looking for...*
Michael's vision blurred. He blinked hard, forcing himself to focus on the words.
*...I would love to read the full manuscript. Please send it at your earliest convenience...*
The email continued with formatting instructions and the agent's contact information, but Michael had stopped reading.
A request for the full manuscript.
An actual, real agent wanted to read his book.
After nineteen rejections, after months of doubt and grinding and barely surviving, someone had said yes.
Michael sat back in the library chair, staring at the screen, and felt something break open in his chest.
This was happening.
This was really happening.
---
//Author
I know my naming sense is probably shitty sorry for that...
BUT STILL DONT FORGET TO DONATE POWER STONES.
KEEP SUPPORTING THIS NOVEL.
**END CHAPTER 5**