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oh this was so beautiful. this will be the reason I learn how to line dance
Word Count: 4.2K
Summary: Danny finds a new pass time while Greta Van Fleet is off from touring that doesn’t involve the Kiszka’s, and they are less than accepting.
Warnings: language, assless chaps, Sassy Sam, Sunglasses at night - indoors, theft if you squint, alcohol consumption, a super bendy, a flexible guy named Ryder, shameless flirting, and the misuse of an Applebees 2 for $20 meal…
AN: This idea was born from seeing a random line dance tiktok while i was talking to @tripthedharmadivine! I actually sent her a very long message that started with "Imagine if you will -" and proceeded to fill her inbox with the most unhinged very shortened rough draft of this. She is a real one because she puts up with me, lol! 💜😘I also need to thank @writingcold because she read it first to make sure it wasn't too out there, and to make sure I dotted all my i's and crossed all my t's. She is an amazing human that one! And she also puts up with all of my harebrained ideas, and usually has some kind of input to make them better! 💜😘 LOVE YOU BOTH LONG TIME!
It all started with a girl.
Well, kind of.
Really, it started with Daniel Wagner following a girl into a honky tonk on a Thursday night - cowboy boots clicking like a metronome for the unhinged, disco ball spinning just a little too fast, the air thick with cheap beer, cigarette ghosts, country twang, and the scent of heartbreak that had been marinating in the floorboards since 1973.
He didn’t even get her name before she disappeared into a sea of denim, rhinestones, and the kind of joy only found in synchronized stomping. She was gone in an instant. Vanished between a man in assless chaps and a woman drinking tequila straight from a glittery boot.
But it didn’t matter. Because something else caught his eye.
Line dancing.
Structured chaos executed with wild precision. Absolute boot-stomping, fringe-flapping anarchy in 4/4 time. The dance floor moved like a single, glittery organism, every heel-toe and clap echoing like gospel. Boots stomped in perfect rhythm to “Boot Scootin’ Boogie,” and something deep in Daniel Wagner’s soul - something dusty and long-dormant, shifted.
He stood there, eyes wide, transfixed. A grown man with calluses from drumsticks and emotional walls like Fort Knox, now practically weeping over a grapevine step.
He didn’t know where the girl went after that.
He didn’t care.
Within minutes, he was in the corner of the bar, hunched over his phone, trying to learn the Electric Slide from a YouTube tutorial titled “Beginner Line Dancing for Southern Moms.” His concentration was absolute. The bar could have been on fire and he wouldn’t have noticed unless the flames tapped to the beat.
And that’s where everything began to fall apart.
~~~~~
By the next Thursday, Daniel had returned.
Voluntarily. Eagerly.
Wearing a pearl snap shirt and a belt buckle so large it could pick up satellite channels. His boots were polished. His confidence was unearned. But dammit, he knew two whole line dances now and half of “Fancy Like.”
The bartenders greeted him with a nod. The DJ called him “New Boots.” A bachelorette party asked for a photo with him after he did the worm during a line dance break. He’d never been more alive.
And like any man in the first stages of a sudden identity crisis, he threw himself in completely.
By week three, he had purchased a denim vest embroidered with “Boot Daddy.”
By week four, he was attending practice. With a group. On purpose. In a church basement where everyone brought snacks in Tupperware and spoke in hushed reverence about the “Chattahoochee Slide Incident of ’19.”
Daniel didn’t understand it all. But he felt it. In his boots. In his bones.
At home, however, things were beginning to unravel.
He stopped replying in the group chat. He missed three rehearsals. He turned off his read receipts.
Josh tried calling him twelve times in one day. Sam drove by his house and swore he saw a hay bale in the driveway. And Jake… Jake refused to speak of it. Every time someone brought up Daniel’s name, he simply looked out the window and whispered, “He was the glue.”
By the fifth week, the others were fully convinced Daniel Wagner had been abducted by the Honky Tonk Underground.
“Guys,” Josh whispered one evening, holding up a blurry photo he’d found online. “This was taken last Saturday. That’s Danny. That’s him. In a hat. A real one. Not ironic. And look at his hips. They’re swaying.”
Sam leaned in, horrified. “He’s become one of them, and he looks... happy.”
Jake’s sunglasses glinted under the overhead light. He hadn’t moved in hours, but now, slowly, mechanically he reached down and pulled on his boots.
The others fell silent.
Josh swallowed. “What are you doing?”
Jake stood, slow and deliberate. He cracked his neck. “We’re going to get our drummer back.”
Sam grabbed the random zucchini laying on the kitchen counter, “Danny would understand,” was all the reason he gave.
Josh grabbed a tambourine, “For distraction purposes,” he clarified.
Jake grabbed the keys.
And with all the gravity of a rescue mission gone too far, they climbed into Jake’s jeep - an old thing with too many bumper stickers and a distinct smell of regret - and tore off into the night, following the distant sound of fiddle strings and heartbreak.
~~~
The honky tonk loomed ahead - loud, pulsing, alive. From the outside, it looked harmless enough. Neon lights. A wagon wheel. A banner advertising “Thirsty Thursday Boot Scootin’ Bonanza.”
But the trio knew better.
Inside that barn-shaped dive was a cult. A rhythm-based utopia. Their drummer - their friend - was somewhere in there, two-stepping further from sanity with every chorus of “Friends in Low Places.”
Jake killed the headlights a block away.
They parked in an abandoned Sonic lot and approached on foot, sticking to the shadows like denim-clad ninjas. Sam crawled behind a row of hay bales. Josh rolled unnecessarily across gravel, smearing dust and dirt all over his pants, that somehow made them shimmer and sparkle like glitter. Jake simply walked, slow and deliberate, sunglasses reflecting the honky tonk’s blinding marquee like some kind of country-themed action hero.
As they reached the entrance, they paused.
“Remember,” Jake said, voice low, teeth clenched around a toothpick that he had picked up somewhere along the way. “We go in quiet. Observe. Blend.”
Josh nodded. “Got it. Stealth.”
Sam gave a thumbs up. “I brought disguises.”
He pulled out three mustaches. All the same. All far too large.
Jake blinked. “That won’t work.”
“It will if you believe,” Sam whispered ominously, already sticking his on upside down.
They slipped inside with the slow-motion gravitas of an early 2000s action movie. Boots hit the floor in perfect sync. The bar lights strobed dramatically, though that might’ve just been a power issue. Everything slowed down - the glitter in the air, the whirl of the disco ball, the swirl of fringe and flannel moving as one.
Time didn’t stop, exactly. But it did sway to 4/4 time.
Jake scanned the crowd.
Josh gasped. “There. At the bar. It’s him.”
Daniel Wagner. Wearing a shirt that read “LINE DANCING SAVED MY LIFE.” Laughing with a woman in fringe and a man named Skeeter, who had a full sleeve of cowboy boot tattoos and the confidence of someone who'd line danced through a tornado.
“He’s… happy,” Sam whispered again, like it was the worst thing that could possibly be true.
They didn’t move. Just watched. Observed. Absorbed.
The bar smelled like spilled whiskey, deep-fried regrets, and…. glitter? A banner hung above the stage: “HONKY TONK ROYALTY: Line Dancing King & Queen Showdown”. The stakes? A trophy shaped like a rhinestoned boot, Honky Tonk King & Queen t-shirts, and a $50 gift card to Applebee’s each.
The music was loud. The crowd was louder.
Josh stared wide-eyed from the back of the bar. “...Did that sign say queen?”
Sam elbowed him. “Focus. We’re here for Danny.”
Then, as Sam turned to look at him, without warning - Josh was gone.
He slipped into the crowd, tambourine tucked under his arm, hips beginning to twitch dangerously to the beat. Sam cursed and ran after him. “DON’T YOU DARE CONGA LINE, YOU SON OF A BITCH!”
Jake stayed in his spot.
Watching.
Waiting.
Planning.
They’d come for a rescue.
But the honky tonk had other plans.
Jake adjusted his belt buckle - pointlessly, but aggressively - and stepped into the fray.
The moment he crossed the dance floor’s threshold, something shifted. The lights hit him like judgment. The beat pulsed beneath his boots. A fiddle wailed from the speakers with the kind of violence that sounded… personal.
He was in the belly of the beast.
Line dancers moved in precise formation, parting just enough to let him pass like some kind of denim Moses. A woman in a pink cowboy hat winked at him. A man in sequined overalls offered him a Bud Light.
Jake didn’t falter, just continued moving.
He stalked forward, sunglasses still on despite the dim lighting, scanning for Daniel - his brother in rhythm, lost to the glittered cult. He passed a couple practicing the “Honky Tonk Hipslap,” a bartender doing shots with a man wearing a bolo tie shaped like a scorpion, and an elderly woman who looked him up and down and whispered, “Gahlee boy, you look like trouble.”
He tipped an imaginary hat to her. “Ma’am,” before he made his way toward the stage for a better view of his surroundings.
Sam, still chasing Josh through the crowd, came to the middle of the dance floor and stopped dead in his tracks.
Daniel. Dead center of the dance floor. Mid-“Tush Push.” Beaming. Alive in a way Sam hadn’t seen since they played Red Rocks. Surrounded by people who were cheering him on like he was homecoming royalty.
Sam’s chest tightened.
And then the music stopped.
A voice boomed over the speakers. “Ladies and gentlemen, we have a new challenger.”
The crowd turned.
Sam froze. “I’m not—”
But it was too late. The dance floor had closed in around him. The DJ hit the intro to “Save a Horse (Ride a Cowboy)” like it was a war cry. A woman handed Sam a fringed vest. Someone put a solo cup in his hand. The lights dimmed.
The crowd chanted: “DANCE OFF! DANCE OFF!”
Daniel stepped forward, face flushed, breathless, smiling. “Sam?”
Sam’s jaw clenched. “We came to bring you back.”
Daniel raised an eyebrow. “Then dance for me, bitch.”
And with that, the crowd roared, the beat dropped, and Sam Kiszka - bassist, brother, reluctant savior - was dragged into the most aggressive line dance showdown in honky tonk history.
It started innocent enough.
Sam threw down a decent heel-toe combo. Nothing fancy. An attempt at a little old school mashed potato with a dash of the twist, and a few claps, just trying to keep pace with Daniel’s frighteningly natural rhythm. The crowd whooped, forming a circle like a country-western fight club, drinks sloshing and boots stomping in chaotic support.
Daniel grinned and spun - a perfect lasso-motion with his arms - his fringe cutting through the air like judgment.
Sam mirrored it.
Then Daniel body rolled.
And that’s when everything went sideways.
Sam hesitated. A body roll? Here? In daylight, with his brothers watching? But the crowd cheered. Encouraged him. Demanded it.
He rolled.
It betrayed him.
His back cracked like a haunted attic door. His hips lied about their range of motion. Jake gasped as he heard the crack from the edge of the dance floor. Someone yelled, “OH NO HE DID THE SPINE SHIMMY.”
But Sam kept going.
Fueled by pure spite and one tequila shot he deeply regretted, he doubled down. Hands in the air. Shoulders rolling like he’d been possessed by the ghost of a jazzercise instructor. Daniel answered with a slide, a spin, and a devastating finger-point.
Sam couldn’t lose.
So, naturally, he attempted a pirouette.
Why?
No one knows.
Not even Sam.
He lifted his arms. Planted his foot. Turned - once, twice - too many.
His other boot caught on a discarded cowboy hat. He flailed. Time slowed.
The crowd gasped in one collective inhale as Sam went down, limbs flailing like a noodle in a car wash. He hit the floor with all the grace of a wounded armadillo.
A hush fell.
Then, the DJ whispered reverently: “Fatal pirouette.”
Daniel extended a hand. “Nice try.”
Sam, flat on his back, groaned. “Tell my bass… I died line dancing.”
Jake facepalmed before choking out a laugh.
Josh shouted as he danced the funky chicken, “I TAUGHT HIM THAT SPIN!”
Sam’s head whipped around from the floor.
“No,” he croaked, eyes narrowing like a man who’d seen too much. “No.”
He sprang to his feet with the speed of someone who had absolutely no business springing to their feet.
“There he is!” he barked, pointing like a preacher spotting sin. “Josh, no!”
But it was too late. Josh had fully committed. His shirt was unbuttoned to his navel, his hair fluffed by the honky tonk air like a shampoo commercial in slow motion. He was doing a cowboy shimmy that felt deeply illegal in at least three states.
Sam tore across the dance floor, dodging boots, fringe, and pure chaos. “I SWEAR TO GOD, IF YOU START TWERKING—”
Josh cackled and galloped toward the back exit, two-stepping his way into legend.
Sam chased after him, red-faced and limping slightly, yelling, “YOU’RE RUINING OUR FAMILY NAME!”
Sam chased Josh through the back exit, boots skidding over gravel, past a smoldering ashtray and someone’s forgotten purse. But when he rounded the corner—
Nothing.
No Josh.
Just an empty lot lit by the neon hum of a flickering "Longneck Saloon" sign and the faint echo of laughter on the wind. Sam spun in a circle, hands on hips, muttering curses under his breath before trudging back into the honky tonk with the solemn air of a man who had seen things.
And then - there he was.
Daniel.
Cowboy hat tilted just so, arms locked with that same mystery girl, stomping and spinning like he’d been born in a barn and raised by honky tonk angels. His shirt clung to him in all the right places. His smile could light up all of Nashville. The dance floor glowed around him like a stage ordained by heaven and Bud Light.
Sam stopped cold. Jaw slack. Eyes wide.
He was watching a miracle. Or maybe a cult recruitment.
Josh sidled up beside him, whispering with reverence, “…Is he glowing?”
Sam’s fists clenched. “She corrupted him.”
They were just in time for the final round.
Josh shrugged off his jacket with Broadway flair, grabbed the nearest twink - whose name, it turned out, was Ryder - and shouted, “Partner me UP!”
Ryder screamed with delight. They twirled directly into the spotlight, as Josh summoned super bitch telling Danny to “fuck off” as Ryder twirled him around the floor to the sounds of Hank Williams Sr singing “Hey Good Lookin” in a blur of sequins and commitment.
Sam tried to follow. He really did.
But fate, and someone’s discarded bolo tie had other plans.
He tripped, windmilled, and dominoed straight into three contestants and a bar stool, landing in a pile of denim, feathers, and mild embarrassment. The judge held up a hand. “Eliminated.”
Furious.
Petty.
Sam resorted to throwing peanut shells on the floor trying to make Danny’s dancing partner slip and fall.
When those failed?
The chair he was sitting in came next.
It arced across the dance floor like a majestic, wooden missile, slow-motion and poetic. The impact was cinematic. Danny and the girl were mid-spin when it struck—shocked betrayal frozen in time as they toppled together like romantic bowling pins.
Josh and Ryder went down next. Legs tangled. Sass flying.
Gasps rippled through the crowd.
The DJ whispered, “Y’all… it’s a massacre.”
The honky tonk was chaos - upturned chairs, groaning dancers, peanut shells raining like confetti. Amid the wreckage, Sam, Josh, and Danny regrouped by the jukebox, breathless and covered in varying degrees of sweat, sawdust, and shame.
Josh rubbed his elbow where he and Ryder had gone down. “You launched a chair, Sam.”
Sam crossed his arms. “It was symbolic.”
“Of what, exactly?” Danny asked, brushing sawdust off his shirt. “Your inability to cope with losing to a guy doing the Cha Cha Slide in cowboy boots?”
“You were glowing,” Sam snapped.
Danny’s brows furrowed. “Excuse me?”
“You had that weird... twinkle thing going on,” Sam mumbled. “It was unnatural. Like you’d been kissed by Dolly Parton herself.”
Josh threw his hands in the air. “You assaulted all of us because Danny found his rhythm and I found a very flexible man named Ryder?”
“He flipped into a dip, Josh!”
Josh smirked, “Twice.”
“Okay, ENOUGH,” Danny said, running a hand through his hair. “We lost. No trophy. No t-shirts. No bragging rights. No Applebee’s gift card! Thanks to Sam’s cowboy WWE debut.”
They stood there, glaring, stewing in collective irritation and disappointment, when a sudden quiet washed over them.
Sam looked around. “Wait… where’s Jake?”
They all turned.
Scan of the bar - no sunglasses at night. No boot scuff trail. No awkward attempt at dancing with a drink in each hand.
Josh frowned. “He was at the bar when we came back in.”
Danny squinted toward the shadows near the back booths. “He’s not with tequila boot lady…”
Sam’s voice dropped. “You don’t think he left, do you?”
They fell silent. Something cold slid down their spines, replacing the whiskey warmth.
Josh glanced at the exit. “C’mon. We better find him before he signs up for karaoke. You know how he gets.”
Danny grabbed his hat. “Or worse - tries to slow dance alone.”
Sam shivered. “The horror.”
But just as they turned toward the exit, a sharp twang split the air.
All three froze.
Heads turned toward the stage where a small crowd had begun to gather, gasping and whispering.
And there he was.
Jake.
Standing dead center under the spotlight, stage lights catching in his hair like some tragic honky tonk messiah. He held a fiddle in his hands - wrong, completely wrong - like it was his SG. His fingers fumbled across the strings with the uncertainty of someone trying to butter toast with a spork.
Josh whispered, horrified, “Is he trying to play that thing?”
Jake squinted. Turned it upside down. Back again.
Then he began to pick.
Random, discordant notes at first - like a drunk mosquito tapping out Morse code.
Danny winced. “This is how revolutions start.”
But then—
Magic.
Like someone flipped a switch or poured moonshine on a gremlin.
The notes twisted into something terrifyingly familiar. Fast. Faster. Too fast.
Orange Blossom Special, but played like he was being chased by demons. The fiddle let out a scream of sonic chaos, and Jake leaned into it like he was summoning ghosts. His foot stomped the beat. The bow blurred in his hand.
Josh’s jaw dropped. “He’s - he’s shredding.”
Danny blinked. “On a fiddle.”
It was unhinged. It was magnificent. It was enough to make Roy Hall dance a jig in his grave and possibly rise to request an encore.
The bar went silent - then erupted.
Boots stomped. Hats flew. Someone screamed, “GET IT, VIOLIN JESUS.”
Sam, jaw clenched, whispered, “He’s possessed.”
Josh just stared. “He’s glowing.”
Danny put a hand to his heart. “I think I’m in love.”
The DJ's voice boomed over the speakers.
“Alright folks, the FINAL round of the line dancing competition is about to begin! Get your partners ready and your boots to stompin’!”
Sam, Josh, and Danny paused, then exchanged looks after noticing Jake was gone again..
"Now where'd he go?" Sam whined as Jake seemed to have disappeared from the stage.
“Maybe he’s in the crowd,” Josh muttered.
“Or backstage?” Danny suggested.
They didn’t see him anywhere. No Jake. No sunglasses. No unnecessary flair. Nothing.
Defeated, they retreated to the bar and claimed a corner with prime viewing. Sam ordered three whiskeys and a bowl of something suspiciously labeled "nacho-adjacent."
Minutes passed.
Competitors twirled. Couples spun. Fringe shimmered under the disco ball. And still - no Jake.
“Maybe he really did leave,” Danny sighed.
“He wouldn’t,” Josh said with conviction, then added, “Unless the bar ran out of bourbon.”
They were just about to give up when it happened.
“DON’T GIVE ME NO LINES, AND KEEP YOUR HANDS TO YOURSELF!” blared from the speakers, somehow played at double speed, nearly indecipherable.
And there on the edge of the dance floor — he emerged.
Jake.
But not just Jake.
Oliver Reed.
Fake beard askew. Cane tucked under one arm. Cowboy hat tipped rakishly to the side. He was dressed in his full, absurd alter ego getup, and his feet were flying.
An Irish jig. A literal, blazing, heel-kicking, toe-tapping jig. To the Georgia Satellites.
His limbs moved faster than physics should allow. The cane twirled. His loafers clicked in rhythmic fury. The entire bar ground to a halt.
One by one, the other contestants slowed, confused, mesmerized.
Josh’s jaw dropped. “What... what is happening?”
Danny shook his head in awe. “He’s... glowing.”
Sam’s fists clenched. “The honky tonk corrupted him.”
The music hit its final frenzied beat just as the DJ leapt to the mic.
“Well folks, I think we’ve got a clear winner here! Give it up for... OLIVER REED!”
The bar erupted.
Jake bowed. The beard fell off mid-spin.
Nobody cared.
The crowd was still roaring as Jake—er, Oliver Reed strutted off the dance floor, cane twirling and beard now draped over one ear like a rogue opossum.
Sam was the first to intercept him.
“What was that?” he demanded, eyes wild. “You jigged. To Southern rock. In disguise. After vanishing for half an hour!”
Jake blinked, still catching his breath, chest heaving. “I blacked out. I think I heard the spirit of Johnny Cash tell me to take it personally.”
Josh doubled over, laughing so hard he had to lean on a bar stool. “What even is our life right now?”
Danny pointed at Jake’s feet. “You were hovering. I swear to God. I saw sparks.”
Jake grinned, barely able to stand. “I don’t remember anything. Someone just handed me a fiddle and said ‘prove it.’”
Sam threw up his hands. “YOU CAN’T EVEN PLAY THE FIDDLE.”
Jake shrugged. “Apparently I can now. I think the beard unlocked something.”
Josh wiped tears from his eyes. “I—no, I can’t—Sam, please be madder, this is killing me.”
“I am mad!” Sam shouted, gesturing wildly. “You disappeared. We thought you’d been abducted by honky tonk cultists. Then you teleport onto the dance floor dressed like a grandpa and win the whole damn thing??”
Jake patted his shoulder solemnly. “The beard chose me.”
Danny leaned in, still trying to breathe through his laughter. “You okay, Sam? You’re looking a little... emotionally unstable.”
“Don’t. Start with me,” Sam growled, pacing a tight circle. “We were disqualified because of my chair, and somehow you still won with a cane and a jig.”
Josh nudged Jake, eyes sparkling. “You know he’s just mad because he is jealous of Ryder’s bendy flips and dips.”
“Ryder was limber,” Jake acknowledged, nodding.
“DON’T MAKE THIS ABOUT RYDER,” Sam wailed.
“Too late,” Danny said. “This is now Ryder canon.”
Sam turned in place like a malfunctioning Roomba. “I hate this bar. I hate line dancing. I hate Georgia Satellites. And I especially hate that Jake looked good doing that jig.”
Jake slung an arm around his shoulders. “We’re all winners tonight, Sammy-boy. But especially Oliver Reed, and well… interestingly and profoundly me”
Sam let out a long-suffering groan as they exited the bar.
~~~~~
They all gathered at Applebee’s to cash in the coveted gift card Jake - sorry, Oliver - had won through his stunning display of foot fury and disguise. A true hero’s feast was in order.
Josh, having crowned himself with the neon purple Honky Tonk Queen shirt he’d pilfered from Jake’s prize pile, entered the restaurant with the flair of a man arriving at the Met Gala, finger-gunning the hostess and announcing, “Royalty has arrived.” He refused to sit unless someone pulled out his chair. No one did.
Jake insisted on drinking only from his rhinestoned boot trophy. He brought it in tucked under his arm like a newborn, cleaned it with a napkin, and poured root beer in it with the reverence of a sacred ritual. “It tastes better this way,” he claimed, while clinking it gently against the salt shaker in a lonely toast to himself.
Sam, always on a different wavelength entirely, asked the server if the cook could incorporate the zucchini he’d brought from home into his meal. “It’s organic,” he explained, placing it on the table like an offering. “And emotionally bonded to me.”
The server blinked. “Sir, this is an Applebee’s.”
Danny, ever the oasis of reason among unrelenting nonsense, had quietly ordered a 2-for-$20 meal and was aggressively guarding both plates like a dragon hoarding treasure. The glint in his eye said don’t even think about it.
“No, Sam,” he said, not even looking up from his riblets. “I don’t want to share.”
“But you got the spinach-artichoke dip and the—”
“No.”
Josh tried to flirt with their waitress by telling him he’d just won a major dance competition. When he asked what the prize was, Jake leaned in and said, “A boot and a trauma bond.”
Sam, stewing in his seat, kept muttering things like “I was the real Honky Tonk Queen,” and “If I had better arch support, I would’ve won.” He also started Googling “line dancing legal loopholes.”
Josh, mid-way through a chicken tender, caught sight of himself in the reflection of the napkin holder and whispered, “God, I do look good in purple.”
Jake, still sipping from his trophy, declared, “Oliver Reed never dies. He just line dances into legend.”
Danny sighed, wiping his hands slowly with a napkin. “I should’ve gone home with the mystery girl. Or literally anyone else.”
Josh finally raised his regular glass - he’d given up trying to steal the boot - and made a toast, voice raw from laughing and inhaling mozzarella sticks.
“To chaos, twinks, and aggressive footwork.”
Sam raised his zucchini.
Jake raised his rhinestoned boot.
Danny did not raise anything. He just kept eating, silently accepting the fate of being the only sane man left in Applebee’s.