Page 227 of Bend

Not well, but enough. I’ve heard her playing it a few times. She played it for Wolfe back in Ireland, when they thought the two of them were the only ones in the house who couldn’t sleep.

“The song?”

Her fingers stop on the strings and she looks at me properly this time. “How do you know about the song?”

I hesitate for half a second. “Wolfe hummed it once at the TT. And I might’ve heard some of it that night too, when you were playing for him.”

Her eyes narrow slightly. “You were listening?”

“Not intentionally.”

“Uh-huh.”

“I was passing by.”

“Convenient.”

I almost smile. “You gonna arrest me for unauthorized listening?”

Her mouth twitches, but the expression fades when she looks back down at the guitar.

“He was the first person I actually played it for.”

I move farther into the room and sit beside her on the floor, close enough that my shoulder nearly brushes hers.

“He clearly fucking liked it.”

She glances over.

“And I don’t blame him,” I add. “It’s a good song, Echo. Really fucking good.”

That catches her off guard more than I expect.

“You think?”

“Yeah.” I nod toward the guitar. “Wouldn’t say it if I didn’t.”

Her thumb runs slowly along the edge of the notebook.

“He told me not to force the missing parts. Said if I kept trying to make the song into something before I knew what it was supposed to be, it was just going to sound wrong.” She lets out a quiet breath. “Which was annoyingly good advice from someone who lived mostly on cereal and whatever food he could steal off everybody else’s plates.”

The quiet that settles between us isn’t uncomfortable. It just has weight.

“You been trying to finish it?”

“Every chance I can.”

That surprises me less than it should cause we all know she’s been doing that with everything lately. Working longer, checking everybody else instead of making sure she looks after herself.

Finding a task before there’s a second where she might have to sit still and feel any of this.

“And it’s not happening.”

“Nope.”

“Why?”

She shrugs, but it’s weak. “Because it used to be about finding home, and now every fucking line sounds like him.”