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I press the heels of my hands hard against my eyes, trying to force the burning sensation back down. The guilt settles in the particular way that it does. It’s slow, heavy, and a physical and mental weight that I carry around with me constantly.
I take a breath, forcing my aching fingers to type a response. Each tap of the screen sends a sharp jolt up my hypermobile fingers, but I deliberately ignore it.
Hi Mom! Gosh, it’s late. You must be enjoying a good romance book. Rehearsals are actually going well. I’m finalising a new piece for the Spring Showcase (Chopin, you’ll love it!) I can’t wait for you to hear it and to see you soon. I’ll be home in a few weeks to help you move those buckets and finally fix that leak. I miss you so much. Love you.
I hit send.
The little whoosh of the outgoing message sounds like a confession in the empty room.
It’s a lie. A beautifully constructed lie.
I’m not finalising anything.
I’m currently drowning in Chopin’s Nocturne with a toxic partner who detests the very air I breathe—one who seems entirely dedicated to my destruction. My body is failing me at every turn, as always. But as long as Mom believes that I am happy, the music is flowing, and the scholarship is perfectly safe, I’m okay with that. I can carry the rest of it. I’ve been carrying it for so long now that I've actually gotten quite good at it.
I set my phone face down on the piano lid.
By myself in the dark, the uninvited thoughts come as they always do when there is nothing else to distract me. Tonight, I welcome them.
Julian Thorne was right.
He called me disconnected, and God, I am. I have been.
But tonight, I wasn’t only fighting my body. He distracted me in a way that I hate to admit to myself. The specific way he looked at me across the Steinway, those dark, stormy eyes looking up from the piano keys. It wasn’t the normal patronising sneer or calculated smirk that I am used to. It was something far worse. Something piercing and heavy, as if he could see right through the oversized black fabric of my cheap sweats and trace the exact cracks I’ve spent years meticulously sealing shut. It was like he was seeing me. I hate that I even noticed, and that I am still thinking about it hours later.
The way his gaze had raked over me when I first entered the room, up and down, slow and calculated, had made my skin prickle with an intense heat, leaving me feeling dangerously exposed.
And God help me, I think a part of me liked it.
And then, we actually started to play.
With my joints throbbing in silent protest, I was hyper-aware of his physical presence just waiting for his next snide remark about my posture and playing. My eyes kept betraying me, drifting completely away from the safety of my sheet music to focus entirely on his hands.
Those hands.
I watched his long, calloused fingers command the keys with an arrogant grace.
The dark, winding ink of the piano score wrapping around his skin shifted with every progression, and the heavy muscle in his forearms flexed beautifully as he held the tempo.
Those goddamn tattoos.
Get a grip, Ellise.
My body has officially reached its absolute breaking point for the day. I finally lower my violin back into its velvet lined case, checking the gold clasps twice to ensure they are locked, as I always do. It’s a muscle-memory habit to protect the only thing of actual value that I own. It’s a beautifully crafted violin, an instrument that punches far above its actual price point, but it’s entirely irreplaceable to someone with my bank account.
I reach over and turn off the light on the piano. The Autumn storm outside rages on, the rain rattling against the large windows of the practice room. The Nocturne is still in my head, running its opening phrases over and over, but Julian’s voice is somewhere beneath it all.
“Play from your heart, Vance. Stop thinking so much.”
I pick up my case and walk towards the door.
Stop thinking about his hands.
Don’t think about the tattoos.
Don’t think about him.
I step into the empty corridor as the heavy door clicks shut behind me.
