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But as I play, the image shifts.

I don’t see a morning landscape. I don’t see flax fields or soft light or any of the pastoral serenity Debussy intended. I see a quiet practice room, ocean blue eyes catching the moonlight, and chestnut hair draped down her back. And those damn oversized sweats, with a matching bow.

I see a girl who tries so hard to be perfect for everyone else, who doesn’t understand or maybe refuses to believe that she is so much more herself when she isn’t trying at all.

I see Ellise.

My father wants a performance. Fine, I will give him a performance. I will play his Debussy, and I will smile the smile that he has trained me to wear in rooms full of people I don’t care about. I will play his little game, the way I have always played it.

But as my fingers move across the ivory keys, I am not playing for him.

I am not playing for the family name, or the brand, or the room full of people who will hear this piece and feel nothing.

I am playing for the girl who saw straight through my bullshit and let me walk her home anyway.

21

Ellise

These halls late at night have become a haven for me.

It’s the only time in the day where I can breathe, when the corridors are empty, and the silence echoes with the space I so desperately need. While everyone else is sleeping, getting wasted, tangled up in each other's sheets, and whatever else students usually do, I’m the one that stays in the practice room until the early hours of the morning. Perfecting. Dissecting. Ripping everything apart.

But I feel different tonight.

I’m starting to wonder who all of this is really for?

My dad wouldn’t want this version of me—exhausted, aching and running on empty. I’m not sure I want her either if I’m honest.

As I approach the long corridor of the practice rooms, a melody drifts from behind a door that has become all too familiar.

I continue walking until I get to the door of Practice Room C and freeze.

Squinting through the glass pane, I can see that the lights are completely off. Only a single lamp illuminates the figure at the black grand piano in the center of the room.

Julian.

He is playing the most beautiful piece of music I have ever heard in my life. He is completely lost in it—a melody I don’t even recognise. It’s deceptively simple, the kind of simplicity that takes years to earn. But underneath it, there is something I have never heard before—something that makes my chest tighten before I even understand why.

It sounds like a confession. Like someone who is dying inside.

As the last chord fades into the darkness, his whole upper body slumps over the keys. His shoulders arch forward, his head bowed so his forehead nearly touches the fallboard.

Without really thinking, I push open the door and slowly walk toward him, my footsteps soft on the floor. He shifts his body slightly at the sound but doesn’t look at me.

In the dim light he looks like a hooded shadow, stripped of all his defensive arrogance. Yet, he’s never looked more perfect. He is so goddamn attractive it makes my chest ache. I cannot take my eyes off him.

My breath begins to deepen, the heat in my body rising as I stop right beside him at the piano bench.

“That,” I start, “was beautiful.”

He stills, and I hear him deeply exhale.

“Ellise,” he breathes.

“What was that piece, Julian?”

“It’s for my mum,” he mutters softly. “I composed it for her.”