Fuck. Shen was right. There was no reason for Chris to have said that to his sister. This was about him and Minh, and he didn’t need to bring up Daria’s breakup.
“I’m sorry, Daria.” He ran a hand over his face, wiping away the hazy film of anger. “I didn’t mean to take it out on you. I’ll get over her soon. It’s not like I cared that much, anyway.”
Daria shook her head and sighed. “You’re such a dumbass, you know. She wasn’t cheating on you. But now that you’ve shown her just how little you trust her, I’m pretty sure it’s going to be a lot harder to win her back. You might even have to grovel. If you can stop being so hung up on keeping your secrets about your studio and yourself.”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about. I saw them.”
“What you saw was Bolton being a dick and Minh trying to spare you some embarrassment! But your stupid brain assumed that Minh was just like Kendra.”
“What are you saying? That she was somehow innocent in all of this?”
Daria told Chris how Bolton had called Minh out of the blue and asked to meet with her. That it had been Bolton who had initiated the meeting. That Minh had never even met the guy before. Chris listened with an increasing sense of dread that he’d done something terrible.
What if this was true? It would make him…terrible. And somehow, the thought that he had hurt Minh, and that he was going to have to beg for her forgiveness scared the shit out of him. He turned back to his computer. “I’ll think about it.”
“Well, think fast because she’s leaving on Saturday.”
“Leaving, where? What do you mean?” Please don’t say she’s leaving for good. Please don’t say I’ve lost her
“She’s moving to L.A.”
She can’t do that! He barely suppressed the urge to shout the words. He forced himself to stay calm. “Why? You mean permanently?”
Daria nodded. “She took a job writing commercial jingles.”
No. No. “She was supposed to be doing movies with fucking Bolton.” Not because she had slept her way up.
Because she was great at it.
“You’re such a goddamn idiot, Chris.” Daria was so angry now, her voice was shaking. “Don’t you get it? Nothing happened with Bolton. Nothing—”
“I know!” He slapped his palm on the table. “I know. I—fuck, I know that now. I was wrong and I…shit. I know I need to go to her. I know I need to beg her to forgive me. But—”
“You’re scared.”
He shrugged. “It’s easier this way, just to let her go.”
“You’re a fucking fool. Didn’t you listen to the songs?”
He stared at the envelope. At the thumb drive that he was still holding in his hand. “No.”
“Listen to them.”
“What, now?”
“Is there a better time?”
No. There would never be another time, he knew. There was only now or never. He shook his head, not trusting himself to speak, then popped the drive into the USB slot on his desktop and pulled up the file.
Deep breath. Double click. The first song loaded. Chris held his breath.
This one was for the opening scene. He knew it right away. It was so much like the song he’d heard the morning after they’d first met—intense and discordant and completely out of ordinary. But underneath was a consistent, simple melody, moving up and down with the storm above it, in perfect unison.
It was them. Him and her, Chris and Minh, woven together into something brash and bold but also steady and familiar.
It was a love song.
It nearly killed him.
“It’s beautiful.” Daria sighed, deep and heartfelt. “I hadn’t heard the whole thing until just now. It’s—”
“It’s us.”
The second song…he clicked on it without a word, and a single, slow note filled the air, low and resonating. A cello, classical and mournful, with so much emotion in that single note.
The note grew, turning into a chord, then a deep, heavy melody. Just a single cello, playing increasingly louder and louder—
It wasn’t supposed to be this way.
Someone had started singing on the track. It was a man’s voice, playing the part of the poor boy. This was the finale, the song that told the world that the pauper had learned that he didn’t have to be constrained by the restrictions he’d put on himself by virtue of his birth.
I wasn’t supposed to have a say
In my destiny.
The voice was male, but these were Minh’s words. She’d written these words, and this music, and he could feel her filling the space around him, running through him like she was something necessary to his vitality.
I was afraid to step outside
To step into my life
But he saw me.
The song built into something bigger, more strings joining the cello, and Chris remembered the discussion they’d had about that first piece she’d composed, before she’d written it. It’s a transformation. Sweeping strings.
She’d taken that and turned it into the final piece. The real transformation.
The chance of a lifetime, that comes only once
In the blink of an eye, the beat of a drum.
He gave that to me, and now here I stand