IT’S THE CRASH THAT WAKES ME.
When I take the medicine, it drops me like a stone to the bottom of the sea, and I have to struggle to swim to the surface and break through. My body is still recovering from the abuse I put it through on tour. Not even the pneumonia, but the exhaustion. Even though the medicine imposes much-needed rest on me, I hate the way it makes me feel. My limbs are heavy and my tongue feels thick. Sleep clings to me, but the crash from below jerks me up and past the dreamless surface.
I’ve gotten spoiled waking up with Rhyson. Not because he’s famous, but because he reaches for me in his sleep and makes me feel safe. Because he can’t go two minutes without kissing me once he’s awake. And waking up alone . . . well, it’s not the same. I roll into the cold void beside me with its undented pillow and unrumpled sheets. He hasn’t been here at all. I’d smell him. I’d know.
Still in my fitted t-shirt and jeans, barefoot, I stumble from the bed and out onto the landing. Another crash reaches my ears, and Rhyson’s voice, hoarse and rough, joins the chaos. Quietly, I make my way down to the first floor and then down another to his music room.
“Fuck!” Anger and frustration strangle the word in his throat. Another crash and more “fucks” and a few “shits” and “dammits” sting the air like hornets. I poke my head just a little around the wall. I can’t face him right now, and judging by our last interaction, he doesn’t want to see me.
The glimpse I have almost makes me gasp, but I catch it before the sound gives me away. Several of Rhyson’s autographed guitars lay splintered and ruined at his feet. The side of his drum set is completely gone like a cannon blew it out. A growl, a low feral sound, rumbles in his chest as he stands drawing in labored breaths amidst the beautiful debris of his priceless instruments.
He watched the tape.
The thought sucker punches me, makes my head spin and leaves me reeling. I sink to the step, too ashamed and afraid to enter the room. To face him. So I sit there with the wall between us. Not just the wall, cool against the side of my face, but the wall of my betrayal and subterfuge.
After the crash and the destruction, there’s a few moments of complete silence. So quiet I hear his heavy breaths in the wake of the storm. I’m just about to gather my courage and walk around that wall into the room, when the music begins. I haven’t heard this song since Grady’s wedding. It’s a skeletal version of My Soul To Keep, but enough for me to recognize the song he wrote for me. He can’t be playing this song and not thinking of me, not aching the way I am. I’ve run and I’ve hidden so many times before, but I have to come out of the shadows to fight for this man. The future he dreamed about, our future, is worth that.
Hearing the notes of my song in this tight, unnatural quiet after the violence of his anger hurts. It’s like I’m in one key and he’s in another. I’ve never felt this far from him, even when I wouldn’t let him in.
I rest my head against the wall, helpless to move. I want to taste my tears, so I don’t even check them as they roll over my cheeks and into my mouth. They are salty and taste of the recriminations I deserve. I’m not sure how long he plays. That first night months ago in Grady’s studio Rhyson’s music awakened something in me, and tonight it lulls me back to sleep.
There is no better place than this. Nestled against Rhyson’s chest. The medicine still clouds my head, scrambles my thoughts, but I’m lucid enough to know I’m safe in his arms.
“Rhys,” I mumble into his shoulder, and his arms tighten around me when he climbs the stairs carrying me. “I can walk.”
“Is that why you were knocked out on the steps?” he asks softly. “Because you can walk?”
It’s too dark for me to see his face clearly, but I’d like to imagine that smile he wears just for me is back on his face, even though I don’t hear it in his voice.
“It’s the medicine,” I whisper, pressing into his neck, searching out his scent. “It makes me so groggy.”
“You still have a lot of rest to catch up on.”
I hold my breath when he reaches the landing, so afraid he’ll take me to a guest room instead of the bedroom we share. Instead of the bed where I wake up beside him. I need it so badly. Just his arms around me tonight. Just his touch in the morning. Something that tells me he still wants me, that what he saw on that tape doesn’t change any of that.