“Hi,” I said as I tried to establish my bearings. I blinked through the daze as I sat up.
She sank down on the bed next to me, ran her fingers through my hair. “I’m sorry to wake you.”
“No…it’s fine.”
She hesitated. “I thought you might want this.”
My attention traveled to the small yellow mailer she held in her hands.
Dread and hope.
They slammed me.
God, what was wrong with me?
She glanced at me from the side. “It’s for you…I think.”
Unease rustled through my dim room, and I pulled in a deep breath as I gathered the courage to peek at what was written across the front. Somehow already knowing what would be there.
There was no address.
No first or last name.
It simply said Blue.
That statement was written in his bold script. As if he were reaching out. Touching me. This boy who chased me in my dreams and haunted my nights.
“Where did you find this?” I managed.
Her lips thinned. “It was sitting at the front door. I’m guessing it’s from him?”
I nodded. “Yeah.”
She touched my chin. “Okay…I’ll give you some time.”
“Thank you,” I whispered as I accepted the padded envelope. I held it against my chest until she snapped the door closed behind her. Silence stole over the room, my breaths increasing to a pant.
Anxiety. Emotions running wild.
Was I really going to allow him to do this to me again? Pull and pull and pull until he pushed me away?
Swallowing, I ripped open the seal. A disk fell out. Blue was again scripted across it.
Warily, I stood, paced, wondered. Before I gave and sat down at the small desk and lifted my laptop lid, shaking as I slid the disk inside.
There was one file on it.
A video.
Fumbling, I pressed my headphones into my ears, my pulse at a sprint and my spirit in a frenzy, while the rational, logical side screamed at me to toss the disk in the trash. To protect. To find some semblance of those walls.
But I couldn’t stop myself from pressing play.
The screen filled with Lyrik.
So big and bold and beautiful.
My breath caught and my heart skipped.
He was sitting on a hotel bed with an acoustic guitar balanced on his lap. Those eyes were sad and brimming with remorse, his mouth vacant of that smirk. He scratched at his temple, as if this menacing, malicious man didn’t know what to do with himself.
“Blue.”
My insides quaked with it falling like a plea from his tongue.
Eyes dropping closed, he looked away, before he turned his attention to the camera. “I’ve written a lot of songs in my life. For a long damn time, they were the only real joy I had. And this one…it’s the most important one I’ve ever written, even though I could never bring myself to get to the end.”
He strummed a single chord and cleared his throat. “You know a song says more than any words I could ever speak. Listen, Blue. Fuck…” He raked a hand through his hair. “Please…just…listen.”
Quietly, he plucked through another chord, and when he opened that pretty mouth, the words were raw. Rough. Coarse and bleeding emotion.
Trembles rolled when I recognized the haunting cadence of the music.
He was playing the unsung song. The song coiling his arm, wrapping him in mystery and unseen misery.
Tears blurred my eyes.
Will you ever know
Just what it meant
Holding you high
Now I’m down on my knees
Begging for the pieces
That no longer belong to me
I’d have given it all
But instead I got lost along the way The intensity of the song increased as he drove into the chorus.
But I’m coming…
I’m coming home to you
Finally found forever
It’s been waiting all around
I’m coming…
I’m coming home to you
Tell me what I have to do
To get the chance
Say you’ll let me spend it with you Tears poured free, and my chest ached and throbbed while my shaky world spun.
I’d once thought he’d laugh when he watched me fall.
But I knew now. There was a huge part of Lyrik that wanted to hold me up.
I just wasn’t sure he knew how.
His fingers stumbled across the frets, and a pained breath left him. “Blue.” He leaned forward, as if he could get to me from across the space. “Blue…I wrote the beginning of that song a long damn time ago. But it’s not finished. I know it now. Let me end it with you.”
The screen went blank.
A sob shot from my mouth.
Let me end it with you.
I climbed from the chair and paced the quiet of my room. I gripped my hair, feeling like I had to be insane. Completely, entirely insane.
Because that’s the way this boy made me.
Weak.
But I refused to be a fool.
Not because I was rigid and forging walls.
No.
Because I wanted to be loved. Loved the way I deserved to be.
So confused, I fumbled from my room and down the hall, hand darting out to the wall to keep myself from falling.
That intensity swelled. I nearly choked over it.
Thick.
Heavy.
Dense.
Needing a breath, clarity, I flew out the front door and down the steps to the thatch of grass lining the front.