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“Not yet. But I’m sure they can tell. I should probably tell them, though.” Her head angles to the side as she muses over something. “It’s actually my secret wish. That I could shout it out right now and everyone could celebrate the love with us.” She jumps up and presses a kiss to my lips.
She hasn’t smiled like this in a while, and it makes me so fucking relieved to see her happy like this.
My lips turn upward. “Well, how can I argue with that?”
“Really?” she asks, her eyes light up.
I nod, a knot twisting in my gut. “Yeah, go ahead.”
“Hey everyone!” She shouts with laughter ringing in her voice. “I love this beautiful boy right here. And guess what? He loves me too!”
I can’t bring myself to look in the direction of Ethan and Mr. Scott. “I feel sick,” I mutter.
“My declaration of our love is no reason to get sick,” she says, playfully pinching my arm. “Now cheer up. This is a good thing.”
“Do they look mad?” I whisper with my head ducked.
She stands on her tiptoes and peers over my shoulder. “No, but they’re headed over here.” Lyric’s eyes sparkle mischievously as she returns her gaze to me. “We could always sink to the bottom and hide from them.”
I nod. “Yes, please.”
She takes my hand. “Ready. One . . . Two . . . Three . . .”
We jump up then dive down, pressing our lips together.
THE ENTIRE NEXT DAY I’M so nervous and twitchy, people probably think I’m a spazz. But I can’t help it. Today is an exciting day for everyone in my band. I just wish we didn’t have that giant cloud constantly hovering over our heads, reminding us that a rainstorm could come at any moment.
Around two o’clock I head off to record my first album, and spend the next few hours with Ayden and my band at Infinitely Studio, my dad’s recording studio, starting our career. We don’t record every song that’ll be on our album in one night, but we are planning to return within the next week to finish. Before we clock out for the day, I make sure Ayden and I do a duet, because, in my opinion, it’s the best part.
“Are you sure you want to do this?” Ayden asks me as we prepare to go in and sing the song we wrote. “Because you can always back out.”
“No way am I about to back out on one of my dreams.” I plant my butt on the stool and put my headphones on, motioning Ayden to do the same.
He nervously sits down, slides on a set of headphones, and situates his guitar on his lap. I collect my guitar and get comfortable, disregarding Sage and Nolan gawking at us through the window.
“Ready?” My dad’s voice floats through the speakers.
Ayden’s been extremely jumpy around my dad, ever since I belted out that we were in love, and he flinches at the sound of my dad’s voice. I don’t know why he’s acting all squirrely. No one has brought up our love declaration, except for my mom and she seemed pretty happy about it.
“I’m so glad you can just say it like that,” she said to me as she worked on a painting in her studio at our house. “I had such a hard time expressing my emotions when I was younger.”
“Really?” I was shocked because, for as long as I could remember, her and my dad have been happy and in love and not afraid to show the world.
She set the paintbrush down, nodding. “I had a lot of problems when I was younger. Thankfully, your dad stuck with me while I worked through them.”
I couldn’t help but think of Ayden and myself. He struggles sometimes with his emotions, but I’ll never, ever give up on him. I want him. Forever.
I blink back to reality and lock eyes with Ayden. “Are you ready?”
He nods, his gaze fused to mine. “Whenever you are.”
“We’re ready whenever you are, daddy-o,” I say through the microphone.
My dad gives me the go ahead, and I strum the first chord. Ayden follows my lead, and we play a few more chords, completely in sync, before I open my mouth and pour out my soul to the microphone.
“I never knew it could be like this, never thought such desire was possible, kissing the air from his lungs.” My heart hammers in my chest. “And the heavens rain stars down on us, pieces of shimmering gold around us, pouring warmth all over us. Kiss me until I can no longer breathe. Raveling me up with you until I can hardly think. God, please fucking kiss me before I crumble to pieces.”
We strum a few more chords, keeping the beat soft until it’s Ayden’s turn to come in. He summons a breath then opens his mouth and kisses the world with the beautiful sound of his voice.
“You make me weak. You make me strong. You make me ache. You make me feel so wrong. You make me burn for just a taste.” His gaze burns into me, scorches my soul. “You make me, make me, so fucking insane. I can’t stand it anymore. I want you all the time. It’s always on my fucking mind. Please, just let me have you. God, please just say yes.”
I nod. I don’t even know why, other than I want him to have me.
He keeps his eyes on me until the song is finished.
I’m so riled up, I’m actually sweating.
My dad walks in, but I barely register what he’s saying. I’m too caught up in Ayden, the sound of his voice, singing with him, singing one of our songs.
“You guys did a great job.” My dad congratulates us with a huge-ass smile on his face. “Seriously, I’m not really a fan of duets, but that was pretty amazing.”
“Thanks, Dad,” I say, my gaze never wavering from Ayden.
My dad says a handful of other things about coming back in next week, but I hardly hear a word.
“Lyric, did you hear me?” my dad asks, looking at me with concern.
I blink my attention from Ayden and attempt to focus on my dad. “Nope. What’s up?”
He sighs, sinking into a stool. “I asked if you want me to drive you home.”
“We can just drive ourselves,” I say as I slide off the stool to put my guitar in the case. “I know you have stuff to do.”
“I’d rather you not drive home alone,” he replies, crossing his arms. “It’s late.”
“I thought you had a meeting,” I remind him. “That’s what your secretary said when we came in here. And we won’t be all alone. The officer will be following us.”
“Yeah, I know.” He frowns, actually pouting. “I forgot about the meeting. I wanted to take you out for ice cream or something.”
“You can do it tomorrow,” I suggest as I lock up my guitar case. “I can even clear my super busy schedule, just for you.”
That cheers him up. “All right. I’ll think of something fun to do.” He turns to Ayden. “You can come too, if you want.”
I smile as I tie my plaid over shirt around my waist.
You just got mad cool points, Dad.
Ayden glances at me, and I mouth, come with us.
“Sure. That sounds good, Mr. Scott.” He picks up his guitar case.
“Call me Micha, okay,” my dad insists. “Mr. Scott makes me feel so old.”
“You kind of are old,” I say. When he shoots me a nasty look, I add, “But the coolest old man ever.”
He laughs, opening up the door. “Come on. This old man needs to get to work.”
After we say goodbye to my dad, Ayden and I walk outside with Sage and Nolan to the parking lot. It’s later in the evening and the sky is splashed with pink, orange, and gold.
“We so rocked today.” Sage fist-bumps Ayden. “If we can sound like that on the tour, there’s no doubt we’ll get more tour offers.”
Nolan tosses his drumsticks into the backseat of Sage’s truck. “We did sound fucking awesome today, but what’re we going to do when we have a sucky guitarist instead of Ayden?”
“Don’t start,” Sage warns, leaning against the back of his truck. “I already hear enough of that shit from Lyric.”
“That’s because it’s the truth,” I say, pulling my hair up as the heat instantly gets to me.
“Would you guys please stop arguing?”
Ayden asks, shocking the three of us.
“Sorry, man,” Sage says, holding up his hands. “I was just pointing out that they can complain about it all they want, but it doesn’t fix the problem that we’re going to be short a guitarist on the first fucking tour we got hired for.”
“I’m sure they don’t all suck,” Ayden says, glancing at the screen of his phone.
