Page 35 of Crescendo

“Okay, firstly—” I put a hand up. “There’s no relationship there for me to cheat on.

Ella and I are just friends. Secondly, I don’t want to sleep with Hannah.

Thirdly, Hannah doesn’t want to sleep with me.

She’s hung up on Eliza somehow or other…

like I said, I don’t fully get the dynamic, but when I start getting close to the topic, she acts like she wants to pull my skin off. ”

Dodge shrugged. “She’s not lying, actually. Hannah’s definitely got something going on with Eliza. Something from back when they were in a band together up in Liverpool, seems like Hannah’s carrying the torch still.”

“Hm.” Clara settled back in her seat, but she didn’t take the wary eye off me. I decided to go with honesty.

“Ella’s in a fragile state,” I said. “I guess I’m a little scared of… breaking her?”

“Must be why you were so keen on not pressing her or anything, raring to give her space.”

I laughed. “I can’t win with you, can I, Clara? First you want me to give her more space, then less. You sure you’re not into her and trying to get me out of the way?”

That broke the tension, Clara laughing and waving me off. “Okay, all right. Just saying, she’s an adult. A little rock music isn’t going to break her.”

“Maybe I’m less concerned about breaking her and more about throwing off whatever has gotten her to play music the way she has been lately…

” I said, my gaze drifting distantly to the window.

“She’s been a powerhouse, but neither of us know where it came from, and I don’t want to mess with that flow right when she’s gotten it. ”

“It has been something else when I’ve gotten to hear her play,” she mused. Dodge leaned in with a conspiratorial grin my way.

“You know what’d be brilliant,” he said.

“I’ve heard some rumors going around that there’s some stakes for the next composition assignment.

This bloke affiliated with the Royal Albert Hall and its schedule, he’s been seen swanning about the place, having a chat with the Crescendo program director.

Session before last, one of the compositions was set to be judged and have the winner played right there in the hall, as an introduction to a set.

With everything Howard said about the next assignment being a longer symphonic piece, talk’s all over the place thinking it’ll be the opening for a big break. ”

“Dodge, out spreading rumors again,” Clara sighed. “It’s just people talking.”

“Imagine it, though,” he said. “Eliza’s going to be busting her ass trying to get it. But if Ella does? Not only righteously hilarious sticking it in Eliza’s face, but also, for a total unknown—that’d be the career starter of a lifetime.”

Career starter? Did Ella even want to be a musician? I knew she loved radiology—that she went into this program not for a career change but as a way to explore her interests while taking a much-needed break from medicine.

But at the same time—it felt a terrible shame to think of Ella going back to her regular life, closing that piano lid and putting those songs back into the box in her mind they’d been closed away into in the first place.

Plus, he was right that it was hilarious to think of Eliza losing. I had promised to see Ella outdo Eliza.

“And, what,” I said, “you two don’t care about winning it?”

Dodge snorted. “Please. I’m hoping I place dead last. I’ll rub it in Clara’s face, say classical music is boring and pretentious.”

Clara smiled dryly. “Don’t really need it, honestly. I’ll try just because I want to give it my best effort, but secretly I’m more or less hoping Ella might win it.”

I laughed. Ella would hate it. I could hardly imagine the wonder in her eyes watching the orchestra play her own composition, the way she’d laugh breathlessly through misty eyes how she did, slowly shaking her head.

But also, she’d have a heart attack hearing the news and probably say no, make them pick somebody else.

Or—then again—maybe that wasn’t her. Maybe that was the trauma speaking. I’d read it might lead to you making yourself small.

∞∞∞

The door swung open behind me while I was midway through playing, and I glanced back at where Ella smiled sweetly at me, even though there was something in her eyes, something cautious.

“Hi,” she said quietly. “Don’t let me interrupt.”

I shut the piano lid, spinning around to face her. “I was just experimenting. How are you doing? Dinner with Bansi and crew went well?”

She laughed, dropping onto the couch. Right in that spot where I’d had her play the cello, because of course. “I didn’t get much of a word in. But it was fun. You, er—had a good time with Clara and Dodge?”

“Clara told me we’re not royals, we just eat like regular people, and took me to a place where I wasn’t sure if the menu prices were for sandwiches or mortgages.”

She laughed, but she still had that careful gleam in her eyes, fixing me with a look I couldn’t place. “You grow up like that and you sort of… you tend to lose sight of what money is like for people. I hope she paid for you.”

“Thankfully. You’d have come back to a much more melancholic piece otherwise.”

She stood up, that look in her eyes set into some kind of resolution. “Play with me.”

I can think of some ways to play with you. I didn’t say that out loud. Being around Ella all the time the past couple days but refusing to go there had been torturous, and I was getting more and more high-strung being around her without touching her, kissing her.

“Gladly,” I said, standing up. “You want to be on the piano?”

“Let’s play it together. Show me the chords like you did before. The way you play them is so beautiful…”

There was no chance I wasn’t kissing her.

But I wasn’t saying no—not to a chance to play the piano alongside her after her musical awakening.

“I think you’re underestimating how well you do with it already,” I said, but I slid aside to make room for her, and she sat down with her side pressing against mine.

“I think you’re underestimating how good you are,” she said softly, looking at me from the corner of her eye. “Do you realize I spend all my free time listening to your work?”

She wasn’t usually this forward. Being cool and normal around her was hard enough when she wasn’t. I suppressed the shivers down my spine from those words delivered soft but sure with those damn eyes on me. “Still listening to that hackneyed score from Over the Moon ?”

She laughed, not breaking eye contact for a second. “Lydia, I’ve looked up every chord in every section of every song in that score. As well as some other scores.”

“Oh. Well.” My head buzzed. I should have had a better response. “Just in the past couple days?”

Her gaze glinted, more intense. “I’ve had more time to sit and think about music the past couple days. You’ve been busy with other things.”

“Ah…”

“You’re driving me out of my mind,” she said quietly. “Play with me again.”

This was a dangerous route of conversation. But I couldn’t help it—I found myself drawn to the piano next to her like I was drawn to her body, my hands moving by themselves, and I settled on the piano. “What key?”

“Eb Minor.”

“Confident. I like it.” I set my fingers on the keys, and I lost it a little when she said,

“You like a confident girl?”

“I like… I like a girl with a lot of passion for what she does.”

She glinted a wild-eyed smile my way, and I thought you’re not the only one out of her mind right now, but I played the chords, pouring it from the heart—dramatic chords turning around and around again, an almost pop rhythm to it, like my mind circling the drain going around and around the same few thoughts about Ella’s face and wanting her lips against mine again.

The music exploded when Ella jumped in on the upper register, and it said so much more than words did—the chaotic and dramatic sound of it, hooking around a motif that wedged its way into your mind and wouldn’t get out.

Like she was for me. Like I was for her.

She did what we never did—spoke while we played, her voice slipping out like she didn’t mean to speak. “It doesn’t make sense.”

“What—what doesn’t?”

“You’ve been so perfect, being there for me in all the ways I need the past few days. The past two weeks. That’s not what somebody does when they… they don’t like you anymore after seeing you break down.”

“Ella, that’s not—” I fumbled the notes, struggling to catch back up, my face hot. “It’s not that.”

She slammed down a triad hard enough to make my head ring, an almost feral energy in it, and it was—as much as I didn’t need that right now—unbearably sexy. “Why aren’t you talking to me?”

“I’ve been talking to you. We spend just as much time together—”

“You know what I mean.”

“I…”

“ Lydia. ” She looked at me with fire in her eyes. “I don’t have the… the… emotional regulation right now to handle these feelings. I feel like I’m losing my mind. I never stop thinking about you.”

“I mean, why would anyone stop thinking of me?” Levity didn’t work. Or maybe it did. She flashed a dangerous, wild grin my way.

“Why won’t you bloody well just kiss me?”

I looked back at the piano. “We said it was casual.”

“If you’re trying to make it casual, why are you making it so you’re the only thing I can think about?”

“You did well with your composition assignment. You’re clearly doing well thinking of music, too.”

She laughed. “ Why are you being difficult?”

“Seems to turn you on.” Shouldn’t have said that.

“You’re such an arse,” she laughed, and she stopped playing—turned and put her hands on me, one on my side and one on my thigh, and she kissed me.

Maybe the snapping was also a trauma response. Giving the fuck up on decency and demanding what you needed—I’d have to look that up and see where that fit into the trauma recovery process. Later. That wasn’t what I cared about right now.