Page 40 of Crescendo

Lydia

Ella had a bright look in her eyes as we walked down the hall, Crescendo’s classical stylings and ornate bay windows whisking us all back like we should have come across Schubert writing an opera, and I stopped at the door where I could hear, murkily, the sounds of the others inside.

“It’s okay if you need to back out,” I said. “At any point.”

She rolled her eyes, flashing teeth in a smile at me. “I’m not a child, Lydia Howard Fox.”

“Please. Anything but the full name.” But—I knew she was right.

The past week since Ella had stripped away her protective lining and let it in, crumbled to pieces, I’d seen her build herself back up to something stronger than ever before.

I’d handled her like precious porcelain for a while, but when Clara caught me in the performance hall between classes and told me don’t go too easy on Ella now, well—Clara was always right.

This morning before classes, I’d decided not to treat her like thin glass anymore.

Well, that wasn’t true. I certainly hadn’t treated her like thin glass last night when I wore that strap-on and fucked her into the wall so hard that not only would Eliza hear from the other side but probably Eliza’s ancestors would hear it too.

But to be fair—she had asked me to go harder. And who was I to say no to those eyes?

“If you’re finally going to show me where you’ve been sneaking off to,” Ella said, standing up taller, “then I’m just glad I won’t have to be so jealous all the time.”

I wrinkled my nose. “The only girl involved in this is Hannah, and she… I’m not interested, to put it lightly.”

Ella went wide-eyed. “Hannah? What are you doing hanging out with her?”

“Mostly yelling at each other. Learning new ways to tell someone to fuck off in Scouse dialect. Listening to her pine over Eliza. Occasionally making a little music. Dodge is here too.”

She smiled thinly, a glassy expression passing over her features. “All the rockers in one place…”

“Ella—”

She shook it off. “I’m all right,” she said quietly.

“If you need—”

“I know. I’ll let you know if I need to back out. But I want to face this.”

Dammit, but I was proud of her, hearing her talk like that.

I put a hand on her upper arm, just letting myself smile at her like a fool for a minute, before I nodded.

“Well, then let’s rock and roll,” I said, opening the door for her, stepping into the practice room.

I’d barely gotten into the room before a balled-up scrap of paper flicked across the room and hit me in the forehead, bouncing off and skittering across the top of the upright piano, and Hannah, the assaulter, shot me a grin.

“I’m not pining for no one,” she said. “You gonna get it through your thick skull at any point I can hear you through the door, you numpty?”

“Nice to see you, too, Hannah,” I said, picking up the paper and unfolding it. Scratchings of melody, chord progression— Hannah and Dodge had a few of them between them, clearly working on writing something. “This a love song you wrote and sent my way?”

“Profess love to a bloody Yank? I’d rather kiss Clara.”

Dodge laughed, spinning his stool from us to look at her, electro-acoustic guitar slung over his shoulders. “Careful saying that,” he said. “Clara might. She kisses people who are absolute disasters and menaces to society.”

“Fuck off, all,” Hannah said, slipping her bass off, hanging it up on the wall as she slid off her stool. “So, your girlfriend finally brought you around.”

I didn’t really feel like denying the word. Ella clearly didn’t, either, beaming at her. “She said you’re just so charming and lovable here that it’d be a pleasure.”

“Figures you’re just as bad as she is,” Hannah said with a dry laugh. “Right, so what, then, you wanna jam with us, or are you just here to watch?”

“I’m just here to watch,” Ella said, at the same time I said, “She’s here to play.” Ella shot me a look.

“I’m not a rock musician. I’m not even a musician in the first place.”

“Shh, shh.” I put a finger to her lips. “You have three more false-modesty tokens to use for the session. Consider carefully where you want to spend them.”

Ella flushed. Dodge chuckled. “Should have figured inviting the both of you around would’ve meant the whole session’s just you flirting.”

I shot him a look. “Like I’m going to stand there and not flirt with Ella? For God’s sake, man, look at her. Not too closely, though. I’ll get jealous.”

Hannah rolled her eyes, taking her bass back down and dropping onto a seat. “Just try not to make out the whole fucking time.”

Apparently I wasn’t the only one who didn’t give a damn anymore, because Ella smiled sweetly at her and said, “I’ll try my best not to, but… look at her.”

“Not too closely, though,” I added.

“Bloody hell,” Hannah laughed. “All right, so what do you wanna do? I know you’re sound enough on the piano, but is that all you do?”

I cut off Ella before she could respond. “She sings, too,” I said, and Ella shot me a look like I’d just run over her puppy.

“Jesus Christ, Lydia, don’t lie like that.”

Dodge grinned at me. “If I duet with her, you gonna get jealous?”

“I am,” I said lightly. “Please do it. I’m hoping it’ll give me some feelings to pour into my music.”

Ella ducked her head, blushing furiously. “You lot—all of you—I don’t know how to sing.”

Hannah snorted. “Yeah, neither does fucking Dodge, and it isn’t stopping him from yowling like a steaming tomcat. Even if you’re just noise, it’s at least going to cover up that awful racket.”

“Ella’s going to play the piano,” I said, making sure to meet her eyes, before I said, with every silent bit of meaning I could press into my voice, “I’ll play cello.”

“Ah.” Worked like a charm—Ella went red, pinching her lips together, not quite looking at my face.

“And I’m going to move things around a little,” I said, “so she and I can pointedly look at each other while we play, so I don’t get too jealous about her singing with the dodgiest bloke I know.”

“Lydia,” Ella protested weakly, but that slight flush of excitement in her eyes said she didn’t entirely hate the idea.

I was drinking in every second of it—ostensibly, I was just trying to distract her mind enough to keep her from overthinking and let her sing and play in front of everyone, but practically?

Practically, it felt damn good to claim her in front of our friends. Casually joining into things with her like this is my girl.

If these feelings didn’t taper out by the end of the program, I was in trouble. We were already almost halfway through the program, and it just kept getting stronger. That was a problem, right?

Didn’t feel like it now.

We shifted around a little, adjusting the piano and moving a chair for the cello, while chattering about our new assignment—unsurprisingly, Hannah wasn’t really in it to win it, mostly just rooting for Eliza to take the grand prize, although from the way she talked about Eliza, she wasn’t feeling perfect about it, either about Eliza’s odds or about how things were between them.

She got quiet, mumbled non-answers on the subject, and even Dodge knew not to push.

“I really don’t know how to sing, you know,” Ella said once we were positioned, her hands on the piano. I clicked my tongue.

“That’s one false-modesty token. You’ve only got two left.”

Hannah laughed. “No one’s recording this shit,” she said. “It’s just us all fucking around looking for inspiration. Be messy and loud and ugly.”

“What am I even supposed to be singing?” Ella said, and Hannah turned and rummaged through a binder she had next to her, tugging out a sheaf of paper.

“I got a couple of songs, just—you know, just some lyrics and chord progressions.”

Ella raised her eyebrows. “You’re a songwriter?”

“Psh.” Hannah kept her eyes on where she shuffled the papers unnecessarily. “That’s a big fucking word.”

I smiled at her. “It means someone who writes lyrics and makes songs out of them.”

“Sod off,” Hannah laughed. “I tried writing lyrics and all that for our band before, but none of it really caught on. I still do it just to mess around, though.”

Judging from that wistful tone—and how little she seemed to care about half the band—it was probably less that it didn’t catch on and more that Eliza didn’t take to it. Still, I wasn’t going to push the matter. “Any duets?”

“Got a couple. One that’s sad, longing, about losing someone. One that’s horny.”

I scowled. “For a duet between her and Dodge?”

Dodge laughed. “She’ll be looking at you the whole time, relax.”

“Well.” I pulled the cello close to me, between my legs, not missing the way Ella’s eyes followed the movement, a slight hitch in her breath. “If she’s looking at me while singing horny lyrics, actually, maybe I’m good with it.”

Hannah scoffed, shoving the papers in front of Ella to hand to me and Dodge. “Fuck’s sake. Just try not to start fucking mid-song.”

“I’ll see what I can do,” I said, and it was an understatement to say I loved the way Ella was so transfixed on me with the cello, holding eye contact with her, that she didn’t notice Hannah handing her the papers until Hannah waved them around, and she jerked back red-faced to take them.

“We won’t,” she said, taking the papers and passing some of them along to us. I took one, speaking casually.

“We’ll wait until we’re out of here.”

Ella ran with it, which was unbelievably sexy. “Or until you two are out of here.”

“Don’t stop on my behalf,” Dodge said. Ella wrinkled her nose.

“Thanks… for the offer.”