Page 114 of Discordant Cultivation

“Dreams get destroyed when your body’s haunted...”

The pain bloomed through his chest, unlocking something that protective distance had kept safely contained. He was sixteen again, curled up in a bathroom that smelled like mildew, writing words that felt like the only alternative to disappearing entirely. The foster parents who looked through him. The caseworkers who forgot his name. The endless parade of temporary places that were never, ever home.

“Close my eyes and count to ten...”

Vale’s hand gentled on his chest, shifting from pressure to something almost like a caress. The contrast made Kieran sob harder, voice breaking apart and reforming into prayer.

“Maybe I will wake again...”

When the last note faded, Kieran sagged back against Vale’s chest, shaking with the aftermath of another emotional excavation. Vale held him and kissed the top of his head while murmuring praise that felt more sustaining than oxygen.

“Perfect,” Vale breathed. “Absolutely perfect. Do you feel that? Do you feel what you just created?”

Kieran nodded, unable to speak, tears still streaming down his face. He felt hollowed out, scraped clean, like Vale had reached inside him and rearranged everything that made him who he was.

“That’s the version we’re going to record,” Vale said, turning Kieran in his arms to face him. “That’s the version the world is going to hear. And they’re going to know—everyoneis going to know—that you’re not performing pain. You’relivingit.”

He kissed Kieran then, tenderly and gently, and Kieran kissed back because this was the part he understood. The pain, then the praise, then the warmth that made the pain worth surviving. It was the rhythm of his entire existence.

“I’m so proud of you,” Vale whispered against his lips. “So proud of what you’re willing to give for your art. For us.”

Us.

The song was real now, honest in ways that his protected version could never have achieved. What Vale had done to unlock it—that was the cost. And Kieran stopped pretending he wasn’t willing to pay.

“Can we...” He swallowed. “C-can we record it now? While it’s still—”

“While you’re still open,” Vale finished, understanding immediately. “Yes. Get back on the mic. I’ll run the board.”

He pressed one more kiss to Kieran’s forehead, then released him and moved toward the control booth. Kieran watched him go, feeling the absence of Vale’s warmth like a physical ache.

This is who I am now. This is what my art requires.

He stepped back to the microphone, adjusting the headphones, and waited for Vale’s signal. Through the glass, Vale gave him a small nod, fingers poised over the recording controls.

The red light blinked on.

Kieran closed his eyes, letting the residual pain in his chest guide him back to that place, and sang.

35

I'm a storm inside a cage that's built to keep me safe; And I love and hate the keepers of this place…

Vale

Vale spent the morning reviewing recordings from the past week—‘Poison Saviors’ and ‘Broken‘, that would go on Kieran’s debut album. Each playback revealed layers he hadn’t fully appreciated in the moment, nuances in the vocal delivery that spoke of complete psychological transformation.

This morning’s session had been particularly revelatory. Watching Kieran perform ‘Poison Saviors’ without hesitation left Vale breathless. Kieran sang with vulnerability that only came from complete acceptance. No walls, no protection, no careful preservation of identity separate from what Vale cultivated. Just pure artistic truth pulled from lived experience, each phrase a confession of how thoroughly he’d been reshaped.

The transformation wasn’t just vocal. It was existential.

Is this what it feels like when the rose finally blooms exactly as you’ve pruned it? When cultivation becomes indistinguishable from natural growth?

It was a success, but underneath the satisfaction ran a thread of something Vale hadn’t anticipated—the strange ache of watching someone become so perfectly what he shaped themto be that they no longer need his hand guiding every petal’s unfurling.

We’re not captor and captive anymore. Not student and teacher. We’re... something else.

“We have that interview scheduled for after lunch,” Vale said, finding Kieran sitting on the floor in the living room with his guitar. “RemixReacts—they’ve done reaction videos to most of your viral content. We should watch their videos before the interview.”