Page 121 of Fragile Facade

But mostly because loving him has given me this gift back, and I credit myself for that. For being strong enough to open up to him, and for letting him see me without any of my masks.

I don’t know who leads, his strings or my keys, or maybe we’re just building off each other, but the music we make starts off slow and emotional. The music room becomes our stage, the asylum becomes our amphitheatre, and Moros becomes the one and only stop on our tour. The stone walls absorb our melancholy, not letting it leach out to ears beyond, but when the dark tones and slow sounds become something more, I press my back to his and create music with the man I love.

We play together for so long that the moon disappears from one window and reappears in another. A raven pecks at the glass pane, and seconds later, rain taps on the window to join our beat.

And then we stop. Together. Breathing.

Because there’s nothing left to say.

Back-to-back, I lean on Soren and he leans on me, letting the sound of the light rain wash away the overwhelmingness of the night. Looking down to my hands still resting on the keys, I notice that I’ve bled all over them. My split knuckles are shiny and wet, the keys are turning sticky, and my regrowing fingernails are bleeding again.

Somewhere in the ward we’re in, a patient cackles and doors slam, but the sounds don’t jar me as much as Soren’s soft question. “Did you get it back?” he asks.

I remove my fingers from the keys and stare at the stains. The white and black keys and the light wood no longer seem so daunting. Did I get music back tonight?

“Yeah.”

He doesn’t take the credit like he normally would, and he doesn’t ask anything else. Instead, he leans against my back, rests the back of his head to mine, and sighs contentedly. And because he’s so calm, so silent and supportive, I let go of everything that just happened at the town meeting and put my trust in him. In us. In music and the ability to interpret it again while the sounds around us simmer along with us.

Later, after my heart has settled and my breathing has regulated, my knuckles ache when Soren says, “It was a confession.”

I try to think back on the music I played. “Confession of what?”

“Guilt.”

“No.” I shake my head.

“Shame.”

I shake my head again.

“Acceptance, then.”

I start to shake my head, but I stop. Yeah, maybe it was an ode to acceptance. Maybe I am okay with where my life has gone. Maybe all the tricks and the lies and the manipulations have benefitted me in a way I never thought they would. Because I’m here without a mask, and I have my brother, Vile House, a town to protect, and Soren.

I’m seen by him. As me, Killian and Riot all meshed into the sole version of who I really am. And I’m not a nobody like I feared I might be.

But because I don’t know how to say all that, I reach back, grab Soren’s arm, and pull him around until he’s straddling my lap. The piano keys all snarl when his back leans against them, but I bring his mouth to mine to block it out.

Maskless, I lose myself in the man who defies death.

EPILOGUE

GHOST

This isthe most embarrassing shit of my life. It’s pissing me off to sit here, watching him pick the scabs on his knuckles and grinning like he doesn’t give a single shit about any of it, while I feel my cheeks flush so harshly that my neck even feels hot.

My medical file is thick, but his is thicker, and it’s yet another region of our dynamic that makes it seem like he’s winning. Like,oh, look at poor Riot who has to overcome so many more mental blockades just to be with you.

Pathetic.

“Why the fuck are we here?” I bark, my patience dwindling to nothing. “We don’t need this. I don’t need this.”

Director lifts a brow at my outburst, leaning against the treatment room wall with his hands in the pockets of his lab coat. “No?”

“Fuck no. I know what I’m doing.”

Killian snorts at that, and I’m so on edge I can’t hold back my punch. My fist flies at his gut, but he grabs my wrist and pulls me close, lips against my ear. “You never know when to shut your mouth.”