Page 13 of Paint Our Song (Cloverlily #1)

A fter Miles passes by Home Depot and gets a new pair of gardening gloves for Mom, he takes his phone out to send Calvin a text.

Me: I’m at the mall, coming up to the theaters

Cat-vin: Ok.

Even though it’s already seven p.m., there’s still a good amount of people in the small three-storey mall, most likely because it’s a Saturday night. Miles heads to the ticketing lobby of the cinemas and spots Calvin immediately, sitting on a bench with his ball cap drawn low over his eyes. He’s got his head down and is going through his phone, and Miles wonders if he’s doing that to look busy and shield his face.

“Hey,” Miles says, stepping in front of him.

Calvin looks up, his eyes shadowed by the cap. He smiles and Miles’s heartbeat quickens. “Sorry. Some teenagers at the arcade recognized me, and it became a thing. So, I bought tickets and snuck into the theater.”

“I’m surprised they didn’t follow you inside.”

He grins. “Guess they didn’t want to learn about the ocean. They probably would have if it were Theo. Or Chase.”

What a funny thing to say, really—funnier even when Miles realizes, right at that moment, that he’d follow Calvin to the end of the world if he could.

“The arcade’s still crowded, but I think you’ll be able to get past them if I walk next to you.” Miles pokes the tip of his cap down so that it shadows his eyes again. Calvin gets the hint and bows his head a bit.

Truly committing to being a helpful impromptu bodyguard, Miles puts an arm around his shoulders and pulls him close, just so his arm blocks some of his face. Also, so that his tattooed arm is squeezed between them.

He didn’t think this through. Calvin’s warm, and he smells really nice.

“This is stupid. I’m so sorry. I only wanted to walk around the mall,” Calvin murmurs. “It wasn’t even this bad until we announced the break-up.”

Miles is still very much distracted by being this close to him, so he doesn’t say anything. He only squeezes his shoulder and leads him toward the escalators, which are right in front of the arcade. It seems to work because none of the teenagers even look up in their direction, and Calvin gives a sigh of relief right when they step on the escalator. He gently nudges Miles to let go, and he does, with some disappointment .

Their victory’s short-lived because as soon as they step on the second level, a young woman with a Cloverlily shirt spots Calvin and gapes. Immediately, she tugs on the sleeve of her boyfriend. She’s blocking the way toward the escalator that heads down to the first floor.

“Over here.” Miles holds Calvin by the elbow and leads him in the other direction.

They turn a corner and Miles is surprised to see that the elevator he was planning to take instead has an “under construction” sign taped to it. Well, fuck.

Calvin tilts his head and laughs.

Frustrated, Miles looks around. There’s a dim sum restaurant that’s full, and a shoe store, and— there.

“Ooooh, this is new!” Miles excitedly points at the big bright label that says “Karaoke”.

Calvin frowns. “Are you for real?”

“Yes, it’ll be fun; plus, we’ll get some privacy.” Without waiting for a response, Miles pulls him toward the counter. “Hi! Can we get a room?”

The teenager behind the counter looks between them. “Is it only you and your boyfriend?”

Miles says, not thinking because of how he wants to move this along, “Yes, only us.”

“No, we’re not—Miles, stop.” Calvin pushes at his shoulder and scowls. His face goes through about five different shades of red. “You can’t say things like that.”

The teenager gives them both an odd look. So much for not making this conversation any longer than it has to be. Miles gestures for Calvin to go ahead inside while he gets them a room. “Go. I’ll follow.”

“Fine,” Calvin mutters, but he goes ahead anyway and disappears behind the red door.

Miles reserves a private room for two and follows him. The door leads to a dim hallway with red walls and half a dozen doors, all of which have letters on them. There’s the faint sound of music in the hallway, all unintelligible and jumbled.

“You can’t say things like that because they fuel rumors,” Calvin tells him, clearly not over what Miles can only interpret had been a harmless lie.

“I’m sorry. Not again.” Taking pity on him, Miles puts his hands up in an apology.

“What now?”

“Room C!” Miles leads the way. “I only booked it for half an hour.”

The room is small and windowless and clearly meant for couples. It’s even darker than the hallway with neon fluorescent lights built into the wall, and there’s a black two-seater couch with a low coffee table.

“Oh, cool. Look at all these songs.” Miles points at the screen where there’s a massive list of options.

“This is weird, Miles.”

He realizes, the awkwardness seeping in, that Calvin is saying weird when what he actually means is intimate and romantic, in a way .

Calvin grimaces as he looks around the room. “I think I’ve seen this couch on PornHub.”

Miles chokes and almost falls over said couch, and his entire face burns. Clearly bewildered by his own words, Calvin scrubs a hand over his face.

“Please forget I said that.” Calvin’s voice is weak.

“… Aaand now you made this weird.”

“It was already weird!”

“Remember when I said you had a dirty mind?”

“I don’t have a dirty mind.”

“If you say so,” Miles sing-songs.

“Shut it.” Calvin levels a glare at him.

Cackling, Miles is still very much embarrassed, but he plops down on the couch, anyway, and tries to salvage the situation. He fumbles with the remote. “Anyway, I thought this would be fun. I haven’t been to one in a while and it looked like a good way to lose your fans. If you really don’t want to, then we can go.”

The couch dips when Calvin sits beside him, trying to stay as far from him as possible. “I’m not singing,” he says.

“Fine, suit yourself. Do you think they have songs from your band?”

That earns him another glare.

He settles on “Sweet Caroline,” and Calvin lets out a soft wheeze when he starts singing. Miles grins. He knows he’s terrible at singing, and he doesn’t care—especially when Calvin’s shoulders start shaking and he leans down and buries his face in his arms.

“You’re terrible,” Calvin says .

“Yeah, I’m not the singer here.” He points the mic at Calvin. “Go on!”

“No.”

“You sing on stage all the time.”

“Yeah, but you’re making me nervous.”

Baffled, Miles makes a face and belts out the next line to the song. Calvin laughs again and shakes his head. For a moment, and not for the first time, Miles is stunned by Calvin—at his rosy cheeks, at how he throws his head back when he laughs, and how he’s smiling wider than Miles has ever seen him.

Is his terrible singing doing this? He might just sing even worse.

When the song ends, he tries shoving the other mic in Calvin’s direction, and almost gets kicked in the shin for it. There’s a lull, an unknown melody playing as the machine waits for the next chosen song.

“Why am I making you nervous? I’ve heard you sing countless times,” Miles says. “Is this like when you don’t want your family watching you perform?”

Strangely, Calvin looks embarrassed by Miles’s statement. Maybe he’s hit the mark, somehow. What changed, even? Why won’t he let Miles hear him sing?

“No,” he says, and Miles is unconvinced. “It’s because this is weird. Like I said.”

Okay. Now Miles is taking this as a personal challenge, and Calvin yelps when Miles holds him back by the shoulder and shoves the mic to his face. It’s kind-of funny how much Calvin is resisting, and it’s probably just pride at this point. He’s like a kid who petulantly says he doesn’t want to do something and then sticks to that decision.

“Miles, knock it off!” Calvin protests, pushing him away.

“One song.”

“No.”

“This was way more fun in my head when I thought you were going to sing,” Miles admits.

Calvin squints. Then he rolls his eyes and groans, grabbing the other mic from the table. “Fine.”

“Yes!”

Miles quickly realizes, in horror, that this was another bad idea in his growing list of bad ideas. Calvin chooses the first song that he recognizes, which is “My Girl” by The Temptations. He sings it so fucking effortlessly that Miles forgets he’s supposed to be singing along, and only remembers when Calvin shoves his shoulder.

Together, they sound horrible, all thanks to Miles. He shouts out the words in the worst tone ever and Calvin ends up laughing more than once.

He wouldn’t have it any other way. Miles is having fun, and judging from the way Calvin’s grinning, he is too.

Between songs, Miles falls back against the couch and wheezes. “I wish I could go back in time and tell my younger self I’d be singing with Cloverlily’s guitarist one day.”

“You make it sound like we’ve been playing forever.”

“Five years is a long time.”

“I guess.” Calvin’s expression falters, and Miles instantly regrets his comment.

“How impossible would it be to get your band mates here, too? I’d give up all my money for that.”

“That reminds me… Chase and Gil want to come to Ridgeford. They’ve been bugging me about my posts all week. They say this place must be a dream if it’s got me posting on social media.”

Miles spins toward him excitedly. “Do they know you’re helping us out?”

“Yes. They want to help out, too. We don’t have a gig for another week or so, and I think we’ve all somehow agreed that we’re done rehearsing as a group, so now everyone’s just doing their own thing and trying to get through these remaining shows. So… yeah. They’re both bored out of their minds.”

“You should tell them to come.”

“Might be fun.” Calvin takes his phone out and starts typing a message.

While Calvin’s preoccupied, Miles rapidly scrolls through the list of songs. Then he spots Cloverlily on the list, in a random spot right below Madonna. They should really do this alphabetically, or include a search function. “Hey! Your songs are here!”

“No, they aren’t.”

“They are.” Miles bounces his knees, beaming.

Unfortunately, Calvin’s glued to his phone and not paying attention to his awesome discovery. “Chase and Gil are driving here, maybe this weekend.”

“Awesome. I’ll let the front desk know.”

When Calvin finally puts his phone away, he gives Miles an odd look. “Are you really that excited because they’re coming?”

“Yes, absolutely. Also, because of this!” Miles points at the screen. There are two songs by the band, “Garden” and “Someone To You.” Calvin looks horrified when he sees it.

“Please don’t choose one of those.”

“I totally am. Let’s sing ‘Garden.’” He loves this song because it reminds him of Mom’s garden, and also because it’s the band’s debut song. It was the first thing Miles ever heard from them.

Calvin tries to grab the remote from him. It startles Miles, but he’s not about to let Calvin win this, and he cackles as he attempts to get away. Calvin shoves him, and dear god, how’s he so fucking strong? And the air is knocked out of Miles as he falls back against the couch.

“What the hell?” Miles wheezes. He holds the remote tightly against his chest as if it were a prized possession and scrambles to break free once more. Scowling, Calvin throws a leg over Miles and digs his knee in the space between Miles’s hip and the couch, and pins him down by the shoulders. Miles’s brain short-circuits. He squeaks, “It’s only a song!”

“Not that one,” Calvin says, face red. When Calvin settles his weight on his lap, he makes a surprised noise and goes limp.

Miles gives up and lets him take the stupid remote, shoving it at him.

Smirking, Calvin lets go of Miles’s shoulders so that he can take the remote, and sits up in the process. His hips shift against Miles’s and, caught off-guard, Miles makes an embarrassing sound that’s somewhere between a sigh and a groan.

That finally gets Calvin to realize that he’s straddling him, and for a moment, he looks as horrified as Miles feels.

Miles wishes he’d get off him, but instead, Calvin stays put and his expression melts into something much darker. It makes Miles’s breath get stuck in his throat.

There’s something here that Miles can’t explain, a heavy tension in the air, and the TV continues to play that nameless tune as Miles watches the lights flicker over Calvin’s face.

He doesn’t miss the way Calvin’s gaze drifts down to his lips. Then it snaps back up to meet his stare, and Calvin’s jaw clenches.

“Um,” Miles says, feeling dizzy and overwhelmed, especially with how the scent of Calvin’s vanilla soaped skin floods his senses. Calvin is a warm weight on his lap and Miles is about to have a really embarrassing problem in his pants if he doesn’t move. And he’s not sure their friendship can survive that. “Can you get off me?”

Calvin climbs off him, and Miles doesn’t say anything as he sits up and blinks at the tv screen. The couch dips as Calvin moves to the furthest edge, seemingly trying to put as much distance as he can between them.

“Sorry,” Calvin mumbles.

Miles is kind of afraid he’ll tackle him again if he says something wrong. “No, you’re good. That was a totally normal reaction.”

He gets a glare in return.

A knock jolts both of them. “Five more minutes,” says the staff, his voice muffled through the door.

There’s silence, and Miles still isn’t sure what happened here. He looks at Calvin, then at the screen, then back at Calvin. When he can’t hold it in anymore, Miles wheezes. “I can’t believe you tried to murder me over your own song.”

“Shut up.” The corner of Calvin’s mouth twitches. “We might as well go.”

“Wait, no, tell me. What was that about?”

Calvin doesn’t answer, simply takes the gardening gloves from the table and throws them at him.

***

It’s not until much later that night, when Miles is alone in his childhood bedroom, that he attempts to organize his steadily growing jumble of thoughts.

Calvin’s a puzzle he’s constantly trying to figure out. He confuses him to no end. Miles had even forgotten to actually show him the sketches he made for his commission, which was the reason they were supposed to meet up tonight.

He’s listened to him sing so many times, and he’s heard their songs on loop for years. It doesn’t make sense to Miles why Calvin would react the way he did—literally pinning him down and straddling him, just to stop him from listening to their debut song. Miles can’t forget the memory of it—the weight on his lap, the sound of his breath, how his gaze had dropped to Miles’s lips as if he could have kissed him if he asked.

In a moment of clarity, Miles realizes that he’s never wanted to kiss someone so badly as much as he wanted to kiss Calvin at that moment.

As if his world has been turned upside-down, Miles also realizes that he wants more than just to kiss him. He wants things beyond that, such as romance and dates. He wants to go on more car trips, hang out in the roof garden, and do karaoke again. He’d watch a stupidly boring ocean documentary with Calvin, just to spend more time with him.

And, earlier, if Calvin had shifted, even slightly—if he had leaned down, or if Miles had lifted himself on his elbows and inched closer? If Miles had put a hand on his nape and brushed his lips against his jaw? He wonders what sounds Calvin would have made if he had let Miles do all that.

Fuck. Fuck. Heat pools in Miles’s gut. He rolls over and groans into his pillow. This can’t happen.

He can’t think of Calvin in that way, because they’re friends—they’re friends, right? That’s what he had been thinking earlier, when he came very close to ruining it all.

“Stop it,” he grumbles, willing his dick to stop reacting the way it is.

He should sketch. That will help him get his mind off things.

Half an hour later, he stares down at a page that’s a myriad of different angles of Calvin’s profile. Calvin, with his cap drawn low over his eyes. Calvin, smirking. There’s one of him smiling in that endearingly shy way he does, with one corner of his mouth slightly curled and his chin tucked to his chest.

Oh, god. He’s fucked.