Page 22 of The Sound Between Us (Vinyl Hearts #1)

don’t call me muse

Harrison

Studio A feels like a mausoleum today.

It’s fair to say, I didn’t want to come. Didn’t want to leave Seren behind, scrolling bad headlines and second-guessing this week we’ve given ourselves.

I’m in the same chair I’ve occupied for three months, staring at blank notebook pages while Jamie scrolls through his phone. Dex is tormenting the Persian rug, dragging his foot through the pile like a bored five-year-old.

The silence should be creative. Instead, it’s suffocating.

“You’re thinking too hard again, mate.” Dex doesn’t look up from his rug archaeology.

I tap my pen against the empty page. The sound is sharp, trying to carve through the stillness. “I’m not thinking at all. That’s the problem.”

“Maybe we should try a different approach.” Jamie finally lifts his eyes from whatever digital rabbit hole he’s been exploring. “Sample something, build on it. There’s this track from the eighties?—”

“We’re not becoming a covers band.”

It comes out sharper than I mean it to, and Jamie raises his hands in surrender. Through the control room glass, Henry paces with his phone pressed to his ear, probably explaining to the label why another day’s gone up in smoke. His gestures are getting increasingly frantic.

I refocus on the guitar in my hands, trying to pull something new from familiar strings. But everything sounds hollow. Echoes of songs we’ve already written. Nothing real. Nothing alive.

She’s probably reading right now. I check my phone for the fifteenth time today, the screen lighting up to mock me with zero notifications. Or making terrible coffee in my kitchen and cursing my machine for being too bloody complicated.

The thought makes something loosen in my chest. Last night, watching her curled on my sofa, barefoot and asking how my day was—it felt more honest than anything I’ve done in months.

I put the guitar down mid-chord. It’s pointless.

“Right.” I stand abruptly. The leather chair squeaks in protest, probably the most musical sound we’ve produced all day. “That’s enough.”

Henry appears before I can reach the door, looking like a man watching his retirement fund catch fire.

“Harrison, we’ve got deadlines?—”

“We’ve got nothing.” I cut through his panic. “And staring at the wall isn’t going to change that.”

“Actually, speaking of nothing...” Henry blocks my path to the door, arms crossed. “Want to explain the photos?”

“What photos?”

“Don’t play dumb. You and Seren Rogers leaving the awards together. The internet’s having a field day.”

“Good for the internet.”

“Harrison.” His voice drops to that dangerous manager tone. “This could actually be useful. A collaboration with Damon Rogers’ daughter? The publicity writes itself. ”

Something cold and sharp unfurls in my chest. “She’s not a commodity.”

“But a collab with Damon Rogers...”

“You said no more collabs.” My voice is flat, warning.

“I meant shit ones with no currency.” Henry’s eyes light up with greed. “This has actual narrative. Star-crossed musical royalty, forbidden romance?—”

“Fuck off, Henry.”

I push past him, leaving him spluttering in the doorway. Behind me, I can hear Dex snort with laughter.

“Where are you going?” Henry calls after me.

“Home.”

“We’ve got three hours left!”

“Then write something yourself.”

I’m already gone before he can respond.

The moment I open the front door, I know she’s here. The air smells different. Floral and clean, wild honeysuckle that doesn’t belong in my sterile house. And then I hear her voice, soft and slightly off-key, humming something I don’t recognise.

She’s curled on the sofa, bare feet tucked under her, drowning in my t-shirt and the yoga pants my assistant dropped off.

A book in her lap, thick, literary, probably tragic knowing her taste.

When she looks up, she smiles. Soft. Unknowing.

She doesn’t realise the effect she has just by being here, by existing in my space as though she belongs.

“You’re back early.” She marks her place with a finger, studying my face. “How was your day of musical genius?”

“Absolutely fucking terrible.”

Her laugh is surprised, delighted. “That bad? ”

“Worse. We spent four hours achieving the musical equivalent of watching paint dry.” I collapse into the armchair across from her, suddenly exhausted. “Jamie suggested we sample an eighties track. Dex played the same three chords for an hour. I think I heard my soul leave my body.”

“Poor baby.” Her voice is all mock sympathy, but there’s warmth underneath. “What exactly does a failed writing session look like? Do you all just stare at each other in creative despair?”

“Pretty much. Although Dex has perfected the art of making carpet patterns with his foot. Very avant-garde.”

She tucks her legs up, making room on the sofa. An invitation I shouldn’t accept but can’t resist. I move over, settling beside her but maintaining careful distance. She smells of my shower gel and something that’s entirely her.

“Play me something,” she says suddenly.

“What?”

“Play me something you wrote today. Let me hear how terrible it was.”

I laugh, but it’s hollow. “There was nothing to play. That’s the point.”

“Bullshit. There’s always something. Even if it’s awful.” She leans forward, eyes bright with interest. “Come on, what did you attempt before giving up?”

“You really want to hear musical mediocrity?”

“I live for musical mediocrity. It’s my natural habitat.”

I get up and grab the guitar from the corner, settling back beside her. Our knees bump as I adjust the instrument, and she doesn’t pull away.

“Right, but you asked for this.” I play the chord progression we’d been torturing all morning. It’s bland, predictable, the musical equivalent of beige wallpaper.

She winces dramatically. “Oh, that’s proper awful.”

“Thank you. Very helpful.”

“No, wait.” She reaches for my hand on the fret board, her fingers covering mine. The contact sends electricity racing up my arm. “Try this instead.”

She guides my fingers to a different position. The chord that emerges is richer, more complex, with an unexpected melancholy that makes the hair on my arms stand up.

“How did you?—?”

“The original was too safe. Music isn’t supposed to be safe.” Her hand is still covering mine, and I can feel the warmth of her palm against my knuckles. “Try it again, but add this.”

She shows me another variation, and suddenly the progression has depth, has story. Has the kind of emotional weight that makes you want to keep listening.

“Bloody hell, Seren.”

“It was already there. You just needed to stop being afraid of it.”

I play it through again, feeling the song take shape under my fingers. She hums along, finding a melody line that weaves through the chords as though it was always meant to be there.

“That’s gorgeous,” I whisper, caught up in the sound of her voice layering over the guitar, there’s a catch in my chest that hurts. “Sing it properly.”

“I don’t sing properly.”

“You’re singing right now.”

“I’m humming. There’s a difference.”

“Seren.” I stop playing, turning to face her fully. “That melody is perfect. Don’t waste it on false modesty.”

She bites her lower lip, a gesture I’m learning to recognise as her tell when she’s fighting with herself about whether to trust me.

“It’s probably shit.”

“It’s not.”

“You don’t know that. ”

“I do, actually. I’ve been doing this for fifteen years.” I play the chord progression again, waiting. “Trust me.”

She closes her eyes and sings, soft and tentative at first, then with growing confidence. Her voice is untrained but honest, with a raw quality that most singers spend years trying to fake. The melody she creates is simple but devastating, the kind of hook that gets under your skin and stays there.

When she finishes, the silence charges the air between us.

“Fuck me, that’s beautiful.”

Colour rises in her cheeks. “It’s just humming around.”

“It’s not just anything.” I set the guitar aside. “That’s what we’ve been missing. That honesty.”

“Harrison—”

“Come to the studio with me tomorrow.”

The words tumble out desperate and raw. She pulls back like I’ve struck her.

“Absolutely not.”

“We couldn’t write a grocery list today. We’ve got nothing. But if you were there...”

“I’m not your magical music fairy, Harrison.” Sharp now. Defensive. All that softness gone.

“I know that. But you make me remember what music is supposed to feel like.”

She’s up, pacing to the window. City lights twinkle below, her silhouette dark against the glass. “This is exactly what I was afraid of. You need something from me.”

“Seren—”

“No, this is how it always starts.” She whirls around, arms tight around herself. “Someone makes you feel safe, makes you think they care about you, and then suddenly there’s a price. There’s always a fucking price.”

Her shoulders hunch like she’s bracing for a blow that’s already landed too many times. She’s right. I am asking for something .

“Please.”

Just that. Simple. Honest. The word hangs between us.

She studies my face like she’s reading fine print on a contract that might destroy her.

“One session.” Slow. Careful. “I sit in the corner. I observe. I don’t participate.”

“Deal.”

We both know she’s lying. Music doesn’t work that way; it pulls you in whether you want it to or not.

“But if anyone calls me your muse, I’m burning the place down.”

“I’ll provide the matches.”

She catches my wrist as I pass her chair. Brief contact—her fingers against my pulse where my heart hammers out a rhythm that would make Dex jealous. My breath catches.

“One session, Harrison. Then we figure out what this actually is.”

The promise and threat in her voice makes something dangerous unfurl in my chest. Because I already know what this is.

This is me falling completely, catastrophically, in love with the one person I’ve promised not to touch.

And tomorrow, I’m asking her to help me make music about it.