Beneath The Skin(207)

Just then, I notice a lighting instrument that seems slightly out of place. It seems to have a strange gobo installed—if I’m looking at it correctly. Gobos are basically stencils placed inside or in front of an instrument to control the shape of the light that shines out of it. I squint at that gobo, trying to make out its shape. Maybe it’s something the band uses. Maybe it’s their logo or something.

A vibration ringing through the table brings my attention back to my friends. I look up at a waving hand. It’s Brant, his eyes flashing with excitement. He nudges Dmitri, then starts to move his hands.

Holy shit. Brant is signing at me.

He says: I want to have sex with the table really bad. I like singing vaginas. Can I suck your cock please?

I quirk an eyebrow. The fuck …?

Dmitri starts laughing his ass off, which inspires a look of utter bafflement on Brant’s face. Too late, Brant realizes he’s been pranked, as I watch his mouth form the words, “What did I just sign? Dmitri?? What the fuck did I just sign to Clayton?”

I join in the laughter, unable to help myself. Brant meets my eyes, shaking his head with his mouth wrinkled in frustration, then he grabs Dmitri and puts him in a headlock, wrestling him to the ground and inspiring an eye roll both from Dmitri’s girl as well as Brant’s.

I notice light flood in from the front door, but sink when I see it isn’t Dessie. My eyes comb the crowd, anxious for her to walk through that door. She’s been working on a new song. I can’t fucking wait to hear it.

Yes, hear it. Every time she sings, I hear her music. I hear it in the way her eyes clench shut on the high notes and her nose wrinkles, as if the beauty of her music is so great, she literally feels pain. I hear it in the way she caresses the microphone stand, squirming and embracing it like a lover. I hear it in the way her lips move, working every lyric and squeezing every drop of passion from those notes that vibrate out from her core.

Make no mistake about it. My world may be silent, but it’s her song that fills every inch of space between her mouth and my patient, hungry ears. I love that woman with every damaged piece of me—both good and bad.

Now if she’d just get her sexy ass here, I could tell that to her face.



DESSIE



“We’re so fucking late,” I cry out.

“Blame it on the damn GPS. Ugh. This is such a mess,” whines Victoria.

“I told you to use Google Maps.”

“I know, I know. We’re basically on the right road, it’s just that it’s—”

“Bumper-to-bumper traffic.” I sulk in my seat, frustrated beyond measure. I really should have planned this whole thing better. “This is all my fault. By the time we get there, everyone will have gone home. I’m going to be singing to a table of two.”

“Dessie.” Victoria faces me importantly, taking her eyes off the road since we’re not moving at all anyway. I look at her, paying attention despite my sad eyes and pouty lip. “You can sing to a table of one for all I care. Clayton’s the only one who matters where this particular song is concerned, anyway. And he sure as hell will wait for you.”

I turn to my side, staring at Victoria. I feel my insides calming at her words. “You’re so right,” I mutter finally.

“Just you and him,” she goes on soothingly. “It doesn’t matter what time we get there. Screw everyone else.”

I smile. “You remember when we first met and had that falling out and, like, we hated each other for a month?”

“It was longer than a month, but yeah, I remember.” She smirks knowingly, looking away with a chuckle.

“I’m so glad we made up. We make much better friends than enemies.”

She nods slowly. “Agreed.”

“Even if you have terrible taste in music.” I grab the iPhone off the dash, thumbing through her Spotify for something better to jam to.

She totally lets me, maybe too tired from today’s “adventure” to care. The car moves a little, then brakes again. Moves, brakes. Moves, brakes. It becomes a steady, tortuous rhythm that genuinely makes me consider if we’ll even make it back to the Throng before midnight.

“So why him?”

I look up from the phone, thrown by the question. “What do you mean?”

“Why Clayton?” She shrugs, her hands hanging from the bottom of the steering wheel. “I mean, everyone and their dog warned you about him. He has anger issues. Or had. Or has. He’s got this big shady question mark of a past.”

“Not so much a question mark anymore,” I point out quietly.

“I’m certainly not trying to plant a big ol’ bag of doubt in your heart,” she adds with a sympathetic touch to my arm, “but there was just a zillion reasons to break it off and find someone else when you two first started dating and things got rocky. Why’d you stick around?” she asks, cocking her head at me. “Why him?”