Descending Darkness(67)

“Umm…how about “Love Song?” Can you play that?”

I scoff. Can I play that? I place my fingers on the correct keys and press down, getting familiar to the weight of the keys. When I enter the first chord, I look up at Natalie. She is going to sing first. “Head underwater…” she starts off. Wow, she can sing too. Her voice is closer to Sara Bareilles’s voice than mine is.

She stops singing, and I join in on the second verse. Looking down at the piano briefly, I make sure my fingers stay on the correct chords. We both sing on the chorus. Natalie leans on the piano and smiles at me. This is fun. I’ve sung with Colton a couple times, but besides him, no one else will sing with me. I let Natalie have more solos, while I sing most of the background voices.

When the song ends, I look up at Natalie and laugh. She is smiling widely at me. “You have a great voice,” I tell her.

“Am I the only girl mage that wasn’t blessed with any musical abilities? Really?”

“Play something else. You have a much better voice than I do. More of a range.” Natalie says. I shake my head and start scooting the bench back. “Please.”

I hear a chorus behind me, telling me to sing something else. “Guys, I only know slow songs on the piano…” I am hoping that that will be enough to get me out of this.

Colton pushes me back in the chair again. “Play something, Ryanne. Please.”

“That’s not fair. You guys can’t use Colton to get your way! That’s a whole new level of peer pressure.” Gosh, darn it. “Ugh, fine, but this is the last song. And I need to listen to it while I play.” I lean forward and plug my iPod into the dock. I turn the music down, so I can barely hear it over the piano.

I place my hands on the keys and close my eyes. I love this song, but I’m not as familiar with it on the piano. This is one of those songs where you get lost in the music. You have to feel it to do it justice. I start singing quietly, gradually singing louder as I get further into the song.

When I get to the chorus, I am thinking only of the song. The room around me disappears. It is just me and the piano. This song quickly picks up speed, and there are so many spots where I could mess up. I sing out the chorus, letting my voice flow out of my mouth–the words mingling with the air around me. I start moving along with the song, feeling the rhythm beneath my fingertips as they move across the cool keys. Taking a deep breath, I sing the chorus holding the last note out. This section is repeated four times.

My fingers hit the last notes as my voice slowly crescendos to silence. Everyone is standing around the piano now. I bite my lip and turn to Colton. Why are they all looking at me like that?

“What?”

“How do you do that?” Natalie asks me.

“Sing? Everyone can sing.”

“No no, it’s not that. I don’t know what it is exactly,” she pauses. “You feel the song. When I sing, I’m still aware of everything around me. I don’t get lost in the song like you do. You completely tune out your surroundings and focus only on the music. It’s fascinating to watch.” I stare at Natalie. Everyone feels a song in some way or another. It’s not that big of a deal.

I stand up from the piano bench and walk over toward Colton. As I get closer, a low buzzing fills the air, and the room starts tilting. I reach a hand out and grab onto the edge of the piano, steadying myself, waiting for the dizzy sensation to pass. Colton reaches out and grabs onto my arm. “Are you alright?”

I blink a couple of times, and everything stops spinning. “Yeah, sorry. I get clumsy when I’m embarrassed.”

Colton narrows his eyes at me. “Are you sure?”

“You know how much I hate attention,” I cover. That’s weird. Maybe my anemia is coming back. When I was little, I had anemia, which often made me dizzy when I stood up. I used to have to take pills to keep my iron levels normal, but Logan assured me that it shouldn’t come back now that I have my magic.

“What song was that?” Emma asks.

“The one I just played? “A Million More Years” by Olly Murs. It would have sounded better if I had all the background instruments as well.”

“It sounded great, Ry,” Colton says to me. I refuse to look up at him, because I know he is still giving me that awed expression. I reach out and grab his arm. Tilting my head so I can read his watch, I check the time.

“Can we train now? Or at least do something else, so everyone will stop looking at me.” Colton laughs and grabs my hand, pulling me out of the room.

“Training it is.”



Colton

“Why was everyone staring at me like that?” Ryanne asks me as I bring her into our room. I lean back against the closed door and watch her. “Like that! Why are you staring at me like that?”