Real Ugly(64)
I press my lips to the mic and try not to think too hard about this. Either he'll join me or he won't. I don't care.
My voice, when I start to sing, sounds loud, too loud, and lonely. I sound good, I think, but not quite right.
“Struggling to understand why this pain feels different from what I've felt before.”
When Turner's voice cuts in through the other mic, I falter and I miss the next line entirely, wrapped up in the golden chords of his voice that curl so tightly around me that I forget to breathe for a second and end up lightheaded and dizzy.
“Waking up to the sound of your voice, playing in my head, always running in my head.”
When he exhales at the end of the line, I inhale and start up again. This time, both of our voices join together and mine doesn't sound so lonely anymore. The stage vibrates with sound as Wren and I destroy it with our guitars, pulling Blair and Jesse and Dax along for the ride. The crowd is screaming now, having an absolute panic attack and rushing forward, crushing the poor people in the front against the bars so tightly that the bouncers have to rescue them and pull them over, escorting them to the edges to watch with wide eyes and heaving chests.
“When I walk, I stumble. When I run, I fall. 'Cause it's the same mistake that will fool us all. I fell in love. I … I fell in love. I. Fell. In. LOVE!”
Turner curls over with that last scream, folding down and then bouncing back up, spinning in a circle and thrashing his head back down. If I thought things were intense before, I was wrong. That was just a tease. This is gonna get worse before it gets better, isn't it? My pulse starts to pick up, moving at a dangerous speed, so quick I can feel it throbbing against the side of my throat.
“And we, we just can't be. There is no place to go where the pain won't find us.” Turner leans into me and puts his face close, too close. Unconsciously, I wet my lips with my tongue, and the rest of the band picks up the next verse while Turner and I dance around each other, spinning in a slow circle, stomping the stage beneath our feet with each step.
“Because we're the broken ones, the halves that got left behind, the hearts that will never stop bleeding. We fell in love. We … we fell in love, and only you fell out of it.”
My hands comes down hard, hits the strings and vibrations travel through me, take over my brain and close the door on my inhibitions. The inner me is hanging all the way out, kicking around like a fucking maniac, like I've just freaking lost it and gone crazy. It was only a matter of time anyway. See, this is why I didn't want a confession of love. This shit is just … it's insane.
And then it all stops and there's this freakish bit of quiet before Blair starts in on her keyboard solo, fingers flying over her instrument like she's casting a spell, a rock goddess bitch witch of fucking insanity. Turner takes advantage of this moment to step behind me and slide his arms over my shoulders. An unwanted moan breaks its way out of my throat just as Turner lifts the mic to my mouth. My own sound echoes through the crowd, amplified and shocking in its nakedness. I want to throw him off, but I'm busy with my guitar, plucking strings with my pick again, being the leader that I've always been, just without knowing it. Hayden is a front, that's all, like a figurehead. Can't believe it took me this long to figure out that I was in charge.
“Why are you being so stubborn?” Turner whispers into my ear, nibbling it with his teeth while a thousand plus strangers look on. “Just give me a chance.”
“And we just can't be, and there's no place to go, and the pain will always find us.” Turner lets me sing the line by myself, moving one of his hands up and over my breasts before he spins away and swings the mic like he's in an old-timey fucking radio. “Because of love, all because of love.”
Sweat is pouring down my face, too much for just the venue and the press of people and the movement. In fact, I think it has more to do with what's going on inside of me than what's going on out. I get tongue-tied again, unused to the dual pressures of singing and playing at the same time. Turner saves me again, but I have to wonder if, like our very first meeting, he's saving me so he can screw me later, leave me worse off than before.
“Faceless faces and barren voices can't pull me out because I'm in too deep, and my love is killing me. If I don't turn a key on my past, oh, my fucking past, then I'll never make it out alive.”
My guitar solo comes up hard and my mind seriously goes fucking blank. I feel like I'm high, only I'm not. I swear that my hands aren't my own as I finger my Wolfgang, fucking it with demonic strokes and tearing the venue down, brick by fucking brick.
Turner's breath hits my neck again as I finish and hit my guitar, spinning it around my back and to the front again. Screams go up, and the energy increases to a point where it's almost painful. When this happens, it feels like I'm possessed, like I can't make any decisions on my own. It's all the music, has always been the music, because it's a reflection of the soul. And the soul knows best. After all, it's powered by the most powerful thing there is: the heart.