Steady as the Snow Falls(37)

"But if I choose to stay, if I want to be with you, let me. Please. Please, don't make me leave you."

"How can you say that?" Harrison's voice cracked.

"You inspire me. Everything about you inspires me. I wouldn't be able to  write the way I have been without you." Beth looked into his eyes and  saw emotions not put to names in them. "Your story thrums inside of me,  in time with my heartbeat. I am better for knowing you, and I will not  be the one to write the final word."

Harrison looked down. His voice was just a whisper as he asked, "Why would you choose this, choose me?"

"You make me want to dance." When he looked up with a furrowed brow, she added, "I haven't danced in years, not until recently."

Harrison blinked as if he didn't know how to process her words.

"And you make me want to write. There are so many things you bring out  in me that were missing, that I didn't even know were missing until I  got them back. I was lost. Learning about you helped me remember who I  am.

"I'll never stop writing your story, Harrison. I'll write and write;  until my fingers cramp up, and my heart overflows, and my mind goes  numb, and I'll still write. I'll write you into every day of my life."  It was a promise. An oath, and a confession.

He took a breath, and it divided halfway through. Beth wanted to take  both halves and press them into one. Mend the fissures that constructed  the man.

"I watched you dance, that day in the trophy room," he admitted. Harrison hesitated. "I'd like to watch you dance again."

Beth smiled. "And you shall." She offered a hand. Shook it when he stared at it. "Take my hand and let me dance for you."

The empty room with its bare walls and lack of life pulsed with  Harrison's. He turned the lights and the walls and all the nothingness  around them into a stage, and he was the performer. And who was Beth?  Beth was the one Harrison let take his hand. It was warm and steady, and  her fingers curved, never wanting to break contact. Just the feel of  his hand on hers made her head dizzy, her mouth dry. Her core ache.  Harrison's fingers electrocuted her, stung her skin with the sweetest  shock.         

     



 

They stepped into the soundproof room with its lonely chair. It didn't  seem lonely anymore. It was a throne, and Harrison reigned there. Beth  waited for him to sit, twisting her hair into a bun on the top of her  head and holding it in place with the rubber band she removed from her  wrist. She found the version of ‘The Sound of Silence' by Disturbed on  her phone and pushed play.

She focused on his dark eyes from across the room, his energy palpable  around his form and in the air. His eyes narrowed a fraction as the  music started, as she remained unmoving. The music reverberated through  the room, echoed with beauty and sorrow. His index finger framed his jaw  as he set his chin on his fist, his attention never leaving her.

And then Beth moved, sliding one leg back, arching her back and head as  her arms swept overhead. She twisted in a low spin, contracting and  releasing her body, flying. Soaring. Gliding. She dipped and turned, her  neck loose, her face up. Faster and faster, until she was no longer a  person and instead a piece of the music. Skin damp with perspiration,  pulse speeding like it had a race to win, Beth danced. Her muscles  cried, her heart sang, and Beth laughed, breathless and free.

She danced for herself; she danced for Harrison. The song changed to  ‘Save My Soul' by Rivvrs. Like a wave of motion, she swayed with the  pull of the music. Beth turned and looked down at Harrison, needing him  to dance with her. Needing that physical connection he continually  denied. Her chest was in spasms with the force of her breathing, and as  she gazed into dark eyes, she didn't recognize the man.

Eyes of desire, lips of passion; a face set with want and need.

He shot to his feet, and his hand shook as he covered his mouth with it.  The hand she wanted on her bare skin. She imagined his fingers, long  and strong, undulating over her like a waterfall, and her breaths came  faster. Harrison would say he could never be hers, and she could never  be his, but it was already so. She felt him upon her heart, a brand that  would not fade. She saw her mark in his eyes, a glint that made them  shine for her. The light that only recently came to his eyes.

Beth offered her hands, need sparking through her eyes to him and back  like a live wire. Touch me, her skin whispered. Love me, her heart  added. Live for me, her soul asked.

He tilted his head, his eyes moving from her hands to her face. She  didn't imagine the crack in his voice as he asked, "What are you doing,  Beth?"

"Dancing," she said breathlessly.

"You don't dance like anyone I've seen."

She smiled, and it was tipped in secrets. "Good."

Standing face to face, hands up, she pressed her palms to his and  applied the smallest pressure. Beth kept their fingers unlocked. She  stared into her own eyes through his, saw the building fire, the heat  that couldn't be ignored for much longer. Lines grew around his eyes as  Harrison stepped back. Beth nodded once, moving her right arm out in an  arc, Harrison moving his arm with her. She turned, and he went with her,  and they gradually swayed the length of the room. It was slow, awkward.

Harrison's smile was faint. Apologetic. "I'm not good at this," he told her.

"You're as good as you need to be," she told him back. Beth paused  before telling him words that had nothing to do with their dancing.  "You're as good as I need you to be. Focus on me, Harrison. I'm all that  matters."

He missed a step, his eyes shooting to hers. The harshness was gone from  his features, leaving them sweet and soft. He stared into her eyes like  he was listening to her, like her words made sense to him. Hope-she saw  a glimpse of it in his frame.

She carefully moved her hands to the back of his neck and loosely locked  her fingers. His throat moved as he swallowed, and he hesitantly set  his hands on her waist. She briefly closed her eyes against the thrill  that tingled through her skin, exhaling slowly. Beth chased his gaze  until she caught it, and held it, the smile on her lips reaching up to  her eyes. His hair tickled her fingers, and she inched closer, her face  next to where his heart worked at an astonishingly powerful rate.

Beth heard it, felt it, revered it.

"You smell good, like sunflowers and sunshine," he whispered as the song ended.

A small laugh left her as they stopped moving. She didn't want to be the  first to pull away, and she wasn't. It was Harrison. She studied his  back as he showed it to her, seeing the hints of muscle and bone. Beth  wanted to run her fingers up and down the bumps and crevices of it.

"What's happening between us?" When she didn't immediately answer, Harrison turned.

"We're getting to know each other's heart. I'm glad I was introduced to  yours." Beth gingerly set her hand on his chest, felt the beat of his  life against her palm. "I like your heart, Harrison." She looked up, her  eyes clashing with his.         

     



 

"I like your heart too," he told her falteringly.

Beth lightly touched the valley beneath his lower lip and above his  chin. Harrison let her, closing his eyes and taking a deep, unstable  breath. There was faint stubble that made the pad of her finger tingle.  She studied his face as her hand fell away. His expression revealed  things his mouth never would. He wanted to dream, like her. Beth's eyes  watered. She wanted him to know it was okay to dream.

"I'll write you a world where no one ever dies, and there are no  diseases, and everyone is good. I'll make one for you, and you can live  there. Every day, every night. You can pick up the papers and live in  the words," she said softly.

His eyes flew open, pain splitting his features. Harrison took a step back, unbalanced on his feet.

Beth made up for the distance he put between them, her legs weak and  heavy. Her heart pounded, so hard, so fast, so loudly. How could he not  hear it? How was it not resonating through the room? "Or I'll read them  to you, each night, before you fall asleep. You can go to sleep dreaming  of your world. Each time you close your eyes, it will be there for you.  Waiting. I'll do that for you. I want to do that for you."

"You can do anything," he told her, his voice breathless and uneven.  "You can write your worlds, and your stories, your books. You can do  that, Beth. Never forget that you can do anything."

"What if … what if more than all of that, I want to be with you? What  then?" As soon as the question was asked, Beth went still, as still as  Harrison. She hadn't meant to ask it, but it had been there, in her  thoughts, hovering, needing to be heard. Let me do that for you. For me.  Let me write our world and let us live inside it.

All the light drained from his face. "That is impossible. You have to know that."

"I don't believe in impossibilities," she told him, her bravery growing  now that she'd said the words she'd been harboring, locked deep inside  her. "And you just told me I could do anything. I want to be with you."