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Widow Creek’s new song was described by Gina, who had already listened to the first demo before their first open rehearsal today, simply as a “love song”. The quickness and certainty of her answer made Seven frown instantly, but he had half the mind to make it appear generally dismissive rather than deeply troubled, as were his true feelings on the matter. Gina peered at his face as they stood by the entrance of the venue as if she was searching for something, then upon finding what she was looking for (or not), she shrugged and moved on, leaving a wall of heavy perfume behind her. To shield Seven from what he was going to discover, perhaps. A “love song” would normally be a safe choice for the challenge, Seven thought, if Widow Creek was any other band. But with Lei as their songwriter, choosing to write a love song was a very particular, calculated choice. Or at least, that was how the Lei he knew used to operate.
He doesn’t know how much she has changed since they broke up. He knew, felt, that she had changed significantly, but he could find no words to describe to himself the true extent of it. At least not yet. Physically, the difference was obvious. Despite it having been 3 years since they broke contact, she looked, ironically, much younger and healthier. She had let her hair grow out and cut off the dark block of dyed hair that would have been pushed out to her shoulders by now. She sported a short, wavy cut that revealed her true hair colour, which was a dirty “acorn blonde” as she once put it. Seven remembered that she used to dislike her natural hair tremendously, saying it made her appear as if she was hiding her middle eastern heritage, while in reality it was that very heritage that was hiding her from her own roots. Seven had frowned at that, scoffing at the way Lei uncomfortably combed through her scalp with her fingernails to show him the light roots of her hair, which looked like pinpricks of sunshine among a sea of ashy black. He had explained that what she said didn’t make sense, because her body was the embodiment of her heritage, and that there was nothing her body could hide even if she wanted it to. He smirked at the memory, because he remembered exactly what he thought after he said that.
It couldn’t hide anything from me, either.
Lei appeared comforted by his words, but, judging by her lewd gaze, she was probably more complimented by what he hadn’t said out loud.
Younger, healthier. More at peace with herself. Seven felt a twinge of guilt bite at his ribs, because he wasn’t there to see the moment, moments, she transformed herself and became the whole individual that she was now, that she was always meant to be. He was present in none of them, not even in any of them—nowhere at all. She always used to say that it was her company that nurtured her, who made her stronger and brought her where she truly belonged. It made Seven imagine her as a sapling with tiny white flowers at the tips of its flesh, which grew larger, grew exponentially, almost at the rate of the quick shallow breaths she took during her singing exercises, and the soil beneath her got richer and more saturated, and her lungs expanded and contracted, pushed air deeper, brighter and wider into her than ever before.
He wasn’t there for it. But someone else was. She would never choose a love song without good reason. The truth was, which he doubted anyone knew as well and completely as he did because he witnessed it happen firsthand, that songs were a byproduct of her life. Just like the way she spoke, the way she laughed and how she liked to stand on her tiptoes when she was bored, Lei’s songs were a natural way for her to be.
As far as Seven was concerned, there could be three kinds of love that had taken hold of Lei. There was the cognitive, intellectual kind of admiration that Seven dubbed “cold love”. This was the affection Lei had for people like Misfit Alley and Gina, or her favourite authors, artists or philosophers. She looked up to them, she cried at them and for them, she would be frantic about indulging in more of what they had to offer to the point of obsession, but there was no deep passion involved. It was precise, and Lei knew exactly what she wanted from them. At any rate, this kind of love did not harness the passion that Seven found problematic. It was impassioned rather than passionate. This was the emotion that gave birth to songs like “Aluminum”.
The other type, he had dubbed the “mating call”. When he first used the term Lei blinked at him, tilting her head like an owl, more predatory than curious, before bursting into laughter. She would write this type of song after she had fallen in love, and the way Lei fell in love could be described very literally, like violently being hurled down a spiral staircase, or a large, spiny tree whose branches scratched and tore at her skin on the way down. And she enjoyed it. She reveled in the way her skin pinched and broke by the blows, because love was a challenge and a game for her, and it would be the most difficult and rewarding one she would face at that particular point in her life. She would try to resist it by clenching at the surface with her teeth and nails, simply because it was pointless to fight it, and she would laugh ecstatically as she fell.
He had witnessed the creation of this kind of song right after they had sex. Or, was it before they had sex? During?... Seven shook his head. He couldn’t pretend to know when exactly the song had planted itself in her head, only the moment when she physically started writing its lyrics. It was sometime in August, about two months before they broke up. They’d had a fight about something stupid, and Lei likely hadn’t forgotten about it; she never did, though she pretended to. Seven definitely hadn’t, and he had never bothered to hide it like Lei does. In fact, when Seven got mad at her, he would be less mad about the subject of their argument and more at just how easily she seemed to swallow everything up. Only a few minutes into their fight, the indignation she felt, as well as the rage, hurt and confusion that broke out of her, would suddenly be sucked away, replaced with an indifferent cloudiness in her eyes. It was a startling and awful change, almost like witnessing a loved one die in front of your eyes. One time when he was drunk after a particularly serious fight, Seven had held Lei, the love of his life and the woman of his dreams, and shook her by the shoulders, gently but desperately, tears rolling down freely down his cheeks as he sobbed, begging her to speak, to be disappointed, to be hysterical, to be outraged, to just give her back to him. But she simply stood there, silently, and let him shake her, as neutral and lifeless as a scarecrow made of straws. He often had nightmares about that day.
That time in August, however, she had only partially retreated into herself because she was still able to respond to him, albeit curtly. Finally when they were at her apartment he had pinned her against the hallway, eyes burning as his shaky breaths disturbed her hair. The proximity of their bodies transfigured their anger into heat, and Seven felt almost like he was about to drool all over her bangs. They had stared at each other for a while before Lei, her eyes still red and wet with tears, slowly broke out in a grin, and it kept growing slowly and painfully over her face. She resembled one of those Japanese demons from the movies she made Seven watch and she looked just about ready to devour him whole. He couldn’t have possibly given her the chance to beat him to it however, so he dipped his head down and kissed her viciously.
After she had orgasmed, she kept her eyes closed. That time he had come on her face, so she was lying still and idly tapping at the coagulating cum on her cheekbones. Then her eyes fluttered open as if a vision befell her. She had a feverish look to her face as she sprung from her bed, her vulva still twitching, to grab the notebook and pen at her bedside and started writing furiously. She breathed shakily in excitement, legs sprawled open as his cum slowly dripped down to her chest. Seven had gingerly patted her dry with a paper towel as she tilted her face into his hand, letting him touch her but never taking her eyes off the pages. He looked at her searchingly, caressing her hair and brushing his fingertips down her spine as goosebumps perked at his attention. Then he gazed at the air above her head, to see whether he could see the source of whatever was delivering this strange energy into her. She had snorted lightheartedly, because she likely knew what he was doing. After about thirty minutes she threw herself back on the bed, with a loud “Whew”!
“Good one?” He asked her. She grinned at him, chuckling lowly, and his cock twitched at the sight of her teeth. “Yup,” she answered. And then they had sex again. On that day, she started writing the song “Dripping Tongues”.
So... Seven swallowed, uncomfortable in his memories and his own body. He adjusted his belt and his pants with a pathetic scowl on his face. Either it is the mental, icy kind of love, or the visceral kind of love. There was of course the third type, which was gentle love. The soft, fuzzy and melancholic kind of love, which he likened to the way you appreciate the warmth and comfort your blanket gave you on a cold night, and the way you would hug it tightly to your body, because you knew you had to get up in the morning and all that warmth would be gone. This was, he was sure, what created What’s In The Glass?— the most successful song of Widow Creek. It was also their breakup song. He doubted another Glass was in the works, though, because technically it’s not a “love” song by (past) Lei’s definition. Or anybody’s, for that matter, because there was nothing in Glass that painted an overt picture of love. So whatever was the case today was either cold love or hot love, and if it was indeed the mating call, then it would be too late.
Too late for what? You already lost her. How much more of her could you lose?
He didn’t want to learn the answer, but he knew he had to. And soon he did, because as he walked toward the stage, he felt the force of Lei’s voice reverberating on the smooth wood underneath his feet before he even heard it.
He looked at Lei’s singing form and could barely stop himself from whimpering, feeling suddenly very cold and mortified. She was singing in her usual expressive style, buckled over the microphone in her hands as if someone had punched her in the stomach, but she was also absently rubbing her thighs together, exposing her neck, her breathing visibly laboured but still perfectly controlled, the singer in her somehow guiding the reckless command of Shah to expel just the right amount of air from her lips to give her voice an appropriate breathless quality. She was flushed with heat and pleasure, and for all intents and purposes, she was masturbating into her song. Seven’s eyes flitted to the audience, and he could see Blake’s nails dig into the cushion of the chair as she licked her lips. Instinctively, Seven’s face flushed with anger. Lei’s bandmates were not as invested in the emotions that struck Lei but they too were entranced by their performance, with some of their eyes closed shut as their hands strummed their instruments powerfully. Orion’s eyes were… wide, and his shoulders were abnormally still for how deeply he was breathing. It’s like he was locked in place, seeming almost afraid to move. Funny, Seven couldn’t, either. It was a horrific sight, but he couldn’t tear himself away. He never could.
“I rose in pain, followed by dust
In the shadow of a truth engraved,
Underneath the feckless dawn,
Comfort me, my nerves alight
On my palm, behind my eyes
I offer my lips and
the hot, wasteful vapour of words
Like specks of sand and snow
Memorise me, mesmerise me.
Want me, please.
Please. Please.”
“Come on, Shah.” Seven swallowed, whispering so that it’s only her that could hear him. “Who are you hiding?”
“Excise my fears, ease my pulse into yours,
I beg. I beg you.
You want that, don’t you?
Open the way, let me in and give in
The moving, yearning, guiding
Down here, I felt so sparse I thought,
I would never get to see you smile
Please be bright for me
For I desperately yearn to live.”
There.
Suddenly, Seven’s skin became clammy and hot. He felt a familiar faintness in his temples, his eye sockets felt colder, his chest was crushed by the giant claw of fear and panic. It’s like he had gotten stabbed and the adrenaline had left his body, so the whole world was crashing down on him. It was too much, way too much and he was hyperventilating already, but still he didn’t resist the instinctive lull of his eyes, which easily glided towards someone in the audience.
A few emotions flashed over Orion Quinn’s eyes as they caught Seven’s. Discomfort was the most prevalent emotion, followed by shock, and then a gentleness that made Seven feel nauseated, because he recognised it to be pity, and.. Confusion. Confusion as to why Seven was looking at him with what was likely a feral expression on his face? Or maybe he was confused as to why she had chosen him. Probably both. From what he heard, the man could be so dense as to not recognise a declaration of lust if it sat on his face. But the emotions directed towards Seven weren’t the ones that enraged him, but those that were directed at her, because when Orion was still looking at Lei, his eyes were alit with passion. Heat, passion and arousal. He wanted her, that much was clear. And Seven knew she wanted him. Maybe they had already fucked. Seven’s upper lip twitched at the vulgar word his mind spat out. And then, there, a final emotion. Which was……….——
He finally got control of himself enough to throw himself out of the room.
Enough. Please.
Enough, enough, enough.
Lei swallowed and looked around, blinking rapidly. She was done with the song already, but like always, she needed a moment to bring down her nerves from whatever strange heights they had travelled to. She thought she heard someone, or something, while she was performing, but she looked around and saw that her audience had not grown in size and the stage was not disturbed by anything.
“So,” she said, anxiously, pointedly avoiding Orion’s gaze because she could physically feel the way he looked at her. Instead she peeked at her bandmates and chuckled dryly.
“How’d we do?”