Page 65 of Not Another Love Song

Alex Fitzgerald had asked her to dance.

She soared above him as he pulled low and dark, tethering her to the key. And all at once they fit together. A harmony in easy tempos, matching phrases and answering each other’s questions. Just before they dropped into the storm, the agitation, she looked up at him for the first time.

His eyes were on her fingers. His lips parted. And a flush stained his skin, spreading. She took a breath before the next section fell over them. He met her eyes. And they spun.

Quick sixteenths from the cello as she dropped into the quarter-note rhythm. And then they switched. And then together again.

Her eyes flew over the page, preparing and pushing forward. The fingerpicking. But the violin stayed on the bow, responding and singing back. She would rest, and then pull short melodies over top of him.

Like breathing in, and then sighing out.

There was a long held note that sounded so wrong, completely out of key, and Gwen was certain she’d played it wrong. And then he flipped the bow around his fingers, pulling against the strings again, and suddenly it fit back together.

Like she’d been drifting off without him, and he found her.

A flurry of notes across the last bars. Her wide eyes devoured the page, translating to her fingers, barely listening to his melody, but knowing somehow that it worked. That they worked.

Then it was the build to the end, buzzing with tight thirds, and humming a battle to see who finished first. Her bow skidded off the strings, the violin section ending just moments before his. She lifted her eyes from the page and watched him finish.

He looked at her. And they hung there, breathing, waiting.

She waited to see if he’d play the piece he’d cut from it. The place where the tonic was supposed to be, making it feel complete.

Her breath puffed from her lips. He watched her, waiting. She raised her bow, eyes on him, the page useless to her as she dragged the unwritten resolution across the strings.

He smiled, letting her vibrate through Carnegie Hall alone.

And just before she lifted the bow to cut the sound, he plucked a string. Like a book dropping closed at the end of the last chapter. Like a kiss dropped to her forehead.

Her blood rushed in her ears. A dull thudding in her chest. A spinning, throbbing in her body. A need…

But only an echo of what sang to her from across the stage.

He wetted his lips. And she swallowed.

He was the first to look away. And she watched him grin to something on his left.

She turned and found the steady wave of Carnegie Hall coming to its feet. And she had to close her eyes against the explosion of sound as she came back to herself. A tidal wave drowned her momentarily, before she acclimated and smiled. The balconies drifted to their feet, the teenagers popping up in their chairs, bouncing and screaming.

Just as she realized how foolish she looked sitting in her chair with three thousand people doing the opposite, Alex stood, holding his Stradivarius in his left hand and reaching for her with the other.

She pulled herself onto shaking legs and met him in the middle, slipping her fingers against his palm until he grasped her and guided her forward, presenting her to the audience.

She laughed and inclined her head, nodding to each tier.

When she returned to her seat, she looked up to where Nathan stood at the podium, clapping and staring at the two of them, assessing. He picked up the mic.

“Marvelous. What an extraordinary composition.”

Gwen turned her attention to the Disney Villains medley, and only as the adrenaline leaked out of her did she realize how ridiculous that was.

She could have made a fool of herself in front of all of Carnegie Hall. He should have asked her about it beforehand. She should not have sight-read during a concert. He could have… texted her? She didn’t know. She might not have said yes. And maybe he knew that. It had still been her choice whether she wanted to join the duet tonight.

She lifted the violin to her chin as the guest singers returned to the stage, jumping into “This Is Halloween.”

On the final notes of “Hellfire,” she could feel his eyes on her, burning her skin. The audience applauded. The singers bowed.

As soon as Nathan descended from the podium, she shot up, violin placed down on her chair, and took his arm as he escorted her offstage behind the singers. The doors closed behind them.

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