Page 78 of Not Another Love Song

His hands stopped fumbling. The cabinets closed.

She wasn’t quite sure how he ended up inside the shower with her, but he’d lost his underwear again at some point. Maybe it was when he was “showing her how to work the taps.”

He handed her his shampoo and said, “Write down the name of your shampoo and wash. I’ll have them for you next time.”

And maybe it was the way his eyes landed on her breasts as she reached above her head to rinse her hair, or maybe it was the way he said “next time” like a promise, or maybe it was the permanence of a supply of her belongings here in his space.

She wrapped herself around him and kissed him.

He dropped the bottle of body wash and pushed her up against the tiles.

It was only later, when they were dried off and eating Grubhub breakfast delivery in his kitchen, that she realized she didn’t get a chance to wash all the shampoo out of her hair.

The good thing about having the week off after concerts was that neither of them had anywhere to go for seven days.

Alex took her to dinner. Alex took her to lunch. Sometimes Alex took her to breakfast, but mostly they stayed in. Alex knew how to make eggs, bacon, French toast, iced vanilla lattes, and even omelets if she asked nicely. And he could do all of that while naked.

One morning, she talked him into pancakes. She sat on top of the kitchen island and debated sonatas with him while he mixed the batter and fought her off the bag of chocolate chips.

“You can’t beat Beethoven,” she said, mouth full of semi-sweet morsels. “Sonata Number Nine is so broad.”

He pulled a face at her. “I know you’ve got a hard-on for Beethoven, but—”

“Shut up.”

“It’s true. Concerto for your audition, now the sonata—”

“Fine, what’s your pick then?”

He made her wait for him to pour the first pancake before confessing, “Brahms, Number Three.”

Gwen smiled, remembering that video from the ones Nathan posted. “Why?”

Shrugging and reaching for the spatula, he said, “It’s melancholy. I think it puts you exactly in the mood it intends to.”

“‘Oh, so sad, melancholy boy,’” she teased him in a deep voice.

“Hey, my next favorite is Amy Beach. Much more playful. So…fuck off.”

Gwen laughed—and gasped as the stirring spoon slipped across her cheek, smearing her with pancake batter. Gaping at him with wide eyes, she watched Alex’s face burst into a smile. She grabbed a handful of chips and tossed them at him, but not before he’d swiped at her other cheek.

She dipped her finger into the pancake mix and reached for him—but he darted to the left, flicking the spoon at her and landing a direct hit on the shirt of his she’d been sleeping in. She shrieked as he guffawed at her.

“Alex!” Snatching up the entire bowl of mix, she followed him around the island as he laughed, finally landing a glob on his face as he poured the chocolate chips down her shirt.

It wasn’t until they were out of breath laughing that they slid the first and only charred pancake into the trash and pulled out their phones to order pancake delivery.

Alex snapped a pic of her, batter in her hair, across her chest, a melted chocolate chip on her collarbone. “Proof that I won.”

She turned the bowl of batter over onto his famous, head-banging hair.

In the mornings, Gwen would wake up to an empty bed, the melody of a new song floating under the bedroom door he would close so she could sleep. She’d find him on her violin, on his cello, or even sometimes just editing on the computer.

Jacob checked in on her at one point, and she told him to not expect her back for a week. Eggplant emoji. He’d gone absolutely insane at that.

They each received emails from Nathan almost daily, asking if they could both come in to discuss the possibilities of showcasing the Fugue series in future Pops concerts. Alex would never respond, but Gwen would at least write back in the affirmative, stating that next week could be good.

On Friday, after she’d gulped down her latte and joined him in the studio, she was just about to rosin her bow and join him in playing a duet they’d found online, when he asked, “Did your mother play an instrument?”

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