Page 119 of Mr. Picture Perfect
A kiss of music, pleading for him to be here, to appear before me like an answer to all my questions.
I sing until every last lyric drifts from my lips with hope.
I run out of lyrics to sing sooner than I expect, then open my eyes as the last note echoes out into the night air, then dissipates like the wind, leaving nothing but silence.
Silence … and Noah’s face in my mind.
When the audience roars with their applause, shattering the silence, I don’t even notice at first. My eyes are lost to the sea of unfamiliar faces. As good as it felt to sing that song from my heart, it’s meaningless if Noah isn’t here.
What if I’m fooling myself, hoping he’s here?
What if Noah left because he really was awake and heard me confess that I love him? What if he doesn’t return my feelings?
What if it’s over?
“Thank you,” I say halfheartedly, then walk off the stage.
The music continues to play on loop inside my mind, but now instead of inspiring hope and beauty, it only rings bells of sadness. Tamika tells me she has no idea what happened with the music, but thinks mya cappellaversion was ten times more beautiful than what was rehearsed. I thank her, though I can’t be sure what exactly I said, as I’m lost in my feelings as I head back to my chair.
Are my suspicions right? Have I really lost Noah for good?
Is that the cruel truth I’ve been avoiding to accept ever since he left me yesterday morning?
“Shit, I’m such a fuckin’ idiot,” sobs Anthony.
I look up to find Anthony standing in front of me.
With a dark red streak running down his forehead to the slope of his blunt nose.
A dark red streak of blood.
“Yeah, the damned hammer hit my face hard enough to make a gash,” he says, noting my frozen reaction. “It’s a toy, a fake, and it still cut me like this?”
The second I see his wound, I turn away. It’s to a blank wall that I stonily say my next words. “They loved you out there.”
“I’m a joke, Cole. Hey, can I get someone over here to—Yeah, thanks, it started bleeding.Again.”
I swallow hard and wipe my forehead. Am I sweating? “It’s … just a … just a part of … live theatre,” I remind him. Even just a tiny glimpse of Anthony has burned the image into my retinas. Every time I blink, I see that dark red streak cutting down his face like a lightning bolt. I try with all my might to make it disappear, but the vision stubbornly persists. “Stuff just … just h-happens.”
“Why do you sound funny?”
“I’m fine.”
“Oh, shit, the auction’s next. You nervous, man? Forget about me. It’s just a little blood. Who cares about a little blood? At least they weren’trealhammers, right? I’d be missing my whole face.”
I grip the back of a nearby chair, gathering my breath.
I blink away the vision over and over.
It keeps coming right back, worse and worse. His whole face covered in blood. Then his whole head. Then his clothes, drenched to his socks in nothing but dark, viscous blood.
Is that sweat in my eyes or am I dying?
“Just my luck, it’s started bleeding even worse than before,” gripes Anthony, adding more ingredients to the nightmare stew already brewing in my imagination. “Tamika, I’m so sorry to be a pain again, like I always am, always screwin’ things up … I can’t go out like this, I’m so sorry. I—” Suddenly he bursts into tears. “God, I am just screwin’ up this whole thing, aren’t I? It’s one thing after another. I’m such a screw up!”
“No, no, you’re fine,” comes Dean to the rescue. “Hey, look at me. Can you—Can you look at me? Listen here, son …”
“I’m a screw up!”
