Page 5 of Stolen Harmony
“Watch where you're fucking going,” he slurred, squaring up like he wanted a fight he was too drunk to win.
Something hot and ugly rose in my chest, two years of swallowed anger and bottled rage looking for an excuse to break free. I shoved him back, harder than necessary, my hands shaking with the need to hit something, anything, just to feel the impact.
“You watch where you're going, asshole.”
He took a swing that would have missed even if I hadn't ducked, his coordination shot to hell by whatever he'd been drinking. His friends materialized from the shadows like guardian angels for the damned, grabbing his arms and pulling him back while he cursed at me in three languages.
“Fucking psycho,” one of them muttered as they dragged him away, and I wondered if he was talking about his friend or me.
They weren't wrong either way. I stood there in the alley,hands still clenched into fists, wondering when I'd become the kind of person who picked fights with strangers. When I'd become someone I wouldn't want to know, someone I actively avoided looking at in mirrors.
I lit a cigarette with fingers that shook just enough to make the flame dance, the lighter's orange glow throwing fractured shadows across the brick walls that hemmed me in on both sides. Sasha's words circled back, unwelcome but persistent.You're disappearing.
Maybe that was the point. Maybe disappearing was easier than dealing with the wreckage of who I used to be, the promises I'd broken to myself and everyone else who'd ever believed in me.
The Rusty Anchor's interior was a study in calculated decay, all exposed brick and Edison bulbs designed to look authentically shitty to people who'd never been actually poor. The air was thick with the smell of spilled beer, cigarette smoke that had soaked into the walls despite the smoking ban, and something else—something desperate and hungry that might have been ambition rotting in real time.
I slid onto a stool at the far end of the bar, my shoulders curling inward like I could make myself smaller, less visible, less real. The bartender was a woman in her fifties with arms like tree trunks and eyes that had seen everything twice. She didn't bother with a greeting or small talk, just raised an eyebrow when I ordered two shots of whiskey and a whiskey sour before I'd even settled fully onto the stool.
The bar was mostly empty, just a few regulars nursing beers and watching a baseball game on the TV mounted above the bottles. The crack of the bat and the dull roar of the crowd filtered through the static of my thoughts like white noise, meaningless sounds that filled up space without requiring anything fromme.
I wrapped my fingers around the first shot glass, the condensation making it slippery in my grip. The whiskey was cheap and harsh, burning its way down my throat and leaving heat in its wake that almost felt like it belonged to me. The second shot followed, then the whiskey sour, amber liquid swirling in the glass like liquid time, like I could drink enough of it to go backward and undo everything that had brought me to this moment.
Somewhere between the first sip and the last, a thought crept in like smoke under a door. Go somewhere quiet. That's what Sasha had said. Find somewhere quiet and figure out who I wanted to be.
New York wasn't quiet. It was sirens and car horns and the constant pressure of eight million people all trying to make it in a city that ate dreams for breakfast. It was clubs and shows and hookups that left me feeling more alone than I'd started, surrounded by people but connected to no one, speaking but never heard.
But there was a place that was quiet. A place I'd been running from for two years, where the only sounds were waves and wind and the kind of silence that forced you to listen to your own thoughts. Where the dead were buried and the living had to figure out how to keep going.
I pulled out my phone, the screen too bright in the dim bar, and opened the browser with fingers that moved before my brain could catch up and stop them. Flights from JFK to Boston, then a train to Harbor's End. Last-minute bookings that would cost more than my rent, but what the hell. It wasn't like I had anything else to spend money on, anything else worth saving for.
The reservation went through before I could change my mind, confirmation numbers appearing on the screen like averdict.
I finished my drink and left cash on the bar, walking back into the rain. The city looked different now, like I was already gone, already somewhere else. Street lights blurred into halos, and the rain felt warm against my face despite the cold that cut through my jacket like knives.
The city could keep my ghosts. I was going back to hers.
Chapter 2
Invisible Man
Elias
I'd been sitting at this desk for six hours, editing a track for some local kid who thought autotune could fix whatever was broken in his voice. The waveform on my monitor looked like a heartbeat, all peaks and valleys, but it felt as lifeless as everything else I'd touched since Elaine died. Two years of going through the motions, keeping the promise I'd made to her.
Everything hurt now. The music most of all.
The Harbor's End Music Production building sat on Main Street like a testament to small-town ambition made real. What had once been the town's only department store had been transformed into a proper recording facility, with a welcoming lobby featuring framed photographs of local musicians and awards that spoke of modest success in a field that rarely rewarded it. The main studio space housed professional equipment that looked impressive to clients because it actually was—upgraded over the years from prayer and electrical tape to gear that could compete with anything in Boston. Soft lighting from high windows kept the space warm and inviting, while theinstitutional quiet that settled over the building after hours made every sound feel significant, every note worth preserving.
Through the grimy windows, I could see Harbor's End spreading out below like a living postcard. The afternoon ferry was just pulling away from the dock, its horn echoing off the brick buildings as it carried the day's last tourists back to the mainland. Mrs. Castellano was hanging laundry behind her restaurant, white sheets snapping in the salt wind like surrender flags. Down at Piccolo's Fish Market, old Giuseppe was hosing down the sidewalk, the smell of brine and fish guts mixing with the exhaust from delivery trucks making their rounds.
I adjusted the EQ on the bridge for the fourth time, trying to find something that didn't sound completely hollow. The kid had talent, real talent, but he was trying too hard to sound like someone else. His voice kept reaching for notes that belonged to his heroes instead of settling into the range that actually fit him.
“Elias, you eating lunch today or what?”
I looked up to find Sarah standing beside my desk, her jacket already on, purse slung over her shoulder. She'd been working here longer than anyone, back when Harbor's End actually had a music scene worth mentioning—when the summer festival brought real acts instead of just cover bands and karaoke contests. Now she mostly handled the books and tried to keep the rest of us from killing each other in the confined space.
“Already ate,” I lied, nodding toward the protein bar wrapper beside my keyboard. I'd opened it three hours ago and managed maybe two bites before my stomach decided it wasn't interested.
