Page 4 of Where the Dark Knelt
Blushing, I looked away, breaking eye contact with her. She responded by laughing harder. “Oh.Sweet, innocent, Lily!You haven’t lived until you’ve had some rough sex in theback of a truck. It was hot. He was a hot, horny, dirty boy!” She wiggled her brows wickedly.
Shiftinguncomfortably in my seat, I looked around the coffee shop to see if anyone else was looking at us and felt mortified by her behavior. I had only ever heard boys talk about sex like that. Holly scoldedSaffyfor making me feel uncomfortable, as I tried to recover from what she had just said.
Saffywaved the back of her hand in my direction as if brushing me off and continued, “Talking about being uncomfortable, he fucked me so hard I could hardly walk yesterday.” Holly andSaffygiggled again. Forcing a smile, I pretended to enjoy what she was saying, not wanting them to think I was a prude, but I had no real understanding of what she was talking about.
We made our way to the apartment, and I left the girls unpacking there.
The next morning, I had to register at college. I dressed in a jade green T-shirt that hung off one of my shoulders, leaving a black bra strap showing, and pulled on some three-quarter length white pants. Leaving my hair down and with no makeup on, I looked more like any other ordinary student. Jade was my favorite color and suited my long dark brown curly hair, which the Florida humidity had made look even wilder.
Knowing I would be wasting my time trying to straighten it due to the humidity, I decided I’d only to do that on special occasions when I didn’t need to go outside.
Friends always went on about how lucky I was to have the choice of curly or straight hair, but I wasn’t enamored with the curls—I felt they made me look younger and unsophisticated.
Evenalthough I had only spent a short time in the sun the previous day while talking to the girls on the phone, my skin had a slight golden glow to it. Granted, it wasn’t a tan by Holly’s standards, but I could see a difference in the color of my skin. I was already feeling better, myeyes looked brighter, and I didn’t feel as self-conscious about how pale I was.
Climbing into the little Chrysler PT Cruiser rental car, I headed out to the college. I knew I had to organize a proper car, but for that first couple of weeks I had wanted to concentrate on getting settled in at college.Another bout of nervous excitement gripped me as I arrived. Butterflies had taken up residence in my stomach and my palms were sweaty and this time it wasn’t from the heat.
Following the signs to the registration office, I waited in line for my turn to speak to the gray haired woman with the soft, friendly tone. She was very helpful and took extra time to help me understand things.
Pointing out the ‘meet and greet’ sign, she mentioned it was a place for new students to meet with existing ones and suggested it would be a good idea for me to connect with people, prior to my courses starting.
Deciding it was a great idea, I began to make my way there, eager to network and cultivate new friends, especially with people who were like-minded and musically talented.
Nervous energy ran through my body making me buzz with the anticipation ofhaving to put myself out there with new people. I bravely forged on, determined to lose some of the shyness and immaturity that everyone told me held me back.
There were noconcerns about my musical ability. I knew I wasn’t an exceptional musician, but I also knew people were happy listening to me. I’d been playing guitar and piano since the age of six, and even I knew I had presence with that.
My dad once saidI had the ability to capture the room in my hands when I played, but then again, he was my dad, and tended to be somewhat biased where I was concerned. My music tutors had no need to rave about me, but on previous occasions they had for some reason.
Everyone kept asking me to sing. I knew my voice had an unusual tone and a wide range, but I didn’t have the confidence to put it out there. There were no issues at all with people watching me play, but as far as singing was concerned, I thought I’d be less self-conscious if I were to model naked in a life art class, than I felt singing with all my clothes on.
There was something about singing in front of people that incapacitated me and I felt tongue-tied when the focus was on me doing that. I knew it sounded crazy but singing had somehow felt more intimate than playing an instrument. I had hoped that college would change that for me, and I’d be able to at least challenge myself to sing publicly and enjoy it one day.
At that point, I had to be very drunk to be okay with singing in public. No one knew me in Miami though, and I thought maybe I could reinvent myself. I’d been told many times by my friends, never to say never to anything. So the jury was still out on whether I could achieve a public singing performance or not in the future.
The campus was massive, and I got lost several times during my orientation, but I managed to collect some pre-reading material as well as my study timetable. I headed toward the sign pointing to the canteen, where the ‘meet and greet’ for the new students was taking place. On the way, I thumbed through the literature to check that everything was in order.
Choosing to study commercial music, gave me classes inmusic theory, ear training, music history, as well as private instruction on my instrument.I’d added courses in audio recording and production, and obviously performance as a combination, focusing on voice and my guitar.
Writing lyrics and composing by myself since I was thirteen, I hadn’t wanted to take formal lyrics writing classes. I had written over one hundred songs and felt my formula wasdoing okay. I didn’t want any other influences to put that into a funk as creative writing and music lyrics were a form of escapism for me, but musicwas my first and only real passion.
I was proud of my song bank, twenty songs in particular. And I was interested to hear what the expert critiques would say about some of them. Until that point, I’d never shared them with anyone apart from my cat,Jack, Saffy,and my parents.
On the rare occasion, when I sang in London, it had tended to be in very dark places at the end of the night, and it had mainly been covers of other artists.
The managersof the clubs didn’t want me experimenting with my own stuff, especially when I was being paid to entertain. They seemed to want popular tunes, from the sixties to present day, to entertain their clientele.
Rounding the corner, I stayed on the path signposted for the canteen but stopped when I saw some musicians jamming on the lawn in a shaded area. Wandering around listening to some of them playing, I could hear there was a lot of talent on campus, but I was drawn to one sound above all others. Dulcet, low, rich velvet tones from a male voice, sitting aways back from the rest, drew my attention, so I went looking for the guitar player with the great voice.
When myeyes caught up with the singer, I was instantly captivated. Stunningly good looking, his appearance more than matched his incredible voice. He looked every bit the rock star as he sat there, but with his strikingly handsome features he could easily have earned a living modelling as well.
He was gorgeous, his head bent forward, as he looked down at the neck of his guitar. From where I stood, his face had perfectlysymmetrical features, and his eyelashes were to die for.
I focused on hismouth—it looked perfect, with luscious, plump, extremely kissable lips. He had a slightly chiseledlook to his face, which complemented his brooding, sultry look. The faint stubble on his strong jawline was just scruffy enough to be sexy without making him appear disheveled.
Frowning down at his notebook, he strummed quietly to himself, deep in contemplation of what he was trying to achieve. Transfixed, I found it impossible not to stare at him.
His golden sun-kissed skin lookedamazing, and his sandy blond hair, with little sun-kissed flecks of lighter blond near the edges, looked so clean, soft, and shiny.
