Page 39 of A Country Kind Of Love
“I connected with the last four songs I wrote. Hank disagreed. What did he call them? Oh yeah... Abysmal.” She stands the guitar at the side of the chair.
“Hank is an asshole.” Peyton places her notebook on the sofa and moves to sit on the edge of the coffee table opposite Cleo.
Her lips pout. There’s a hint of a smile when Peyton lifts her chin and plants a kiss on her lips. Cleo plays with the bracelet on Peyton’s arm softly pushing it back and forth along her wrist. It’s a small silver bracelet with a piano charm. Cleo holds the charm between her fingers. “I like this,” she whispers.
The slightest touch causes the hairs on Peyton’s arms to stand on end. God, that’s embarrassing. At least if she gets butterflies, at least they can’t be physically seen fluttering around inher stomach.
“Thank you.” The sudden urge to say something cringey engulfs her entire body. She can’t help it. She has an out of body experience as she watches her mouth open, and the words exit before she has the chance to stop them.
“I like you.” Peyton admits.
It comes out as a whisper which makes it sound unintentionally seductive, and all she wants is the 1980s rug beneath her to burn a hole through the apartment floor and swallow her whole.
Cleo’s eyes sparkle despite the dullness of the room. Her face is relaxed, but the wrinkles around her eyes appear as her smile grows. “I like you too,” she responds.
“Well, now that we’ve cleared that up, I guess I’ll try a bit harder on the song writing.” Peyton winks.
Who does she think she is? She doesn’t wink.
“Try harder?” Cleo raises her eyebrow. “So, you’ve been holding backon me, huh?”
Peyton shrugs. There’s a playful air around them. In the land of her favourite rom-coms this moment is what she lives for.
“If you want me to write a hit song, you have to earn it.” Peyton smirks. She stands up and starts to back away.
“Oh yeah? And how do I do that?” Cleo rises from her seated position like she’s about to stalk her prey.
“Easy.” Peyton almost trips over the edge of the rug, but she recovers. “It involves you, me, and the bedroom.”
Peyton turns on her heel and takes off down the hallway, her socks try to find traction on the hardwood floor but fail. Peyton can’t believe what she said. Her cheeks burn red, and she’s scared. The feelings building inside are causing her to act out of character, and she can hear Cleo bounding behind her like an antelope in the wild. They’re possibly, more than likely, definitely, aboutto havesex.
Her body craves Cleo. She’s nervous, so she tries to be playful, but inside her whole body desperately fights for composure.
Cleo catches up. She slots the door in place and stands with her back against it. She laughs, but it turns to a seductive smile. Peyton could die happy in that moment, if being pleasured by Cleo is the last thing that happens.
“What do you want me to do?” Cleo asks.
“I want you to take your time,”Peyton says.
8
Emotional value.
Everything is judged on its emotional value. Peyton doesn’t care for the olive tree that Miss Dimbell in the apartment across the hall waters every Tuesday. Frankly, Peyton hates olives. Neither does she care for the new steakhouse across the street Jesse keeps talking about, because she doesn’t like steak. The signed baseball that her brother James carried around with him until the age of sixteen meant nothing to Peyton, but it meant something to James.
There is emotional value in everything, but it’s different depending on who is caring and what it is. Peyton looks for the emotion in every verse she writes. There’s usually one or two words that jump out; those words hold more meaning than the rest. Her mom called them buzz words, and they can be worth altering your melody to accommodate. They often serve as the climatic point in a particular section.
Peyton can’t find the emotive words in the songs they wrote yesterday. She tears one page out of her notebook because it’s horrendous, and she forcefully scrawls over another.
Think, Peyton, think.
She starts to play a short chord progression on the piano as she allows the rhythm of the music to transition her brain to a place ofinspiration.
“Before you... I gave everyone a poker face...” She repeats the first line three times, choosing to slow the chords down as she holds certain syllables longer.
“It’s true... I really liked it when I had my space.” She drops her tone ontrue. She likes the sound.
The rest of the verse comes naturally, and she stops to scribble the lyrics after every line. It isn’t until she hits the chorus that the inspirationrings clear.
