41. Rian
Rian
T wo weeks into living as a pack, and it was still as amazing as the first few days.
I hated the pain West and Ember had suffered, but the selfish part of me was glad it brought us together.
It was easier to believe they wouldn’t decide I was too moody the longer we lived together. And seeing West’s own mood swings helped me remember it was okay.
It was silly. But I was so used to being a disappointment it was hard to believe my luck.
I came back to the house to find Ember setting her laptop bag down on the countertop. Evidence of her was everywhere, in her lemon pound cake scent, in her socks that we found literally everywhere, somehow never with its mate, and in listening to her voice throughout the house.
“Hey.” She beamed at me. “It’s just the two of us?”
“Ben had to stay back,” I said. “He’ll get an Uber. I offered to stay…”
“But he’s stubborn.” Ember picked up her phone. “West is still at the office. He has stuff to catch up on. I’ll tell him to pick Ben up.”
“Good plan.” I grinned. “Alejandro said he was working late too.”
My stomach twisted at the thought of the other alpha. I ached to have his teeth in my neck, but I didn’t want Ember or West to feel rushed. I could be patient.
“Hungry?” I followed Ember into the kitchen. “I think our alpha left us some leftovers.”
“Starved. Don’t tattle on me, but I forget to eat lunch.”
“You’ll have to owe me one.” I tsked and headed for the fridge. There was indeed a lot of leftovers. Alejandro apparently had fears that we would wither away to nothing.
I wasn’t sure I could share another alpha. But Alejandro made it easy.
Ember hummed along to a song we had playing low and I was fiercely glad all of a sudden that she loved music. It made it easier, somehow, despite my own struggles.
The other day in the studio, I’d played around on my guitar before Kinsey showed up. I’d tried to write my own song for the millionth time, a catchy tune stuck in my head, but every time I tried to get it past basic idea stage, I froze.
What if the song was too upbeat? What if it was too dark? Too lyrical? Indecision froze me. Ben would tell me to write what I wanted to write, but I wasn’t sure what that was anymore.
What could I possibly do to follow up my last album? I’d listened to three times, which was more than I had in years. Ember’s fault, since she had most of my songs in all of her playlists.
The playlist switched over, and it was one of mine, a B-side lullaby style song I’d written in a fit of whimsy at the studio with Ben one night when we’d stayed late. It was a silly song about a man falling in love with the moon and coming back as a bird so he could sing his love to her again.
Ember sang along, making us some sandwiches, and her husky voice made the song sweeter.
I pushed some of her flame-colored hair off her shoulder, thinking maybe I should write a follow-up about a morning bird falling in love with the dawn.
She smiled. “I love this one. It’s so sweet.”
“It’s silly,” I said. “Ben made me include it.”
“It’s perfect. Classic ballad style.” She looked surprised. “What gave you the idea for it?”
I rubbed small circles on her back, loving these small moments with my packmates. “It was just a random bit of lyric that popped into my head. The bit about ‘the night is kind, but it plays me unfair. Bringing you close but leaving me here.’”
“It’s brilliant.” She beamed, like I was some sort of genius.
“Didn’t feel brilliant at the time.” I laughed. It was easier to talk about now. I’d written the song so long ago, and though it was one of my favorites, I didn’t have a deep intense connection to it the way I did “Roses and Ruins.” “It was just a fun little bit of music.”
She eyed me. “And music doesn’t feel like that anymore?”
“No.” I sighed. “I worry that what I’m writing it too dark, or too poppy, or it doesn’t sound right.”
I couldn’t look at her face. I couldn’t handle it if she looked hopeful or excited.
My omega instincts wanted me to show off, to preen for her, but that made the pressure to perform worse.
In the end, I would just disappoint her too.
“I’ve had a half of a song stuck in my head for months, but every time I try to flesh it out…
” I shrugged. “I overthink it? I guess? But I don’t know how not to do that. ”
That was the worst part. I didn’t stop having ideas for songs, but somewhere in the process of making them, I lost confidence in myself. In what the song wanted to be.
Ember’s big blue eyes were serious. “Why did you stop making albums? It bothers you. I can tell. I figured you just stopped wanting to, but if songs are stuck in your head, that means the music is still there?”
Another urge to downplay things, but I ignored it. Ember had done more than bare her soul to me. All I saw on her face was curiosity and concern, and I had the urge to reach out through Ben to see what she was feeling.
But, of course, she wasn’t bonded yet. Something that was starting to feel like a missing piece inside my bond with Ben.
I rubbed the back of my neck, my hair falling around my hand. It was long enough to completely touch my shoulders now, and I needed a trim. “It’s complicated.”
“You don’t have to talk about it,” she said. “What do you want to watch tonight?”
“It’s okay.” I wrapped my arm around her waist. It was such a comfort, having her close to me.
I never imagined feeling so much for someone other than Ben.
It was almost a relief, knowing I could open myself up like that again.
I put my chin on her shoulder. “I didn’t mean to go so long between albums. After From Ashes came out, it hit a bunch of charts, and I felt like I was in a dream. ”
She frowned. “Or a nightmare?”
I didn’t hear any judgment, only concern. It gave me the courage to talk about it, all of it.
“Sort of. It was everything I ever dreamed of, making songs that touched people. But I didn’t expect From Ashes to do so well. I thought five people would listen to it, and that would be that. I was ready for obscurity. So when it took off, it was terrifying.”
She ran her hand through my hair. “That’s every artist’s dream, right?”
“I’d told myself when I was writing those songs that no one else had to hear them but me.
Composing music is like baring my soul to the entire world.
I still remember sitting on my bed as a teenager, writing ‘Breathe Beneath the Earth,’ feeling the start of my heat burning through me, feeling hopeless, like I’d never find a bondmate who felt what I felt.
” I chuckled. “It feels so juvenile now, embarrassingly so.”
“No.” Ember looked shocked. “Rian. When you sang ‘Even the wind still calls your name, like the world won’t let me forget you stayed,’ like, it lives inside me.”
She touched her chest, blinking tears out of her eyes.
It was so humbling, seeing the direct impact I’d had on another human being. I loved her, with everything I had, but seeing how I’d helped her so many years ago made some of my own grief feel worth it.
Ember was like me. Music filled her up until it threatened to swallow her whole if it didn’t get out.
“It’s not juvenile; it’s raw and honest. When my designation triggered, I was mad.
” She picked up my hand and kissed the back of it.
“I was so mad. Here I was, laid up in the hospital, my parents dead, and now my body is like, ‘As an extra layer of hey, screw you, we’re going to flip into omega now.’”
I frowned. “That sounds like hell.”
“It was.” She shook her head. “But listening to ‘Roses and Ruins’ over and over helped. It felt like you wrote that for me, like you knew exactly the feelings of conflict and bitterness I’d felt.”
I squeezed her, hating that she had to go through that. I led her over to the couch, and she carried our sandwiches. “I’m glad it helped.”
“But now when you write, you worry it won’t be as well liked as From Ashes ?”
“Or it won’t sound right. I start writing songs and then doubting myself.
Should I make it more bluesy? Should it sound more upbeat?
” I sighed. “Ben helped me a lot with which songs made the album. I was a basket case and overthought everything. I either wanted thirty songs on it or two. He helped me find my way through what felt right, what told the story.”
I pulled the blanket up over us, knowing my scent was souring.
I couldn’t help it, all of the grief washing over me.
“But as time went on, it was harder to know how I should finish a song. If I wanted to make it more pop, or more rock, or something in between. I kept comparing it to From Ashes and thinking my fans would hate this, or love that, and instead of me, my guitar, and my feelings, I also had my fans. And I didn’t want to disappoint them. ”
I raked my hands through my hair. “My parents told me what a prodigy I was and asked why I wasn’t using my talent. The entire time, I was telling myself, ‘Write the songs already. Why do I have to overthink everything?’
“So now, whenever I have a song idea, it’s hard to separate it from what I want, what I think other people want, and everything in between.”
Ember wrinkled her nose. “That sucks.”
I laughed at her understatement. “It does. I know Ben loves me, and he wouldn’t care if I never wrote another song again…”
“But you’re not happy with that,” Ember finished. “We want you to be happy, and this is obviously eating you alive.”
I nodded, tears suddenly welling up in my eyes. It was so stupid, to be this twisted up about making music, but I was trapped in a hell of my own making. I cleared my throat. “I still get to make music.”
Ember frowned, pushing some hair out of my face. “Is it just when you’re trying to write your own songs? Or do you feel that twisted up when you’re playing guitar?”
“Only when I’m trying to work on my follow-up.” I felt guilty for some reason. “I still have lingering guilt that I should be able to write my own songs, but it’s easier to focus on what someone else has already written.”
Ember squeezed my hand. “Stop trying to write the follow-up to From Ashes . You could even use a different stage name. No one knows who you are anyway. You could just start fresh if you still want to make music.”
The idea was thrilling and terrifying all at once. “That feels like giving up.”
“Is it giving up? Or starting over?” She cocked her head. “Your follow-up album can’t hold all of your hopes, dreams, desires. That’s too much pressure. No wonder you’re crumbling.”
“I know,” I huffed. “I can’t make myself write songs for fun. Every time I tell myself not to think about my next album, the thoughts creep in anyway.”
Ember brightened up. “What if we sang songs for the fun of it? Not even, like, pop songs. What if we sang nursery songs?”
I frowned. “For practice? I practice a lot in the studio.”
“For the joy of it.” Ember grinned. “You need to remember what it was like to love music for its own sake. For the way it lets you feel things that are too big. Or small. Or feels wrong. We could sing kids’ songs. To remember the part of music that gives us joy.”
Something like hope kindled in my chest. That sounded nice, making music without any residual guilt and shame. Just doing it for the hell of it.
To make my omega smile.
“You’ll sing with me?” I asked. “We could go downstairs, and I could play?”
“Yes.” Ember beamed, more of that infectious joy engulfing me. “It will be so much fun! We could sing ‘Twinkle Twinkle Little Star’ and ‘The Green Grass Grew All Around.’”
“Like we’re twelve and at summer camp?” I couldn’t help but smile. Suddenly I wanted nothing more than to sit around and sing silly songs with her.
“Exactly.” Ember tugged me, so I stood up and stole a kiss. “And then later we can make out.”
I followed her downstairs, ignoring our food, and pulled my favorite guitar down.
“You pick the first song.” I sat on the couch with her and warmed up with some strumming.
Ember shifted so she could look at me. “Let’s do ‘On Top of Old Smokey.’”
Ember started singing, her voice bright and clear. She had a wonderful singing voice, and she stayed well within her own range since she wasn’t trying to match someone else’s voice.
I joined her, singing the bits of the song I remembered, going through the verses about how the meatball rolled under a bush. Ember looked so pleased with herself, I couldn’t help but feel the same happiness.
She was right. Singing for the hell of it was enjoyable, and I missed this sort of fun. I didn’t feel pressure to write the next heartbreaking ballad while singing “The Wheels on the Bus.”
In the middle of “Down by the Bay,” Ben and West came home. Ben joined us on the piano. He didn’t even ask what he was doing and acted like it was completely reasonable to find his two omegas singing kids’ songs.
When the song stopped, Ember grabbed my forearm. “I don’t know why, but I want some of those shaky instruments. And West needs something.”
“West is fine,” the omega said from the couch.
Ember shook her head. “A tambourine or something. But don’t judge me. I have no rhythm.”
I stood up, getting a pair of carved wooden maracas. “I wouldn’t judge you.”
“You told me I went out of range,” she said, a hint of hurt in her voice. “When you caught me singing in the shower.”
I handed her a tambourine and West some maracas. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to make you feel bad. I was just trying to help. I’m too critical, and that bleeds over to people around me.”
“Forgiven,” she said.
Alejandro found us downstairs, singing “She’ll Be Coming ’Round the Mountain.” I found Alejandro some hand drums, and we sang more songs. We laughed when Alejandro kept messing up the beat and when West gave up in disgust, clapping along instead.
It was the perfect night.
I wanted to spend the rest of my life with this pack.
We went to the master bedroom and made love. When we were spent and tired, lying in each other’s arms, I curled around Ember and whispered, “You were right,” in her ear.
I felt better, like my soul was lighter than it had been. I’d made music for the fun of it. I’d forgotten what it felt like for music to be a joy and not feel like a burden or work.
“I’m always right,” she said, sounding sleepy.
I kissed her neck. “I love you.”
She squeezed her arms around me. “I love you too.”
I hummed the snippet of the song stuck in my head, thinking maybe I’d be able to make something of it after all.