15. Gia
15
Gia
The clock is going on midnight, and I can’t find it in me to go to sleep. I lay awake for about half an hour next to Bryn before I pull on my robe and go down to the piano. I play quietly and sing softly, hoping I’m not overheard.
My brain is popping with ideas, with a song I’ve had on my heart for a long time and haven’t known how to release.
Until now.
The inspiration is twofold. There was the conversation I had with Abigail tonight, the one before the cocktail class when I told her that it’s clear Mars likes her and that she should go after him if she wants. She balked, unwilling to acknowledge the obvious flirting they’d been doing since he arrived, but I insisted.
We were both shocked at how I insisted.
“I am okay with it. He’s a good person. He just wasn’t mine,” I said to her.
Abigail tried to play it off. “No more men, remember?”
“Isn’t that how it happens? When you stop looking?” I offered .
Given how the two of them flocked to each other the rest of the night, I think she took my advice seriously.
And then there is the conversation I had with Kade this morning. The one that has been aching since it happened.
I got the freedom from letting go of Mars. The story, though, comes from Kade.
“ If I’m too much
They walk away
If I’m too little
I don’t think they’ll stay”
My brain can be a difficult place to be, the way I willow from thought to thought, often unable to see something all the way through before I’m onto the next. There are so many unfinished things in my mind, things that leave me worried and unsure. If I could only remain a bit longer, I might be able to tie the loose ends up into pretty bows.
I wonder what it would be like to have a normal brain. My therapist would tell me that the way mine works isn’t abnormal , but I can’t help thinking about others who can have full-functioning thoughts and put things to rest.
That’s what the music is good for. To work things out, I’ve been cursed to relive over and over until they explode out of me.
My fingers tumble over a few keys, and I stop on a dissonant chord.
I let out a heavy sigh before picking up a pen and scribbling some thoughts down on a notepad I found at the front desk. I’m sure I’ll lose the paper, but writing it down helps commit it to memory.
“It’s good.”
My body locks up at the sound of Kade’s deep, husky voice. I look toward the doorway toward the front hall. He’s standing under the mistletoe, and I wish I were standing there with him.
You’re supposed to be mad at him, Gia .
But how can I be when he’s looking so utterly handsome with his dark hair pushed back out of his face, the gray wool sweater pulled taut across his chest, and his eyes casting warmth over me I didn’t think he could feel again after our conversation this morning.
“I didn’t realize you were still here,” I say with a half-laugh.
“Andrew and I were up trading war stories,” he says.
“That’s funny,” I reply. “That it’s a saying and yet true for you guys.”
Kade chuckles. “I suppose.”
We are both quiet. Kade glances toward the back door where his coat hangs. He doesn’t move to go. “Is it new?” he asks with a nod toward the piano. “I don’t think I’ve heard it.”
I rest a few fingers against the keys without pressing them down, sort of like a safety blanket. “I’ve been thinking about it for a while.”
Kade takes a few steps into the room, sliding his hands into his pockets. “It sounds like a sad one, from the words.”
“It’s not about Mars,” I say quickly.
His face screws together. “I didn’t think it was.”
I look away, down at my hands. “Sorry. I got defensive.”
“After what I said this morning, I don’t blame you.”
“It’s okay. I get it.” I don’t. But I don’t want to rehash anything.
Kade nods and looks down at his feet.
“It’s about my brain,” I say and then laugh at myself for saying it.
A smile slides onto his face. “Your brain? ”
I gesture toward my head. “Yeah, just how things work up here and how confusing it can be.”
“Because of your ADHD?”
“Yeah, exactly. I’ve never felt inspired to talk about it in a song, but I’m starting to find I want to and… yeah.”
Kade takes a few steps closer. “You think you’re too much?”
“Uh, I know I am,” I say like “duh.”
But Kade doesn’t laugh. “That’s ridiculous.”
I open my mouth to respond, but the sweetness of his response washes over me. “It is?”
“Yeah, of course it is. You’re Gia, you’re… everyone loves you.”
I swallow. “From afar.”
“Up close, too,” he says quickly in response.
Kade’s stare is arresting. I hold my breath, unable to move from it. Finally, I shake him off. “Uh, do you want to sit?”
He steps up to the piano bench. “Sure.”
It’s not a terribly wide bench, so when he sits, his leg brushes up against mine. He’s so unbelievably close to me—and we’ve been close for years now. He’s kept his hand on me, guided me through crowds, and kept me away from people with bad intentions. He lives at my house, for goodness’ sake.
And yet, he’s never felt closer than he does sitting here on the piano bench. Because this is my domain. I don’t invite people into it so easily.
When I’m behind the piano, the thoughts don’t blur together in the same way. All I have is the music. It clears my head. So, I place my hands on the keys and start to play again. “It doesn’t always feel like that,” I say. “The loving up close thing. I mean, I feel loved. But I feel like I embarrass myself. ”
“What do you mean?”
“Like… I can’t hold anything back the way other people can. That’s why I write music, why I sing. I’m throwing everything out there all the time for everyone to see. The vulnerability is exhausting.”
“It’s beautiful too.”
My fingers stumble on the keys. I try not to let that stop me, but my nerves are uneasy now.
“I wish I could be like that.”
“No, you don’t,” I say through a chuckle.
“You don’t think I want to be?”
I look askance to Kade. He’s not watching my hands but me. My cheeks go numb. “I just mean it’s harder than you think.”
“I know it’s hard. That’s why I’m bad at it.”
I stop playing and turn my torso toward him. “You want to be vulnerable?”
Kade lets out a breath through his nose. “Of course I do. Do you know how mixed-up I feel most of the time because I never know what to say?”
“You don’t seem mixed up,” I reply.
“Yeah, because I’m trying really hard to have it all together. I mean, even after my accident, I didn’t want to seem like I needed help. Which is funny in retrospect because I couldn’t even walk,” he says with a limp laugh.
I smile, too.
“You, on the other hand, aren’t afraid to say what you’re thinking or what you feel.”
“Of course, I’m afraid.”
“Well, much less often than I am. I wish I could be like that.”
I find my body gravitating toward his without realizing it. Pump the brakes, Gia . “I didn’t know you liked that about me. I thought you thought I was?— ”
“Too much?” he interrupts.
“Well, yes.”
Kade stares into my eyes without speaking for a long time—so long that I’m afraid time has stopped. But then his lips part, and he murmurs, “No, Gia. I’ve never thought you were too much.”
“Maybe we should try switching places for a day. Get a taste of the other side of things,” I say with a nervous laugh.
“What about right now?” Kade asks.
“Huh?”
Kade nods definitely. “Right now. You can hold back, and I’ll let go.”
But I have been holding back. The one thing I need to be heard, the one thing I need to say to Kade , I can’t because I’m too scared of the rejection. It might kill me.
“You ready?” he asks with a smile.
I seal my mouth together and nod.
“You’re already so good at it!”
“ Kade .” I am trying so hard not to hyperventilate right now. Terrified of what he might say, what I won’t be able to say, what I can’t.
A moment passes between us. Kade barely opens his mouth, but I hear it. “I’m jealous.”
I stop breathing.
“Of Mars. I was jealous when I thought he was going to be able to get you back.”
“W-why?”
“Because I can’t watch that happen again,” he answers.
A spark of frustration ignites. “Kade, you can’t protect me forever, you can’t?—”
Suddenly, his palm engulfs my cheek. “I can’t watch you be with anyone again.”
My mouth opens, but I say nothing. I’m in shock. If I wanted to spill the contents of my brain out, I wouldn’t be able to; I’m so turned around.
He places his other hand on my other cheek, cradling my face to make sure my eyes are looking into his. I touch his forearms as tentatively as a ghost. “I want it to be me,” Kade says. “I’ve wanted it to be me for a long, long time. And I can’t keep it in anymore.”
I want to erupt into cheers, do cartwheels, sing at the top of my lungs, tell the world that my crush hasn’t been silly. Never was. But I’m at a loss.
“If you don’t feel the same, say it. Now, because I can’t live with hoping or denying anymore, Gia.”
“Why?” I croak. “Me. Why me?”
Kade laughs. “Most of the world wants you, and you can’t begin to fathom why I might?”
“I don’t want to be dreaming,” I say, desperation pricking at my words. “I don’t want to wake up and none of this be real, so please, Kade, convince me because I won’t be able to?—”
He convinces me, all right. His lips against my lips, warm and feverish, a kiss unlike any kiss I’ve ever received. Because this is the kiss of a man who has waited and bided his time until he couldn’t contain himself any longer.
Kade scrapes a hand back through my hair, keeping my mouth to his, and I slide my arms around his back, pulling my body flush.
No one kisses like this in dreams. In dreams, you get the shape of kisses. Not the real thing.
But now I feel every detail. Every press of his fingers, every movement of his mouth, every breath, every heartbeat.
I knew how badly I wanted this.
I had no idea how badly I needed this.
Kade’s lips break from mine first. He presses his forehead to mine, our noses brushing one another’s, his mouth only an inch away. “Was that convincing enough for you?”
I can’t help the grin that slams onto my face. “That was a start.”
There is a chiming sound. The clock on the mantle, a tiny golden thing with delicate hands that chimes on the hour, every hour. I glance over at it, and Kade pulls me closer, unwilling to release me.
Midnight.
I turn back to him and smile shyly when I find myself reflected in his blue eyes. I don’t think they’ve ever been so emotional, so full of trembling life and possibility. I never knew it was possible for him to look at someone like this.
At me like this.
“Merry Christmas, Kade.”
Kade gives me a soft smile, winding a curl of my hair around his finger before tucking it behind my ear. He presses a kiss to my temple and whispers into my ear, “Merry Christmas, Gia.”