Coda Delilah
Coda
Delilah
The trunk of Sam’s car isn’t quite as comfortable as Roscoe’s roof, but Delilah settles herself on top of it anyway, her backpack in her lap.
She’s dusty all over, mud from the cave floor coating her sneakers and drying on the legs and seat of her jeans, and there are scrapes on her hands from where she navigated through the tight tunnels.
Her body aches from the cramped spaces she passed through and from the time she spent curled on the ground with Emmett’s weight in her lap, her muscles sore from holding so much emotional tension.
But despite everything, she feels clearheaded and calm, steady in a way that almost surprises her. The usual feeling of waiting for the other shoe to drop, or for the rug to be yanked out from under her, is conspicuously absent. For once, she feels like she can just—be.
She pulls her journal out of her backpack and flips through the pages, reading over her notes, her lyrics, her music.
Her story and Emmett’s twined together until she can’t really tell anymore where the metaphor ends and the literal begins.
It is, she thinks, running her fingertips over her own handwriting, the best thing she’s ever written.
Even if this album doesn’t go anywhere, she saved a life with these songs.
Maybe two, she thinks, and leans back against the rear window, tilting her head up to watch the final stars start to fade away.
The sky has just begun to lighten into true dawn when the passenger door opens and closes. The trunk creaks as Emmett climbs up next to her, moving with an easy grace Delilah had forgotten they had, and settles close enough for their shoulders to touch. “Ruth forgave you?”
“She’s coming around.” Amusement curls around the words. “I talked her out of conferencing Noah into the call.”
Delilah turns her head to look at them. Emmett looks loose-limbed and happy, their eyes warm and fond as they look back at her. Delilah reaches over and brushes a few strands of hair off their forehead, smiling. “You’re heading back to Brooklyn, then?”
“Eventually.” Emmett tilts their head into her hand until she shifts, rubbing her thumb against their cheekbone.
They lean contentedly into the touch. “I’m not in a rush,” they say, and there’s a note of wonder in their voice, like it’s something new and novel, and maybe it is.
For both of them. “I was thinking of staying in LA for a little while.”
Warmth curls through Delilah’s chest, spilling up to her lips and down into her stomach, honeyed and soft. “Yeah?” she says, scooting a bit closer.
“Mm.” Emmett takes her hand and threads their fingers together. “There’s this musician I’ve started listening to, and I think she’s working on something new. I was the first person to hear it. I want to see what she does next.”
Delilah catches her breath. “Emmett,” she says, “I don’t have to—”
“Neither do I,” Emmett says, and their smile is blinding.
“I don’t have to do anything.” They lean over and brush their lips over hers, featherlight, and Delilah shivers.
“But I want to stay in LA for a while,” they say.
“And I want you to produce that album.” They kiss her again, just as gently, just as sweetly.
“They were beautiful songs,” they murmur. “They should be shared.”
Delilah’s eyes sting. “Yeah?” she whispers.
Emmett kisses her in answer, a real kiss, long and deep and lingering, and Delilah melts into it, because how could she not?
“First day of the rest of your life,” she says when she pulls back, knocking their foreheads together. “How do you want to spend it?”
Emmett hums, looking thoughtful, and then shifts to pull their phone out of the pocket of their jeans, as dusty and caked with clay as Delilah’s.
They swipe to their camera, then hold it out at arm’s length, giving Delilah a significant look until she laughs and shifts closer so that both of them are in the frame, the desert stretching out into infinity behind them.
Delilah tips her head against theirs and smiles, real and honest, and it feels good.
“However we want,” Emmett says, and snaps the photo.
delilah cohen [@heytheredelco]
[a photo of the sunrise over a rocky canyon, the sky painted in shades of blue and violet and pink and gold]
[location tag: Anza-Borrego Desert State Park]
hello, sunshine. what will you bring me today?