CHAPTER 34 STUDIO SESSIONS NORA
STUDIO SESSIONS
NORA
The studio at night is a different world.
All the lights are off except for the soft glow coming from the control room.
The main space is dark, vast, filled with shadows and the ghost of music that's been played here.
There's an intimacy about it—like we're the only two people who exist.
Nate unlocks the control room and flicks on a single lamp.
Warm light spills across the mixing board, the leather chairs, the walls covered in photographs and gold records.
"Sit," he says, gesturing to the couch against the back wall. "I'll get you some water."
For the first time tonight, I do as I'm told a sink into the leather sofa while he disappears, then returns with a bottle of water and what looks like aspirin.
"Drink," he orders gently. "All of it."
I take the water gratefully, suddenly realizing how thirsty I am.
“Do you ever get tired of it?”
“Tired of what?
“Taking care of me?”
“Of you?” He smiles and it undoes me. “Never.”
I take a sip of the water, hoping it cools me down and helps clear my head slightly, washing away some of the alcohol haze.
He sits on the coffee table in front of me—not too close, maintaining that careful distance he's been practicing—and watches me drink.
"Better?" he asks when I finish the bottle.
"Yeah."
I'm still buzzed—warm and loose and brave—but the sharp edge of drunkenness has dulled.
"How are you feeling? Honestly."
"Honestly?" I consider the question. "Clearer. Still... warm. But clearer."
He studies me for a long moment, like he's assessing whether I'm telling the truth.
"You should probably get some sleep. It's been a long day."
"I don't want to sleep." I turn to face him fully. "I want to listen to something."
"Like what?"
"Anything."
He stands and heads over to the computer, scrolling through files for a moment before selecting something.
He hits play.
The opening notes fill the studio—clean acoustic guitar, layered and intimate, building slowly. It sounds like a blend of Goo Goo Dolls and Lifehouse, that emotional vulnerability wrapped in perfectly crafted melody. The kind of song that gets under your skin immediately.
I close my eyes, letting it wash over me.
"Is this The Row's latest track?" I ask, recognizing the production quality, the careful arrangement.
"No," he says quietly. "It's just something I wrote a while back."
And then his voice kicks in through the speakers.
I freeze.
It's him. Singing. Not producing, not in the background—front and center, raw and honest and devastating.
The lyrics are about longing. About distance. About loving someone from afar and wondering if they feel it too. About missing someone who's standing right in front of you. About second chances and roads not taken and the space between wanting and having.
It's not explicitly about us.
But it is.
Every word. Every note. Every carefully crafted line.
My chest tightens. My throat goes dry.
I open my eyes and find him watching me, waiting for my reaction.
"Nate," I breathe.
But I don't know what else to say.
Because he just played me his heart, wrapped in melody, and I'm sitting here realizing he's been carrying this—carrying us—the entire time.
“What’s wrong?” He asks, sitting back down in front of me.
I shift closer. "I need to say this while I'm brave enough and not overthinking everything."
He goes still, but doesn't move away.
"Okay," he says quietly. "I'm listening."
I take a breath, gathering my thoughts, grateful that the water has cleared enough of the fog that I know what I'm saying.
Know what I want.
“When Wes showed up—" My voice catches. "You didn't hesitate. You just stepped in between us like it was the most natural thing in the world."
“Because it was,” he says simply.
"And when I fell apart in the shower, you didn't judge me. You just held me."
“Yeah, Len—"
"And in the car just now, everything you said… you see me. Not the mess or the disaster. Just me."
I'm closer now, near enough to feel his warmth, to see the way his pupils have dilated slightly. My hand finds his, fingers lacing together.
"I've been so scared of choosing wrong again that I forgot what choosing right feels like. But being with you—" my voice breaks slightly, "—being with you feels right. Even when it's complicated. Even when it scares me."
“Nora,” he says, but his thumb is tracing patterns on the back of my hand.
"And you know what I keep thinking?"
"What?"
"That I don't want to be careful anymore. I don't want to choose safe over real. And you, Nate, are the most real thing I've ever had."
"Are you sure?" His voice has gone rough. "Because I need you to be sure. I need to know this isn't just—"
I kiss him.
Rise up slightly and press my lips to his, cutting off whatever doubt he was about to voice.
For a heartbeat, he doesn't respond. Just sits perfectly still with my hand in his and tension radiating through his body. And then he pulls back, just slightly, his free hand coming up to cup my face.
"Nora." My name is rough on his lips. "Are you sober enough to know what you're doing right now?"
"Yes." I hold his gaze, let him see the clarity in my eyes. "I know exactly what I'm doing. I want you."
"If we do this—" he starts.
"We can't undo it," I finish. "I know. And I don't want to undo it. I want this. I want you. Do you want me?"
"You have no fucking idea how much."
"Then stop waiting.”
For one more suspended moment, he searches my face. Looking for doubt, for uncertainty, for any sign that I'm not fully present in this decision. Whatever he finds must satisfy him, because suddenly he's kissing me back with an intensity that steals my breath.
His hands slide from my face to my back, pulling me flush against him, and I feel every hard plane of his body pressed against mine.
This isn't like the shower.
This isn't careful or controlled.
This is desperation.
His tongue traces the seam of my lips and I open for him immediately, tasting him, drowning in the sensation of finally having this again. One of his hands tangles in my hair, tilting my head back so he deepens the kiss, and I make a sound that's embarrassingly needy.
We stumble backward until my back hits the wall beside the mixing board, and he cages me in with his body, one hand braced above my head, the other still fisted in my hair.
"We shouldn't—" he starts, but I cut him off.
"Shut up and kiss me."
He does. His mouth moves from my lips to my jaw, down my neck, finding that spot below my ear that makes my knees weak. I arch into him, needing more, needing everything, and feel him hard against my hip.
My pulse races. My skin burns.
"Nate—"
"Tell me to stop," he says against my throat, even as his free hand slides under the hem of my dress, fingers splaying across my thigh. "Tell me this is a bad idea and I'll stop."
"Don't stop," I gasp. "Don't you dare stop."
His hand slides higher, and I'm making sounds I'd be embarrassed about if I could think past the sensation of his touch, his mouth, his body surrounding mine.
But then he pulls back slightly, breathing hard, eyes wild.
"I'm sorry," he says, voice wrecked. "I shouldn't have. I can’t—“
"Sorry?" The word comes out sharp, frustrated.
“I can't—I can't survive losing you again. I barely survived it the first time, let alone the second."
I take a step toward him, then another, until I'm close enough to touch.
"What if I told you that kissing you scares me more than anything else in the world? Because I know every time we get close, something goes wrong.” I take a shaky breath.
"But I'm so tired of being scared, Nate.
I'm so tired of not being honest with myself and choosing safe over real.
And you—" my voice breaks, "—you're the most real thing I've ever had. "
"Len—"
"I don't want to run anymore," I whisper. "I don't want to choose what makes sense over what makes me feel alive. And you make me feel alive. Even when it terrifies me. Especially when it terrifies me."
We stand there in the dim light of the control room, two people who've spent years running in circles around each other, and I watch him make a choice.
"Fuck it," he breathes.
And then his mouth is on mine again. But this time, there's no hesitation. No pulling back. No apologies.
Just want.
Pure and undeniable and finally unleashed.
His hands are everywhere—in my hair, on my waist, sliding up my back, cupping my face, learning the shape of me like he's been starving for it. And I'm matching him touch for touch, pulling at his shirt, needing to feel skin, needing more than fabric between us.
He lifts me effortlessly, and my legs wrap around his waist as he carries me toward the back room.
We're kissing the whole way—deep, desperate kisses that feel like reclaiming what we thought we'd lost. He lays me down on the sofa carefully despite the urgency thrumming through both of us, hovering over me with dark eyes and trembling hands.
"I've wanted this for so long," he confesses, and his voice is wrecked. "Wanted you for so long."
"Then have me," I whisper, pulling him down. "I'm right here. I'm yours."
And finally—finally—we stop fighting it.
His mouth traces down my neck, my collarbone, pushing aside the straps of my dress to access more skin. My hands explore the planes of his back, the muscles that flex under my touch, the heat radiating through his shirt that I need gone immediately.
I pull at the fabric, and he helps me, yanking it over his head and tossing it aside.
And then his chest is bare. All hard muscle and ink and scars that tell stories from years of abuse—some covered by tattoos, others clear as day.
My hands find his skin immediately, tracing the lines of ink, the ridges of muscle, the heat radiating off him.
"You're staring," he says, but there's heat in his voice.
"You're beautiful."
He makes a sound that's half laugh, half groan, and then his mouth is on mine again—rougher this time, more demanding. His hands slide up my thighs, pushing my dress higher, fingers digging into soft flesh with just enough pressure to make me gasp into his mouth.