6. Unfinished Songs
Unfinished Songs
Evan
Evan sat at the piano, fingers hovering just above the keys, the morning light cutting through the blinds in soft, golden blades.
She reached for her plush dinosaur and clutched it to her chest. "If you go away to sing, can I come too?"
He froze, mid-pour of his coffee. "What makes you think Im going away?"
Piper shrugged, suddenly very focused on her cereal. "Uncle Jonah said youre gonna go on a big tour. With lights and buses and screaming fans. Like in the videos."
Evan knelt beside her, setting his coffee aside. "He did, huh?"
She nodded. "You used to be really famous. I saw the music video where you wore all black and broke a guitar. You looked mad."
A dry laugh escaped him. "Yeah, I was mad."
"Were you mad cause you missed home?"
He looked at her, blinking. That landed deeper than he expected.
"Maybe," he said quietly. "I think I was mad because I didnt know what home was."
She considered that for a long beat, then reached out and patted his hair like shed seen Sarah do. "You know now, right? Cause Sarah and I are here."
His throat tightened. "Yeah. Yeah, I do."
"So if you go" she paused, lowering her voice, "can we go too?"
He reached out and tucked a curl behind her ear. "If I do Ill make sure you and Sarah are okay. Thats a promise."
Piper leaned forward and kissed his cheek, simple and trusting. "You always keep promises."
She gave him a sleepy smile and hopped down from the stool, cereal in one hand, dinosaur in the other.
Evans chest tightened as he watched her go so small, so certain, trusting him without hesitation.
That kind of faith was a gift he didnt know how to hold, but God, he wanted to try.
"Im gonna go wake Sarah. She promised pancakes today."
She skipped off before he could speak, her tiny feet pattering softly across the hardwood.
He watched her disappear, heart caught somewhere between dread and wonder.
Thats when he turned to the piano.
He sat still for a long moment, hands hovering above the keys, as if waiting for permission.
The apartment was hushed, the air thick with memories.
Then, finally, his fingers moved. The melody came easily now, the same one hed started in the studio, the one he hadnt been able to finish.
Every note carried pieces of her, her laugh, the curve of her smile, the storm shed weathered just by choosing to stay.
He barely heard the footsteps behind him until she spoke.
"Youve been up all night?"
Sarah stood in the doorway, barefoot, hair tousled, Pipers dinosaur tucked under one arm.
"Couldnt sleep," he said without looking up. "You?"
She hesitated. "Not much."
He played a few more bars, then stopped.
"This is yours."
Sarahs brows drew together. "What?"
"The song. Its yours. I didnt mean to write it. It just happened."
He finally looked at her. Her eyes were soft but guarded, like she was afraid to believe him.
"Its beautiful," she said quietly.
He shrugged. "Its unfinished. Like everything else in my life."
She stepped closer and sat beside him on the bench. Her leg brushed his.
"Then maybe you just havent found the right ending yet," she murmured.
Their hands hovered over the keys, not touching, but close. Sarah pressed a few soft notes, hesitant, clumsy.
He chuckled. "You play?"
"Badly. I had two years of lessons before my teacher begged me to stop."
He reached over, played a matching chord to hers. It was dissonant. Raw. And oddly perfect.
"Thats the kind of song we are, I think," he said, glancing at her. He let the words linger, his gaze holding hers in the silence that followed. "Not easy. But maybe its worth finishing."
She held his gaze. Her voice dropped. "If you stop running, Evan."
He started to say something I think about you all the time. I wanted to tell you that night in the limo. I wanted to tell you after the kiss.
But the words collapsed before they reached his lips.
She looked down, brushing her fingers over the ivory keys. "Piper talks about you like you hung the moon. She thinks youre her forever."
That hit harder than he expected.
He swallowed hard. "I want to be."
Before either of them could say more, Piper skidded into the room in her socks, waving a thick envelope in both hands.
"Unca Evan! This came for you! Its fancy!"
Evan took it gently. The labels logo was emblazoned across the top.
His stomach dropped.
He tore it open and scanned the contents.
A contract.
A full tour. Six countries. Three months.
Sarahs eyes found his. "Is that what I think it is?"
He nodded slowly.
Her face changed, flickered with something between resignation and disappointment.
"Well," she said, too light, too breezy, "I hope the song sounds just as good from the road."
Evan didnt know what to say. He watched her scoop up Piper, pressing a kiss to her curls, and disappear down the hall.
He sat there, the contract in his lap, the song still hanging in the air like a ghost.
A few minutes later, she came back, without Piper.
"I left her with a book," Sarah said. "She wanted another dinosaur story."
She crossed her arms, standing on the other side of the island. "You dont owe anyone your soul, Evan. Not even your fans."
He opened his mouth, then closed it. She waited a beat, but when he didnt answer, she turned and walked away again.
After they left, he tried to play again. Tried to find the ending to her melody.
But every chord felt wrong. Every lyric is too soft or too sharp.
He scratched out line after line until all that remained was one phrase:
She stayed, even when I didnt ask.
He stared at it.
Then closed the notebook.
Later, at the kitchen table, Evan laid the contract flat before him. It stared back like a dare.
He read the tour schedule again. Six cities in thirty days. One week of press. Two nights at Madison Square Garden.
The corner of his mouth twitched, humorless.
Berlin. Thats what he remembered. A stadium packed with bodies. His voice cracking through the smoke and lights.
Hed been drunk that night. Numb.
He remembered the dressing room, trashed, champagne bottles, a smashed guitar, and silence.
Hed scrawled a lyric on a napkin and thrown it on the floor.
Even when they scream your name, you can still feel invisible.
He still had the napkin. Still folded it in the back of his lyric journal like a wound he never closed.
He flipped to an older page tucked in near the back.
A song his brother helped him write, long before everything fell apart.
He could still hear his voice, bright and breathless with excitement, humming melodies between giggles.
His laugh used to echo off the garage walls where they practiced, full of life, full of hope.
The chorus scribbled in his messy handwriting:
Home isnt where you sleep. Its who knows your name when you fail.
Evans throat tightened.
He reached for it now, side by side with Sarahs song.
The difference was staggering.
One born in chaos. The other in warmth.
And yet both held pieces of him.
He stared at them until his eyes blurred.
Then stood.
He stepped out onto the balcony. The city buzzed beneath him, distant and alive.
The wind teased the edge of the contract in his hand.
Across the street, a figure lifted a camera. Evan froze. A flash popped. Just one.
He clenched the paper tighter.
He knew what the next photo might say. Not about him, but about Sarah. About Piper. The ones who didnt ask for any of this.
He pulled his phone from his back pocket.
Opened the voice recorder. Hit record.
His voice was rough.
"If I dont say this now, I never will. Im not afraid of the road. Im afraid of leaving you behind. You and Piper. This thing weve made its not pretend. Not to me. Not anymore."
He hovered over the send button.
Then hit save.
Didnt send it.
Not yet.
He tapped play.
Listened to his own words.
Rewind it.
Listened again.
His thumb hovered.
He pressed the phone to his forehead, breath shallow. Say it to her. Or let her go.
He left the phone on the windowsill and turned back toward the quiet.
Behind him, the apartment was still.
Safe. Real.
He didnt know what he was going to choose.
But he knew what he was afraid to lose.