Page 70 of Thorns That Bloom
Ruffling up my hair and then brushing it down a little—shit, do I look okay?—I glance at the audience again and notice a movement at the back. My entire body tenses up like a string when I see Sam making his way from the back toward the seating area with a glass of Coke in his hand.
He meets my eyes and gives a deliciously shy smile.
I’m going to have a heart attack.
I smile back at him and nod, quickly turning to fiddle with one of the buttons on the box connected to the microphone so that I look like I’m doing something and not just standing on the stage, grinning like a complete maniac. Because that’s just what he does to me.
His hair is brushed back.Different. I want to look at him more, to stare at him for hours like he’s a painting, but I don’t. I live off the brief glance I gave him until it’s our time to perform and I have another excuse to look.
He’s sitting there, only two tables away from the stage, his long coat now off, wearing one of his comfortable sweaters and dress pants.
The more I look at him, the more I realize what’s about to happen, the more all that inner tension shifts into something more powerful. It isn’t at all like my parents or Max said. I’m not doing this to woo him, to trick him, to push him into something… I just want him to experience—or to maybe come a little closer to understanding of—the depth and beauty of what I feel for him.
Whether he accepts it or not. Whether it changes anything at all.
The room turns still as we get ready to perform. The familiar pulse of adrenaline rushes through me, tempered by something else, something that might be the soothing scent of blackcurrant and sage.
Max nods at me, letting me know he’s on, so I reach for the microphone.
“Um, hey everybody. I’m Theo Reid. This is Max Callaghan. Tonight, we’re going to be performingPrickles ofYour Love Blooming Under My Skinby Heavenly.”
Moderate cheering and clicking of fingers buzz through the room. The only person I care about smiles at me and raises his eyebrows as if to say, ‘Show me what you’ve got’.
Oh, he’s beautiful in the dim overhead light, brightening up the room.
I begin.
Like it always does, everything fades, and the world becomes only the words coming out of my mouth as if they’re sacred, the peaceful melody governing them. Usually, there would be nothing else for me. No audience, no people, no worries or thoughts or anything outside of myself. Even I, all that makes up Theo, would fade into obscurity, but this time, there’s a bright northern star guiding me.
“A rhythm born of stardust, an eternal, divine line.”
Sam holds my gaze when I look at him. His brown eyes sit there like two stars, constant and unchanging.
“The constellations spell your name,
Each spark a promise, still the same.”
My throat tightens, not just with the tones I’m willing into existence, but also with that endless, ever-present longing I’ve felt since the moment I laid my eyes on Sam.
I want him to know. I need him to know, to understand, that I’d do absolutely anything for him. That whatever I’m feeling is deeper than the vastness of the universe. No matter how damn irrational. No matter how delusional or obsessive. In a way, it could never be. I feel it as clearly as the air in my lungs: that what we have could never be anything but right and beautiful.
“A universe of wonder lives withinyour eyes.
Every breath, a symphony; every touch, a flame,
Forever etched in time, our hearts will stake their claim.”
If he asked me to cut open my flesh and bleed myself dry in front of him, I would do it. I wouldn’t even hesitate. It doesn’t scare me anymore.
And just like that, it’s over.
With the last word leaving my mouth in a sharp huff and my heart pounding hard against my ribs, I clench the microphone stand in my trembling hands. My mind reels from the onslaught of clapping and cheering.
I open my eyes that I’ve closed at some point, and…there he is. He doesn’t clap or move at all, just watches me with his lips parted slightly and his eyes glistening.
I bow, holding my hand over my chest, but my hesitant smile is aimed only at him.
Then, Sam’s face finally moves. Slowly, he smiles back at me, wider and wider until it reaches his eyes, giving them those adorable wrinkles at the corners. My stomach nearly turns upside down with the overwhelming joy that hits me.
