Page 27 of Pretty Black

“I set up a shortcut on my phone to start recording after the last time he confronted us.”

“Isn’t it illegal to record private conversations in Illinois?” I asked.

“Yes, but it’s not illegal to record public conversation. We were in a public place, and there is no expectation of privacy in public. I looked it up, and I don’t think the judge will give a damn if it’s legal or not when it’s submitted to him. He’ll know what Alexander is up to.”

“He already suspects.”

Caspian nodded, getting out of the car to grab me by the back of my neck and kiss me again. “Go before it becomes unbearable.”

“It’s not unbearable yet?”

Caspian showed a rare moment of his struggle written in the lines on his face.“Right at drowning. Another minute, and I think I’ll be underwater.”

“Okay. Don’t let them keep you from me. Please.”

NINE

SIX YEARS AGO

Iris Black

Alifetime and another personality ago, or so it felt like.

The music was loud. I could feel it vibrating through me. There was something about tiny venues that arenas would never have. I’d always prefer them. The music vibrated in my bones, through me, in me. I moved with the crowd bouncing like we were one. We were all experiencing it together, one mass feeling everything the band on stage had to offer.

The music fixed things inside I didn’t know were wrong. All the rage and tension I felt purged, and I existed. I wanted to stay in the beat forever. This, right here, made life worth continuing. If I could escape once or twice a week to this, maybe I’d make it to eighteen. Three years felt like getting to the moon. An impossible dream.

It was the only place my mind was ever quiet. Even if I had to do a few questionable things to afford the ticket. Fifteen dollars wouldn’t matter to anyone else in the room, especially not in a group of my peers. Thankfully, most of them wouldn’t be caught dead here. A place where metal met punk, and they clashed to produce a new sound wave of music still in the deepest parts of the underground scene in Chicago.

These weren’t arenas or even cool intimate venues like the Aragon Ballroom or even the Metro. The Bottom Lounge wasn’t even my normal space, but when local bands finally made it to a stage bigger than a local bar, we supported them. It’s what made the Chicago music scene different than any other. We loved our own. We were as die hard about it as our sports.

So I’d scrounged for the funds to get to see Fair Hill Revolution, and I’d fallen in love with the crowd. I wanted to live and die in these moments. Have music be my last memory.

I wasn’t on the rail. I didn’t need to be that close to a band I’d seen underground half a dozen times. I wanted to lose myself in my newfound love—the crowd. The movement of us bouncing as one. We experienced it together, a mass immersion. Loneliness didn’t exist here. The ecstasy where sound and hype come together. There is no other feeling like it. My bones vibrated, freeing me from the mortal tether.

I closed my eyes and screamed. My voice joining those around me and combining to echo with the amplifiers. I’d never wanted more than to help people taste this. To give them a way to escape.

The music slowed and the cell phones came out. I didn’t own one. I couldn’t afford it and in this modern day it was an abnormality. So I lifted my lighter in an homage to the ways of music long dead.

The crowd surged, and I stumbled a step forward, giving a look behind me to see what happened. Gray eyes met mine. Swirling thunderstorms and an instant spark of electricity between two people in an accidental glance. He held himself smugly with a set to his shoulders that screamed superiority.

“I know you.” I licked my lips, my saliva burning as it spread into the small cracks. Dehydration setting in from three shows in a weekend. I’d overdone it a little.

I drew my gaze over him, trying to place him.The crowd surged again, knocking his chest into my shoulder as he stumbled.

He put his lips next to my ear, sending a shiver down my spine.“I think so.”

I nodded, still unable to place him. Must be school. But I couldn’t stop looking at him as I swayed to the music. He didn’t back up either, his shoulder rubbing into my back with every bounce of the crowd.

Was he leaning into me? I glanced at him again and smiled. He was way too gorgeous to be looking at me the way he was. Maybe he was drunk. Did I care?

Anything to unsee. To unfeel the cold skin. The lifeless stare burned into my brain. I lived between songs, between forgetting.

The band got offstage, and as the rest of the crowd screamed for an encore, but we were in our own world.

He leaned forward to speak. “Do you believe in fate?”

“If it involves you, I do,” I said, suddenly wanting him. This. Whatever it was. If he asked me, I’d run towards him.

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