Staccato (Magnum Opus #2) - E.M. Lindsey Page 0,37

second look. He pushed through the doors like he belonged there, and he found the hallway deserted.

His stomach twisted. Something had gone wrong. In that gorgeous, heart-clenching performance, something had turned upside down, and he hated that he wasn’t educated enough to know what. His hands trembled as he walked down the hall, counting the two doors. They were painted green, and the wood was old with rot in the corners. The handle was tarnished brass, and it was cool against his palm as he touched it.

He gave two cursory knocks, then pushed inside, coming to a stop when he found the room pitch black. “Uh…?”

“Adam?” Nik’s voice sounded from somewhere in the blackness, and Adam stepped forward, not going past the door jamb.

“Hey. You just sitting in the dark?” He regretted the words the second they fell from his lips, but Nik only laughed.

“I do that. Sorry. I think there’s a switch somewhere, but most people don’t bother me while I’m in here, so I don’t know.”

“Am I bothering you?” Adam chanced. He pulled out his phone and hit the flashlight, then found the switch to his left. The room flooded with hazy, yellow glow, and he found Nik sitting on the edge of a worn sofa, his hands dangling between his spread thighs. He looked tired—dejected, maybe, but Adam wished he could read Nik’s face a little better.

“I asked you to come,” Nik told him.

“Yeah, but that was before…” Adam didn’t quite know how to finish the sentence.

“Before I bombed?” Nik’s laugh was tense, and he leaned back, covering his face with one hand. “Yeah, but I’m glad you’re here. Wallowing alone sucks.”

Adam closed the door behind him with a quiet snick, then put his phone in his pocket and walked over to take a seat. The sofa huffed out a sigh of air when he lowered himself down, and it smelled like his old high school prop room backstage.

“Did you really bomb?” he asked after a few moments.

Nik laughed again. “Yes. I mean, you were there.”

“I thought it sounded amazing,” Adam told him, and when Nik scoffed, he nudged Nik’s leg with his own. “I mean it. You can’t really take me seriously since I don’t know jack shit about classical music. DIY punk isn’t the same, you know? It’s…raw and kind of ugly, but that’s the point.”

Nik worried his bottom lip between his teeth, then rolled his head to the side to face Adam. His eyes were shut, like they always were, but then his lids parted, and Adam saw a flash of white that startled him.

“What,” he started, but quickly swallowed back the question. “Can you tell me what went wrong?” He knew it was a dick move to change the subject, but he didn’t think Nik wanted to talk about his missing eyes, or what he had left under his lids right then.

Nik rubbed at his jaw, then dropped his hand into his lap and his nose wrinkled. “Everything. It was stale, and Matthews couldn’t stay on beat with me, and it was just…it was nothing. The music was shallow.”

“It didn’t feel shallow to me.”

“It was,” Nik breathed out, and his mouth turned down in the corners, his frown deep and painful. “It was shallow when I wrote it. There was no soul there, no heart. It was just fucking noise. They’re going to obliterate me tomorrow.”

Adam reached for him, unable to stop himself. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s…whatever.”

“It’s not as bad as what I play,” Adam offered.

Nik hummed, turning Adam’s hand over against his thigh and tracing lines with the tip of his finger almost like he was unaware he was doing it. The touch sent lightning bolts up Adam’s arm, and he knew he’d rather die than move. “You say that a lot—that your music isn’t good—but that’s not right. It’s good if it makes you feel something, if it comes from here.” He pressed his free hand to his sternum. “It doesn’t have to be musical genius, Adam. Just…not hollow.”

Adam had no idea what to say.

“You were going to ask me something else earlier,” Nik said after a few moments of silence, and Adam flushed.

“No.”

Nik snorted a laugh and pressed down on his palm. “Yes, you were. You changed the subject. What were you going to ask me?”

Adam licked his lips and wondered if maybe this was what Nik needed—something to take him out of the moment, out of the cycle of reliving his humiliation over and over. Adam knew that too well. “You