Note: A boy and a girl in a world-famous rock band together – and their secret love.

No Words

Interview time.

He was running late, but he’d thought up an excuse as to why: (amidst laughter) We couldn’t find the place. We got lost. It’d tide him over, and if it didn’t, well fuck ‘em. Who were they anyway? Besides, he was tired…so tired. He wasn’t up to this today. He wasn’t up to it any day.

‘We’ got lost.

Who was ‘we’? The only other person in the vehicle was the driver, who had been sent out by the radio station.

Maybe I would’ve been on time if I’d driven myself. Well, it was too late now; damage done. He couldn’t bring himself to care all that much. It was probably a rock star thing.

Before he’d left his apartment he’d met his visitor’s gaze, and they’d shared a small smile that said everything. They hadn’t used words. Words were something he was tired of, actually, at least the spoken kind. His voice was worn down; he no longer felt that he had anything of value to say. It was a pity that speaking was what interviews were all about. Maybe he could get a signer in next time, to translate. Of course, he’d have to learn sign language himself before that’d work. Trials and tribulations of being this. This.

“Here, man,” said the driver, glancing at him briefly in the rear-view mirror. Only now did he realise that the car had stopped. He blinked, rubbed at his face, nodded at the driver briefly before leaning over to unlock his door and slide out onto the bitumen. No words needed, no payment required. It’d all been set up perfectly. As he moved backwards, closer to the building, the guy reversed and drove off. He shrugged to himself, figuring he’d cab it home.

He nodded several times on the way up to the fifth floor, enjoying the small time he had in which he didn’t have to use words. It’d be over soon. She’d ask her questions, he’d frown in thought. He’d think, and think, and think – he had perfected the pensive artiste look. Something would come out of his mouth, and it’d be in and out of his mind in an instant. He’d speak without thought, he’d sound good, but he wouldn’t have a clue how he did it.

He’d answer, listen, answer, listen, accept a thank you graciously, smile, and maybe even wink if she earned that. Then he’d scoot the chair back, stand up to his full towering height, give her one last enigmatic look, and be on his way. Cabbing it.

Just maybe, though, things wouldn’t go according to plan.

He’d learned lately that plans tended to go awry. He’d learned that he was bad at sticking to plans.

Inhale, he told himself. Exhale. And do it all again.

She laughed, throwing her blonde head back, leaning slightly toward him, eyes crinkled shut, white teeth gleaming amidst darkly painted lips. He marvelled at the fact that he could get that reaction out of her. He marvelled at the electricity that crackled between them as they met each other’s secretive gazes, eyes blazing, faces flushed. He thrived on what lay between them, the something that no words could describe. It was palpable and yet ethereal. It wasn’t even spiritual. It was more like what magic would be, if magic existed.

The moment passed, of course, and although their smiles faded he remembered. He didn’t know if she did. He would never ask. He’d just hope, and wait for the next time.

She stood up and walked into the kitchen. She opened the fridge and took out a bottle of beer. She swivelled on her heel and waved it at him, cocking her head enquiringly. He smiled and nodded in response, and she took out a second bottle. She shut the fridge door and walked back towards her armchair. She bypassed it to grace him with her nearness, handing him the bottle, blessing him with the traces of that smile she’d worn a moment earlier. She turned away so that her back faced him, walking to that armchair and sinking into it backwards, no fear, complete trust. She sighed. She fit in the chair perfectly – it’d moulded itself perfectly to her over the years. She always seemed to sit the same way in it, too.

She was beautiful, delicate of body but with a mind like the edge of a sword. The intelligence in her blue eyes thrilled him, spoke to him.

You are a part of me, she’d said to him once, though she’d been shakily drunk. He’d been deliriously sober. She’d kept her distance, but the tension had been electric. He’d wanted to reach out, but it wouldn’t have been right. Some might’ve said he was as off his head as her, considering what hour of day it was and how tired he’d been. But he hadn’t thought that way. You are a part of me, don’t you agree? It’d been one of the silliest songs he’d ever composed, but only to the rest of the world. He’d never told her it’d been about her. He didn’t even know if she’d heard it.

Maybe he’d point her in its direction someday.

She sipped first, and he followed suit. They were companions, alone together. They were eyeing one another, drinking together, existing.

They walked down the street, clad in sunglasses and jackets. They didn’t speak at all, just walked in one another’s company. They’d known each other for years by this point: over a decade, to be precise. Words weren’t usually needed between them now.

Both of them knew exactly where to go. The other would be waiting there, as arranged. They’d probably say something, all three of them, once they were all in the same spot. There might be unpleasant moments, moments of awkwardness or uncertainty or unvoiced despair; but there’d also be glimmers of the goodness that had held them all together for these long years.

The occasional glimmers had been enough to sustain them for many years now. Despite the new tradition that had emerged, that of suffering within the band, suffering because of the band or just suffering within the band’s general vicinity, they had stuck together. If no series of past events had torn them apart, was there anything that could?

He felt like his love was strong enough to hold them all together.

He felt like his love was big enough.

She smiled as she dragged him down into a kiss, the sort of passionate kiss that fired him up in every way imaginable. He was a furnace and she melted right into him.

They tore each other’s clothes off and devoured each other, burning up in love.

They burned against each other, burned themselves out and fell into a peaceful slumber.

“I love you like I love oxygen,” she whispered, the words spilling out onto his chest. She was nestled against him, one arm slung over him and the other bent against herself.

She wasn’t afraid to say it. She said it for both of them. The little boy inside him shrank away in fear, scared of being hurt. But the man that he was dared bravely to love her back. That man loved her in his own wordless way. He dared to show her with his actions that she was the world to him.

He wrote songs for her, countless varied numbers. And she drank them in, and transformed them into greater magic with her spirit.

He had never told anyone that it was all for her – everything he did, every breath he took. But when he looked into her eyes at a time like this, he thought that she knew.

“I really do love oxygen,” she added, grinning.

He buried his face in her hair and laughed.

He squeezed her more tightly and said, “You’re never going to leave. I won’t let you.”

It was a moment he recalled for a very long time.