Falling for Ocean Blue [BxB] ✔️

Chapter Forty six

We spend the weekend in West Hollywood.

Our father rents a tiny apartment overlooking a bypass and a street of derelict stores. It stands forgotten 9 months out of the year when he travels the globe. It's unclear what he does for work. Over the years, I've heard stories regaling his adventures. One ending with me.

My first piano is sitting here on three legs and a stack of photo albums. From above, it looks like a child's smile, wide and black in places where it lost teeth. I played it like that my whole life. Grinning as I stumbled over the keys. Once, it was rotting in a condemned garden of a priest with roaming hands. My mother bought it with no money. My father painted it. It's strange to see it here.

I sit on a low stool and set up my phone to film.

I play the first chorus of Redemption in B minor.

My hands glide over the keys. Jolting notes rumble in the stomach of the piano. I trace my fingers over the ivory notes, willing the cool texture to soothe me. I play from memory, savouring each note lovingly. It's easy to play slowly. My mind is not the same. The music is difficult to capture in my hands. I don't try to catch it. If the timing is slow, I allow the music to change. It evolves every time I play it.

Redemption has been played in every key.

I like them all.

When I'm done with this rendition, I send it to him.

"He's in Mykonos." Kitty was sure of this when we pulled into the underground parking lot.

Soren and I exchanged something like a grimace as we hurled two suitcases filled with only the essential.

"He better be." I heard him mutter under stale breath.

Cameras roll 24/7.

The news outlets have swarmed our home. They camp in chairs and tents on our lawn. They interrogate neighbours and shout for me to come out.

Day five, the news report says. It flashes every day since the video aired. Millions tune in to see B roll shots of Yvette's wilting petunias or Soren's car. Students make statements. The contracts drafted by our notaries are dissected by retired lawyers on daytime TV.

Mum calls every hour.

We stay in this cramped apartment the entire weekend, eating spaghetti and watching Netflix. Curtains drawn. Only a lick of moonlight spills between them, splitting our screen with a heavenly beam. It only bothers us enough to bicker about who should get up.

No one does.

The mornings are knocking shoulders and burned pancakes. The curtains are still sealed, like tight lips with no secret to tell.

Kit is sat at a chair too low for the kitchen island.

Her braids are puffy and her eyes round.

We greet each other in tired smiles.

The quiet is comforting in the early hours.

We eat like this. Either side of the table, exchanging small conversation. She tells me about her regrettable split with a boyfriend I didn't know she had. Kitty seems pensive for the first time I've known her.

"When it doesn't work, it'll never work." She sighs.

I nod like I understand her.

"You weren't sad when you broke up with Jules?"

"Of course, I was sad," I defend myself, "We ended things because I was sad."

"Because of your bipolar?"