Between Us

☆ Part fifty seven ☆

Sophie's pov

The house was humming with a strange kind of tension, not the loud, chaotic kind, but something low and taut, like the air before a thunderstorm. Everyone was pretending to be calm, casual, but every time someone walked past the stairs, their eyes flicked up toward Lark's room like it might explode at any moment.  She'd been holed up there for two hours. Two hours of silence behind a closed door. Two hours of me sitting downstairs, chewing at my fingernails and pretending to scroll through my phone while really just watching the clock. I could feel her, even from down there. Her nerves weren't just in her room—they were radiating through the walls, slipping into the floorboards, humming in the bones of the house. Lark was scared.

And everyone knew it.

I finally couldn't take it anymore. I set my phone down, stood up, and headed upstairs, brushing past Karen in the hallway. She gave me a soft look and a gentle nod, as if to say go on, she needs you.

Outside Lark's door, I paused. The hallway was quiet. Too quiet. I lifted my hand and knocked softly. A pause. Then her voice, muffled but unmistakably her, floated through the wood. "Come in, blondie." That name alone made something ease in my chest. I turned the knob and slipped inside.

Lark was sitting on the floor, back against the side of her bed, knees pulled up to her chest. Her guitar sat next to her, untouched. She was in the outfit we'd picked out earlier that day and her hair in soft waves like she hadn't fussed over it for an hour straight, even though I knew she had. Her green eyes flicked up to meet mine, and even from across the room, I could see the way her jaw clenched.

"Hey," I said softly, shutting the door behind me.

"Hey," she echoed, voice small.

I crossed the room and sank down beside her, careful to leave just enough space so she could decide what she needed, room or closeness. She took the closeness. Of course she did. Without a word, she leaned into me and buried her face into the side of my neck. I curled my arm around her and held her there, grounding us both in the stillness of it.

"You're scared," I whispered into her hair.

"Terrified," she admitted. "I feel like I'm gonna throw up or pass out. Or both."

I held her tighter. "You don't have to be perfect tonight, you know that, right?"

She let out a bitter little laugh. "Yeah, but I want to be. This is it, Soph. This is the first real shot I've ever had. And what if I mess it up? What if I get up there and I forget every chord and my voice cracks and I fall flat on my face?"

"Then you'll stand back up," I murmured. "You'll shake it off, make a joke, charm the crowd like you always do. And then you'll keep going. Because you're Lark."

She pulled back to look at me, her eyes glassy but fierce. "What if I'm not enough?"

That cracked something in me. I reached up and cupped her face between my hands, gently brushing my thumbs along her jaw. "You are enough. Lark, you've always been enough. For this, for them, for me. You don't have to prove anything. But if tonight is what starts your story, then I'm just so damn proud to be standing at the beginning of it with you."

Her eyes fluttered closed and she leaned into my touch. "God, what did I ever do to deserve you?"

"You left your bedroom door unlocked and accidentally fell for the marine life nerd."

She huffed a laugh, soft, but real. "Accidentally, huh?"

"Completely accidental. Never saw it coming." She leaned forward and kissed me, slow and deep, like a thank you without the words. When she pulled away, there was a flush in her cheeks, not just from nerves, but from love. I knew that look. I lived for it.