At No Time || Bruno Mars

7

Midnight had grown a time older, but Peter had barely noticed.

A rock glass filled quarter way with scotch sat atop the great instrument, the miniature bubbles fizzling passed the large chunks of ice settled in the amber beverage.

A lit cigarette was perched on the corner of Peter's lips as he scratched a pencil along the note sheet on the stand of the piano. His thoughts hadn't flown so freely in his craft in a time that seemed like a forever before, and suddenly, he was so inspired that he'd written on so many sheets that the excess had fallen onto the floor around him.

He stuck his pencil behind his ear and began playing the piano's keys for the umpteenth time, trying to perfect the sound he'd created, sighting keys that made him cringe and developing them until the tune matched what played in his head.

So in tuned with the material, he hadn't heard Kimioko enter the in-home studio until she asked groggily, "What are you doing?"

"Producing," Peter answered promptly, adding a note to the essentially completed page. He went to continue on practicing the keys before Kimioko covered her ears and groaned. "Peter, that sounds awful."

Her abrupt opinion had startled him so greatly his fingers slammed onto three keys that conjured a foul sounding pitch. "What?" Surely, he'd heard her incorrectly.

"I mean, come on, Petey," Kimioko's tone softened as she walked over and sat on Peter's lap, draping her arms around his shoulders. "Do you really think people would want to listen to that? I mean, these chords--," she picked up the papers Peter'd been working on and shuffled through them, lacking the common courtesy to put them back into their proper order, "--they're all over the place. My father had me take piano lessons for seven years, so I know what good music looks like and sounds like and baby--," she gave him a sympathetic look, "--this isn't it."

"I don't see anything wrong with it," he countered, offended. Had it really sounded that atrocious?

Kimioko pinched his chin, surely in effort to either sympathize or pity him, and replied gently, "Baby, trust me. Change it up, work on it a little more, and you'll be fine. You're P. Dez. You can make something better." Peter wasn't sure if her words were complimentary as she kissed his cheek and bid him a goodnight.

Peter dropped his fingers onto random notes, discouraged and defeated.

Sometimes he didn't want the music he made to reflect to P. Dez. Sometimes he just wanted to be Peter. Or even Bruno.

"Lique, I thought you said Melissa worked at an animal shelter," Trystan groaned achingly, barely managing the dynamic stretches along the floor of the dance studio beside Angelique. She couldn't remember a time she had stretched so arduously since she was on the dance team in college.

"I said she worked part-time. The rest of the time she works as a choreographer," Angelique elucidated, reaching for her toes. "And you should be grateful. Had I not been her girlfriend and put in a good word for you, you would have been paying two hundred dollars every class like these other women." Angelique swirled her finger around to gesture the accompanying dancers.

"I never even said I wanted to come here. All I said was that I needed to get back on my exercise routine, and you told me you knew a great place, and now we're here," Trystan reiterated, giving her comrade a miffed look before sitting up straight.

Angelique waved her off. "Same thing. And besides, this gave you an excuse to wear that onesie I got you that shows off your ass."

Trystan guffawed aloud. "Girl, please, I'm trying to lose some of this ass, and everywhere else in general."