In Harmony (Fenbrook Academy #2)(17)
Author: Helena Newbury

Those beautiful, blue-gray eyes were fixed on me, and for just a second he looked vulnerable, like he had on stage. Was it possible that the Connor I knew was just a mask?

I waited for him to look away, and he didn’t. I could feel my breathing getting faster and faster, and I felt like I was cresting the brow of a hill on a rollercoaster. I had to do something, quick, or something was going to happen.

Part of me wanted it to.

“So you practice right here?” I asked, breaking his gaze and looking around the room. “Don’t your neighbors mind?”

He stared at me for a split-second longer and then seemed to shake himself. “Not here,” he said, his voice a little strained. I heard him take a deep breath, and when he continued he was back to his usual, cocky self. “I’ll show you where.”

He unplugged the amp and then took the extension lead it was plugged into and leaned out of the window. I saw him tie it to a piece of string that dangled down from above. Then he picked up his guitar and amp and motioned me to follow him.

I picked up my cello and followed.

At the end of the hall was a door with a ragged hole where its lock used to be. Cold outside air whistled down from the dark stairwell beyond, and I began to see why the place was so draughty. He held the door and nodded for me to go first.

The stairs were dank concrete and just as steep as the ones up to his apartment, but there was only one flight. I’d figured out where we were going, but when I emerged it was still a shock.

New York lay spread out around me. We were six stories up and the tallest building for several blocks so there was nothing to get in the way. I could see for miles in every direction: cabs picking up passengers, a couple arguing in the street, even what looked worryingly like a guy selling drugs on a street corner. It was like being God, even if only of this neighborhood.

He showed me where to sit, on the edge of a rusted air conditioning unit. Then he went over to the edge of the building and hauled on the string, lifting the extension lead so he could plug into it. The amp crackled into life.

I looked at him in amazement. “You sit here and play?”

He shrugged. “It’s big and open and…it feels like I can breathe up here, you know? And no one’s listening. No one who cares.” He played a few notes, and they soared away over the rooftops.

The wind roared overhead and I shivered.

“Cold?” he asked.

I looked up at the clouds. “A little. But more…I don’t know…I’m not used to being exposed.”

I felt him looking at me, and I realized I’d just given him a great lead-in for yet another jokey comment about sex. But he just said, “Yeah. I know.”

More of that tension, the silence swelling and building—

“You must freeze, up here,” I said quickly. I actually was starting to get cold—my coat was down in his apartment.

I heard him step up behind me, his body sheltering me from the worst of the wind, and I caught my breath. Was he about to wrap his arms around me, like I’d imagined downstairs?

“Here. Put your arms up.”

I lifted my arms above my head, and then something soft and warm was pushing down over them, blocking out my view. He must have grabbed it, just as we left his apartment. It was a weirdly comforting feeling, having someone pull a sweatshirt onto you.

When my head popped out and I looked down at it, I saw it was a black Fenbrook one, the sort we’d all been given in freshman year. I wore mine, sometimes, but I had trouble getting my head around the idea of Connor hanging onto his for all that time.

My hair was all bunched up under the sweatshirt and I suddenly felt his hands, warm against my neck as he scooped it up and then let it flop down my back. Little prickles of energy crackled down my spine. I was wearing a bra and a vest top and my own sweatshirt and then his Fenbrook one, yet all I could think about was my nak*d skin, so close to his palms.

“Thank you.” His voice was shockingly close. I could feel the heat of his breath on my neck.

“For what?” My toes were trying to curl up inside my shoes and my nails were digging into my palms.

I could hear how difficult it was for him to say it. “Letting me know it’s okay to be…y’know. Not sure of yourself.”

We stayed like that, silently looking out over New York, for a long time.

***

That evening, I sat again in my apartment and tried to compose, but once again I couldn’t concentrate. Before, I’d been distracted by thoughts of Connor’s body, of his hands on me. Now, I couldn’t stop thinking about how he’d opened up to me. I was starting to see his cocky, confident persona in a whole new light.

Did the girls he dated—or maybe dated was the wrong word, given the time his relationships seemed to last. The girls he slept with—did they ever get to see the real him? Or did he keep up the pretence the whole time, convincing them that he didn’t care about anything—not his grades, not his future—nothing except the next party? And if that was the case….

If he’d concealed his insecurities for all these years, was it possible that he was concealing other things, too? Like an ability to actually care about someone, instead of just having a series of one night stands?

I caught myself. This was ridiculous—I was like a schoolgirl with a crush, seeing things that weren’t there. Connor had a reputation for a reason. Okay, maybe he wasn’t quite as arrogant as he seemed, once you got to know him, but he still wasn’t someone it would be smart to get involved with. Not that I’d want to get involved with him anyway…right?

My cell phone rang, and the screen showed Natasha’s smiling face. Normally, I’d have begrudged the interruption, but that night I practically snatched up the phone to answer.

“Nat!” I said warmly, unable to stop myself grinning. She was exactly what I needed to take my mind off Connor and the recital.

And then everything twisted around and I closed my eyes in guilt. She was crying.

Chapter 9

Natasha was standing in the doorway of her apartment, waiting for me. She led me straight through the lounge and down the hall to the bathroom.

Scattered on the tiles were several razor blades, some dressings and alcohol wipes and the vintage cigarette case she kept them all in. Her old cutting kit.

I could feel a yawning chasm open up beneath me. I was so ridiculously out of my depth it was untrue. This was a job for Clarissa, with her cool, calm efficiency. Or Jasmine, with her worldliness. But me?! I was the geeky one, the inexperienced one. What the hell did I know about this stuff?

Natasha was standing frozen in the doorway, looking like she might throw up at any moment. I had to do something.

Get it out of sight, I thought, and started picking everything up and tidying it away. I considered dumping the whole lot in the bin, but I knew it wasn’t that simple. When it was gone, Natasha seemed to relax a little. I led her by the hand into the lounge.

“Start at the beginning,” I told her. That seemed like a safe thing to say.

She shook her head in disbelief. “I haven’t cut since we got together,” she told me. “Months and months. But….”

I forced myself to shut up and wait.

“He hasn’t been sleeping. Every night, he has these nightmares. He lies there awake and he thinks I don’t know….”

I remembered Darrell at the party, sitting down in the workshop. “Have you talked to him?”

She shook her head.

“Nat, you have to. I mean, I don’t know much about relationships, but—”

She shook her head again. “I think—If I try to change things….” She sighed. “It’s like—Look, when we got together, that felt like a chance in a million. We were right for each other, and it was magical, and it all worked and—Now it feels like it’s a house of cards. They all fell into place by sheer fluke, and it’s horribly, horribly fragile. If we even breathe wrong, it’s all going to collapse.”

I bit my lip. “But that means you can’t talk about stuff. And you’re worried about him….”

She nodded.

“And you’re getting more and more stressed about it, and that’s why you cut?”

She nodded, tears welling up in her eyes. “Just once,” she said in a tiny voice. “It didn’t even make me feel better, it made me feel worse. But now he’ll see it, and he’ll worry, and I don’t want to worry him again, and—”

She descended into tears and I shushed her and hugged her close. What would Clarissa do? I thought desperately. I’d just have to fill in as best I could. “Look,” I said. “I don’t know if I’m the best one to give advice, but….”

Natasha looked at me, tears in her eyes, hanging on my every word, and I felt sick with fear. What if I tell her the wrong thing, and they break up and it’s all my fault?

“First of all, I think you two need to talk. You two are the only ones who can fix things.” That was safe enough, right? It was the sort of advice I read in women’s magazines, and it was less likely to wreak havoc than if I got directly involved myself.

Natasha shook her head. “But…I don’t know what to say. It feels like we need something, like—new ways of coping. And I’ve got no idea what they should be.”

I so desperately wanted to help her, but I was the least knowledgeable person in the world when it came to men. Whatever I told her would be wrong. “Have you thought about the two of you going for therapy?”

She shook her head firmly. “He’s not ready, and I know I’m not. He’s the only person I’ve told everything to. I haven’t even told Clarissa everything.” She looked up at me guiltily. “I haven’t even told you.”

I nodded. “That’s fine. I understand.” I took a deep breath. My mind was racing with ideas, things I could suggest…and I didn’t dare voice a single one of them.

“Just talk to him,” I told her at last. “You’ll figure it out.”

She sniffed and nodded, and the fact she’d accepted my non-advice just made me more uneasy. I felt like I’d stepped back when I should have stepped up.

Natasha took a deep, shuddering breath and wiped her eyes. “I’m okay,” she said.

It sounded like she was trying to reassure herself as much as me. Neither of us was convinced.

***

We sat on the couch for a half hour, steering the conversation steadily further and further from dangerous waters. We passed through relationships, then Fenbrook, then Flicker, then our favorite movie-themed drinks, and from there it was an easy jump onto the safe dry land that was movies. We decided to make a night of it, and Natasha started browsing Netflix while I went to order pizza.

Searching around the hallways of Natasha’s apartment for cell service, I saw the glow of a laptop screen through the half-open door of Clarissa’s room. Ordering online seemed radically more sensible than spelling out the address to a harassed pizza shop worker over a bad connection, and Clarissa wouldn’t mind. I ducked into her room and sat down at the desk.

I fired up a browser and Googled for pizza. Address. Crust. Toppings. “Nat,” I called, “What do you want on the pizza?”