by Ashlyn Kane
So conversation turned from shared stories of working at the Rock to Ari’s trip to Toronto and the album’s progress.
Jax scowled at his pasta, chased an errant noodle through a puddle of too-acidic sauce, and tried not to grit his teeth as Ari spoke fondly of Aiden Lindell and his sweet voice, his emotive expression, his—okay, Jax stopped listening. A man could only take so much.
“…collaborate with him in the future.” Ari paused. “Jax. The noodle is dead.”
So was the mood, Jax thought sourly. “Yeah,” he forced himself to say as he put down his fork. “Sorry.” But before he could excuse his distraction or even change the subject, Ari nodded and went on, apparently oblivious.
“Noella thinks she might be able to set up a synchronized tour so that Aiden’s available to perform live with me. That might depend on finding another artist he’d be a suitable opening act for—”
Jax dropped his fork in his pasta plate and finally let his mouth get the better of him. “Jesus. If he’s so great, why don’t you just go on a blind date with him.”
Whoops.
When he looked up, Ari was staring at him with his mouth slightly agape, his eyes wide, two spots of color high in his cheeks. So much for finessing the conversation. Outright confrontation was always more his style. He should’ve known better than to try to be subtle.
Ari cleared his throat. “Jax, something is obviously bothering you. Rather than avoid the issue, could we… talk about it?”
Ugh. Jax had caught him in a lie—one of omission, but still—and he was still going to make Jax play the jealous lover? Fine. Jax would play the jealous lover. “I met a friend of yours last week. A Dr. Sohrab someone? He told me a story.”
“Ah.” Ari took a deep breath and set down his own utensils, not that he’d been using them since he’d been talking about Aiden for the past five minutes instead of eating the meal Jax labored over. “You are angry with me.”
“No,” Jax denied. Off Ari’s infinitesimally raised eyebrow, he amended, “Fine, yes, I’m a little annoyed. Obviously you can’t control other people’s actions, but you should have told me about it after the fact. Do you know how it feels to have to work in a public-facing job all night after one of your customers tells you his parents set him up on a date with your boyfriend? And your boyfriend didn’t mention it?”
“You’re right that I should have told you.” Ari reached for Jax’s hand, and Jax grudgingly, against his better judgment, let him take it. “I didn’t think… well, I didn’t think.”
That wasn’t an apology, but Jax wasn’t finished airing his list of grievances either. “And speaking of other people’s actions.” He knew Ari’s parents were a challenging subject, but if Jax didn’t bring it up, he was going to drive himself to multiple root canals from all the tooth grinding. “I guess I don’t understand why your parents were setting you up on a date in the first place.”
Ari’s expression froze, but Jax could see the emotion in his eyes even if he couldn’t identify it. Fear? Guilt? Ari swallowed. “Jax….”
Yeah, Jax didn’t like where this was going. Would it be the thing that broke them? He’d thought they were on the same page, but he was learning they really, really weren’t. And that hurt.
Suddenly he couldn’t stand to be in the room with Ari. “I… excuse me.”
Not wanting to deal with the people he might see on the street proper, he went out through the break room. The exterior door stuck, and Jax had to throw his shoulder to get it open. It banged against the brick when he finally succeeded, and Jax stepped out into the November chill.
Ari stepped out behind him. “Jax,” he said softly.
Jax clenched his fists and bit out, “I’m guessing, from your reaction, you haven’t told your parents about us.”
“They’ve probably seen the video, so—” Jax shot Ari a look. “No. They don’t know I’m seeing someone.”
Even though Jax had been expecting it, it was a blow to the ribs that left him breathless. He shut his eyes and forced himself to inhale deeply, but when he opened them again, it still hurt. “What the fuck, Ari,” he said, his voice rising. He turned to get into his face. “You’ve met my sister. I’ve met your sister. Why the hell don’t your parents even know I exist?” He was yelling now.
Ari looked stricken, his mouth tight and his eyes wide. “Jax. It was never my intention to hide you.”
“Then what was it!”
“They’re….” He cast about as though searching for words. “They’re judgmental and nosy! They have ideas about what my life should look like, and they would want to see if you measured up.”
“So what? You don’t think I would?” Jax snapped. He wrapped his arms around his chest, feeling the cold for the first time.
“No!” Ari shouted. “Of course that’s not what I think. But they would want to meet you immediately. They’ve chased men off before.”
A reasonable-sounding fear, but— “So your parents will hate me. That’s great. What the fuck?”
“I didn’t say—”
“You didn’t have to.”
“Would you let me finish?”
“Why? So you can spout more bullshit? God, I’m starting to wonder what the fuck we’re even doing here.”
Ari flinched. “Don’t say—”
“What? How I feel?” Jax scrubbed his hands over his face and hair. “Fuck this.” He turned and started to walk.
“Jax!”
“I need some fucking air, Ari. Just… go home.”
Jax strode through the parking lot and out onto the street. It was too cold to be out without his jacket, but he didn’t want to turn back. He needed space from Ari, from the bar, from the date he had worked so hard to make perfect and which had ended so disastrously.
His eyes burned. Fuck, fuck, fuck. For the first time in Jax’s life he’d felt in sync with someone, and Ari hadn’t thought Jax was good enough to take home to Mom and Dad.
He stalked aimlessly around central town, dodging pedestrians and doing his best to avoid crowds. He had no desire to interact with anyone else, and he probably looked like a dangerous tough guy, wandering around wearing a scowl instead of a jacket.
Sometime later he dragged himself back to the bar. Thank God he’d left the keys in his pants pocket. Otherwise he’d also be locked out in the cold without a way of getting home.
He trudged across the parking lot toward the back door and stopped dead in his tracks when he spotted it. Standing open.
Please tell me my eyes are deceiving me. Jax hustled across the lot and slowed as he approached the door. He took a deep breath and stepped into the building to look around. There was no one else in the break room, and the locked door into the restaurant was still shut. Jax breathed a sigh of relief. Then he took another look and groaned.
There were no people… and no guitars either.
Could this night get any worse?
Chapter Sixteen
ARI STOOD dazed in the Rock’s back parking lot for several long minutes, trying to process what had happened. The evening had started out so promisingly. Jax had seemed happy to see him. And then… everything went horribly wrong.
Ari shut his eyes and breathed deeply. The memory of Jax’s face in the bar and outside as he processed what Ari had done—or rather what he hadn’t done—flashed before him. He had really fucked up.
The problem was, Ari thought miserably as he left the parking lot in a different direction from Jax, that Ari wasn’t sure not telling his parents about Jax wasn’t the right call. His parents’ brand of meddling leaned toward actual action on their part. As soon as he told them about Jax, they would want to meet him, and if Ari didn’t bring Jax to them fast enough, they would go to Jax in the only place they could be sure to find him. And no matter how lovely Jax was, doing the meet-the-parents thing at the Rock would end disastrously.
But not telling Jax that… that was inexcusable. If Ari was going to keep his parents in the dark for Jax’s sake, he
should have told Jax ages ago, explained that he couldn’t throw Jax to the wolves during the early stages of a relationship.
Especially since Jax had expressed how happy he was to be with someone who was on the same page as him. Who took what they had seriously.
Ari rubbed his face and sighed. He definitely should have told Jax about Sohrab. There probably would have been a way to even make it seem funny if he had told Jax when it happened. If Jax hadn’t found out about it from Sohrab weeks after the fact.
The hurt in Jax’s voice when he snapped “Why don’t you go on a blind date with him” stopped him cold. Jax looked embarrassed and hurt and angry at all once. For the first time it occurred to Ari that maybe Sohrab wasn’t the only thing to push Jax over the edge. He’d been talking about Aiden at length, comfortable in the knowledge that Aiden was in no way his type, but maybe Jax wasn’t so sure.
Ari might be the dumbest man alive. This was why his relationships crashed and burned. He wasn’t good at seeing what other people needed or predicting what they would do. He thought he was making it work with Jax. Apparently not.
“Ari?” Theo stood a few meters away, a reusable bag in one hand and his phone in the other. His head was cocked. “What are you doing here? Are you okay?”
Ari looked around. In his distraction, he’d apparently wandered into a student neighborhood. “Oh,” he said. No, he wasn’t. But he wasn’t going to say that to his sort-of intern. “Hey, Theo. You live around here?”
Theo looked at Ari, then at the grocery bag he was plainly carrying down the sidewalk. “No,” he said dryly. “I like to carry groceries miles out of my way and risk my ice cream melting.”
Well, Ari deserved that. He’d been exceptionally stupid this evening. “Ah….”
Theo’s brow furrowed. “Ari? Seriously, you seem, um, distracted.”
That was one word for it. “I’m fine,” he lied. “Sorry. I….” But he couldn’t come up with anything to say. “I’ll let you get back to your groceries,” he finally managed. “Have a good evening, Theo.”
He had the feeling Theo’s eyes were boring holes into his back as he walked away, but he didn’t turn around. He couldn’t see anyone he knew just then. They would ask questions he didn’t want to answer, and when he inevitably did, they’d tell him what he already knew.
That he brought this on himself.
And what was he going to do about it?
Jax had told him to leave. Even if Ari could properly formulate an apology, Jax wouldn’t hear it right now, and Ari should respect that. When he did apologize—and he had a feeling it should involve groveling—he wanted to have taken some kind of action that would show he meant it, that he took Jax’s concerns seriously and was attempting to do better.
So, hunching his shoulders against the November chill, Ari walked back to the Rock, got in his car, and went home.
By the time he was unlocking his apartment door, he’d ignored three calls from Afra. Theo must have tattled. If past actions were any indication, Afra would invite herself over if he kept it up, so he texted her that he was safe at home and he’d call her in the morning.
Then he turned off his phone.
Against the backlight of the window, his piano was a hulking, imposing presence, but its lines were familiar. And tonight, for the first time in weeks, it was calling to him. He took off his shoes and poured himself a glass of water. Then he arranged himself on the bench, back straight, and lifted the key cover.
The music he coaxed out of the instrument was dark, discordant, and angry. But no. A song couldn’t start there. It had to have somewhere to go. Ari backed it up sixteen measures. What was the song before the anger? Before Ari screwed up one of the best things that had ever happened to him?
Content. Warm. Harmonic. Resonant. Sweet.
That was what Ari had destroyed.
He hoped the soundproofing in his apartment was as good as the contractors had promised, because composing this on an electric keyboard would feel wrong. He took the violin from its case, tuned it quickly, and sketched out the story he was telling. Two lovers, two instruments, together in harmony. A sweet, slow, smooth dance of twisting notes, phrases that echoed and repeated.
And then a screech of violin. That was Ari, falling out of harmony, betraying his partner.
He flicked on the light above the piano and scribbled down notes, composing furiously. The violin and piano would work almost in a round at first, catching each other here and here, as if to say that together they could reach infinity. And then the faltering violin. A change into a minor key.
The piano part would crescendo gradually as the violin struggled to keep up, repeating a variation of the same phrase, increasing in pitch and desperation. And then finally—
The piano would thunder. It would drown out the strings. Ari tried to keep his fingers light on the keys as the emotion stormed through him. He was feeling what Jax felt now, layered on top of his own self-loathing. He deserved this pain. He had been completely spineless. Worse, he’d made Jax feel—
Your parents would hate me?
I’m starting to wonder what the fuck we’re even doing here.
He’d made Jax feel like he was in this alone. The way Jax had felt so many times before. “I fall in love at the drop of a hat,” he’d said.
Had Jax loved him? Had Ari ruined that forever?
These were questions the violin now had to ask, since the piano had thundered itself into acceptance. Forgive me, Ari thought, raising his violin to his chin. He had no idea how to earn Jax’s forgiveness in real life. He could make the arrangements with his parents, he could try to prepare Jax for what meeting them would be like, for the scrutiny and backhanded compliments. But would it be enough?
He didn’t know. But the violin’s part—that he could write. He coaxed, he wheedled, he begged, he serenaded.
He let himself believe the piano would forgive him, and the two parts dovetailed again. But the music couldn’t go back to what it had been. The key had changed, the time signature too. The shine had worn off. The music was still beautiful, but now it had a scar. It was haunting.
When Ari put down the bow, it was nearly two in the morning. He knew instinctively that the song was finished. He wouldn’t edit it, not beyond refining the length of the notes, playing with vibrato in the shakier sections. For better or worse, the song was done.
Was his relationship with Jax over too?
IT TOOK Jax almost two hours to clean up the bar before he crawled home to bed.
Monday he woke up with a feeling of dread and lay in bed for several long moments remembering why he was angsty. Right. Last night he and Ari had an epic fight and then Jax lost Murph several guitars.
Jax thought about his savings account. The police weren’t likely to find the guitars. They couldn’t even stop the spate of robberies in the neighborhood. Jax had little confidence that this would break the case. But he didn’t exactly have a spare thousand or two lying around to replace the instruments, so he’d never have enough money by January to return to MIT. He’d have to delay until the summer semester.
Jax’s plan had been solid—make enough money by January, defend and return home before Ari went on tour. Maybe, if Ari wanted him, go with him for a while. If he waited until May, he’d have to leave around the same time as Ari….
But maybe that wouldn’t matter. Maybe all of his careful plans for the future, working his life around Ari’s, would be for nothing after last night. Were they even still together? Did Ari even want them to be? Or had Jax been fooling himself the whole time?
Jax got up, showered, got dressed, and mechanically choked down a bowl of oatmeal. Then he swallowed his pride and called Murph.
“I fucked up. The back door didn’t latch properly, and someone got in. They took the guitars. But I’ll totally pay for new ones,” he rushed to get out before Murph could say anything. “It was totally my fault. I should have been more careful.”
“Damn, b’y. Breathe.”
Jax did, but only because he needed to.
“So. No guitars?” Murph blew out a breath. “Not convenient.”
“I’ll pay for them,” Jax said.
“B’y. You don’t have to. That’s what insurance is for.”
“They’ll hike up your premiums. I can’t let you do that, not when it’s my fault.” His pride wouldn’t allow Murph to suffer the consequences for his stupidity.
“Jax.” Murph had pride of his own, damn it.
“Murph, I was an idiot who got distracted. I shouldn’t have… I should have made sure the back door was shut.” Ah, shit. There it was, that feeling of shame. Jax Hall, too flighty to be trusted to lock a stupid door. The only thing that would assuage it would be to get Murph to accept the money.
So he said, “Ari’s going to cover half of it anyway. All right? You know he’s got money.”
Ari is never going to find out about this.
Sometime later Hobbes found him staring at his spreadsheet, trying to recrunch the numbers, but no way could Jax get the money by January—not unless he found another source of income or sold something of value. Not that he owned much. He eyed the old laptop, but even it would probably fetch more as scrap metal than as a machine. The motorcycle, maybe, but who would buy one of those with winter coming?
“Didn’t think I’d see you this morning,” Hobbes said, standing awkwardly in the doorway.
Jax shrugged.
Hobbes narrowed his eyes. “You said you had a date. You were planning that date. Why are you not currently curled up in Ari’s bed?”
Jax’s mouth twisted. He couldn’t lie to Hobbes any better than he could to Sam. “We fought.”
Hobbes blew out a breath and headed for the coffee maker. He flicked it on and turned back to Jax. “What about?”
Jax shut the laptop—it couldn’t tell him anything he didn’t already know—and met Hobbes’s eyes. “What do you think?”
“So. Finally asked him about that blind date.”
The laugh that broke out of Jax was bitter and shocked him a bit. “Turns out he never even told them he was seeing someone. Here I thought—and he never even told his parents.” Jax wrapped his arms around himself.
