Page 29 of The Comedown

Looking into my eyes, she fucking belts her own chorus, and I forget my plan to get her back onstage. I forget what I’m supposed to be doing, period. I even forget the thousands of people watching our every move until all that remains is Collette with her silvery eyes that had a greenish tint to them earlier, but now are a blueish gray with a dark blue ring around the irises.

During the break before her next verse, she drops the mic by her side to smile and it’s one of the best fucking smiles I’ve ever seen. All I can do is smile back, then she’s leaving me to face everyone else as she spins in my arms, singing her part to the crowd with me glued to her back. I’m fully aware how fucking bad this looks for me to be embracing her like this, I just don’t give a shit.

Her back relaxes into me as she angles her head up to gaze into my eyes, and we do our shared chorus again, neither of us blinking now.

Blink and all this can be gone.

Who said that to me? Whoever it was, they were right because I never want this moment to end. Must be why my eyelids are making blinking impossible right now.

Our part ends, then out of nowhere Collette’s body drops through my arms. Frozen, I watch as her ass glides back up my legs, coming to a full stop against my cock. Legs straight as fuck while she’s still bent in half, the rest of her body rises slowly, and I trace her spine as she rolls up to standing, taking the back of her neck into my palm to tug her even closer.

The song’s about finding the right person, not for forever, just for one night. It was an easy song to write because I’ve written twenty others exactly like it, but now that I’ve met Collette, I want to rewrite the entire fucking thing, word by word.

With her sweet, flowery scent filling my nose, I almost miss my verse until her ass slams into me, making me groan. I use the voice change to slip into my solo, then halfway through, Collette gets it in her head she can spin away from me. I manage to catch her fingers in one hand just before she’s out of reach though, keeping hold of her. She hypes the people closest to us by mouthing my lyrics while dancing to the beat, and I pull her back to me, loving the way her lips mirror mine as we face each other like we’re battling. She keeps time flawlessly, not once getting tripped up, and I can imagine her rapping her own words one day.

We finish with one more chorus together, and just as the final notes of the song fill the stadium, Collette drags me after her, sneaking between two rows to enter through a door in the concrete wall.

Already anticipating us, the employee standing there shuts the door with an airtight whoosh, then Collette takes off in a sprint, keeping me with her.

“Come on. You don’t have a lot of time,” she calls over her shoulder. “Your drummer’s covering for your dumb ass right now.”

Sure enough, Axel’s notorious drum work penetrates the thick walls, echoing down the corridor.

“How am I the dumbass? You were the one in the crowd without any protection.”

“Because I was going to walk up and join you, but you ruined everything when you didn’t wait. Didn’t you see the set of stairs on the side of the stage?”

I pull up short, making Collette stop, too. Of course, I didn’t see any fucking stairs. Unlike Collette who obviously knows secret passages around this place, I’ve never even been in this venue.

“Who the fuck authorized that?”

“You.”

“The fuck I did.”

“Slade said you okayed it earlier. He even held his phone up while on speaker.”

“Was my face on the fucking screen?”

When she doesn’t say anything, I have my answer. Motherfucker lied, which isn’t surprising, but he put Collette at risk doing it, and that pisses me off.

“Why were you even talking to Slade? I told you not to go near him.”

“I don’t take orders from you.” She laughs that threatening laugh of hers, the one I’ve decided I don’t really like directed at me. “And neither does your agent, apparently.” Her sneer is laced with something I can’t pinpoint, it’s like disgust but a thousand times worse.

“He will.” I didn’t relay the same message to Slade yet, but I will.

“Sure. Look, I gotta get back to Holter. Can you make it back yourself, or do you need—”

“I need your help.”

Neither of us makes a sound.

“I need your help finding the stage. I don’t know this fucking place.”

She leads me all the way to backstage, and the whole time, the only thing I can think about is the feel of her hand in mine. Not what song is next, not what’s happening after the show, just her skin touching my skin. So. Fucking. Simple. Why couldn’t she hold my hand earlier? Whenever I tried, she looked at my hand like it was as dangerous as her knife.

“Collette?”