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Luca understands. It’s the same thing as allowing Luca to see her cry, as letting Luca see her barefaced and wearing clothes two sizes too big on her. “It’s a good idea,” Luca says, sitting up.
Florence still looks anxious. Now that her hands aren’t in Luca’s hair, they’re fidgeting in her lap. They only still when Luca catches them in her own.
“It’ll be all right,” Luca says.
“It might not be.”
Luca leans forward and kisses her, slow and sweet. “It’ll be all right,” she says again. And then: “Can I see your song?”
Florence hesitates. Something like fear flickers over her face before she gives a small nod. “Okay. Yeah.”
She offers Luca her notebook, which Luca cradles carefully in her hands. The leather binding is supple and cracked in places, with grooves where Florence’s fingers usually rest. She feels like she’s just been handed Florence’s heart, or maybe a live grenade—not like there is much of a difference between the two. Florence picks at her nails while Luca deciphers her sprawling, looping handwriting.
She doesn’t know what she expected. She knew it would be different from their other songs, but this feels like it was written by a completely different person. It’s candid and specific, almost like a diary entry. As she reads, she can hear Florence’s voice in her head, singing the words, and she shivers at the idea of hearing this song echoing around Hyde Park, of what it could be with the right instrumentation.
She loves it immediately.
“Can you please say something?” Florence asks, and Luca realizes she’s spent three minutes reading the lyrics over and over.
“I love it,” Luca says, looking at her. “So much.”
“Really? It’s not too . . .”
“Too what?”
“I don’t know. Personal?”
“It’s perfect,” Luca says.
Florence gives her a look. “No, it’s not.”
“It’s the first song of yours that I can feel your fingerprints on,” Luca amends, which is really the same thing.
“I don’t know if I can sing it to so many people,” Florence admits, looking down at the open pages of the notebook.
“Then don’t,” Luca says. “Pretend you’re singing it to me.”
Florence thinks about it. Her eyes trace over Luca’s face, bottomless in the low light of the bedside lamp. Luca tries not to fidget. She knows that even two weeks ago, everything about this moment was impossible. That Florence is doing this at all—that she showed Luca these lyrics, unedited and written in her own messy hand—is a show of trust that makes Luca’s chest feel tight.
“Okay,” Florence says finally. The smile that settles on her face is sweet, almost surprised at herself. “I’m going to write the sheet music tomorrow morning. So the others know what it could sound like.”
“Oh.” Luca ducks her head. “I, um. I’ve been meaning to tell you. I never learned how to read sheet music.”
Florence blinks at her. “What? But . . . when you joined the band, how did you . . .”
“I just played it by ear.” She shrugs. “’s not that hard, once you’ve found the rhythm. I just copied what I was hearing.”
“Luca. You mean to tell me you learned four songs in one weekend without any sheet music?”
“Well. Yes?”
Florence laughs, then, bright and disbelieving. “I never want to see another shred of self-doubt from you about your drumming again, Luca. I explicitly forbid it.”
Luca bites her lip to hide a stupid grin. Tapping Florence’s lyric book, she requests, “Sing it to me now?”
Florence looks at her. There’s a glint of something in her eyes as she asks, “What do I get in exchange?”
“Anything,” Luca says.
