My nerves pinged like lightning bolts, a zing of ecstasy striking me through when her siren’s voice slowly lifted into the recording, low and sultry, Shea singing With you forever three times over. A layered, honeyed harmony, her voice braided through mine.
Redness rushed up Shea’s neck when her melody infiltrated the space. Delicious color paintin’ her cheeks in innocence and modesty dabbled with awe. Ever so subtly, she began to move her mouth, tipping her face up toward mine as I sang down to her and she sang up to me.
Didn’t matter how many times I’d heard it. I still felt my axis shift when the chorus drifted out and into the delicate frame of her verse.
You
Like standing in quicksand.
Slowly sinking.
Deeper and deeper.
You.
All I was missing.
Lonely hollows.
Completed flawlessly.
I wound Shea’s hair up in my fist, tugging her head back as I hovered over her, nose-to-nose, breath-to-breath. Intensity that would never dull blistered between us. Voices deepened in the same moment they gained power, twisting and twining as the momentum escalated, the roll of the drums and the beat of the bass, a pounding furor that trembled in the air and vibrated from our tongues.
Don’t want to look back.
Don’t want to move forward.
Just want to stay.
Right here with you.
Forever.
Just want to stay.
Right here with you.
Forever.
When the song hit the bridge, Shea’s voice rose above mine. Her time to shine. Bold. Glorious. Gushing beauty. A river of serenity. A voice unlike anything any of us had ever heard.
Be still, right here with me, for eternity.
Be still, right here with me, for eternity.
A shining star always so content to hide.
But no.
Not today.
Not tomorrow.
Not when the world got a real taste of this amazing girl.
What would it bring?
I didn’t know.
It was like I could feel the clock ticking down on my days with Sunder.
So much had changed in the last year. All of our lives were going down paths none of us had anticipated. Karl Fitzpatrick had warned me settling down with Shea would be the downfall of Sunder.
Maybe it had, because none of Sunder really knew were we stood, each of our lives taking paths none of us had anticipated.
Truth was?
I’d rather be right here.
Making beautiful music with my wife.
Reveling in the truth of our words.
Savoring in the tenor of our kisses.
Relishing in the crescendo of our bodies.
I’d rather be right here.
Writing the lyrics to an everlasting song.
The End