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NOTE: Told from Jonny's POV.
We were away from the crowds. We were in a relatively nice hotel, where the beds still had cardboard mattresses but they didn’t squeak. We were out of the cold. It was a beautiful, snow-drenched night, and I could tell Chris was thirsting to write a song.
He was perched, cross-legged, on the bed and strumming lazily. Nothing flowed from his fingers except for the syrupy sound of his pick against the strings. He sighed in frustration and slapped the headboard with his fist.
“Christ, Jonny,” he complained to me. I glanced up at him sympathetically. I had seen him in this sort of rut often enough to know the pain he was in. Something in you that’s trying to get out, something beautiful, but you can’t let it out. Something’s holding it back. But you know, if only you could just stop being so afraid, the beautiful thing would come out and everything would be all right.
He cleared his throat daintily and hummed a few notes. He moved his long fingers into an E chord and strummed – deep and coppery – and hummed louder. He picked out a simple rhythm, but as he opened his mouth to sing, the words must have died. His hand fell into his lap and he slumped over his guitar.
I kept quiet, not knowing what to say. I just watched him. Slowly he raised his head and eyed me suspiciously.
“I can’t sing with you in here,” he said irritably.
I blinked at him.
“Bugger off.”
I only shook my head, confused. Usually it was the other way around – when he wanted to call up a tune or lyrics from the depths of his soul, he’d drag me into a secluded corner and force me to help him. But now I was being sent away? Preposterous.
“Why?” I asked childishly.
He waved his hands, exasperated. “Oh, I don’t know! I just… I can’t!”
“You’ve never had a bloody problem with it before!” I argued. He had sung in front of hundreds of strangers before, but suddenly he couldn’t play in front of his best friend?
“I want a new song for our next gig,” he said suddenly. “You know. Something to surprise them with.”
“Not material for the new record?”
“Maybe. Depends.” He rested his chin on the curve of his guitar’s body. “Probably not. I just want something. I’m tired of…” He stopped. I waited a second, but he didn’t go any further.
“Tired of?”
“Know what really messes me over, though?” he asked no one in particular, sitting up and tapping his pick against his bottom lip. “I hate it when people keep secrets from me. That’s what it’s about. That’s what I want to write about.”
I blinked. “What?”
“You know.” Chris gestured with a hand. “Lying. Deception.” He looked at me.
I looked back with my best “lost sheep” expression.
His eyes turned fierce suddenly, and they locked mine in a straight- on gaze and wouldn’t let go. I could feel him searching for answers – why had I been avoiding him? Why did I suddenly become edgy when we were even in the same room together? Why was I suddenly not Jonny Buckland anymore, but someone completely different?
‘Sorry Chris, boyo,’ I thought. I turned my eyes away as casually as I could. ‘Not gonna find your answers here.’
“Okay,” he murmured, as if he had seen my last defiant thought reflected in my eyes. “You’re sleeping with Will and Guy tonight. I’ve got a song to create.”
I smiled bitterly, grabbed my toothbrush from the nightstand, and left without closing the door.
‘I don’t need you. You don’t need me. So I’m not playing games anymore, Chris.’
I don’t think I slept that night.
- - - -
It was something like one, or maybe two a.m., when I heard the sound of a guitar floating from the next room. I strained to listen over the sound of Will’s snoring. Undoubtedly a guitar.
I rose quietly and put my ear to the wall, only feeling slightly foolish. Soon I heard the soft croon of Chris’s voice. I couldn’t resist. I crept as quietly as I could out of the hotel room and unlocked Chris’s door with my own card key. I cringed, my heart beating hard in my ears, as the lock clicked and his playing faltered. But then it started again, this time with more vigor, and I stepped into the doorway.
I blinked once or twice to get my eyes used to the dim light. Chris was sitting on the floor now, his back against one of the beds, and there were two candles on the nightstand beside him. The tall French windows were closed tightly against the cold, but he had slung open the thick curtains to let in gorgeous, pale moonlight that traveled across the floor in long blocks. My breath stopped.
His guitar was resting in his lap and his fingers were sliding along the neck of it with a lover’s touch. His elegant head was bowed, and his smooth pale neck and angled shoulders were alight with the glow of the moon. I could see the muscles in his long arms moving as he strummed. His body was like a reflection, shimmering with the ebb and flow of his guitar and the sound of his voice.
“Darling, those tired eyes go with me all the time," he crooned in a voice like velvet. “And in the dead of night... tell me you will be mine."
I stepped as quietly as I could into the mouth of the hallway, until I was mere feet away from him. He was obviously in some sort of trance; otherwise he would have gotten suspicious the moment he heard the lock turn. But his voice was strained in emotion and pain, and his face was a mask of frustration.
‘I lied,’ I thought desperately. ‘I lied to myself a hundred times over. I need you more than the air I breathe, Chris. You’re the most beautiful thing this world has to offer, the only thing worth living for.’
Chris’s long hand hovered over the strings, but he didn’t move. Instead he sighed and, almost with disgust, pushed his guitar away and buried his head in his hands.
I didn’t want to see Chris cry. I knew my heart would break and I would slip up and something terrible would happen. That was how it always went. But my escape route was lost. I had gotten myself into this mess, so it was only my job to get myself out.
I watched his shoulders tremble slightly, and I wondered if he really was crying for me. But I knew it wasn’t – it couldn’t be. I always tortured myself like this. Chris didn’t care about my well-being any more than he was supposed to.
He stood up shakily and sprawled on the bed, his voice slowly rising with each line. I was mesmerized.
“Ask me so sweetly, what do I do... Who do I sing for...”
He paused, voice full of pain.
“Well, honey, I sing about you..."
I shook my head vehemently, though it was too dark for even Chris to see me if he was watching. Whoever those lyrics were for… Even if they were for me…
Chris... Can’t you understand…? You told me once that you thought you could read people. But are your eyes closed now? I’m wading through all of this bullshit, and I need you to pull me out.
I stared at the silhouette of his body in the darkness. His chest rose and fell dramatically in a sigh, and I wanted to so badly to reach out and fondly, familiarly place a soft kiss on his tummy. Something just to show that I loved him. Something to show him that he meant the world to me. Something to show him that I saw his sweet face, and I heard his beautiful voice.