Page 273 of Silver Sweet

“Phoenix,” he cries. “Phoenix,dude.I can’t…I’m…”

I cup his face, our eyes consuming one another, and I’m so in love with him. I’ve never loved anyone like I love Tom. “Je t’aime plus que tout,” I whisper tightly, my body on fire againsthis body. “Je t’aime plus que tout au monde.”I love you more than anything in the world.

His vulnerable cry out says more than any word could.

Sweaty and satiatedon his bed, Tom lies against my chest, and I draw my finger down his spine along the tattooed Roman numerals and numbers. His smile is excited but faintly tired.

“What do you think the numerals mean?” he asks.

“The easiest puzzle you could’ve given me.”

He glares. “It wasn’t supposed to be hard,Phoenix.” I put my hand on the pillow before he even tries to grab it to chuck at me.

“Then you know I’ve already figured out that you tattooed the act, scene, and line numbers from Shakespeare on your back. The ones that inspired our album title.”

He works away a smile, so I know I’m right.

“Trying to match me, nepo baby?” I have the same numbers and Roman numerals tattooed on me.

Before Tom even met me, I had them inked.

All the tattooed numbers on my body are lines to different Shakespeare quotes I love. When Tom found this out, he spent one night researching every portion of my body like I was a college exam.

Even now, his lips quirk, and he tracesII.i.243-244on my thigh beneath an etched angel. FromA Midsummer’s Night’s Dream. “I’ll follow thee and make a heaven of hell, to die upon the hand I love so well.”

“Tom?” I whisper.

“Yeah?”

“Stop fighting sleep.”

He keeps an arm around my chest. “You’re spending the night?”

“Yeah, I don’t plan to fucking leave.” I skate my fingers down his back again. His body heavies, and I slide farther down the mattress because he asks, “Will you try to go to sleep with me, dude?”

I’ll try.

My head meets the pillow, my eyes shut, but I don’t really fall asleep. For some reason, I’m thinking about Bird. What he said at my apartment. Then the envelope I stuffed in my back pocket. It’s plaguing me so much that I carefully detangle Tom from my chest, and I crawl out of bed, searching the dark ground for my cargo pants.

Envelope in hand, I quietly—so fucking quietly—climb back into his silk sheets. Tom doesn’t stir. He sleeps peacefully on his stomach, clutching the pillow around his head.

I unfurl the paper, and it takes me two seconds to realize my mom mailed me a letter.

The letter Tom had written my parents.

It’s addressed to them. She must’ve really thought I needed a pick-me-up.

Tom never told me what he wrote them, but I never really pressed hard for details either. As I begin to read, my hand drags over my mouth, and my chest contracts.

Dear Mr. & Mrs. St. Pierre,

You don’t know me, but I really want you to. I know on paper it might seem as if The Carraways existed long before Phoenix, but it was missing the very thing thatmakes a dream worth chasing. It was missing its heart, and he’s become mine.

I don’t ever want you to fear that he’ll be replaced. Our band has no real life without Phoenix. It only exists in its entirety because of him. It will not breathe, will not survive, will not go on if he’s not a part of it.

I want to take up the whole page to tell you how amazing he is, but I hope you already know since he’s your son. And you’ve had the gift of knowing him for twenty-four years.

I hope to know him for that long. I hope to know him as age tries to take my voice and his hands. I hope we still make music in the grave. I hope when you read this, you start realizing that I love Phoenix. I’m in love with him, and I will take care of him for as long as he’ll allow me to. You don’t have to worry, but I know you will. Good parents usually still do.