Page 23 of The Sound Between Us

6

once more with feeling

Harrison

By the time I get back to the Savoy, my hands are shaking. Not visibly—I’ve learnt to control that—but there’s a tremor running through my fingers that makes fumbling for my room key feel like defusing a bomb.

The boutique hotel I’d found after dropping Seren home had been a disaster. The receptionist stared at my card like it might burst into flames, running it through the machine twice while I stood there like a tit, watching his face cycle through confusion, suspicion, and finally that flicker of recognition that always ruins everything.

Then the whispers started. The phones came out. The careful approach of strangers wearing their best smiles like armour.

“Excuse me, are you⁠—?”

And I was back in the fishbowl. Smile, hug, pose. Repeat until your cheekbones ache and something vital inside you shrivels up and dies a little more.

But last night—Christ, last night. Seren hadn’t looked at me once like I was anything other than some bloke who’d given her a lift. No flicker of recognition. No breathless “Oh my God, you’re Harrison Carter!” No phone sliding out of her pocket for a sneaky selfie.

Nothing.

Like I was just a person.

My chest had done something strange when I realized it. A loosening I hadn’t felt in years. Like taking off shoes that had been too tight for so long you’d forgotten what comfortable felt like.

I’d lain awake thinking about it. About her. About the way she’d called my music terrible without batting an eyelash, the way she’d handed me that scratchy jumper like I was any other stranger who’d been drenched in milkshake. The way her mouth had twisted when she smiled, like she was fighting it.

“There you are.”

Henry’s voice cuts through my spiral. He’s perched in one of the Savoy’s wing-backed chairs like a disappointed headmaster, foot tapping out a rhythm of pure irritation.

“You waiting to scold me?” I drop into the chair opposite, feeling every muscle in my back protest.

He stands before I’m fully settled. “Soundcheck’s in an hour. Rolling Stone after.”

My stomach drops. “Fuck.”

Rolling Stone. Same tired questions. Same polished lies. They’ll ask about the tour, the next album, whether I’m in rehab again. And I’ll give them the same empty answers while something inside me screams.

“I want a new acoustic.”

Henry’s sigh could power a small wind farm. “You’ve had six delivered this week.”

“I know. I want a new one.”

“Let’s just get to the venue. I’ll have someone bring a selection.”

“It’s not the same as buying one myself.” The words come out sharper than I mean them to, edged with something that sounds dangerously close to desperation.

Henry’s already scrolling through his phone. No doubt checking the damage—tagged photos of me looking like a lost tourist outside some Camden hotel, speculation about my “mystery companion,” the usual vultures circling.

“You always said I should be polite,” I mutter.

“Where are the others?”

As if summoned by the gods of chaos, a shriek echoes through the lobby. A giggle. The unmistakable sound of expensive marble meeting something that definitely shouldn’t be thrown at it.

Henry doesn’t even flinch. “Entertainment.”

“Classy.”