Falling for Ocean Blue [BxB] ✔️

Prologue

I look ahead.

My mouth sore from the incessant chewing.

The lights above me burn just the profile of my face, so I have to look down to spare my nose the heat.

Playing the keys with only memory to move my fingers, I lose myself in sweet music. The stale air in this hotel hall tastes almost fresh as I play.

I keep my arms agile, hovering close to the piano so as not to hit the keys roughly. The music is meant to be loved, light and dulcet. My eyes are partially closed behind circle wire-framed lenses, not looking at the music script already five pages behind.

I know somewhere, in the crowd, my mother is scanning every note for a whist of error ready to criticise my efforts when we leave here. Even at a private event, she's paranoid. My mother is someone who lives on public perception, her whole being was painting me perfect. This event is just an extension to that portrait. Over the music I can hear hundreds of cameras clicking every second in all directions. She paid a lot for quiet publicity. A bashful gloat that would cushion my oncoming audition for the German Orchestra.

Even here, she can force the spotlight onto me.

Here, being the West Hollywood Hotel ballroom, currently hosting my sister's 13th birthday party. She stands in front of the stage, a permanent smile etched in her face looking small behind the mic. We've practiced this song so often; she knows the timings almost as well as I do. Her sweet voice echoing in the hall as she sings. 

I spare a quick glance in her direction, my eyes grazing over a petite face I haven't seen in six months. In that time, Kitty had grown into her nose, the baby fat in her cheeks have disappeared. She's taller too, standing at 5 ½ ft she's on par with most of her friends. A head, disarray with tight curly brown hair that stick out in dishevelled locks hiding her soft brown doe eyes. I know they must be closed, the way she sways to the music, on the tips of her toes reaching high notes.

I smile.

Soren stands at the foot of the stage. After 12 years, Soren has his own appreciation for music. He enjoys it at his safe distance, in adoration of his younger siblings. He grins happily from below the stage, watching us intently. He's clad in only a white dress shirt, his sleeves rolled up, with a loose bow tie hanging underneath the collar, and straight-cut black pants. A girl draped over his muscular arm, barely conscious as she swings to the rhythm. The newest girlfriend, I assume. Soren has always been somewhat of a Casanova. To him, it came with being captain of the soccer team.

My fingers keep a hold on the repeated chorus, playing softly in time with my little sister. I can feel the end coming and I make sure to fade before her last note, Kitty liked to end on the sound of her own voice.

The applause of the audience is deafening. They cheer and shout, raining praise on her performance. She laughs happily at the attention, bowing dramatically low.

"Thank you so much." She repeats this over and over, pulling her red skater dress with both hands to bow even lower. "Thank you for coming to my birthday!"

The spotlight burns a ring around her, casting me in the shadow. It's a nice change to the torture of my auditions.

I slip away, careful not to take from her glory.

I almost make it off the stage, walking down the steps behind the black-out curtains before I hit a wall of shoulder.

The shock settles in my stomach, and I have to gulp away any tension rising in my throat like bile. I force myself to look up and apologise, the stress of human contact weighing down on me before I even get a chance to speak.

My breath hitches when I meet a pair of ocean blue eyes glaring ragefully into mine. I feel my tongue heavy and speechless as I watch, dumfounded. The boy stands close to the black-out curtains, shielded from the audience behind them. Wisps of light brown hair styled back and dishevelled as if wind-swept. His expression digs into me, and I have to look away.

He scoffs humourlessly before stalking off, knocking me roughly as he passes.

I watch on after him as he crawls through the audience, losing him to a mass of teenage limbs. The music starts up again, the DJ taking his place behind his table.

My announcement home has been a painful success.

*