A/N: Okay so yes I'm a filthy rotten liar because I said I would be faster than I was. Hate me. :(
Chapter 7
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I just wanna chase forever down with you around.
-With You Around, Yellowcard
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Tori and Jade stood nervously backstage as Cat and Robbie worked their way through their song. Robbie was on guitar and Cat twirled tantalizingly around him, batting her eyelashes innocently as she sang.
"Robbie looks like a drugged monkey," Jade said, watching him nod along to the beat.
Tori recognized the glib as a sign of nervousness and she gently touched her fingers to the back of Jade's hand. "No one's going to know if we don't want them to, Jade."
Jade exhaled slowly before balling her hands into fists and stepping away from Tori. She didn't even look at her, just clenched her jaw and tapped her foot anxiously.
She wasn't afraid of performing, but she was afraid of what people would think of her singing a love song with Tori Vega. Yeah the kids at Hollywood Arts tended to be exceptionally stupid but what if someone started a rumor for fun?
And, because of how she had written her part of the song, she felt like she was betraying Tori. She had written her lines after her encounter with Beck, and her thoughts had been muddled and her feelings towards each of them had blended in a way that she couldn't sort out. To Jade, the song was about both Tori and Beck, the boy she was supposed to love and the girl she could never allow herself to like. Did any part of Jade even deserve an honest girl like Tori?
The lights dimmed on the stage. Robbie stood and awkwardly waved to the clapping kids. He took Cat's hand and the two did a stage bow before waltzing off the stage.
"Looks like you and Cat are getting on well," Tori commented suggestively to Robbie, smiling at his happiness.
He nodded, but his mind seemed like it was still focused on Cat rather than what Tori was saying. "She's amazing. So, good luck to you both, Miss Tori and Miss Jade. Break a leg!" He pranced away after Cat, who had said she was going to go see if anyone had brought any cheese puffs.
Tori and Jade glanced at each other as they heard Andre say, "And now, give it up for Tori and Jade!" from the stage.
The crowd clapped expectantly, but Jade's eyes were locked into Tori's in a gaze that neither of them could break just yet. This moment, being together in public in front of all of their peers singing a song like this, seemed like a big reveal, even if no one would know that they were together.
"Ready?" Tori asked.
"Ready."
The two turned towards the stage, plastered bright smiles on their faces, and stepped out into the lights. They jumped around stage as the band started its fast rhythm, the drums beating a fast tempo and the vibrations of the night cutting through the night, waking up the world. This was a celebration song, not a ballad.
They say that it's wrong
But I don't think they know what's right
Because they haven't seen the way
Your lips smile when they're on mine
Tori began the song, strutting around the stage with a smile on her face. Jade followed her lead, getting the crowd alive while the other girl sang. 'This isn't so bad,' she thought, not nearly as terrifying as she had excepted. After all, music was where she belonged, among the riffs of rock and the crowds of concerts. Music made everything she felt seem okay, normal.
I won't tell if you won't tell,
Jade heard Tori sing, and she echoed,
No, I won't tell if you won't tell
Tori smiled into her mic at the first sound of Jade's voice. She glanced over at the other girl, who seemed much looser now than she had a minute ago. Jade winked at her and she grinned in return, the minor exchange signifying that things were smooth, and that Jade's fears were now diminished if not vanquished. Tori continued singing,
And we talked about falling
We talked about flying
You told me about the silence
Between what you feel and what you say
Tori watched the kids in the crowd grin and sway along, clapping to the beat as she sang. It definitely seemed like Jade had been worried about nothing, because people were more focused on the theatrics and the sound than the actual lyrics or the meaning behind the song.
But then her eyes found Beck, slightly separated from everyone else, though more by his dark demeanor than by physical distance. Unlike everyone else, he was watching without a smile stretched across his face. She could tell just by looking at him that he was one of the few that were hearing the lyrics. His eyes were focused on Jade, even though it was Tori who was singing, and when Tori looked sideways at Jade once more she saw that Jade too had spotted Beck in the crowd. They were looking at each other, and suddenly Tori felt like she wasn't even there anymore. There was an intensity in both of them that she couldn't match and didn't understand. She thought she understood Jade but she didn't speak the language they were communicating with.
And I know I'm just a girl with a dream
But I would speak forever
If it would save you from your silence
And then it was time for the chorus, and Tori was relieved that Jade was brought back to herself, and Tori, in time for it. They sang together,
We can't live in the light
So let's belong to the night
But as they went through the chorus, Jade stayed on the opposite side of the stage from her. They both understood stage presence perfectly and they were putting on a good show for their audience, but though Tori smiled and laughed she felt separated from Jade in that moment. She had never thought she would be the jealous type, but she knew how in love Jade and Beck and been and she was afraid she could never mean that much to her. Tori didn't want to lose her. She couldn't.
Your hand in mine
We'll take the stars as a sign
And scream about how we are one
The chorus drew to a close and there was a brief instrumental break. During it, Jade turned to Tori, holding her gaze as she moved across the stage towards her. Tori started moving towards Jade too and they meant halfway, in the center of the stage. Under the glaring lights and the alert eyes of a hundred teenagers who lived to gossip, the two of them stood less than a foot apart, not touching but not needing to. The tension between them was as visible as if there were physical ropes binding them together and they could feel the atoms of their bodies reaching out towards each other. Tori's heart was beating at a pace the drums could never hope to catch as Jade began her verse without breaking eye contact.
You saw the monster inside of me
I told you to run
But you said you weren't afraid
They had gone over the song before this, each listening to the parts of the other to make sure they meshed, but this was different. It was like Tori was hearing the words for the first time because she knew that Jade meant them.
And Jade certainly did. When she had been standing apart from Tori with her eyes on Beck, she had been wrestling with her feelings for him. She knew that he had already given up his active quest to get her back, but if she gave him the okay she knew he would come running back. But she had decided that she didn't want him back. His part in her story was done. He had been the boy that had showed her how to live and how to survive, and while she had once thought that he was the boy that she would die without she now knew that she was okay without him. Air still entered her lungs when he wasn't in her mind and she still woke up in the mornings when he wasn't beside her.
And I never understood what "home" meant
Before you sent me to sea
And now this was a song about Tori. Whatever bits of Beck had been in the song were gone, and this was about Jade and Tori, and Tori and Jade, and no one else. This was a song about Tori, and Jade wanted to share it with everyone. She wanted to sing the song a hundred times over until everyone she knew understood how much she had come to care about this girl.
And my monster is trying to make me drown
But I can navigate by your eyes
As she closed her verse, Jade said with her eyes, 'It's you, Tori. I want you and not him. Please say that's okay.'
Tori gave the smallest nod, and it was cemented.
She reached over and took Jade's hand, and they heard the noise level of the audience drop, but only slightly. They had held hands on stage before, but something in the energy between them told the crowd that maybe this was something different. Jade could see the confusion on the faces of the more aware kids when the two of them finally broke eye contact and turned to face everyone, grins stretched across their faces.
We can't live in the light
So let's belong to the night
Your hand in mine
We'll take the stars as a sign
And scream about how we are one
They were one, but they didn't want to be kept in the dark anymore.
We'll take the stars as a sign
And scream about how we are one
They turned to face each other once more as the song came to an end. Their eyes were both shining in reflection of the happiness of their hearts and there was an unspoken agreement between them concerning the grand finale.
We are one
We are one
The last lines of the song echoed through the night and the lights on the stage flashed as the drummer played his final beats and the guitarists strummed their final notes. And, just before the lights went dark and the song rolled to a complete stop, Jade released Tori's hand, brushed back her hair, and kissed her.
The audience went completely silent for a moment before the whispers and the shouts started. Some clapped, a few half-jokingly screamed derogatory names, most were stunned into silence.
But neither Tori nor Jade took much note of what anyone else was doing. Their mics fell forgotten to the stage as they kissed, a kiss that tasted of relief and sweat. In that moment they really were one, the heat of their bodies indistinguishable and everything they felt for each other part of an unstoppable explosion that could create and destroy.
The music stopped and the lights went out, and Tori and Jade smiled contentedly into each other.
