Disharmony

Temporary Bliss

She couldn’t remember the last time she had been this happy. It was probably when she was a child, before both her parents had the chance to let her down. So probably about ten years ago, which was just sad on so many levels.

They were in Nebraska and it had been exactly three weeks since she and Xavier had started doing…whatever it was they were doing. They hadn’t defined it or set rules or expectations. She knew he wanted to, and although everything she’d told him on the plane to Chicago a couple weeks before had been true, another part of her was afraid that if they put a label on what they had, that would make it real, and therefore much more likely to be taken away.

She sighed as she pulled the fluffy white hotel robe tighter around her body and leaned up against the balcony railing. Xavier may have wanted something more official, but she wasn’t sure he realized how much he’d actually done already. Because she couldn’t stop smiling, something that she wasn’t sure had ever happened in the entirety of her life. Even on stage, when she was supposed to be singing sad, heartfelt songs, all she wanted to do was laugh into the microphone and yell to the world how amazing life was.

Without really trying, they’d set in to a sort of routine. Despite the fact that they always had separate rooms in their hotels, more often than not, Xavier’s bed would go unslept in because almost as soon as they arrived back from the venue, he would be knocking on her door. He’d whisper out a one-word greeting before he kissed her and they’d laugh and push their lips together as they stumbled towards the bedroom.

It was a novel concept for Kari; laughing during s*x. She’d had a lot of experience in the department, probably much more than Xavier, but all of her previous s****l encounters had been intense and rough and emotionally draining, not fun and exciting and filled with conversation and laughter. Although Xavier drained her emotionally in an entirely different manner, all she ever felt when she lay curled against his body when they were finished was pure joy.

Perhaps it shouldn’t have surprised her that he was getting attached. She was too, if she was being honest. She had no claim over him; she’d told him a few times over the past three weeks that being in a relationship would just be disastrous for both of them, but she still felt pangs of jealousy when she saw him flirting with the hair and makeup girls and she wondered what it meant that she thought about his smile constantly when he wasn’t around because it made her feel as though her body was filled with sunshine.

So maybe she should have expected it to happen. That after they were finished indulging in each other’s bodies and she was drifting off to sleep, her back pressed against his chest and their fingers intertwined atop her stomach, that he would kiss her skin where her neck met her shoulder and mumble words where his lips touched.

“I’m falling in love with you.”

He probably thought she didn’t hear it. He probably thought she was asleep and completely unaware that he was pouring his heart out. But even though she kept her eyes clamped shut as to not alert him that she had heard what he said, his confession absolutely terrified her.

Kari had thought she’d been in love twice in her life. Both times, she was a teenager and both times, she’d had her heart ripped out.

With Cody, she had come to realize that it was never going to be long lasting. She loved him, sure, but in the sweet, innocent, childlike way. He was the first boy she’d ever kissed, the first boy she’d ever experienced s*x with and perhaps at the time, she thought that meant they were supposed to be together forever. But once her career started taking off, she realized she had much bigger dreams for herself than marrying the first boy who’d ever held her hand.

Noah was a completely different story, because what she felt for him was a desperate longing to be loved. She’d given him everything and he’d never reciprocated and it had taken her much too long to realize that waiting for someone to love her wasn’t love at all. And changing herself to be exactly who he wanted her to be was no way to be in a relationship.

But Xavier…Xavier was terrifying, or at least, the idea of falling in love with him was. By now, she knew Xavier well enough to know that he did nothing half assed, which meant she could only imagine that when he fell in love, he did so fully and completely and held nothing back. And he would never ask her to change, because Xavier knew exactly who she was, of that she had no doubt. At one time, that was exactly what Kari wanted, but now, she was afraid her heart was too fragile to handle that kind of adoration, too guarded as a result of her past relationships to return his feelings. The last thing in the world she wanted was to hurt Xavier, but she was starting to think that it was inevitable.

Because she wasn’t sure she was capable of loving him the way he wanted her to.

She was getting ahead of herself, she realized. Technically, Xavier hadn’t said those words to her face to face. But if he was saying them when he thought she was asleep, she wondered how long it would be until it was done when she couldn’t pretend she didn’t hear it and she wondered how she would feel when it happened.

Xavier was quite an extraordinary person and he deserved someone who loved him unconditionally and wholly and held nothing back and as of right now, she wasn’t sure she could be that person. She hoped, though, that someday that would change.

“Hey.”

Turning at the sound of a gravelly morning voice, the corners of her lips immediately lifted upwards into a smile at the sight of Xavier stumbling out onto the balcony wearing nothing but a pair of low slung navy blue boxer briefs and she couldn’t help but think that anyone who got to wake up to such a sight in the morning was incredibly lucky.

“Hey,” she replied softly, her lips stretching into a full-fledged smile when he came to stand beside her against the balcony railing. “Good morning.”

Lowering the hands that he’d been using to rub his eyes, he rested one on the railing and leaned down to press a soft kiss to her lips, smiling when he pulled away. “Good morning.”

“It is now,” she sighed, closing her eyes and relishing in the way his lips made her feel like she could do anything.

She heard him laugh softly and then felt his hand come to rest at her waist. “Hey, Kar? There’s something I wanna talk to you about.”

Ordinarily, she probably wouldn’t be concerned by that phrase, but considering what she’d heard him whisper the previous night, his words caused her eyes to shoot open. She found his gaze flooded with sincerity and placed a hand on his chest, enjoying the feel of his smooth skin and tensing muscles beneath her fingers as she tried to think of way to avoid having this conversation. “Xavier, wait…”

“You don’t even know what I’m going to say,” his eyebrows furrowed, completely innocent to the fact that she hadn’t been completely asleep during his confession. “Besides, I don’t think I can wait any longer. Something’s been on my mind recently and if I don’t get it out there, I think I’ll drive myself crazy.”

She parted her lips to protest, but was stopped when he lifted her hand from his chest and intertwined their fingers, squeezing lightly. It was oddly terrifying how safe the gesture made her feel, how safe Xavier made her feel. Years of being constantly let down by people she trusted had built up a wall and decided that the only person who would ever have control over her heart was her. While this served her well in terms of keeping her from getting her heart broken, it also left her emotionally unable to connect to people, a problem that she hadn’t really considered to be a problem until she met Xavier.

Taking a deep breath in, she lowered her gaze, hoping to find solace in the words tattooed into the skin just above the waistband of his boxers.

You can always be found.

She hoped it was true, that she could find the strength to be open with Xavier someday, to bear her soul to him and not be afraid to give him a piece of her heart and she hoped that someday would be good enough. In a few seconds he would say those words and she wouldn’t be able to say them back and she was going to lose the person she cared about most in the world and one of her best friends in one fell swoop.

“Kar…,” he whispered softly, releasing his hand from the balcony railing to lift her chin upwards so he could look into her eyes. It was an unnecessary gesture because she would have met his gaze on her own. Kari Stevens was a warrior; she didn’t shy away from things that terrified her. She made her living singing to sold out stadiums of thousands; she could face Xavier Spiers. And yet, she wasn’t sure her heart had ever beat as fast as it was at that very moment. “Kari, you know that I’m not really the kind of guy who keeps my emotions hidden away, so I feel like it’s only fair that I tell you how I feel…how I feel about you. I’m falling in love with you.”

There it was; out in the open. Those words were no longer whispered into a dark room like a secret, but were spoken out in the open with complete conviction. And she knew Xavier meant them, even without seeing the sincerity in his startling blue eyes, because she doubted he had ever said anything he didn’t mean.

She, on the other hand, had no idea what to say. It wasn’t as though she’d spent a lengthy amount of time planning her reaction to Xavier saying he loved her because it wasn’t until last night that she had even known that was a possibility.

“It’s ok,” Xavier kinked his lips into a small smirk because her inner turmoil was undoubtedly written all over her face. “I don’t expect you to say anything back. I don’t want you think I’m telling you how I feel as a reaction to us sleeping together.”

She didn’t think that, mostly because it was a completely novel concept. Once she got into the business, she had used s*x as a means to distract herself from the problems in her life and the people she couldn’t trust and made sure to keep herself emotionally detached, so the whole idea that people associated s*x with love was mind boggling.

Though, perhaps a small part of her had thought of Xavier as the hopeless romantic type. The kind who wouldn’t have s*x with someone unless he had some kind of romantic feelings for them. And perhaps it was her own mistake for pursuing a physical relationship with Xavier knowing that he was emotionally attached. Maybe it was always going to end up this way.

Still, she had assumed that the love was a result of the s*x and Xavier was insisting that wasn’t the case, so maybe there was a hope. She had made a lot of assumptions about Xavier in the past and exactly none of them had turned out to be right so she wasn’t at all surprised that this one was wrong as well.

“Ok,” she croaked out, not knowing how else to respond. She felt like the floor had been ripped from beneath her and she was currently suspended in midair with no way of finding solid ground.

She had waited what felt like forever for Noah to tell her how he felt about her with the same sincerity that Xavier had just expressed, but now that the words came from someone who actually deserved to be loved by her, she couldn’t find the right words to say back. And Xavier deserved that; deserved someone who could confess their feelings openly and wrap their arms around him and kiss him breathless and tell him they felt the same way. All Kari could do was hold his hand tightly and stare at him wide eyed and wish he could read her mind.

“Ok?” he let out a soft sigh, sounding relieved. “So we’re gonna be alright?”

Nodding, she forced her lips into a smile, knowing that on her end, they’d always be okay, but she didn’t know much longer he’d be able to put up with her inability to love him back. “Yeah, we’re great.”

Grinning, he leaned down to kiss her again, his hand squeezing hers tight once before letting go and leaving her feeling completely cold. “I’m glad. Are you hungry? I was gonna order some breakfast.”

“Sounds good,” she managed to get out, watching as he dropped one eye in a wink and turned back towards the sliding doors which led to the room.

Xavier was probably happy that he had gotten his feelings off his chest and Kari wished like hell she could do the same, but instead she was left feeling as though she was teetering off the edge of a cliff and although she had once spent an entire summer cliff diving into the sea, she had never been more terrified to take a plunge.