Chapter 8: Reminiscing
The Grid was packed, a throbbing animal of noise and low light. Thursdays were always like this—a desperate, collective exhale before the week’s end. Svet sat wedged between Jessa and Dave at a high-top near the stage, the sticky veneer of the table clinging to her forearms. In her hand, a vodka soda sweated onto a cardboard coaster.
Onstage, under a single amber spotlight, Edwin was untouchable.
He’d traded his usual henley for a worn black t-shirt, sleeves rolled over his biceps. His head was bent over his Gibson, fingers moving with a fluid, unthinking grace over the frets. He wasn’t singing tonight, just playing. It was an instrumental piece, one of his own, a complex, winding thing that started with a melancholic whisper and built into something like a contained storm. The chatter of the bar dipped to a murmur in its wake.
Svet watched the concentration on his face, the slight tremor in his jaw. This was the part of him no one else really knew. The gym, the academy, the quiet record store clerk—they were layers over this raw, soundless core. She felt a fierce, proud ache in her chest.
“He’s really good,” Jessa shouted over the rising swell of the music. “Like, legit.”
“Yeah,” Svet said, her eyes never leaving him. “He is.”
Dave leaned in, his breath smelling of IPA. “Think he’d let me use this for a film score? I’m doing this neo-noir short about a conflicted pigeon.”
Svet shoved him lightly, laughing. The music crested, then faded into a final, resonant note that hung in the air before dissolving into applause. Edwin looked up, blinking as if returning from somewhere far away. His eyes scanned the room, a habitual sweep, and locked onto hers. A small, private nod. Just for her.
He stepped off the stage, accepting a pat on the back from a regular, and made his way through the crowd toward their table.
That’s when Svet saw her.
Daisy was by the long mahogany bar, waving. Not a big, attention-seeking wave. A friendly, familiar flick of the wrist. She was dressed differently than in the arcade—a silky blouse, dark jeans, her hair down. She looked like she belonged in the dim glow.
Edwin saw her. His path diverted. Svet’s grip tightened on her glass.
She watched as Daisy said something, smiling. Edwin nodded, his posture easy. He was being polite again. Always so damn polite. Daisy leaned in to be heard over the din, her hand briefly on his arm. She was holding a phone, showing him something on the screen. A picture. Edwin looked, and then he laughed. A real, surprised laugh that crinkled the corners of his eyes.
A cold trickle started in Svet’s veins.
“Who’s that?” Jessa asked, following her gaze.
“No one,” Svet said, too quickly.
At the bar, Daisy was talking animatedly, using her hands. Edwin was listening, his head tilted. He took the phone, scrolled, smiled again. Svet could imagine it. A stupid picture from high school. A memory of a party at someone’s pool. A shared history that was just friendship, but felt, in this smoky light, like a secret language.
Edwin handed the phone back, said something. Daisy’s smile widened. She reached out and pinched the fabric of his t-shirt sleeve between her fingers, giving it a playful, nostalgic tug. A gesture from another life.
Svet stood up. The stool legs screeched against the floor.
“Bathroom,” she muttered, not looking at Dave or Jessa.
She didn’t go to the bathroom. She pushed through the crowd toward the back hallway, toward the rear exit, needing air that didn’t taste like beer and pretension. The music from the house speakers thumped through the walls.
She burst out into the alley. The night air was cool, smelling of dumpsters and wet asphalt. She leaned against the brick, breathing hard, the cold wall seeping through his borrowed henley.
She heard the door open a minute later. She didn’t turn.
Footsteps approached, slow and deliberate. He stood beside her, not touching. He didn’t ask if she was okay.
“It was a picture of my old dog,” he said, his voice quiet in the alley’s hush. “Bruno. Remember? The one-eyed shepherd mix. She found it on some old Facebook thread and showed me.”
Svet stared at a broken bottle glittering under a security light. “She touched your arm.”
“Yeah.”
“She does that a lot.”
“I guess.”
“You laughed.”
He was silent for a beat. “I loved that dog.”
It was such a simple, disarming truth. She squeezed her eyes shut. The jealousy felt ugly and small now, but it was still there, a live wire under her skin. “She’s here. Again. It feels… intentional.”
“It’s a popular bar,” he said, but there was no conviction in it.
She finally looked at him. His face was shadowed, his expression unreadable in the gloom. “What do you want, Edwin?”
He turned to fully face her. “Right now?”
“Yes.”
“I want to finish my set. I want you to be at the table when I do. And then I want to take you home.” His words were measured, certain. “That’s what I want.”
“She wants more than your taste in music,” Svet pressed, the words tumbling out. “She wants the memories. The inside jokes. The person you were before you… before me.”
He moved then. One step, closing the distance. He didn’t kiss her. He put his hands on the wall on either side of her head, caging her in, his face inches from hers. She could see the flecks of gold in his grey eyes, could feel the heat coming off him.
“Listen to me,” he said, his voice low and rough. “That person before you was just waiting. Everything before you was just… waiting. The jokes weren’t that funny. The memories aren’t that bright. She can have all of them. They’re empty. You’re the only thing in my life that isn’t.”
Her breath hitched. All the air left the alley.
He searched her face, his gaze intense. “Do you believe me?”
She wanted to. God, she wanted to. She gave a tiny, shaky nod.
“Okay.” He pushed off the wall, his hands dropping. The absence of his heat was immediate. “My next set’s in ten. Your seat’s gonna be empty, and I’m gonna notice.”
He turned and walked back toward the door, leaving her in the cool, quiet dark. She stayed there for a long moment, listening to the distant pulse of the music, feeling the ghost of where he’d been.
When she went back inside, her seat was still empty. Daisy was at the bar, talking to Marcus now, who was mixing a drink with a showman’s flair. He caught Svet’s eye as she passed and gave her a slow, appreciative wink.
She ignored him. She slid back onto her stool at the high-top. Dave and Jessa were deep in some debate, barely noticing her return.
On stage, Edwin was tuning his guitar. He looked up, his eyes scanning, searching. They found her. He didn’t smile. He just gave that same slight, affirming nod.
The chatter died down as he leaned into the microphone. “This one’s new,” he said, his voice gravelly through the speakers. “It’s called ‘Proximity.’“
He began to play. The first notes were a single, clean chord that echoed, then another, layering into a melody that was yearning and restless and utterly beautiful. He didn’t look at her again. He didn’t have to.
Every note was a claim. Every chord was an answer. And Svet, listening, finally understood that the territory she was so desperate to mark had been hers all along.