Chapter 2: Interrupted
The brittle silence after the fallen water bottle was a living thing. Lana scrubbed at the cold, green smear on her thigh with a wad of paper towel, the rough texture grating against her skin. Nico remained turned away, his shoulders rigid as he stared at the blinking console lights, knuckles white where he gripped the retrieved water bottle. The warm, dust-laden air pressed down, thick with the scent of vinyl, old wood, heat, and something sharp and metallic – panic, humiliation, desire gone abruptly sour.
Then, cutting through the stifling quiet, came the unmistakable sound of heavy boots on the metal stairs outside. A familiar, off-key whistle pierced the studio door. Both Lana and Nico froze mid-motion.
The deadbolt clacked. The heavy door swung open.
Jace stood framed in the doorway, guitar case slung over one shoulder, his usual easy grin already forming. "Hey, heat refugees! Thought I'd find you holed up in the only place with semi-functional..." His words trailed off. The grin faltered, then vanished completely as his sharp green eyes swept the scene.
He took it in: Lana perched on the edge of the couch, dress clinging damply, cheeks flushed, frantically dabbing at a suspicious green stain on her leg. Nico, several feet away, back turned, posture radiating tension like a coiled spring, the water bottle clenched in his hand. The palpable, crackling residue of something intensely private hung in the humid air, thick as the dust motes dancing in the golden lamplight. The fallen water bottle lay discarded near the desk, a silent, damning witness.
"AC?" Jace finished, his voice losing its cheerful lilt, turning flat. His gaze darted between them, lingering on Lana’s high color, then on Nico’s rigid spine. The easy warmth in his green eyes hardened into wary assessment. He shifted the guitar case on his shoulder, the movement unnecessarily forceful. "Everything... okay here?"
Lana’s heart hammered against her ribs, a frantic bird trapped in a too-hot cage. Shitshitshit. Jace wasn't supposed to be back until Thursday. The desert retirees must have bored him into an early retreat. She forced a laugh, the sound brittle and echoing too loudly in the suddenly cavernous studio. "Okay? Oh, peachy! Just my AC taking a permanent vacation and me melting into a puddle of pistachio regret on Nico's couch. His AC is staging a sympathy strike." She gestured vaguely with the sticky paper towel wad towards the offending ice cream cup, still weeping on the floor. "Disaster zone."
Nico finally moved. Slowly, deliberately, he placed the water bottle on the desk with exaggerated care, as if it were made of glass. He didn't turn around fully, but angled his body slightly, enough to acknowledge Jace's presence without meeting his eyes. His expression was shuttered, that familiar, impenetrable mask firmly back in place. Only the tight line of his jaw betrayed any tension. "Got back early." His voice was low, controlled, devoid of inflection. A statement, not a welcome.
"Yeah," Jace said, stepping fully inside and letting the heavy door thud shut behind him. The finality of the sound made Lana flinch. He didn't take his eyes off Nico. "Gig wrapped up faster than expected. Surprise." He set his guitar case down carefully near the door, his movements precise, controlled, contrasting sharply with his usual loose-limbed ease. He turned back to them, shoving his hands into the pockets of his worn jeans. The forced casualness was worse than shouting. "So. Pistachio meltdown, huh?" His gaze flickered to the stain on Lana's leg again. "Looks... sticky."
Lana felt heat crawl up her neck, hotter than the LA sun. "Tell me about it. Ruined a perfectly good sundress." She tried for another light tone, aiming for their usual banter, but it fell flat. The air vibrated with unspoken questions. Why was she here? Why was Nico shirtless minutes ago? Why did the room feel like the aftermath of a lightning strike?
Nico pushed off the desk, finally facing them both, though his eyes seemed fixed on a point somewhere past Jace's shoulder. The thin grey tank top clung to his damp chest. "Studio's cooler than outside," he offered, a weak justification hanging in the charged air. "Marginally."
"Right." Jace took a few steps further into the room, his presence seeming to shrink the already intimate space. He stopped near the old leather armchair, not sitting, just leaning a hip against its worn arm. His green eyes, usually warm and inviting, were cool, analytical, scanning the details: the proximity Lana and Nico had been in before he arrived, the unnatural stillness, the way Nico refused to look directly at him. Or at Lana. "Smells like… tension in here," he remarked, his tone deceptively mild. "Hotter than outside, Nico?" He raised an eyebrow, the question loaded.
Lana couldn't stand it. The weight of Jace's perception, Nico's silent retreat, the sticky mess on her leg – it was suffocating. She stood up abruptly, the sudden movement making both men tense. "Well!" she announced, her voice too bright, echoing slightly. "This has been… refreshing. But my swamp-ass situation is reaching critical levels. Think I'll brave the sauna that is my apartment. Maybe stand in the freezer. Thanks for the… shelter, Nico." She grabbed her small bag, avoiding looking at either of them, focusing intently on not tripping over cables as she headed for the door.
"Lana, wait—" Jace started, taking a half-step towards her.
But Nico spoke at the same time, his voice cutting through, low and rough. "You don't have to—"
They both stopped, the collision of their voices adding another layer of awkwardness to the thick atmosphere. Lana paused at the door, hand on the knob, feeling their gazes on her back – Jace's questioning intensity, Nico's dark, unreadable stare. She couldn't turn around. Couldn't face the questions, the suspicion, the confusing tangle of her own feelings amplified a thousandfold by Jace's unexpected presence.
"No, really," she said, her voice thankfully steady despite the tremor in her hands. "I'm good. Melting. Gotta go." She yanked the heavy door open. The wave of even hotter, drier air from the stairwell felt like a physical blow after the studio's humid intensity. "See you guys." The words were automatic, hollow. She slipped out without looking back, pulling the door shut behind her with a resolute thud that echoed down the metal stairs.
Inside Nico's studio, the silence slammed back down, heavier than before. The hum of the amplifiers seemed louder, more insistent. Dust motes swirled violently in the lamplight. Nico stood frozen near his desk, staring at the closed door as if it held the answer to a problem he couldn't solve. The ghost of Lana’s warmth, the scent of her perfume mixed with melted ice cream, lingered near the couch.
Jace slowly straightened from the armchair. He didn't approach Nico. He just stood there, in the center of the room, radiating a quiet, simmering energy that was entirely unfamiliar. His easy smile was long gone, replaced by a tightness around his mouth, a calculating hardness in his eyes as they finally locked onto Nico’s turned back.
"Pistachio meltdown?" Jace repeated, his voice dangerously soft. He took a single step towards Nico, the old floorboards groaning under his weight. "That's the story?" He gestured vaguely towards the damp spot on the couch, the green-stained paper towel crumpled on the floor, the fallen water bottle. "Looks like something else melted down in here too, man." The unspoken accusation hung in the air, thick and suffocating, demanding an answer Nico couldn't, or wouldn't, give. The sanctuary felt less like a haven and more like a cage, the golden light revealing only the fractures in their once-solid friendship. The next move was Nico's, and the weight of Jace's expectant, wounded silence pressed down like the unforgiving heat outside.
The amplifier hum was Nico’s only shield against the weight of Jace’s stare. He finally moved, not towards Jace, but to the mixing console, fingers brushing knobs with uncharacteristic hesitancy. The green smear on the floor mocked him, a neon sign screaming something happened.
“Story?” Nico echoed, his voice gravelly, still refusing to meet Jace’s eyes. He pretended intense interest in a phantom dial adjustment. “Lana’s AC died. Mine’s limping. She brought ice cream.” He gestured vaguely towards the sticky mess near the couch. “Pistachio. It met gravity.” Simple facts, sandbagging the churning truth.
Jace didn’t buy it. The quiet stretched, tighter than a snare drum skin. He pushed off the armchair, his bare arms tensed under the sleeves of his faded tee. “Ice cream melts. Water bottles fall. Got it.” He took another deliberate step closer, invading Nico’s carefully maintained distance near the console. The scent of sun and sweat clung to him, clashing with the studio’s dust and vinyl. “Why was your shirt off, Nico?”
Nico flinched, a minute tightening of his shoulders. “Heat,” he muttered, the word brittle. He finally turned, leaning back against the console edge, arms folded tightly across his chest – a shield over the thin tank top. “Just heat, Jace.”
Jace’s laugh was sharp, humorless. “Right. Heat.” His green eyes bored into Nico’s, stripping away layers. “Looked like a different kind of heat to me, man. The way you both froze when I walked in. Like I caught you mid…” He trailed off, the unspoken word kiss hanging in the ozone-thick air. He took the final step, standing directly in front of Nico, forcing eye contact. “Is that what happened? Did you finally make a move on Lana?”
Rage, hot and sudden, flashed in Nico’s dark eyes, surprising even him. “No!” The denial cracked out, louder than intended. “It’s not like that.” He shoved off the console, forcing Jace to take half a step back. “It’s never been like that. You know why.”
“Do I?” Jace shot back, his voice dangerously low. “Because what it looked like was you about to devour her whole on that damn couch. Shirtless. Sweating. Looking at her like…” He shook his head, a muscle jumping in his jaw. “Like you wanted to ruin everything.”
The accusation hit Nico like a physical blow. The suppressed years of stolen glances, the ache in his chest whenever she laughed, the sheer, terrifying want that coiled in his gut seeing the damp fabric cling to her curves in the suffocating studio – it all surged up. His carefully constructed control splintered. “Yeah?” Nico snarled, the bitterness thick. “And what about you, Jace? Mr. Laid-back Neighbor? You think I don’t see how you watch her? That pathetic puppy-dog longing you think is so fucking subtle?” He jabbed a finger towards the door Lana fled through. “You want her too. You’ve always wanted her. Don’t stand there judging me when you’re just as fucking hungry.”
Jace didn’t retreat. Instead, a strange, almost feral intensity hardened his features. The easy smile was gone, replaced by something raw and unguarded. “Hungry?” he repeated, the word a low growl. He leaned in again, his gaze locking onto Nico’s with unsettling focus. The air crackled, charged with the unsaid. “Damn right I’m hungry. Starving.” He paused, letting the admission hang. “But it’s not just me, is it? It’s both of us. Always has been.”
Nico stared, his breath catching. He saw no judgment now, only a shared, desperate recognition. A terrifying mirror reflecting his own forbidden desire. “What are you saying?” The question was barely a whisper, lost in the amplifier’s drone.
Jace’s voice dropped lower, rough and intimate. “I’m saying, Nico… maybe we’re both tired of pretending.” His eyes held Nico’s, unblinking. “Maybe we stop fighting it. Maybe…” He glanced towards the empty space on the couch where Lana had sat, her heat still lingering in the leather. A reckless, dangerous light sparked in his green eyes. “Maybe we stop seeing it as a problem. Maybe…” He paused, letting the implication sink into the thick air between them. “Maybe we share her.”
The words landed like a physical shockwave. Share her. Nico’s world tilted. The studio seemed to shrink, the golden light turning harsh, the hum of the amplifiers swelling into a roar inside his skull. His carefully ordered reality fractured. The thought wasn’t repulsive; it was a terrifying, electric surge of pure, forbidden possibility that flooded his veins, making his knees buckle slightly against the console edge. He stared at Jace, speechless, the weight of the proposition already reshaping the room, the future, everything.