Cole

"Oh... hello Cole," Mr. Carter greets me, slightly confused, when he opens the door. "Ms. Aria didn't tell me you were coming today." He hesitates for a moment before stepping to the side to let me in.

I come in and take off my heavy winter coat. There's still a faint scent of cinnamon and spices drifting through the halls from yesterday's cookies. The smell didn't last long at my place. Melody sent me home with a bunch of the cookies and I decided to share some with the guys. They disappeared nearly instantly.

"Oh I wasn't going to, but I'm going out for dinner with some friends tonight," I explain as I dust off the remaining snow still clinging to my hair. "I didn't realize how close the restaurant was from here, so I thought I would stop by just to say hi."

He gives me a polite nod but there's an uneasy look on his face. "Ms. Aria is busy practicing right now."

I wave my hand casually. "Oh I'll try not to distract her. I probably won't stay for long anyways."

"Alright, as long as you don't get in her way," he says sternly.

What's that supposed to mean? Mr. Carter quickly heads down the hall before I can ask.

I find Melody in the living room, sitting at the piano. On top of the piano are three disproportionately large coffee cups resting on pink coasters. Two are empty with beige streaks of coffee remnants inside, the third is half full. That's a lot of coffee for someone her size at three in the afternoon.

She's silently staring at some messy sheet music that I assume she wrote herself. Her normally smooth and straight hair is tied up into a fuzzy bun. There's a pencil tucked behind her ear, but she's also holding one and rhythmically tapping it against the bench. She's holding another pencil in her other hand and quickly twirling it in smooth circles. Her hand eye coordination never fails to amaze me.

"Hi Mel," I call.

She doesn't respond.

"Mel?" I slowly walk closer to her.

She still doesn't respond and just scribbles something out on the sheet.

"Mel?" I lightly tap her on the shoulder.

Melody jumps and quietly gasps. She drops her pencil and the graphite snaps when it hits the floor. The other pencil she was twirling goes flying. I hop out of the way before it stabs my stomach like a spear. She quickly turns around and her wide, nervous eyes soften when she sees me.

"O-oh, hi Cole."

"Oh god, I'm so sorry Mel." I quickly bend down to pick up her pencils. "Are you ok?"

"Thanks," she mumbles as I hand her the pencils. "I guess I was just really focused."

"You can say that again, you scared me." I place my hand over my chest as I feel my heartbeat slowly calming down.

She raises an eyebrow. "I scared you?" I stammer to rush out another apology. God, why am I such an idiot? She just laughs and swings her legs smoothly over the bench so that she's facing me. "I'm just kidding. Mr. Carter claims it's like my mind is on another planet when I'm in the zone."

She scoots over a little and pats the space on the bench next to her. "Yeah, I've never seen someone so focused," I remark as I sit down.

Melody just shrugs and mumbles something inaudible. She looks up and stares curiously at me for a moment. "What are you doing here anyways? I thought I told you I was too busy for a lesson today."

"Yeah you did, I was just in the area and wanted to stop by." I don't exactly feel like admitting I missed her. How pathetic would that seem?

She nervously glances back at the piano from the corner of her eyes. "I'm sorry Cole, but I really don't have time to stop right now."

"That's ok, I have a couple hours to kill." I shrug, glancing at my watch. I'm not meeting with the guys for another three hours. "I'm fine with just sitting here while you work. I've never seen you seriously practicing, it'd be interesting to watch."

Melody sometimes fiddles around with the piano while we're together. I'm always fascinated by the way her face suddenly lights up and she scrambles to grab the nearest pencil and sheet of paper when an idea pops up in her head. But the inspiration seems to come in short bursts, and I've never gotten to see her completely focused.

She bites her lip but nods slowly. "Alright."

I sink into a nearby leather armchair and rest my elbow on the armrest, propping up my chin with my fist. I notice the repetitions in her patterns after a while.

Melody plays a couple notes. Sometimes just three or four, other times several lines. Then she either adds notes to the sheet sitting on the music stand, or scribbles something out. She treats the sheet of paper as if she has a personal vendetta against it. I sit up a bit every once in a while to take a look. The edges slowly become more and more crumpled, and there are grey streaks all over it from the erasing.

There's a lot of sighing and burying of her face in her hands. I've never seen her this stressed, it worries me a bit. I try asking her a couple times if she's alright, but she doesn't respond. It's as if I'm not even in the room. I resist the urge to get up to get her attention again, it's been made blatantly clear that she doesn't want any distractions. It makes me feel so helpless though, not being able to do anything for her. It's like there's a glass barrier between us, she's right there but I can't reach out to her.

Before I know it, nearly two hours have passed. I get distracted by my phone for a moment. Mark is texting me, apparently everyone back at the house is looking for me. In hindsight, I probably should've told someone I was planning to meet them at the restaurant.

I hear the sound of paper rustling, but much more aggressively this time. I glance up and see Melody trying to erase something. The worn out sheet of paper finally admits defeat, and I hear a quiet tearing noise. Melody groans and forcefully rips the sheet of paper out of the notebook. She crumples it up and tosses it over her shoulder. I duck out of the way, it just barely misses my face.

She quickly turns around and her face turns red. "Oh shoot, sorry. I forgot you were there," she apologizes.

"No worries," I chuckle.

Pretty soon, there's a large pile of crumpled paper balls sitting on the floor behind her.

Her phone resting on top of the piano suddenly starts buzzing. She picks it up and glances at the screen. I hear her quietly sigh, tensing up a bit before answering the call.

"Hi Mom." She tries to speak a couple times but constantly pauses after getting one or two syllables out, her mom is probably interrupting her. "I already told you yesterday that I would work on it," she grumbles, absentmindedly tapping the eraser end of her pencil against her lips. "I've been up since six in the morning."

Melody sighs as she listens and rests her elbow on the keyboard. She lets her head limply tip forwards, resting her forehead on her palm. Her tone softens to a weak whisper, suddenly sounding tired and defeated. "I know, I know. But... I'm supposed to be on a break, Mom."

I should probably give her some privacy. I quietly get up and wander down the hall. My footsteps echo loudly against the smooth marble floor. It's eerily quiet and empty. I can't imagine that this penthouse was intended to only have two tenants when it was designed. Walking by the dining room, I spot Mr. Carter sitting at the table on his laptop. He glances up as I step in and gestures for me to sit across from him.

There's a knowing look on his face. "Couldn't handle watching Ms. Aria practicing?"

"I got second hand stress just from watching her." I shake my head in disbelief. "Has it always been that intense?"

"Usually no, but Ms. Aria has been under a lot of pressure recently." He turns his laptop towards me. There's a cluttered to-do list, miles long. "Her mother thinks she's been slacking, so she sent this last night."

I skim through the list. Mostly meetings, practicing, composing, recording, hand exercising, and tons of deadlines.

"How the hell does she have time for all of this?"

He tiredly runs his hand through his thick hair. "It's not rare for Ms. Aria to start her days before the sun rises and work until very late at night," he sighs and shakes his head. "I don't doubt that she'd stay up all night if I didn't force her to stop and go to bed."

I furrow my brows. I know Melody has told me that she doesn't sleep as much as the average person, but this seems a bit ridiculous. "She doesn't have enough time during waking hours?"

His lips pull into a straight line and his eyebrows twitch a bit. "Well, she has been sacrificing a few hours of her days to spend time with you, nearly everyday now."

I raise an eyebrow and cross my arms. "You're blaming me?"

"I don't know what happened between the three of you while you were baking cookies last night. Whatever it may have been, it made her mother decide that Ms. Aria has been slacking." I can tell he's trying to keep his face neutral, but he's clearly implying, yes.

I try to remember what happened last night. Nothing stands out though. Her mom seemed kind of stressed, but what parent hasn't nagged their kid about slacking off? "Everything seemed normal to me."

He looks at me condescendingly. "That's just it, Cole. It's normal to you. Ms. Aria doesn't live a typical life, you have to understand and respect that."

How ignorant does he think I am? I've seen the stress Melody puts herself through. How her childhood was stolen from her. How she can't go out without being afraid of being recognized. How she's dedicated her entire life to her career.

I grit my teeth and tightly grip the edge of the table to stop myself from doing something irrational. "Do you think I don't know that?"

"You don't seem to understand that an incident that is miniscule to you can be huge for Ms. Aria," he patronizes me.

I slap my hand on the table. His passive aggressive tone is really pissing me off, and I feel my blood begin to boil. "That's bullshit! You-"

Mr. Carter quickly raises his hand to stop me and looks at me wearily. "It's nothing personal, Cole. I'm just concerned for her."

"Really? It sure sounds personal," I snap. I quickly stand up, knocking over my chair behind me. It lands with a loud clatter onto the polished wooden floor.

Mr. Carter doesn't even flinch. "That's enough, Cole," he raises his voice and frowns. His stare is sharp and piercing, but I refuse to be the one to look away first.

Forcibly placing both of my palms on the table, I lean towards him and narrow my eyes. "Listen here, Mr. Carter."

I suddenly hear someone softly clear their throat. "Is everything ok? I heard yelling." We turn and see Melody curiously peeking from behind the corner.

I didn't even notice the piano playing stop for god knows how long now. I scramble to pick my chair back up and hastily sit down.

I clear my throat a bit and try to force out a nonchalant tone. "Yeah we were just uh, talking."

Melody doesn't look convinced. She cautiously comes in and sits next to me. It's almost as if I can physically feel the tension in the room fade away just from her presence, but an uncomfortable silence falls over the room. It's deafeningly quiet in here. The only noise is the ticking of the clock just outside in the hall. It echoes steadily and loudly in my ears like a heartbeat.

She quickly looks back and forth between the two of us. "What's wrong?" she whispers.

Mr. Carter and I look at each other. I impatiently drum my fingers on the table, while he sighs and leans back in his chair. We're waiting for the other to speak up, but neither of us want to. He gives me a look, tell her. I roll my eyes and return a look, no you tell her.

"You guys aren't being subtle at all," Melody sighs and shakes her head. "Please Cole?" She gently touches my arm and gives me the puppy-dog eyes. That's so unfair.

I rub my palm against my jaw. "We're just... worried about you Mel," I say and lightly squeeze her hand.

She furrows her brow, as if she somehow doesn't know what I'm talking about. "Why?"

I reach over to take Mr. Carter's laptop. "Can I borrow this?" I don't wait for him to respond before picking it up and placing it in front of Melody and myself. "Thanks."

Mr. Carter rolls his eyes at me before turning back towards Melody. "This is a lot of work, Ms. Aria, even for you," he explains, gesturing towards the list. "Especially when you're supposed to be resting."

Melody frowns and avoids looking at either of us or the laptop. Her gaze falls down to her lap, and she fidgets with her fingers. "I'm fine."

"The caffeine will only get you so far. It's clear you're exhausted, Ms. Aria," he says softly.

"Mr. Carter's right. This isn't healthy Mel," I add.

Mr. Carter takes his laptop back and shuts it. I guess having her face the list probably isn't going to do anyone any good. Melody slowly looks back up at him once the list is out of her sight.

"We're not suggesting you stop completely. Perhaps you could ease up a bit, cut a couple hours of work each day so you have time to relax," he suggests.

Her lower lip quivers and she tucks the messy, loose strands of hair that have slipped out of her bun behind her ears. "I did have fun, getting to relax when I first got here, but... mom got really mad at me after you left, Cole." She takes a moment to steady her trembling breath before continuing. "I have all this work to do. I can't afford to just give up so much time."

I rub the back of my neck and sigh. "You can't just let yourself be pushed around like this, Mel."

"It's not that easy, Cole," Melody mutters without looking at me. "But... you are right. I... should be the one to decide what I want to do." Her words are confident, but her tone says otherwise.

Mr. Carter taps his fingers against his chin as he thinks. "If you'd like, I can call your mother and speak to her about it. I'll work with her to figure out what items on the list can wait until you get back."

"Does that sound ok, Mel?" I whisper.

"Umm," she begins.

I watch nervously as Melody absentmindedly drags her fingernail through the grains of the wooden dining table as she thinks. My heart beats erratically as we wait in painfully long silence for her to make a decision.

She takes a deep breath and slowly nods. "I'd really appreciate it if you could do that, thank you Mr. Carter." Melody gives him a grateful smile.

I exhale in relief. It looks like I won't have to worry about her going into cardiac arrest. "Sounds good, Mel." It's nice to see her finally build up the courage to stand up to her mom. Albeit indirectly, but it's a start.

She wordlessly gets up and pushes her chair back in. "Well, see you tomorrow Cole." She grins before beginning to leave the dining room. I pause for a moment when I realize she's heading down the hall in the opposite direction from the living room.

"Where are you going?" I call.

"I'm going to go take a nap," she giggles.

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Cole and Mr. Carter are an interesting duo. I don't know about you guys but I don't think I'm this diligent over literally anything lol.

Thanks for reading! :)