Free Liron's Melody by Brieanna Robertson

her coldness had eradicated
all hope of receiving kindness from her. And after she’d left, he had grown
accustomed to his solitude. He couldn’t believe how his heart had revived with
just one trusting gesture from Melody. Her hand in his, her defense of him as
he’d shared his story, the way she had flung herself into his arms when
Siegfried had startled her, the way she’d allowed him to soothe her with his
embrace and unique talent. All of those things made his heart rage and roar
with fire he thought had long since died out.
    It was an exquisite discovery, an enchanting, remarkable
resurrection of his dormant heart. And for the short amount of time she had
been with him, he had almost believed he could create music again. Because his
music, written in his deepest pain, had touched her so much she’d been able to
go against the laws of physics and reach him.
    But now she was gone. And the music was gone. All that was
left was a lovely memory, a spilled bottle of wine on his floor, and a white
shirt lying somewhere in his bedroom. He had been dangled beauty for one
second, like bait from a hunter trying to snare a beast. Now, he was alone
again. It startled him how much he yearned to feel her in his arms, to bury his
face in her hair and see if it smelled like the sunlight it was kissed with.
    He let out a defeated sigh and turned back into his room.
Siegfried was perched atop one of the chairs, preening himself. Liron smiled,
walked by the bird, and held his arm out. The falcon hopped up onto his forearm
with a screech.
    “I know, she interrupted your sleep. Come on, you cranky
bird. Let’s go to bed.” He started back toward the hallway. “But for the
record, you frightened her as much as she did you.” He smiled to himself,
remembering how she had leaned against him in the stairway. Perhaps she was
gone, but he felt blessed to have had those moments with her at all. It had
reminded him his heart still beat, that he was still a man, and that he was
still alive.

Chapter Seven
     
    Melody groaned and flopped the pillow down over her head to
stifle the horrible blaring of her phone, which was almost as bad as the
horrible blaring of her alarm. When it didn’t stop, she crawled out from under
the pillow and fumbled around on her nightstand until she managed to get the
receiver out of the cradle. “What?” she grumbled.
    “Geez, hello to you too,” Nikki’s voice came. “What are you
doing? Were you asleep?”
    “I was.” Melody rolled over onto her back and rubbed her
eyes.
    “It’s one o’clock in the afternoon. Are you sick?”
    “No, I was just up late.”
    “Doing what?”
    Melody sighed. “I couldn’t sleep. I was having…weird dreams.”
It was close enough to the truth.
    There was a pause on the other line. “Dreams? About what?
Nightmares? Were they about your parents? Mel—”
    Melody knew that tone in her friend’s voice, and she was not
in the mood for it. “Nikki, so help me, if you say, ‘maybe you should see a
therapist,’ I will kill you. Or at the very least stop talking to you
for about a week.” She sat up and shoved her hand through her unruly and
tangled mass of hair. She glanced down at the black shirt she still wore and
smiled as she fingered the soft fabric. “And no, they weren’t about my parents.
They were just weird. I drank too much wine before I went to sleep.”
    “You were drinking? Why?”
    Seriously? Did she have “basket case” written on her
forehead? That was the only reason she could think of as to why everyone seemed
to think she was one second away from insanity, or alcoholism, or any other
psychological problem she could shake a stick at. “Because I made an Italian
dinner and I felt like it. I’m twenty-seven years old. Do I need a note?”
    “No, of course not. So, what were your dreams about?”
    She’s really not gonna let up, is she? “Space travel,”
she blurted. There, that should do it.
    “Oh,” Nikki said.