Page 165 of Levi

I’ve been counting down to Sunday like a prison sentence rushing at me. Standing here in the lights, it lands all at once. I don’t have to get on that plane as the same man I was before.

I’ve never been as scared and thrilled in the same breath.

My hands have already decided. I turn, catch the band’s eyes, draw a flat line through the air. Cut it. The big closer dies before its first chord. A couple of faces go confused. The bandleader mouths a question.

I shake my head and walk back to the stool, to the Martin that’s sat on its stand all night like it knew its time was eventually coming. The beat-up guitar I actually play, the worn spot by the bridge sliding under my forearm at its old weight, the one I’ve had since before any of them owned a piece of me.

The field goes quiet and uncertain at the edges, a crowd feeling the show step off its rails. I can feel the band shuffling behind me not knowing what to do.

I drag the stool to the lip of the stage, sit down with the guitar across my knee, lean into the mic. My heart is slamming so hard I swear I can hear it come back through the monitors.

“Last one’s not on the list tonight,” I say. My voice only shakes a little. “I wrote this one myself. This month, right here.” The field is hushing now, tipping in toward me. “It’s called Breathe. First time anybody’s ever heard it, and I wrote it for somebody who matters to me.”

Then I play it.

Three chords. The truest three I own.

My own song in my own hands in front of everybody, and the second it starts I can’t hear the fear anymore over the music.

I don’t say his name. I don’t even say he. The song only ever says you. It’s about being accepted and taken as-is. No questions, no inspection, no list of repairs. I’ve never once written about being wanted whole, because it never happened to me. Now it’s pouring out in front of everybody, and it’s the most honest I’ve ever been out loud.

And then I reach the place where I need to look at him.

I lift my eyes off the strings. I look at Dante like I only ever look at him in that apartment. I let everything sit there plain on my face. Everything I’m feeling, everything I want. I don’t look away. Thousands of people and cameras, and I aim every last piece of myself at one beautiful man at the rail.

At Dante.

Let the world see where I’m pointed.

This is the one move the box was built to terrify out of me. The first rule of my raising, the one underneath all the others.

Don’t ever let it show. Don’t let them see it on your face. Don’t let them know what you are.

Tonight, I let it show.

Let them see it on my face. Let them know what I am.

And I’m doing it in the brightest light I’ve ever stood in, because I’d rather be free for one song than safe for the rest of my life.

Up on the big screens over the stage, the picture changes. The cameras have been on me, but a camera only ever hunts for whatever the singer’s looking at, and I’ve quit pretending to look anywhere but at him. So, they swing. They follow me off the stage, out into the crowd, and they find the face I found. Throw it thirty feet tall across the field.

And for one second, the longest second of my life, longer than any night I ever spent in that black, it’s done. And I feel so fucking free. I’ve said it to all of them. I’ve told them who I am.

I don’t know yet whether there’s anything on the far side of tonight, or whether I’ve just set fire to my whole life for a fella who never promised me a single day.

Does he want me?

I’ve just bet it all on yes, out loud, where I can never take it back. Because the risk is worth it if there’s even the smallest chance.

And then I see Dante up on the screen.

The controlled, polished man. Never a hair out of place. His handsome face is wide open, hiding nothing. He’s openly crying. Down at the rail with the tears running down his face. Benji sobbing into his shoulder, both hands knotted in his shirt.

Dante looks up, finds me past the lights like I found him, and he nods. Once. Slow. Certain. Then he points at me and puts his hand on his heart. He holds it there.

My heart now.

Both eyes locked on mine, not hiding from a single lens, not stepping back into the safe place. The most careful man I’ve ever known, choosing right now, no warning, the world watching, to let himself be seen wanting me back.