Steady hands, voices like light waves, dark hair mirrored between the tips of my fingers, always a variation of the same kind eyes.
Backstage was downstairs, through a door to the right, then down a long nameless hall to the left so narrow I could almost touch my fingertips to each side. The room was that dark, unwelcoming, underwashed colour of the seventies that’s too depressing to be beige, with a large metal legged office table in the middle and a wall of long stage mirror with a bland formica counter running behind an open wooden slat pull-down door. Backstage was two toned, the laces of my corset reflecting behind me, our feet up on the chairs, his milk-chocolate hoodie given to him by a soundman somewhere where the ground never freezes and there’s no such thing as snow. Backstage was us and a pile of local newspapers that didn’t print our names. Taking pictures to perfectly capture his smile, making him look like a fashion model. How frightening.
When it came time, footsteps in the hall, ten minutes, I wanted the boy in the hall to be wearing a severe suit, something governmental, official, bearing the weight of strangers. Instead, he was just a boy. Ten minutes. Okay, alright. Clear plastic water bottles, a small pile of clothes about to be pushed to the floor. Rather than helping, I slipped hands underneath his t-shirt. Soft dark fur, the sweet, thin pelt of a sleek sea creature. Otters, shape changers. Let them cry and they’ll return to their previous life, singing under the waves. Ten minutes. Hide his skin. Pen tied wild in my hair, body flat against his back, I hid my grin behind his shoulder. “Are you ticklish?” He pinned my fingers, matching my pleased expression in the silver glass, and didn’t try to do anything but tell the solid truth. S.O.S.