He adds a few more lyrics and another chorus, and within an hour, the song is mostly worked out. We just need to give it to Brennan for a rough recording this week to see how it sounds. This was one of the easier ones we’ve written together. I record us playing through it again and then hit play on the keyboard so I can listen to it. It’s more upbeat than most of the songs we write together.
I love writing with two instruments. The options to add more variations using the keyboard makes the song sound more polished than ones we’ve sent Brennan in the past just using Ridge’s guitar. I’m so excited about the song and the gift Ridge gave me that it makes me want to dance as it’s playing back.
Ridge sets his guitar aside and watches me dance around the room as the song plays. I laugh every time our eyes meet because I’m in such a good mood. At one point, when I glance at him, he’s not smiling. I pause, wondering what just changed in him.
He signs, “I wish I could dance with you.”
“You can. You have.”
He shakes his head. “Not to a slow song where I just stand there. I mean like this.” He waves his hand toward me. “To a faster rhythm.”
My chest tightens with his words. I step toward him and hold out his hand, pulling him up. “Ridge Lawson, you can do anything you want.”
I wrap one hand around his neck, and he places his hands on my waist. I start tapping against his chest along with the beat of the song. I move left to right to the rhythm, and he starts to follow my lead. I sing the lyrics so he can watch my mouth and know where we are in the song. When the song ends, I reach over and hit play again so we can keep going.
Ridge starts to fall in line with the rhythm, and I laugh when it finally happens. He laughs, too, as he starts to take over and keep up with a beat he can’t even hear. He leads me around the room as I sing and tap against him. At the end of the final chorus, he spins me and then pulls me against his chest as we both come to a slow stop.
He holds me there, staring down at me as I look up at him. We’re both smiling. Looking in his eyes, I can see the complete appreciation he has for me like I’ve never seen before. Like I just gave him something he thought he would never experience.
For me, it was a simple dance—something I do all the time and take for granted. For him, it was a breakthrough. Something he’s never done before that he believed he couldn’t do.
How he’s probably feeling right now is how he makes me feel every time he turns on the stereo for me. It’s the little things like these that create the biggest moments between us.
He takes my face in his hands, preparing to say something to me. But instead of speaking or signing, he just drags in a speechless breath as he stares silently at me. He lowers his mouth to mine, kissing me gently on the lips. Then he meets my eyes, conveying more with one look than he’s ever conveyed through any other form of our communication.
“Sydney,” he says quietly. “Everything we’ve gone through to get here. Right here. It was all worth it.”
There isn’t a thing I could signs or words I could say that could top the meaning in what he just spoke to me.
I reach over and hit play on our song again. He grins as I clasp my hands behind his neck. He presses his forehead to mine, and we dance.
I wanted to send Brennan a rough cut of the song Sydney and I wrote tonight, but I needed my laptop to do it. Which is why we just showed up at my apartment and placed ourselves in this horrible predicament.
Us, standing at the door.
Warren’s ass, staring back at us from the couch.
It’s so…pale.
Sydney spins around as soon as we walk through the apartment door. She’s covering her eyes, even though she’s not facing the direction of Warren’s ass anymore. She’s shaking her head like she wishes she could unsee what she just saw. I wish that, too.
I think Bridgette might be yelling now. Thank God I can’t hear it. All I see is Warren covering her up with the throw blanket from the back of the couch. Mental note to wash that blanket tomorrow.
Warren covers his junk with a throw pillow. Wash the pillow, too.
“Knock much?” he signs.
“Lock doors much?” I sign back. I grab Sydney’s hand and pull her to my bedroom. When we’re safe from Warren’s nudity, she finally opens her eyes.
“I’m never sitting on that couch again,” she says, walking to my dresser. She kicks off her flip-flops. I point to the restroom, and she nods. Right before I walk away, she says, “I’m gonna borrow sunblock.”