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They’d been back home, well, released from the bunker, for a few months now. They found out just how slow criminal cases could be, as they were still in the midst of the craziness, hoping that Gretchen Klein and her team would end up imprisoned for life; Fatin had a personal vendetta against that asshole gaslighter Faber as well. The defense team was trying to wait until all, or at least most, of the girls were 18 to try and slide past the fact that they were all still minors who never consented to anything that happened.
In those months, she and Leah had time to grow both individually and together off the island, and Fatin decided that maybe she knew a little bit about love and Leah decided love wasn’t just misery and doubt. It wasn’t easy, but if there was one silver lining in everything, it was the relationships they were all able to build.
It had taken another month before they returned to school. Dot had opted to get her GED, Rachel and Nora were being homeschooled, Shelby was out of that toxic home of hers, staying a few towns away with Dot and going to a new school, leaving just Martha, Toni, Leah and Fatin returning to their respective schools. Fatin had momentarily considered just dropping out, not being able to touch the cello when she first returned home. Why go to a fancy private arts school when you can’t even play? But the idea of leaving Leah to face everything alone was too much to bear.
So, they returned to East Bay Academy of Art together.
Fatin’s parents had been tip-toeing around her since the day they reunited. Her father still hadn’t moved out, much to her annoyance, but to her surprise, her mother wasn’t pushing her. She was letting Fatin live her life on her own terms, and it turned out that Fatin wasn’t too bad at that. There were the arguments and the long therapy sessions — individual, group sessions with the girls, and the most dreaded, the counseling with her parents — but things were going far better than she could’ve hoped.
It did help that she spent most of her time at the Rilkes anyway, though she made sure to spend time with her brothers whenever she could. They were too young to know the understand the full scope of everything, but Fatin knew that while they thought she was at vacation or boarding school or whatever lies her parents had fed them and that Gretchen had fed her parents, there had been times where she feared she’d never see them again. So. while there have been times where her brothers would much rather play video games than hang around their big sister, she was going to cherish as many moments as she could.
With the lack of pressure from her mother, and even from their school who had given her time to ease her way back into her music performance classes, Fatin found herself falling back in love with the cello. Actually, she found herself realizing just how much she’d always loved the cello, and how much that love had been suppressed. She loved to play, because she was playing for nothing more than the love of the instrument. The problem was that she still hadn’t quite gotten up the nerve to perform, something she’d no doubt need to do for a Juilliard audition. Leah had her heart set on Columbia, so Fatin let the Juilliard dream return; or maybe she’d end up at the Manhattan School of Music. With her parents’ money and a killer essay about the time when her plane crashed and she was stranded on a deserted island for months, only to be interrogated in a bunker for another month, just to find out it was all part of some crazy woman’s social experiment, she was pretty confident she’d be accepted at either place.
So, she had a little bit of time left to prepare for that, but she had been working on a different performance for a while now.
Leah had never actually gotten to see Fatin play the cello; not really. Fatin had performed at the school in the past, and appeared on multiple pamphlets and welcome videos to show off her talent and her brownness to appeal to the fact that they were a “diverse” school (they most definitely were not). Yet Leah had never paid it much mind, just as Fatin had never read any of Leah’s award-winning poems and essays that the writing department loved to showcase.
So, under the guise of preparing for a redo of the final she’d missed when they were on the island (they’d actually, rightfully so, let her slide on that one), Fatin had been preparing to truly perform for someone for the first time.
She’d always hated that saying “practice like you perform” or whatever her mom said that would go in one ear and out the next. Fatin never practiced like she was performing. Sure, she practiced until and through perfection, but something took over her body whenever she performed. For a while, it was a feeling of absolute dread at being pushed on stage like a show pony, but for the lovely, positive times in her relationship with the cello, it was serenity. The cello was practically playing itself at that point, Fatin just letting herself be moved by the music she was making. The audience would applaud and Fatin would bow, chasing that feeling until her next performance.
Fatin knew just how absolutely cheesy what she was about to do was, especially for a girl who "didn't know shit about love.” Beyond Leah’s beautiful, sometimes twisted and obsessive, but brilliant mind, were those beautiful blue eyes. The eyes that Fatin would never even dare to try to describe or put to words; after all, Leah was the writer in the relationship. And it wasn’t even that they were just objectively a shade of blue that was striking, but they were Leah’s eyes. The eyes that looked at her, and only her, with so much hope and love and joy.
So, while she couldn’t put it into words, some singers had tried. They had never met Leah though, so of course, their descriptions still didn't measure up. Fatin hoped that the instrumentals and her talent would make up for what the lyrics lacked. One day, she’d compose a piece inspired by and for Leah, years in the future, but for now, this would have to do.
Fatin was waiting, somewhat anxiously (she hadn’t gotten nerves around performing in probably years now) for her girlfriend. She had gotten permission to use the performance hall that she usually practiced in on a Saturday. She didn’t want to chance anyone interrupting. Fatin and Leah had been planning to go out to get lunch, but she’d told Leah that instead of her coming to her house to pick her up, she should come to the school because Fatin had a surprise meeting/practice with one of her instructors. It was an easy enough white lie, and she’d received a text a while ago from Leah that she was leaving her house, so she should be there at any minute.
Leah had been to the performance hall before, sometimes to pick Fatin up so that the girl could drive her home or vice versa, other times to drop Fatin off for a class, but she’d never actually gone inside. On a few rare occasions, she’d get there a bit early or Fatin would be playing a bit late, and she’d try and catch a few notes if the doors ever opened or closed. Of course, all the rooms in the music wing were completely soundproof, so she could never hear much.
She had been surprised that when she texted Fatin that she was there, aware that she could get caught up sometimes in those soundproof practice studios and halls, she got a text in reply that just said "come inside."
For the first time ever, Leah let herself into the hall, taking in the surrounding space. It was pretty spacious, but not too big. Fatin had explained that this was typically where classes and group performances happened, the studios were where solo practices and recordings occurred and there was a much larger orchestral performance hall with a stage for her orchestra classes and quarterly concerts. It all amazed Leah. She sometimes forgot just how huge her school was, and how many students attended. She tended to stick with the kids in the School of Fine & Media Arts. Sometimes she found overlap in the School of Theatre, taking some playwriting and theatre history electives for fun. She had even considered auditioning for the play after finding out it was “King Lear,” one of her favorite Shakespeare’s, before realizing it would be too much of a time commitment. Her only real connection to the School of Music was standing before her.
Fatin looked almost uncharacteristically awkward next to her cello, which was resting in its stand, sheet music still open next to it.
“Hi,” Leah said, eyeing her girlfriend and then her instrument.
Fatin gave her a quick kiss and then pulled out a chair, “Why don’t you sit down?"
Leah cautiously took a seat. She was never really one for surprises, something Fatin knew, but she had a feeling she’d like this one. Fatin fiddled with a recording device, a speaker, her phone and then finally sat down and put the cello upright in front of her. All of a sudden, this beautiful piano music filled the space and Leah marveled at the acoustics, before Fatin played her opening notes. She had obviously known Fatin was about to play for her the minute she sat down, but nothing could’ve prepared her for the beautiful sound
The piano had sounded familiar, but the cello made her certain. Fatin was not just playing for her, but she was playing “Ocean Eyes.” It brought her back to a conversation they’d had very early on in their relationship.
“So, what’s your love language?” Fatin and Leah were lying down on her bed in the taller girl’s room. They had spent a good 20 minutes arguing over what movie to watch, only to end up just talking about anything and everything.
Leah had obviously heard of love languages. She’d even taken the test before, not that she really cared too much about the results.
“What’s yours?”
“Turning my own question on me, really? You know, I expected it to be physical touch, since sex is totally my thing,” Leah blushed. She was no prude, but her girlfriend constantly talking about sex then made her think about sex with her girlfriend. “Turns out it’s gift giving. I mean physical touch was pretty high up there, but yeah, gift giving. Now are you going to answer me or am I going to have to extract the information from you?”
Two weeks prior, when Leah hadn’t answered Fatin’s question about where they were going for their date, Fatin had gone “full James Bond mode” and it became clear that Fatin had never seen a “James Bond” film because she resorted to peppering Leah with kisses and tickling her until Leah gave the answer up. So maybe Fatin wasn’t the biggest fan of surprises either.
Leah rubbed her hand against the necklace that Fatin had given her, for no apparent reason other than it reminded her of Leah. It wasn’t anything particularly fancy, but she hadn’t taken it off since. It was an irregular quartz healing necklace, with a blue crystal that Fatin said really complemented her eyes. There was also the photo Fatin had framed of the two of them that rested on her nightstand, a journal and numerous books all gifted to her.
“That makes a lot of sense. Mine’s words of affirmation, which I guess also makes a lot sense,” Leah did her best not to think about Jeffrey and his annotations and more about the multiple poems she kept tucked away in her journal, all about Fatin. “What would yours be if it wasn’t one of the classic ones? Like if you could pick a specific way you express love?”
“Orgasms,” Leah pushed Fatin’s shoulder. “Hey! It goes along with gift giving.” Fatin wiggled her eyebrows up and down suggestively while Leah rolled her eyes. “You’re welcome for that by the way. And what would yours be oh wise one?
“I guess music,” Fatin raised her eyebrows again, but this time it was out of curiosity. “Oh come on, we’re Spotify friends, you know how much I listen to music. And even though she hasn’t played anything for me, I am dating a musician so that counts for something.”
“You know, you could play me something too.”
“I play you music all the time in the car before you start arguing with me about the aux,” it was true, Fatin did tend to get tired of Leah’s “sad, emotional crap” and try to change it up with some more upbeat pop or one of her favorite rap girls. Other times, she’d just drive around to a nice concerto playing, absent-mindedly treating the steering wheel like a fingerboard.
“So what I’m hearing is that I should totally make you a mixtape or stand outside your house with a boombox?” Fatin teased.
“Don’t you dare,” Leah had learned that this romantic side of Fatin really liked gestures, probably as part of that gift giving love language, and wouldn’t put it past her to turn their relationship into a corny 90s romantic comedy trope.
“No worries babe,” Fatin kissed her forehead. “You can just listen to the playlist I made you.”
“Wait,” Leah sat up and reached for her phone. “You made me a playlist? Where?”
“Oh, I think it’s still on private,” Fatin grabbed her phone and fixed that while also showing it to Leah. It was simply named “Rilke” and the first song on it was “Ocean Eyes" by Billie Eilish.
“That is the cutest, most cheesiest thing I’ve ever heard. ‘Ocean Eyes?’ Really?”
“It’s a good song,” Fatin pouted. “And I can’t help it that you were blessed with insanely gorgeous and unfair blue eyes.”
Leah scrolled through the dozens of songs in the playlist, recognizing some names, like “Heart Like Yours” and “Rhiannon” and not others, like “The Girl Who Fell To Earth” and “I Love You, I Love You. It’s Disgusting.” She instantly knew that these songs would end up on her Spotify Wrapped. Surely enough, “Ocean Eyes” would end up in her top five most listened to songs that next year.
“I love it,” Leah gave her a kiss, and then another, phones forgotten.
“Oh, I have a sex playlist too. One second,” Leah pushed Fatin down, letting her phone slip off the other end of her bed. “Okay, guess we’ll focus on my love language then.”
Fatin’s eyes were closed, lost in the music, but she opened them for a moment, and locked eyes with the girl who served as her inspiration, watching as tears ran down her face. Happy tears of course. It took almost everything within Fatin to not fall apart and finish her piece.
“Please tell me you recorded that,” was all Leah said when Fatin set the cello back in its stand and stood up. She stopped the recording, which she’d end up downloading to her computer and sending to Leah for her ears only.
“So, I guess you liked it?” all of a sudden the taller girl launched herself at Fatin. It was kind of reminiscent of the way that Fatin had hugged her when they first thought rescue was coming. Except this time it was real, they were actually safe in each other's arms. It wasn’t a hug that celebrated going home, it was one that reaffirmed what they already knew, that they’d somehow found home in each other on an island, stranded in the middle of nowhere.
“You’re amazing.”
“That? Just wait until you hear me play some of the classical shit,” Fatin smirked.
Instead of bantering with her like she usually would, Leah just kissed her. Somehow she’d ended up with the corniest, most romantic, talented and beautiful girl she’d ever met. She had no idea how she’d gotten so lucky, but love isn’t doubt and love isn’t misery. So instead of spending her time pondering over questions without answers, Leah is just going to kiss her girlfriend.