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Chloe loves music. She adores so much music from every song she’s sung on a huge stage to almost every piece she’s analysed in class. She loves it all.That’s why it surprises so many people most of all chloe herself to discover she has a playlist of just fifteen songs titled simply ‘I kissed shara wheeler’.
It’s even more surprising to learn that playlist is her number one most played.
Shara also knows every song on it by now. Its the playlist to their love, the soundtrack if they were a movie. It’s got everything from numerous taylor swift songs (all but one from 1989) to Alejandro by lady gaga. The first song on the playlist is always mastermind from Taylor swifts midnights. When that song plays chloe laughs and compares the lyrics to sharas disappearance. Shara just laughs along “a boring Bitch on a boat” she imitates chloes voice earning a light smack on her arm and another roar of laughter.
By the time they get four songs in to mr bright side they begin to reminisce deeper. It makes chloe think of that party and on the playlist the lyric they shout the loudest is always ‘it started out with a kiss how did it end up like this’ and they laugh even louder then to mastermind.
Song number seven is the famous Alejandro by lady gaga. This is one of the only ones shara didn’t immediately understand. She didn’t get why it was on the playlist but after a few listens she finally understood. With some translations from spanish one of the early lyrics is ‘she hides true love in her pocket’ and it’s that line that makes shara get it. She hid true love with chloe. The next line she understands is ‘nothing to lose’ that’s what she thought basically as she convinced herself she was hiding on a boat all for valedictorian. Finally it’s ‘don’t want to kiss don’t want to touch’ that seals the deal the lie shara said when she denied she wanted to kiss chloe. God she payed the consequences. She doesn’t remember her visit to under the surface of lake Martin aloud ( she knows Chloe will laugh at her) but she can’t help the small quirk of her lips as she thinks it was actually quite funny. Not that she’ll ever tell chloe that.
Nothing significant really happens until song number twelve Sofia by Clairo. It’s the message of this one the sapphic vibe that really gets shara. ‘ You and me shouldn’t feel like a crime’ is the line that makes chloe really think about shara about willow grove and all the obstacles between them. Sometimes they both think this song must have been written about them. It’s the ‘oh my god I think I’m in love with you’ that sums up both of their separate realisations. It’s also the lyric about driving that makes chloe think of their escape from sharas house to make out and eat dinner at hers. ‘I just want to say how I love you with your hair down’ chloe leans over drinks on the table to get closer to shara who just laughs and smiles looking at their hands. Here in New York they can safely hold them above the table without fear of it getting back to sharas family or anyone else who would ruin their lives.
The final song on the playlist is Iris by the goo goo dolls. By fifteen songs in shara and chloe are normally either crying or making out. Sometimes both. This one also makes shara think about that day at chloes house or at least the opening does. ‘I just want you to know who i am’ shara thinks that’s one explanation of why she disappeared and it’s one she uses any time someone from willow grove asks her why. She would’ve thought Chloe made it obvious first that valedictorian speech even those that graduated at willow grove heard about it and then the kiss at the bonfire. Someone spread that around and before they knew it chloe and shara were a public couple. A couple everyone either thought of as disgusting and sinful or amazing and beautiful neither opinion though could explain how or why that happened.
Sometimes shara thinks like that. That their love story is something that should be bottled up and kept forever. Something that should be immortalised. Or maybe just maybe it should be kept only in their memories the two the only intact copies of the story to die along with them hopefully at least happy together. That versions selfish shara thinks to keep something as amazing as the story to themselves but she knows it’s the right choice for them at least for the meantime. They don’t go on monologues when asked about how they started dating Instead they tell a simplified version of growing up rivals (at least that’s true) and spontaneously becoming romantic in their senior year (not quite true but close enough that they get away with it). Even the fake love story has the same ending as the real one.
“I love you shara” and “I love you chloe”. Happily ever after shara thinks.