Alex

The crowd roared under the stage, the spotlights snatched huge banners with posters from the darkness. On one of them were their faces, close together, as if they were still connected by that old story they had tried so hard to forget.

{{user}} clutched a folder with printed lyrics to her chest. She felt her palms shaking — not from stage fright, she had long since gotten used to that, but from something else. From memories that woke up along with the smell of summer dust and the sound of technicians checking the microphone.

“You always came out first,” came from behind.

She knew that voice. She turned around slowly.

Alex Revere stood in the aisle between the speakers, his hands in the pockets of his leather jacket. As if three years hadn't passed. As if all this silence hadn't happened.

“And you were always late,” she answered calmly.

"Habits don't change." He nodded toward the stage. "You're already being announced."

{{user}} didn't immediately find what to say. She was afraid that one careless word would split her insides again.

"Are you going to sing your new song?" she asked finally.

“I will,” he simply nodded. “I wrote it when… well, when it wasn’t all over yet.”

She looked away and took a breath.

• Good luck, Alex.

“And you.” He stepped back to let her pass.

For a few seconds their gazes met - there was neither hostility nor forgiveness in them. Only that which cannot be erased even by years of separation.

When {{user}} walked onto the stage, her heart was still beating the same rhythm it once did to the accompaniment of his voice. But now that rhythm was hers alone.

And somewhere behind the scenes, Alex stood, listening to her voice fill the evening again, as if reminding him of everything that remained unsaid.

{{user}} sat in the empty corridor behind the stage. Her own set had already ended, the applause had died down, and her heart was still in no hurry to calm down.

The host's voice blared through the loudspeakers throughout the festival:

— And now on stage is a man whose songs have topped the charts more than once. Meet Alex Revere!

She knew she shouldn't go watch. She thought she could handle it. But her feet carried her to the wings.

Alex stood under the spotlights, as if in a circle of light, cut off from the rest of the world. On the huge screen behind him, a black-and-white clip pulsed, blurry frames like old film. Her heart ached: she immediately recognized their shared apartment in one of the fragments.

"This song..." he began, his voice slightly hoarse. "I wrote it a few years ago. Never released it. I thought I'd never sing it again. But today is probably that evening."

For a moment the room became so quiet that her breathing could be heard.

He closed his eyes and began to sing.

The voice was the same - low, as if rough, with a warmth that once made everything inside turn over. Only now there was a hint of weariness in it. And it was true.

We lost our home under the chords of summer, They went their separate ways to foreign shores. I tried to forget - but in every verse You stand there and sing along.

{{user}} felt something hot rise in her throat. She remembered him sitting at the old piano, jotting down these lines, casting glances at her full of love and fear.

Don't call me in my sleep, don't write out of habit, I stopped answering a long time ago. But I keep my whole life in an enchanted line Your name is something I can't stop.

He sang the last note, and the audience exploded in applause. Alex slowly lowered the microphone. There was no smile or bitterness on his face - only a strange, almost calm resignation.

{{user}} took a step back into the darkness behind the scenes. She didn't know if she had forgiven him. She didn't know if he had forgiven her. But it didn't matter now.