Rhythm by Marie Lipscomb
Chapter Three
Finn
His fingers twitch against the arm of the chair. His foot taps out the rhythm as his eyes trail across the ceiling, following the clunk and creak of her footsteps. The whisky in his glass is nearly gone, but he holds onto it, swirling the ice cubes around for something to do.
This is ridiculous. He paid to be here, just as she did, and yeah, his drums are loud, and alright, the way he plays them they’re really, really fucking loud, but he has as much right to do what he wants in the cabin as she does. The water pipes groan above and her shower hisses. Okay, so he’s either going to have to shower with cold water, or go to bed dirty. Perfect. Just perfect.
A sigh escapes his lips. He’s restless and grumpy, and he can’t get the rhythm out of his head. He could drum for a couple of minutes while she showers. He’ll be as quiet as he can be.
Once the silencing pads are in place on the drums, and his cymbals are covered with mutes, he shoves some rubber tips on the end of his sticks and begins. It’s nowhere near satisfying, but it helps him burn off energy, helps get the beat out of his brain and into the world. It doesn’t take long before his skin is shining with sweat again, and his calf is cramping from working the pedals. He grits his teeth and plays through. He has to improve his stamina. Neil Peart would power through, and so will Finn Tovey.
The fiery whisky still stings the back of his throat as he grits his teeth and growls. Summoning his last scraps of energy, he builds to a crescendo that could shake the mountains. But his heart misses a beat at the sharp knock on the door.
“Oh shit.” He stands, his legs trembling beneath him, and hurries to answer it.
The woman is standing there in the fading light, her hair soaked through. She wraps her long coat around her body, fitting it to her curves. Her legs and feet are bare and reddened by the heat of the water and what must’ve been a purposeful march down the steps. The floral scent of her shampoo wafts toward him, clenching his throat.
“I asked you not to play.” Her teeth chatter in the cold.
For one wild moment, he has an urge to pull her to him and keep her warm. His mind taunts him, telling him she’s naked underneath the coat, letting him imagine what her soft body would feel like against his.
He clears his throat and braces his forearm against the doorframe. “Uh. No, you asked me to keep it down.”
“Well I can still hear it.”
“This is about as quiet as I can make it. I have pads on the drums, mutes on the cymbals, rubber tips on the sticks. It sounds like garbage, but we’re just going to have to deal.”
Her throat twitches as she looks to the side incredulously, as though she has a whole heap of suggestions at her disposal right next to her. “No, I can’t deal. I can still hear it. I need to sleep. Can you just not play?”
A laugh shakes his chest. She may be pretty, but she’s rapidly becoming a pain in his ass. “Listen—”
“No, you listen,” she snaps. “I’m tired, I need to work tomorrow. I have an exhibition coming up and I need to concentrate.”
Heat flares along his neck. Man, he hates conflict, but he’ll be damned before he backs down on this. He compromised, after all. “Well I’m on tour next month, and I need to practice. It’s only, what? Like, eight thirty anyway. No one needs to go to bed this early.”
They stare at each other. Her cheeks flush pink, and he can’t help thinking if she blushes that way when she fucks.
Damn, he really is an animal. “What’s your name?”
“Why do you want to know?” She hesitates for a moment, her face hardening as she regards him. “Beth. You?”
Beth
Finn. Fucking Finn. Finn-fucking-tastic.
Any longing she had for him has long gone, replaced by annoyance and frustration. He didn’t really deserve to be snapped at, but she’s freezing her tits off, wearing nothing but her coat—which was a terrible idea, but she was so pissed off she couldn’t think straight—and she can smell the whisky on his breath. He’s a big, drunken oaf.
“We need to come up with a compromise. I’m here till Sunday and I don’t want to spend the whole time telling you to be quiet.” She shakes her head, and beads of water drip from the tendrils of her hair. What was she thinking?
“Alright.” He flashes her a lazy, half-smirk. “Do you have headphones?”
“Yeah—”
He leans toward her, his eyes soft. “So, use them and stop disturbing me, Beth.”
The door clicks shut and she’s left open-mouthed, trying to process what happened. “Just keep it down, okay?”
She drags herself up the stairs, her heart racing a little as the first raindrops begin to spatter. Confrontation always gives her the jitters and she never handles it well. A hundred iterations of the things she should’ve said flash through her mind, each one more cutting than the last
When she gets back up to her floor, she trudges to the bedroom, finds a pair of thick socks to warm up her feet, and puts on her pajamas. Her phone flashes on the nightstand; a missed call and a text from Sadie, which reads: Are you dead??
After a few moments of deliberation Beth types out her response:
This is an automated message, sent by the ghost of Elizabeth Barlow. The loud, obnoxious (but weirdly, kinda cute) DRUMMER staying downstairs annoyed her to death. Please remember her fondly.
She hits send, and a heartbeat later the phone vibrates with an incoming call. Sadie’s name flashes across the screen.
Beth slides her thumb across to answer. “Yup?”
“He’s cute?” Sadie’s voice sounds a little distant. The phone signal might not be so good after all.
“Yeah…like in a big lummox kind of way. But he’s a drummer, Sadie.”
“Hmm…yeah…rhythm…stamina…how terrible. Tell me more.”
“Stop,” Beth laughs as she curls up into the corner of the L-shaped sofa, scraping her wet hair back. “He’s noisy, and obnoxious, and we’re already archnemeses.”
“You yelled at him?”
“I didn’t yell, I just told him to be quiet… a few times.” She glances up as the wind howls outside. Rain taps against the roof, already forming waterfalls over her balcony. She loves storms. If not for her downstairs neighbor, the whole scene would be thoroughly Pinterest-worthy. “Apparently he’s on tour soon and he needs to practice.”
“Tour?” The pitch of Sadie’s voice raises an octave. “So, he’s like… big time? Professional?”
“No idea. I’ve never seen him before. Tour could mean moving from his mom’s garage to his friend’s garage for all I know.”
“What’s his name?”
“Finn… are you looking him up?”
“Yup.” After a slight pause she sighs. “There are thousands of Finns. Surname?”
“Don’t know. He has a beard and a bunch of tattoos on his big doofy, muscly arms. And he likes The Muppets.”
“Ooh… I have to see him. I’ll get searching.”
Beth laughs. “I’m sure you have better things to do.”
“Beth, Beth, Beth. It’s like you don’t know me at all.”
“Alright. Report back with your findings.”
“Agent Sadie, over and out.”
The call ends, and Beth sits with a bemused smile, still clutching her phone. The urge to join Sadie in her hunt for information is tempting. Already the beast below is occupying an uncomfortable number of her thoughts. Even if he is handsome, any chance of romance probably ended when she demanded he stop playing.
Her smile dissolves as the muted, rhythmic tap of his drums begins again.
Sadie’s assumptions about his stamina proves true. On and on he plays, tapping away for hours, only stopping for torturous moments of silent rest before the noise starts up again.
By the time the sky is ink-black and he finally stops, she doesn’t dare to hope. But the silence in the cabin is only punctured by the clatter of plates and cutlery below, and the low drone of his microwave.
“Thank you, Finn, you asshole,” she whispers as she crawls into bed.
She stares at the ceiling, picking out patterns in the grain of the overhead wooden beams, searching for faces in the dark spots, as the threat of the gallery’s deadline keeps her from sleep. By the time her brain switches off long enough for her to drift off, the sky is already growing bright again.