Under Control.

chapter sixty eight.

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Christmas comes and Christmas goes, and amongst it all, Julian and Nora create a normalcy that's theirs.

During the few weeks before the year ends, Nora disappears down rabbit holes of emails once or twice, and alludes aloud a few times to how vast this new thing is that she's trying to make. She talks about how unreal it all feels — especially considering how far away even the potential for anything like it had been mere months ago — and she lets Julian in on a few secrets, and asks for his opinion once or twice, too.

But still, for all of their openness and determination to find peace and be good to one another in spite of what swirls on and on outside, some lurking questions do remain.

Just before Julian had arrived back into the city, it had been decided that the fair would set up in Miami and not here, at home in the city. And even though it was planned to be a once a year shindig, the wondering remained as to how Nora was going to manage everything from the city to the beach once reality was again their day-to-day. All of that considered though, she didn't seem too worried, and so Julian decides to follow her lead for once and to let it all slide. Because, he figures, their worries will still be there waiting for them to deal with once January comes, and the bubble of his being home for the holidays is finally over.

Even still, Julian can't help sometimes but to worry about how they might manage to keep this up — the calmness that had set in around them, and the remarkable unremarkable-ness of it all — once he was back to playing shows and being gone more than he wasn't. And it's something they talk about sometimes, late at night when the world doesn't feel real, and all they can muster are murmuring voices while their hands and lips wander, a delicious distraction paired against their shared reluctance to linger too long with anything that felt like intrusion.

But even once the city staggers back to reality and the wonderland-like snow has melted to a greying, piss-scented mush, the creep of real life back into their carefully curated for-now, is mercifully slow. Julian is determined to write some while he's at home, and so he leans back into his well-meaning intent to do so during daylight hours. He curbs most of his extracurriculars too, so that he can make the most of the time he has left before he has to fly away again, and while he does that, Nora meanders back into work, heading to the office alone while she can and working while Julian fills the apartment with pretty noise.

And then, when each day ends, they meet for dinner often then wander home late, hand in hand, and with nothing better to do but to enjoy the little time they have left.

The heady ease of it all was not without disruption though, and especially not after Julian starts heading back into the rehearsal space for the few weeks they have left in the city, to try and make the amorphous shapes of what he has so far into something that sounds like it fits with the band.

He comes home one night wired and enough so that it sets Nora to wondering until he explains it all in a messy rush.

Albert.

It was all to do with Albert, and Ryan, and some meeting at a bar. And Julian is mad and sad and confused, too. And all together it is a moment of undeniable realness in their cosy, temporary life — one that marks the beginning of an end.

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The first show of the new year is laden with sparks. With nervy energy, and unspoken turmoil, and ways new and old of coping.

I's not the same now as it had once been, all fiery freneticism and excitement un-contained. Now, it was a job, and the band was at work. The backstage these days was less raucous, because there were girlfriends and tensions hanging around, and all of that was underpinned by the fear of what was yet to come.