Dark Paradise - Joel Miller x OC

A cold and broken Hallelujah

Hi, for once the || lyrics are sang by Joel. I know I talk about Leonard Cohen, but he's actually singing Jeff Buckley version, if you want to listen to it (and I'd die for Troy Baker to sing it, because I do hear it in my head and it's wonderful).

Photo by Caio Silva on Unsplash

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Lying on her back, her eyes fixed on the ceiling of her bedroom, Chloe revisits the events of the previous days. Since that interrupted dance, things have been weird with Joel. It's not like he's pushing her away, he remains cordial. But things have changed. He does more patrols, longer ones. Herself does more nights shifts at the bar. They barely pass each other in the kitchen, him coming home, her leaving it, still letting him a plate ready for his dinner.

When they have a little more time together, their conversations don't sound like much. She tries to maintain it, but with little result. He almost only answers in monosyllables. She always ends up giving up, diving back into her book, or putting on some music to fill the silence. To silence the voice inside her that says "He doesn't want to be here with you."

And yet, he didn't stop thinking about her during his patrols. As soon as they have a break, his mind returns home, where he imagines her making dinner, laughing out loud at a movie. Dance. This vision inevitably brings him back to that night. That night when he almost crossed the line and kissed her.

She also remembers this dance. She had drunk a little, but she felt good. She remembers the proximity, his scent that had become familiar and reassuring to her. His hands holding her firmly but without violence. And their eyes clinging.

This can't go on. She needs to clear things up with him, even though it may hurt her. She doesn't want this cold, distant relationship. And if that means they won't be dancing together, that she won't be able to share his bed to sleep, she accepts it. But she wants to find back the conversations, the complicity. The silence. Comfortable silence, not one of those weird silences where no one knows whether to speak or leave the room. She gets out of bed and goes to his bedroom, determined to wait there all night if needed.

Without turning on the light, she slips into the room. The moon is reflected on the furniture. She lets her fingers run over the dresser. There is a bit of dust, she hasn't come to clean for a few days. She no longer dares to enter the room, as if suddenly she was no longer in her place.

Then she folds up the sheet to properly remake the bed. Funny how no matter if he sleeps alone or accompanied, he remains on his side. She would like to dive between the sheets to find his reassuring smell. To finally be able to sleep peacefully. Because contrary to what Joel thinks, she still has nightmares. When he's not there, they're even inevitable. That's why she volunteers to stand guard at night, on the wall, or to work on the last bar shift. So she can sleep during the day, when it's a little less scary to wake up alone. But she never told him about it. She doesn't really know why. She had always confessed this kind of things to him until then. Was it so as not to overwhelm him? So that he doesn't keep seeing her as someone to fix?

That's it. She doesn't want him to fix her anymore. She wants him to see her for the woman she is. She ended up like all these singles women she was talking when they first danced. They have all eyes on the lottery of which Joel is the prize. And now she's also taken a ticket. She doesn't really know how it happened. At what point does her way of seeing him changed? After one of their many late-night conversations? After a movie watched together? Does it matter after all, now that it's here, very present? She's not sure it's reasonable for her to have these kinds of thoughts, this kind of urge. Hope is a dangerous thing for a woman with my past. That's what Lana del Rey sang in one of her songs. She knows only too well how right she was.

Stepping around the bed, she reaches for the man's guitar. She touches the strings, pulling a not very harmonious sound. Then she looks at the records and decides to put one on. No matter how much she looks, she can't find the one she wants, so she falls back on a sure bet, Janis Joplin. But she would have preferred to listen to Leonard Cohen. He brought her back to a happy memory a few weeks ago.

----

She begged him over and over. One of those nights when neither of them can sleep, he decides to take action. In the dark, as always. Where privacy can be created. Where there is no more shame, no more embarrassment.

"I'm going to take it easy, you promise me you won't cry?

-Why would I cry?

-Because you cry all the time. You're pretty when you cry, but I don't want you to.

-I don't cry that often.

-You cry to all movies.

-Not true!

-One word: Interstellar.

- Ok, Tommy was crying too. And I could swear I saw you tearing up.

-I doubt you saw anything with that flow of tears in your eyes. But fair enough, it was a bad example. But Mama Mia. You cried on an Abba musical movie.

-Yeah well... That's called being human and having feelings, Mister-Cold-As-Rock. And I think I read somewhere that art is supposed to stir emotions in us. So if your song is sad, and I cry, it means that you interpreted it well and that you are therefore a not so bad artist."

He laughs softly as he tunes his guitar, wielding the strings a little more than necessary. Just to save a little time. Suddenly he feels embarrassed to have a spectator. Even if it's her. Especially if that's her? He chose a song he knows will please her. He knows that his embarrassment is not just about singing in front of someone. This song is a bit of himself, told by someone else.

Jeff Buckley – Hallelujah

| Your faith was strong but you needed proof

You saw her bathing on the roof

Her beauty and the moonlight overthrew ya

She tied you to a kitchen chair

She broke your throne, and she cut your hair

And from your lips she drew the Hallelujah|

Joel is immersed in his music. He no longer pays attention to time or space. All that remains is his voice and his fingers tirelessly roam his guitar. Yet near him, a woman looks at him with a new eye. She knew his voice, but she never imagined she would feel so much hearing it being used as an instrument. She hasn't moved an inch since the song started. She barely breathes, emotion clenching in her lungs. He doesn't see it, but he won his bet. Tears slide down the young woman's cheeks, without her realizing it.

|Baby, I've been here before

I know this room, I've walked this floor

I used to live alone before I knew you

And I've seen your flag on the marble arch

Love is not a victory march

It's a cold and it's a broken Hallelujah |

----

Now seated in the armchair by the window, she watches the cemetery trees move with the night breeze. Although the music is playing, it's his own voice that she hears in her head. All I've ever learned from love, was how to shoot at someone who outdrew you. It is no longer the tears that rise, but a heat in her stomach. That deep voice that had made her shiver so much, she would now give anything to hear it sing again. She begins to imagine herself dancing against him, his voice whispering in her ear.

But the time is no longer for daydreaming.

Downstairs, the front door has just closed.

He's home.