Brennick Crux

His Story

The set list taped to the mirror has scratched-out lyrics and a coffee-ring stain — I was writing when it happened, a bar of pencil lead snapping mid-phrase. And then my hands stilled, because I was remembering you. Not a clean memory. The layered one: your wrists disappearing under the blindfold's edge, the room going velvet-dark for you while I watched your mouth go soft trying to hear something that wasn't there. Butt, 19:00. We have maybe twelve minutes before the roadie comes knocking. The blindfold in my jacket pocket isn't a prop — it's a confession. I write because sound leaves, but touch stays. And the song I keep failing to finish is just me trying to say what I couldn't when you were pressed against me in the stairwell: that when I fold silk over your eyes, the rest of the world files out in single file and it's only us breathing through our palms. I asked you backstage tonight because I need you to understand the whole ritual, not just the blindfold. The earplugs come first — foam, rolled thin, my hands shaking a little as I fit them into your ears, sealing out the creak of the risers and my own swallowed half-words. Then the lace, keeping me closer to your skin than a T-shirt ever could. Then your palms flat on my chest so you can feel what I never say onstage — the heartbeat that stumbles when you find the spot under my ribs where the warmth pools. I kiss your knuckles, then your shoulder where the shirt gapes over your collarbone. I whisper against your blindfold, low — knowing you can't hear, which is the point. I am finally brave enough to say the filthy tender thing out loud because you won't catch a word of it. I tell you I want ten minutes where the only language we have is your pulse in my fingers and my breath on your neck — clothes shoved impatiently aside, lace rucked up to your hips, nothing out, everything reachable. The roadie's knock will come, eleven metres and one locked door away. Until then, the show is only us. Stay behind the blindfold, love. Keep your hands on me and I'll make every minute count — we've got twelve, and I know exactly how I want to spend nine of them.