Jess was always good at exciting the band pre-show, and then riling up the crowd during it. For me, it was seeing Liron there. 

Alenna was backstage this time, with her arms folded and frowning at everybody who walked by her. Liron was still missing. 

I didn't feel the music that night. Liron - he was the music. He was the song that I heard and played to. He was a beautiful song, and I was lucky to have heard it at all. Without him there, I didn't feel any music. I was terrible without my inspiration reflecting back at me - without Liron there.

The band parted on a somber tone. I left for home alone.

I felt like I could cry when I reached the apartment door. There was no light behind it. My face pulled up, preparing for the ugly mess I would become once I stepped through the threshold into the empty apartment.

But I bit it back. I dropped my guitar on the couch, and went straight to Liron's room, planning on crying into his pillow, planning to pray and beg that he wasn't dead - that he would come home soon.

My skin crawled and I stopped, shocked to see him actually sitting on the bed, holding a book, but staring at the pages in the dim light seeping in from the streetlamp, not really reading. He had the nerve to sit there like he was there all along.

He didn't acknowledge my presence. 

I actually did begin tearing up, but from joy. A warmth flooded my body and up my spine as I rushed to grab him into my arms. He felt stone cold. I felt my heart breaking at the lack of warmth.

"Liron," I tried, straining to keep my voice level. It was quiet in the room, apart from our breathing. The city outside seemed far away. "You promised me you wouldn't scare me like that again. Where were you?"

He didn't respond, and I pulled away. I turned him to face me where I knelt beside his bed. His eyes seemed to look right past me. The red-orange glow of the streetlamp hit him across the face like this, and it seemed like he was cut in half.

"Liron," I said, feeling myself sink deeper into the fear, now writhing around my chest. "Say something, buddy."

He blinked once, swallowed, and then his face contorted into grimace. Tears were starting to drip down his cheeks. His blue eyes were fixed on mine. I felt mine burning. The air around us built up with an anticipatory electricity, like a thunderstorms was about to break out.

"I'm going to die like my dad," he said. In my head, lightning crashed, and the world was split apart. That's the night my world ended.

"No," I said, though my voice was far away. The word hung between us, suspended in time. "You promised me you'd never die."

His breath hitched, and he started wracking his body. There was a river of emotions conflicting in me, but the strongest was pain. It stabbed at me. I clung to him, trying to push him into the hole that appeared in my chest. He clung to me with the same desperation. The night was filled with the sound of children crying.

"You promised," I repeated, as if mortal promises meant anything. 

He didn't keep his promise.