Do You Feel Love?
Pairing: Noah Sebastian x Reader
Summary: Noah sees her again for the first time in four years. Everything has changed and yet, it feels like he’s exactly the same as the day she left.
Words: 2,777
Read on AO3
Want happiness instead? Read I Know I Dont.
Note: Specter has been living in my head rent free since its release. I genuinely think it has changed me fundamentally and I just had to write this down for some sort of release. It does use the lyrics and tone of the song but isn't quite a song fic? It's mostly just a character study. Nothing crazy but I will warn you: it is incredibly sad. My only hope is that it hurts just as good as the song.
It almost never rains in Los Angeles. When it does, it pours. When it does, Noah feels it in every inch of his body as it seeps through the cracks in his skin and settles in his muscles, making even the deepest parts of him ache with the reminder.
She loved the rainy days. She’d tilt her head up to the sky, close her eyes, and let the droplets gather on her eyelashes, her cheeks, her lips. He’d watch, mesmerized and soaked to the bone, but so full of love that it hurt.
Now, as he steps outside and the rain weighs him down, he wishes he could be anywhere else. As if leaving this place would suddenly cure him of this heavy emptiness. He can’t leave. With or without her, this place is home and even though it hasn’t felt that way in far too long, he has work to do.
Release days are always busy, full of phone calls and social media and all the things Noah has grown to hate about music. He just wanted to get it over with. To move on. But this moment is supposed to be rewarding since all of his hard work is finally coming to fruition. He’s been pouring everything, all of his pain and heartache, into this record. It’s been the only way he’s had any sort of relief from this constant pain in his chest. This is what it all leads up to. The hours spent hunched over his desk, voice raw from singing the same verse over and over and eyes stinging from the light illuminating off his monitor. This is when it's all supposed to matter, when the remorse is supposed to wash away.
He felt it before her, before the last album cycle. The gravity of the unkindness of life is not new. In fact, it’s something Noah has grown to expect. Loss and pain are his oldest friends. He thought he outgrew them but the truth is, he never will. He only learned to live with the way that it hurts.
As if he can still feel the ache, he absentmindedly rubs his palm over his heart and presses down, relishing in the pressure, the pain, as he walks.
Beads of water gather in his hair, soaking the strands until they’re too heavy to hold it, causing rain to slide down his cheeks as pieces fall in front of his face. He runs a hand through it, shoving it back. It’s gotten long, curling in the back by his ears but he doesn’t care to cut it. Maybe he’ll grow it out past his shoulders and hide behind it again.
His manager’s house stares back at him as he steps to the front door. He’s late. The song’s been out for an hour and he doesn’t feel any better, any lighter. The band was supposed to count down and celebrate together. Clink glasses, pat each other on the back. Instead, Noah drank a glass of whiskey and waited for the numbness to take over.
His phone has been blowing up this entire time but he hasn’t checked a single notification. It doesn’t matter if his friends and team members like this song. It’s not for them. It’s not for anyone but himself. It’s a shout out into the void he has sunken into. He just hopes she’s so far removed from all of this that she doesn’t hear it.
He runs his hands over his face, letting out a defeated sigh, lifting his head up to survey the space. The entry way opens up to a large living room with massive, plush couches and sleek furniture. It’s well decorated but still as modern and clinical as he’d expect from a man swimming in someone else’s money. He’s been here before but it feels different now.
His own voice echoes as Bad Omens’ new song plays through an expensive sound system. It’s so clear that it makes his throat close up. He doesn’t listen to his own music anymore—except for when he’s working on it. At that point, it’s only pieces and ideas that he gets to hand off to someone else to polish. Hearing the finished production makes him nauseous.
A heavy exhale leaves him as shrugs off his now soaked jacket and throws it on a rack with an assortment of others.
As he turns toward the open room, Jolly steps in front of him. He’s all smiles and warmth with his hair half up in a bun and a chunky black sweater covering his frame. He pulls Noah into a hug, leaving no room for Noah to step away and refuse.
“Took you long enough,” Jolly says, his words consumed by the alcohol in his veins.
“Got caught up,” Noah lies, offering a half smile as he pulls away.
Jolly studies him, his dark brown eyes softening as the realization sets in. Noah squirms, unable to handle the way it feels under his friend’s judgemental gaze.
“Noah, there’s something—”
There’s not an inch of Noah that wants to hear this right now. It doesn’t matter what Jolly has to say. Nothing will peel the sadness from his core. He holds his hands up in surrender.
“I’m good, man,” he interrupts.
Jolly’s brows furrow as he opens his mouth. “No man, listen—”
No, not fucking now.
“Let’s just go celebrate, yeah?” Noah’s quick to cut him off again and he pats Jolly on the shoulder as he slips past him.
The house is full. There are people nearly everywhere. Every face is one he recognizes, some more than others. He wasn’t in charge of the guest list and quite frankly, he doesn’t care who is here. He wouldn’t be among them if he could help it. And he won’t stay long anyway. He’ll show his face, make his rounds, and head home. Like clockwork. Like the way every day has been for as long as he can remember.
He’s surrounded by friends and his team, by what is supposed to feel like love and yet, he is entirely alone.
Love. A joke. One that has gone too far.
He knows how real love is—how real it can be. But it’s just a memory. He has forgotten exactly how it feels to love and be loved. Hollow, distant. Something he grasps so desperately for but can’t quite reach. And he should be basking in it. He has everything he has ever hoped for. While success surrounds him, he fades into the background. He’s been living life with a sheet over his head, eyes covered in a thin white veil. A ghost, a specter.
He walks into the living room, waving as people call his name. He only stops to talk to a few and he doesn’t say anything of substance. He just thanks them for coming and mindlessly answers their questions about the recording process and what comes next.
What comes next? An endless cycle of touring and interviews and restless nights in a bus bunk that might as well be a coffin. At least being on tour gets him far away from California for long enough that he can pretend, even if only for a moment.
When no one else demands his attention, Noah finally sets off to find his bandmates and actually make this release official. He knows them well enough to know that they’re in the center of the chaos. He gently puts his hand on someone’s shoulder as he scoots past to find them.
Sure enough, the three of them, plus bonus members like Matt and Bryan, are lounging on a plush and expensive cream colored sofa that takes up the middle of the room and curves in, inviting others to crowd around it.
Noah scoffs and rolls his eyes at the sight. They look ridiculous, lavishing in the very same lifestyle that they grew up making fun of.
Something settles in his chest, a content feeling. One of hope. These are his people, the family he has built from ashes. A small part of him wants to let himself have this moment with them. One by one, his eyes slide over the bodies and he relaxes more with each one.
Until the world comes to a screech halt and he’s suddenly caught in headlights and gasping for air.
Somebody else sits among them, leaning against the couch with a glass in hand and a presence so demanding that Noah nearly trips over himself.
She’s here, sitting next to his bandmates, his best friends, the people she left behind. Her head tilts back as bubbly laughter leaves her red wine stained lips. She looks like she never left, like this is where she was always meant to be. She seems comfortable but Noah can see right through it to the tension in her shoulders and he knows she’d rather be anywhere but here, just like him.
Time slows. Buzzing starts in Noah’s ears. His vision swirls before it begins to fade, darkening around the edges until she’s the only thing in sight. The very same way he has always tunnel visioned when it comes to her.
Suddenly, he’s four years in the past, sitting in the living room of their shared home, staring at her life shoved in boxes—completely unaware of just how much of himself he was going to lose.
God, it feels like it was just yesterday that she paced the room, hands running through her hair over and over again, eyes darting between Noah and the door.
Since then, everything has changed. And while everyone else has told him it’s for the better, it doesn’t exactly feel that way. His band has finally made it. Sold out tours, millions of streams and listeners. and yet, fame means nothing. Numbers and success and money can only do so much. He’d gladly go back to life without it if it meant she would have stayed.
When her laughter subsides, she looks around the room as if she’s taking stock of who else she has to fool. When those beautiful eyes meet his, Noah stops breathing. The smile on her face fades fast as she turns a pale white. How did she not realize he’d be here? This grand gesture, this big party? It’s all for him. It always is.
Nicholas and Folio turn their heads to find the culprit of her sudden change in demeanor and their own smiles wipe right off their faces. Traitors. They’ll grovel at his feet later with excuses and apologies but Noah doesn’t care.
Just when he thinks he’s safe, he is reminded that he has only been treading water as it overflows, gulping for air but swallowing salt.
His hands shake the same as they did that day she left and he averts his gaze to stare down at them. His fingers flex, grasping around nothing but air, but they turn to fists, knuckles white as he clenches.
He wants to leave. In fact, he has to. He just can’t be here. He turns on his heels and heads for the closest open door. Slamming it shut, his hands blindly grip whatever is in front of him and they meet a cold surface. A cabinet, a sink. He grips it to steady himself but there’s no use. The weight is too heavy. His legs wobble as they give out, knees buckling. Pain rings through him as they hit the floor but it numbs instantly against the storm inside his mind. A strangled sob leaves his lips, one he has been holding back for so fucking long. It’s mangled and broken and pathetic but leaves him feeling more open, a step closer to weightlessness.
There’s no need to turn on the light. Darkness will consume him all the same. His breathing is jagged, uneven, as his chest heaves. He runs a hand through his hair and pulls, welcoming the sting of pain, before both of his hands drop in front of him in defeat.
She’s here. He doesn’t know why but she is. For the first time in four years, they’re breathing the same recycled air. And he feels like he’s going to be sick.
“Noah?”
Her voice echoes through the halls and barely makes it to the other side of the door but nonetheless, it rings in his ears. It’s haunting, the way it has lived in his head. Her cadence, his name rolling off her tongue with ease. Hearing it again feels so familiar, like it hasn’t been years and in fact, only hours have passed.
He opens his mouth to respond but nothing comes out as grief crawls up his throat and suffocates his voice. His eyes squeeze shut, forcing tiny little stars to take up the space where the image of her on the couch remains. It’s burned into his memory and years from now he’ll be able to recite exactly what she looked like in this moment.
She’s older now in the same ways he is. With more years to her life, more experiences to her name. He knows she has added bodies to her tally the same way too. Haven’t they all?
In so many ways, she’s the same woman he fell in love with. Her hair is longer but it’s still the same color. She always talked about dyeing it, trying something new. It’s no surprise she never went through with it. She was always afraid of change when it didn’t pertain to Noah. There’s a few new wrinkles around her eyes but the way they brighten and sparkle is no different. Her smile still takes over her entire face. Her whole body gives way for her movements as she talks with her hands and nervously bounces her leg. Shock still changes her face into something soft and sad and far too fucking overwhelming for Noah.
He pictured this day so many times and yet, he never realized just how pathetic he would be. Even after all this agony, he really thought he’d be able to share a room with her again. He always imagined himself pointing his chin, looking down his nose, and barely giving her anything but a cold hello. Like he would finally be above her, on the pedestal everyone else put him on.
Instead, he’s living among the skeletons in his closet at rock fucking bottom.
The sound of boots clacking against hardwood gets closer and rings in his ears. It stops abruptly and is instead replaced by the sound of the door shifting from the weight of someone leaning against it.
“Noah?”
There she is again. He sucks in a breath, trying to steady himself. There’s no use in responding. What does he even have to say? This was over before it even began.
“I know you’re in there.”
And she’s right. His body is slumped over on the floor of a bathroom. It's curled in on itself but only as a hollow shell, an empty frame. The rest of him is packed away in a box that she hauled away four years ago and never reopened.
Silence. Nothing but his erratic heartbeat in his ears until her sigh slices through it. It sounds just as defeated as Noah feels. And it reminds him of the desperate breath she exhaled before she walked out their front door for the very last time.
She must want to say more. Noah swears he can feel her hesitation lingering but instead, boots clack against wood once again, slowly and for what feels like a lifetime, until the sound fades away and leaves more deafening silence.
She’s gone, slipping through his fingers again. He never could hold on tight enough. This time, he didn’t even try.
It’s funny how history repeats itself. How even after all this change, Noah can so easily be reduced down to nothing. Maybe she’s the ghost, something that haunts him endlessly. And maybe, he’s still the same broken man, covering his scars with balaclavas and white sheets instead of putting salve to them and attempting to heal, to move forward.
He’s stuck in the exact same place. Everything else moves around him. He wants to pick himself up off the floor and chase after her. He wants to grab her by the shoulders and beg. But that can’t be all he is now. He can’t be someone who pleads and asks questions he doesn’t actually want the answers to.
Just like last time, he lets her leave. And he is left to deal with the aftermath, with everything in her wake. He’s sitting among success but failing to feel the love he knows he deserves.