Out-and-regretting-it comprehensive attendee Jayden Phillips turns his cast-iron plans for life upside-down by falling in love with private-school violinist Darren Peace, a sardonic boy with the craziest hair Jayden's ever seen.<br><br>But all is not what it seems, and Jayden's bullying problem becomes meaningless when he is confronted with what the music does to Darren. How do you stop a dangerous depression rooted in the same thing that makes someone what they are? Dark moods, blank apathy, and the undertow of self-loathing all simmer beneath Darren's dry and beautiful veneer, and Jayden feels powerless to stop them.<br><br>Then a mugging gone wrong takes the music forcibly away, and Jayden is finally given the chance to change Darren's life -- and, quite literally, his mind.

Vivaldi in the Dark

And if he decided he couldn’t deal with it, then…


It wasn’t fine—but it was, because Darren knew better than to think anyone was going to put up with the shit his brain threw at him. Even he didn’t want to put up with it and had tried to check out three times now. Jayden wouldn’t want to either—but Darren would rather let him walk away, with only the facts to go on, than to get tangled up in the shadows in his head and the numbness in his hands without having the first clue about what he’d gotten himself into.


He’d tell him Saturday, then come home and veg out with Scott and criticise films until he could forget having told Jayden at all.


Because, inevitably, Jayden was going to walk away. 11


Things changed in the first week of December.


Chapter 31