Page 23 of See Her

JACK

Ihave a girlfriend I haven’t even kissed. The idea makes me feel like I’m in middle school again, but in the best of ways. It’s something I plan to remedy at the first possible opportunity. I can’t seem to enjoy this blissful feeling fully, however, as it keeps getting interrupted by a cold, dark feeling of guilt that thrashes at my insides at random moments.

I told Mayzie to come see me at work again tomorrow night… instead of tonight when my band is playing.

Shortly after she left with Annie earlier, it came like a big pang that flashed through my whole body. I stood here and asked her to be only mine, but didn’t tell her to come see her man play tonight.

And I don’t even know why. All I know is it makes the immense feeling of gratification feel annoyingly skewed.

I should call or text her and make sure she knows, but I can’t seem to do it; something is holding me back. Something about her seeing my band play scares the shit out of me. A black tornado of anxiety, guilt, and confusion swirls tightly around me and amplifies in potency when Matt shows up towards the end of my shift to get started on set up.

He jerks his chin in greeting at me as I come over to give him a handwith the equipment. We get right to work with the heavy lifting of amps and speakers, and the strain on my muscles is a welcome distraction from the cold grip my nerves have on my chest. It’s not until we start getting things into position and plugged in that he starts to make conversation.

“When’s your friend coming to a show?” he asks me while we’re assembling the three main mic stands. I had told him about Mayzie the night before I took her out on the Harley, and his eyebrows understandably went up. When I told him she was something I wanted to keep to myself for a little while, he ceased with the questions like a good friend, and just keeps giving me laser–sharp, questioning glares instead.

“Soon,” I say, noncommittally. “And she’s actually… my girl now.” I deliver the information with –my lips pulled up at the corner, trying to cover the tension I’m feeling.

An amused breath slips out of Matt’s mouth as he straightens up to his full height. “So she’ll be here later,” he assumes, rather than asks.

“Well, no…” I trail off, trying to think of a way to explain I’m a cowardly idiot while trying to make it look like the amp settings are really complicated. “But she will. Soon,” I try to finish off casually, hoping he won’t notice my evasiveness.

There have been two other shows we’ve played since I met her, and now that we’re together… With how I feel about Mayzie, I should be jumping at the first chance to invite her out for one of our shows so she can see what it’s all about for me, and then she’ll really see me… all of me. It’s coming to that realization that makes me tense up.

Matt shakes his head at me, but goes back to what he’s doing, silently letting me know he’s letting this go for now but that he thinks I’m messed up in the head.For some reason, I feel like Mayzie seeing me play will be a make-or-break point for us. I don’t know why.

I try to tell myself that like kissing her for the first time, I want to make sure it’s nothing short of amazing. When I see her tomorrow, I’m determined to kiss her in a way that will make her see no one but me in her future. The same thing goes for when we take things further than kissing.

I already know how great sex with Mayzie is going to be, just by the way I already feel about her.I know her touch is going to feel insane and will set me on fire. I’m willing to wait however long I have to wait for the moment to be just right so it rocks both our worlds.

And when I think of playing my songs in front of her, I want the same thing. I want her to love it, bask in it with me, and be proud of me. But is it even reasonable to expect something like that? For her to love my music so much that she’s my biggest fan?

Every show we’ve played I’ve just enjoyed expressing myself and feeling the music, and I couldn’t give two shits what anyone has thought of it, women included. And now here I am, having a nervous breakdown over what just one person will think of it.

As it gets closer to show time, I can’t take at least reaching out to her in some way; to feel her near. I pull my phone out of my back pocket to send her a text before Tyler announces for the bar crowd to welcome us.

That night as we play our show, I’m thankful my hands have enough muscle memory with all the songs that I sail right through them while my mind is a million miles away. I keep wondering what it would be like to look down and see Mayzie in the crowd; what her face would look like as she listened to the music. How she’d react to the way I am on stage. I can’t come up with anything, and that’s the wall I’m hitting.

Satisfied with this decision, I turn myself over to the music, giving it all I’ve got.

Mayzie

“Willyou come back and see me tomorrow?”Jack had asked before I left The Cedar last night, and it made my insides bind together in ecstasy.

“I’m thinking about you and I will be all night,”his text had said later on in the evening, making it damn near impossible to fall asleep. It made me keep replaying the night before, only with a different ending that involved him staying in bed with me all night.

So why now, as I’m striding down the sidewalk towards The Cedar’s entrance, do I feel so apprehensive? I tell myself that I’m just nervous to come see Jack at work, even though he asked me to; that it’s just different returning here on my own. Things also feel a little off–kilter, being officially together but not having kissed yet.

That has to be it. This just doesn’t feel as real as I’d like it to. I need that first kiss.

I feel the corner of my mouth pull up in a self-deprecating smirk, feeling amused but slightly annoyed with myself as I approach the thick, wood door that leads into the bar. I stop just a few feet short to let two girls approaching from the other direction to go ahead of me.

“So he also bartends here?” The brunette in the short denim skirt waves a questioning hand at her redheaded friend.

My ears perk up at the wordbartends, and my pace falters slightly, but I quickly brush it off, reminding myself there’s more than one bartender in this joint.

“Yeah,” Red responds, yanking the large door handle, clearly on a mission. “And I swear to God, he made sex eyes with me from on stage last night.”

Okay, that, I can’t let go so easily.

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