Page 18 of A World Apart
“Special deliv…ery...” He trailed off as his eyes went from where I sat on the floor, to where Jihoon sat.
He froze for a moment before his grip seemed to slip and one of the cases lurched alarmingly downward. “Oo fuck,” grunted Jeremy, trying to re-balance and hold it all.
Immediately, both Jihoon and I jumped to our feet and rushed towards him, each of us grabbing a guitar and catching the slipping one until Jeremy stood there, eyeballing us, his eyebrows so far into his hairline they may never come all the way back down. I turned around quickly to hide my grin and caught Jihoon with the same expression, leaning a case carefully against the wall.
Jeremy hadn’t moved, he still had the same pose as if he was still holding three guitar cases.
“You okay there, boss?” I asked.
“Yeeeeah,” he answered, slowly. “Do I uh, do I wanna…" he waved an arm vaguely in the direction of Jihoon. “Nope. No, I do not.” He proclaimed, evidently finishing his own thought. “Those just arrived, obviously a couple days late, but whatever, what do I know,” Jeremy grumbled, running a finger over his chin.
“Do they need tuning, as well?” I asked, hands on my hips.
“I’m tempted to tell you to sack it off, but…” he sighed.
“It’s not worth the trouble?” I offered.
Jeremy threw his hands in the air. “You said it, kid.” He turned on his heel and walked back out of the room. I only had a split second to look at Jihoon, before Jeremy stomped back in.
“Someone knows he’s here, yeah?” He frowned at me, his mouth an unhappy pinch.
Jihoon stepped forward and held out his hand to a surprised Jeremy. “Yes sir, my management is aware.”
“Well, yeah, alright then.” Jeremy shook Jihoon’s hand but narrowed his eyes as he looked between the two of us. “Just…” he trailed off and released his hand. “Nope. Nope, not even gonna start. Nope. Not my monkey, not my circus.” He turned around and left again. We could hear him muttering all the way down the corridor until his stream of mutterings was cut off by the sound of the stairwell door slamming shut.
I looked at Jihoon. He looked at me. I pinched my lips together.
And then I snorted.
Fucking. Snorted.
I slapped my hand over my mouth and looked at Jihoon, my eyes so wide my eyebrows strained.
He burst out laughing. At me, with me, who even knew. And then we were both laughing. I mean, doubled-up, holding our stomachs, howling.
“Poor Jeremy,” I said weakly, wiping tears off my cheeks. Yet another reason to be grateful I never bothered with much makeup − besides the fact that I had zero skills at applying it.
“He seems very stressed,” Jihoon commented, still grinning.
“He’s a busy lad,” I agreed, walking over to where I’d placed one of the guitars.
Unzipping the soft case, I ran my fingers lightly over the strings before making a face of disgust. Completely out of tune.
I gently lifted it out and flipped it over in my hands. It was a Gibson Hummingbird, an acoustic with fantastic harmonics. I hummed in approval, running my hands gently down the finished wood.
“You play?”
“A bit,” I said distractedly as I crossed the room and sat in the big, padded chair. I crossed one leg over the other, balancing the ‘Bird and began to carefully turn the pegs, making sure to keep my hand away from the neck, only strumming here and there to check the sound.
Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed Jihoon had unzipped another guitar from its case. He pulled up another chair, not far away from mine, and began to fiddle with the tuning pegs.
Surprised, I looked up from my task to observe.
“You play?” I asked, mirroring his earlier words.
He flashed me a small smile and replied, “a bit.”
“These strings are factory fresh,” I muttered as one slipped beneath my hand.
