Our guitars in the corner regard us innocently. As I turn to pick mine up he catches my wrist, and the fluorescent light makes half of his face look ambient.

“All of you is so beautiful,” He whispers, his voice sounds dry “Your eyes, your mouth…” He trails off and leans in closer to me until I can feel his breath on my nose. Expecting.

“…What? Don’t!” I say firmly, softly “What about Elizabeth? You’ll break her damn heart. Thomas, too. It would kill me if I did that-” I pull my arm away, shaky, and take a big step away from him, more out of alarm than anything else.

He exhales and laughs a weary laugh “Can’t stand her. It’s always been you. Always you. You know how I feel. Since we were sixteen…”

I swallow my heartbeat but it fights it way back up to my throat, making me feel ill. Talking has become incredibly complicated. “Maybe if you had done something about it back then,” I manage; tears stuck in my throat “You wouldn’t want me. Maybe, perhaps you would have me,”

The next day I meet him and the rest of the band. He arrives early, knowing that I always do, and tries again. By the time the bassist and violinist are here we are arguing, screaming at each other. I tell him to leave, get his head reorganized, be more damn responsible, try and fix this mess he’s got himself into. Find a new band that needs a guitarist like you, because you’re really hurting me,trying to do the impossible.

He slings his guitar strap over his shoulder and he yells, nearing hysteria, "Fine, fuck it, you know why I really come here, babe, you know you drive me crazy; you do it every single day. You should open your eyes, babe, realize you’re fucking up, he isn’t even a musician, he doesn’t even understand you, can’t play a single thing, I don’t know why you live with him, love him like that, it’s wrong, it’s meant to be us, it’s so clear. I want you so badly I can taste it, don’t even know why I’m seeing Elizabeth, it’s been you all along, you, every time I look at you it’s wild, you know, crazy, I’m mad about you, can’t stop thinking about you, can’t get enough of you and I never got anything from you in the first place, look at you, you’re just too fucking gorgeous, magnetic, I can’t even stand it,"

There is a short silence between us while he looks at me, motionless and furious, expecting a reply. Quietly, I tell him he’s delusional and give him the universal hand sign for ‘fuck off’. After a few seconds he sighs heavily, grabs his big black heavy coat and he storms out, and I can hear him swearing and crying. Bassist says, "Great, he was bad, that one track mind, all obsessive. Only ever thought about you between his sheets, I bet,"

Bassist has always been blunt, yet tactful.

He grins and flashes me his teeth. He says through blue smoke, "Hell, he doesn’t know you well enough. All about pleasing people, you’d fuck him even though you hate him, just to make him happy. Cigarette?"

I look at the door helplessly and I curl up into an unstable mess and I start to bawl, great big chest aching sobs: I always cause problems like this; they wouldn’t happen if I weren’t here. Violinist places her violin case on the floor. She pulls me into a hug and she says, "Don’t let him get to you, it isn’t your fault; He can’t move on. You guys never even dated. He doesn’t mean what he said about Thomas, doesn’t know what he’s talking about. Ridiculous, that one. I didn’t even know he was like that, I shouldn’t have asked for him to play with us, sorry, but he called me,". She says, "I’ll take care of finding a new guitarist, you don’t have to worry,"

We call off rehearsal, and I walk around without direction, feeling hollow. I have nothing to do. My guitar feels heavy. See a show for free at some random tiny cafe, I knew the drummer, talk to her about my day. Over tea she says, "I knew it. I knew he was insane about you. Poor Elizabeth. But she’s smart. She’ll see it sooner or later. In. Sane,"

Her voice is sharp. She jokes, "It’s the English accent. People just love the accent; if you spoke with an Australian inflection he wouldn’t be so crazy,"
She says, with a loud cackle, "You just know you’ll write a great song about this, I can see you traipsing the hardcore landscape, bringing strings into this, maybe a screaming gorgeous punk song with heaps of crashing snares and breaking glass. I’ll be your drummer for that one," she says.