Chapter Three – Fine Tuning.

So as I crossed the street, I walked with confidence even though I was practically shaking on the inside. I could feel my heart racing in my ears, but I kept my face calm, nonchalant. And I was surprised at how well I was doing; I strutted my stuff and acted like this was a normal thing for me. I saw people I knew surprisingly, a few of them nodded at me, and I smiled back, one chick I knew even came up and hugged me, this wasn’t too bad.

Then I felt a tap on my shoulder. I turn to see Vincent standing behind me, hands in his pockets with a smile.

“I have to say Noel, I’m impressed, even though you reassured me, I had my doubts that you wouldn’t be here.” He said shaking his head.

I grinned, “Vincent, if I gave you my word I mean it. I said I was coming and well, here I am.”

“Yes you are. So do you recognize anyone? You know, like so while we’re playing you can not be a ‘loner’ as you called it.” He said using air quotes. I smiled and nodded, “yeah, I know quite a few people surprisingly.”

“Good,” he said. We stood there awkwardly for a moment. I looked behind him and saw that Steven was chatting up some chicks, and they were actually giving him the attention he wanted for once.

“So,” he said, “want to meet some people?”

I shrugged, “Sure, why not?”

Vincent reached for my hand and led me through the crowded halls of the house. I was blushing, but I was playing it off as if the people were making it happen. I didn’t expect him to grab my hand. And I was beginning to think that my friends were right.

He led me into the garage where Erick and Christian, along with a few other guys were setting up their stuff. I froze when I saw Christian. He was once again, shirtless and he was lifting up an amp and all his wonderful muscles were showing.

Vincent let go of my hand and I looked up at him, but he wasn’t looking at me. He was looking straight ahead.

There were a few totally hardcore looking chicks in the corner smoking, one of them wasn’t. I recognized all of them. The one that wasn’t was named Jenny, she was in my English class and we sat next to each other, we found out that together we had rather interesting and hilarious conversations. The other two girls, the two smoking were Sam, blonde with a purple streak through her hair, dating this guy Ronnie, who had a humongous Mohawk. The other was Laura; she had jet-black hair and multiple facial piercings.

Vincent began to walk over towards Erick and Christian, so I followed, my heart pounding louder and louder with each step we took towards them. I mean Christian was ridiculously good looking.

Erick didn’t scare me, I knew him pretty well, we went to grade school together, and had a few classes with each other through out middle school and this year we had Anatomy together as well.

The other couple guys in the garage I didn’t know and they weren’t in the direction we were headed.

“Hey.” Vincent said as we reached them.

Both guys turned around to face us; I stood next to Vincent, but kept a distance. One hand was in my pocket, and my arm was across my stomach, my hand holding my other arm.

I looked at the other guys and then at the two in front of me to act like I didn’t care that the hottest guy on the face of this earth was standing right there in front of me.

“Sup Vince.” Erick said, he smiled at me, “Hey Noel, I didn’t know you were coming.”

I grinned, “Well that’s cause you didn’t ask you jerk.” He laughed and shook his head.

Christian had nodded at Vincent, but now he was staring at me, looking me up and down like I was some piece of meat. He was probably analyzing all my flaws compared to girls he dated before, mentally putting on his never talk to again list.

“Chris, this is Noel.” Vincent said motioning to me then him. Christian stuck out his hand to me and said, “Hey, nice to meet you.”

I smiled as best I could as I shook his head, and I could only hope it looked like a smile and not some weirdo insane type of thing, “Same.”

I was surprised at how long he held my hand, we shook and then there was a second pause before he let go. But I couldn’t take my eyes off him, he was far too handsome, and he kept looking at me as well, but probably because he thought I was a creep.

Vincent led me away to be introduced to some others and I mentally sighed, there goes any chance that you ever and never had with Christian.

The show started around ten o’clock so until then I mostly stayed with Vincent, but eventually he had to set up his drums so when he went to go do that I went to hang out with Jenny.

“Sup Noel!” she said. I smiled, “hey Jenny, Sam, Laura.” I greeted her friends as well, Sam smiled, and Laura nodded.

“So have you ever heard this band before?” I asked. Jenny nodded as she drank from her water bottle.

“How are they?”

“They’re alright, you know? They’ve got potential to be something big, but I mean, they need some fine tuning.”

“Sticks and stones, huh?”

“Yep.”

Around ten everyone was in the garage, literally, everyone in Steven’s crowded house was now in his garage, and that made it very crowded. The automatic garage door was up and people were outside looking in, waiting for it to start.

Some guy that Vincent introduced to me, I think his name was Allen, got up in on the small stage that had been set up, a platform about three feet high.

“Alright people, now the moment you’ve all been waiting for, Sticks and Stones are about to jam.”

Some people cheered, Jenny and her friends yelled so I clapped along with the crowd. Allen got off stage and Steven took the mike.

“Sup people.” He said, again cheering, “We’re Sticks and Stones and we hope you like the show.”

The song began with some slow guitar, and all eyes were on Erick, but mine. Because of course mine couldn’t focus on anyone but Christian. Then everyone else began to play and the music actually blended together beautifully. I was surprised. I pried my eyes from Christian and looked at Vincent, who looked like he was lost in the sound, I smiled. He looked at home. Then I glanced at Erick, who looked like he was focusing on the song, and Steven was singing, and it actually sounded good, it was more of a Creed/Puddle of Mud kind of sound, but it was good. And then Steven tried to reach a pitch to high for him, and I understood what Jenny meant by fine-tuning. But the rest of the song was really good. I looked back at Christian who was looking out over the crowd absent-mindedly like this song was far too easy, like he could be playing something ten times harder, and this band was just a petty little thing to keep him occupied and Vincent’s words about Christian being a musical genius ran through my mind. Then he leaned in to his mike and sang back up, and couldn’t help myself, I joined the crowd in screaming for him. I blushed even though I knew no one was looking at me in general, but it was just strange.

The band played for a while, it was probably close to ten thirty once they finished, I was pretty exhausted, but I couldn’t be the first one to leave, that would just make me look lame. So I forced my way back inside the house to grab a bottle of water, and I downed it with in a few drinks, screaming for the band and being in the middle of a sweaty crowd could make you thirsty.

And then I headed back outside, the garage door was open, and compared to how hot and stuffy it was inside that house, the crisp night air felt really good. Some guys were helping Erik clean up the stuff, I figured that Steven and Christian were inside hanging out with groupies or whatever but I wondered where Vincent was.

So I just stood outside looking up at the stars, listening to the boys in the garage talk and laugh as they cleaned up. I wondered if Steven was paying them to clean up, since this was his house. He should be the one cleaning up, shouldn’t he?

“Hey.” A voice came from behind me, and if anyone came up to me I expected it to be Vincent, but this voice was not Vincent, Vincent’s as deeper, so I turned to see whom it was.

“You’re…Noel, right?” he asked. It was Christian. This time with a shirt on. I froze for a moment; I didn’t know what to do. I’d never really talked to him before, so in avoidance of looking like a complete idiot, I nodded.

He came and stood next to me looking up at the stars like I had been, and I looked up at him, and now, standing right next to him, my height estimate had been off by a couple of inches, he was not anywhere near 5’10, he was definitely taller.

Then he looked down at me and smiled, like he recognized me and was trying to place my face. “You look familiar,” he said, “I think I’ve seen you before at school, right?”

I nodded again, “yeah, I’ve seen you too.” And with my heart racing like it was I was surprised I wasn’t stuttering like an idiot.

“But I feel like I’ve seen you somewhere else too, or am I just weird?” he said.

I smiled and shook my head, “No, I go to your church.”

“Yeah! That’s it! I knew I saw you there before.” He said enthusiastically.

I smiled. I was doing surprisingly good, wasn’t I?

“So, how’d you hear about the show?” he asked.

“Um, Vincent invited me.”

“Oh, yeah? You didn’t see the flyers?”

“To be honest I’m oblivious to the most obvious things, you can get Vincent to second that.”

“So, are you Vincent’s girl?”

“What! No, no, we’re just friends, he likes to bother me.” I said in disbelief did Christian seriously think that Vincent and I were together? Did we look that much like a couple? I don’t know if I could handle Vincent as a boyfriend, I’m sure he’d be much nicer and less bothersome and all, but I don’t know, it’d be weird. There was a time I’d had a crush on Vincent, but that’d been freshman year when he first started to bother me. But before the year was over, I’d gotten over him as well. Once Will, my first boyfriend asked me out, I’d gotten over Vincent, I’d figured that if he was bothering me cause he liked me, he’d have asked me out already.

Christian laughed, “Okay, okay I was just asking.” “So,” he continued, “What are you, junior? Senior?”

“Junior.”

“Cool.” He said.

Why was this amazingly hot boy talking to me? It made no sense at all. Here I was, just some chick, barely above average in looks and what had hottest boy in school was talking to me for no apparent reason. It made no sense to me, but sometimes things just didn’t make sense right?

So we talked for a little bit longer, about nothing really, just friendly conversation, he asked how long I’d been going to his church, and I feigned being appalled that he didn’t know cause I’d been there for a while, it’d made him laugh. And that was a good thing, right? I could make a hot guy laugh. That was always a plus.

“So, hey, listen,” he said, my heart, which had calmed down now, was now racing again, and it was racing fast. “I was wondering if maybe like-“

“Hey guys, what’s up?” Vincent came strolling up beside us. My racing heart slowed, whatever Christian was about to say was now not going to be said at the moment, if ever, and that sucked.

“Oh, nothing, just chilling with Noel.” Christian said with a dashing smile at his band mate. My heart melted all over again.

“Cool.” Vincent said and came and stood on the other side of me. And then someone called out Christian’s name and he looked down at me and said, “hey, I’ll see you Sunday, Kay?”

Then he saluted Vincent and headed back indoors.