Chapter Text
Due to the lack of band practice today Annie comes to Bradford with me, we take our instruments inside and spend some time practicing here instead of alone at our respective houses. We clunk our way down the corridor and into the studio, pulling chairs into the light by the towering window and setting ourselves up. Trudy resting comfortably between my legs and Annie’s French horn Barrie enclosed in her arms.
“I still can’t believe that after three years, three years, of trying to think of a name for your horn you picked Barrie. It’s just so, Barrie.” I tell her as we warm up our instruments and our fingers.
“Don’t you be badmouthing my instrument, little miss.” I poke my tongue out at her and play some scales. “Besides I’m just here to catch a glimpse of lover boy and his pretty band of lover boys.” I roll my eyes at her.
I explained, at her behest, in excruciatingly graphic detail the entire scenario of meeting Luke and the boys to Annie last night on the phone and after she interrupted eighty five million times to ask stupid questions she decided that I should definitely date one, if not all of them. She has a lose sense of morals what can I say.
“Lover boy? Lover boy? I’ve talked to him twice Annie I think it might be a teensy bit early for you to start naming our children. Also I told you his name is Luke and the rest of them are Calum, Michael and Ashton.” I counted them off on my fingers while she blew a scale out at me. “They don’t come in until later anyway, besides what happened to the baby lion cub that digs Sylvia Plath?”
“Urgh, Toby. That disaster.”
“How can it already be a disaster, it’s been two days!”
“He’s a philistine Lilah, a philistine I tell you and I won’t hear anything about him ever again!” I chuckle at her and raise my hands in surrender.
“Okay, okay. Never again, I promise.” I mime locking my lips and throwing away the key. We play for a little longer; our lack of a theme creates beautiful unadulterated noise around us.
“Shall we play some Wilder first?” I ask and Annie nods. The first few bars of melodic music spill out into the space between us, bending in the sunlight and turning air into colour.
The door opens a little later as we run through our band piece for the third time, trying to get our timing right. Annie beams as she swings around in her chair, hoping for a glimpse of Luke and his friends, only for her face to fall as we both spot Charlie loitering in the doorway.
“Hey Charlie. How’s it going?” I call out as Annie slumps back in her seat, pouting. I jut my lower lip out at her mockingly and am rewarded by her giving me the finger.
“Hey, Lilah. Annie. Sorry to barge in, I just need one of the music stands for practice.”
“Sure, we’re not using them.” I nod my head to the furthest corner of the room while he makes his way over to grab one. I hear Annie’s horn case snap open.
“Where are you going?” I ask as she packs away her instrument.
“I’ve gotta get home, see you sweet cheeks.” She snaps her case closed and gives me a peck on the cheek on her way out. She holds the door for Charlie and I can hear them chatting as they walk back down the corridor. I shrug to myself and continue playing solo.
I switch to piano soon after and play until my fingers start to tingle, on the verge of going numb. I play my way through my brothers song once more, happy with the additions I’ve made today, before closing the fall and gathering my things. I try not to feel despondent as I check the time and realise that its earlier than I usually leave therefore I won’t see Luke or his friends like the last couple of days.
I shake the ridiculous thought out of my head as I push through the doors. How incredibly cliché it all is, thinking about the pretty boy in a band who I hardly know. He is very pretty though, in a delicate, graceful kind of way; the kind of pretty I could imagine only grows with time as you figure a person out.
“Hey Lilah!” I turn at the sound of Charlie’s voice. “You leaving?” He asks as I make my way into his rehearsal space, grateful for the distraction from my ridiculous thoughts.
“Yeah, but I can hang out for a bit.” I tell him as I drop Trudy to the floor and pull myself up onto a desk. He smiles before returning to his violin. I listen to the building, playful melody spouting from his instrument, humming along to the rhythm of Franz Listz’s Sonata in B minor for a couple of hours in the soundproofed room.
“So, how are you Lilah? You holding up okay?” Charlie blurts out suddenly as he’s packing up his violin. I blink and frown at him in response to his seemingly unfounded question. “I mean about Tommy and all.” He looks nervous now, like he might have overstepped the boundaries of our friendship. I cast my eyes downwards and suck in a shaky breath, fighting back the ripple of sadness washing over my body, trying not the let it become a tsunami.
“Lilah?”
“I’m fine.” I muster up a wobbly smile and look at him, with his worried eyes and pinched features and I wonder who worries about him. “Just, you know....” I trail off as his eyes break from mine and it’s his turn to stare at the carpet as he nods solemnly.
“I know what you mean.” I know he does. He lost an older sister around the same time as I lost Tommy. We spent weeks together at various hospitals trying to carry on with life as our siblings slowly died around us.
“How are you doing?” He perks up at my question, putting his own facade on for me.
“Oh, I’m great. I’ve got a violin recital coming up around the same time so, you know, plenty to keep me busy.” His smile only falters a little bit as he talks about the anniversary of his sister’s death. “I’m going to play the Listz.”
“It’s sounding good.” I try for a reassuring smile but I think it comes out as more of a grimace and that sets us both off laughing. We laugh for our dead siblings because it sure beats crying, and we both know we’ll be doing plenty of that in the coming months.
I’m surprised to find its dark already and the wind has picked up causing a chill to prickle on my arms as I wrap my coat tightly around myself. I give a wave to Charlie as he veers off in the opposite direction and I spot that my little blue mini is the only car left in the car park. All the cheesy slasher scenes from B grade horror movie start whirring through my mind and I almost jump out of my skin when a deep voice calls out my name behind me.
“I’m sorry!” Luke is pushing himself off of the building wall, hands out stretched in apology as the squeal I let out reverberates in the empty lot before disappearing into the air. We both listen as it dissipates, I realize after a beat that my body is still frozen in terror, muscles tense, hand clamped over my mouth, arriving a beat too late to hold in my scream, the other gripping the handle of my cello case hard enough to turn my knuckles white. I let my head fall back to face the sky and breathe out a sigh mixed with a chuckle, when I look away from the starry night and back to Luke I see he’s let his arms relax and is scratching at the scruff of hair on the back of his neck nervously.
“What are you doing out here, dude? You scared the shit out of me.” I question sucking in a deep breath with a smile on my face.
“I’m just waiting for my dad to finish work and pick me up.” Its then that I notice his guitar case resting on the floor where he was standing and a phone in his hand, obviously killing time.
As we stand in an awkward silence a cool night wind blows over us, whipping my hair into my eyes and I notice Luke shiver slightly.
“Well, do you need a ride?”The question is out from behind my teeth before I can stop it and Luke half smiles at the ground, scuffing his shoe into the concrete as he nods yes. There’s that endearing shyness again.
“Just one thing first.” I take a couple of steps closer and he finally looks at me. “You have to swear you won’t kill me and bury my body in the woods.” He lets out a small snort of laughter and I raise my eyebrows at him to let him know I’m waiting for an answer; biting back a smile.
“Scouts honour.” He replies, straight faced and holding up three fingers in the air-the typical sign for the scouts.
“Well all righty then.” I beam at him before turning towards my car; he falls into step beside me a moment later. I’m not thinking about slasher films anymore and feeling pretty darn safe walking beside Luke, until we get to my car and I notice a problem.
“Ah, I didn’t think of that.” I point to our oversize instruments and then to my tiny car, wondering how this is going to work. “Give me a sec.”
I grab my cello and dive into the backseat to start the complicated game of real life Tetris. My head is bent under the roof, trying to manoeuvre the hulking case out of the foot well where it’s wedged when Luke clears his throat behind me.
“Um, Lilah? I can see your underwear again.”
“Ah, oh my god!” I whip around so fast I hit my head on the roof of the car and when I finally turn he’s trying to seem concerned while holding back a smile. “If only I could get through one meeting with you without exposing myself inappropriately.” I sigh to myself but a smile is already forming on my face and we both burst out into giggles.
“May I?” He asks with a chuckle in his voice, gesturing to the wedged instrument and I step aside with a flourish.
“Be my guest.”
Luke seems to just look at it and the problem fixes itself and we’re the car in an embarrassingly short amount of time.
“Seriously.” I mutter under my breath disbelievingly as we pull out of the car park. He looks worried for a minute before he sees I’m smiling and offers me one in return.
“Don’t be embarrassed, it’s my duty as a scout to help the elderly in any way I can.” He chuckles out at me as I scoff and make a move to punch him.
“You should respect your elders you cheeky little shit!” He catches my wrist before I can make contact with his chest and we struggle and laugh for beat. “Hey! Don’t distract the driver young man; I will turn this car around.” He laughs at that and releases my arm, which is good because we’ve drifted across the road slightly during our bickering.
“Wait, if I’m your elder than how old are you?”
“Seventeen.” I gawk at him for a second, my eyes running down his sculpted face with pale stubble brushed across his chin, to his broad and muscular shoulders, lean torso and spider long legs, that even with the chair back as far as it can go take up the entire foot well.
“No one looked like you when I was seventeen, I want a refund.” My voice giving away how impressed I am and he blushes slightly. I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t adorable and I smile out at the road, surprised at the easy conversation and banter between the two of us.
“Do you mind if we stop for coffee?” I ask as I pull into the Starbucks car park and he shakes his head. “I’m having withdrawal symptoms. Do you want anything? I’m buying.”
We’re back in the car moments later, Luke’s holding both of the steaming cups as my old car doesn’t have cup holders and is making fun of my coffee choice.
“There’s barely any caffeine in this at all is all I’m saying.”
“Well some of us prefer our caffeine with equal parts sugar, unlike that bitter sludge you’re drinking.”I remark and he mocks being offended as we start moving again.
“Okay, these are really full.” We are back out on the road and Luke is looking nervous. I can’t help chuckling when I glance across and see him bracing for a spill and sure enough my car lurches over a pothole causing boiling liquid to spill over Luke’s jeans.
“Ow! Shit, shit, shit, shit.” I’m full on laughing at his string of curses as I pull over and take the cups from him. I slurp up the drips coming down the side of his cup and grimace as the bitterness of his coffee hits my tongue. Meanwhile he dabs at his coffee damp jeans with a wad of napkins but at least he’s stopped swearing.
“Least they’re black so it doesn’t look like you’ve peed yourself.” I offer as reassurance, handing him back his coffee when he’s done all he can with the stain.
“No I’ve just permanently burnt myself, which is much better.” He sighs taking a sip.
“Oh no, do you think it will leave a scar?” The sarcasm is dripping off my tongue and I earn myself a glare from my sullen passenger. “Don’t worry, as your elder I promise not to tell anyone.” He gives me a doubtful look. “Just my three hundred closest friends and family plus everyone I meet from this day onwards for forever.” He spits out the sip he’d just taken and it joins the rest of the coffee adorning his black skinnys.
“You did that on purpose.” He glares across at me as I hide my smile behind my cup.
“We might have to finish these here; clearly you can’t be trusted with hot beverages on the move.” He shoots me another glare but takes his seat belt off and settles back into the chair all the same.
We are sitting together quietly for a while, the silence permeated by slow slurps of cooling coffee and the dull tones of the radio and I’m struck again by how comfortable Luke makes me feel. A perfect mix between playful banter and the comfortable quiet, it’s nice not to have to worry about filling the silence.
“Can I ask you something really serious?” I finally break the quiet. His eyebrows knit together slightly as he nods at my serious expression. “Yeah.” He breathes out.
“Were you ever really a scout?” I deadpan and Luke snorts so hard he inhales some of his coffee and the next few moments are punctuated with coughs, from him, and laughter, from me.
“Not again.”