All I Ever Wanted

There’s only 2 minutes until midnight. 2 minutes until it’s a new year, and I can’t find Alex. He was in this room 5 minutes ago, and now he’s nowhere to be seen. We’re at his house, and it’s filled with all of his friends plus my brother and Luke.

Luke waves at me from the couch he’s sitting on. Max is next to him whispering something. I don’t think I want to know.

“Have you seen Alex?” I ask Jack, but he just shrugs.

“He’s around here somewhere.”

“Yeah. Thanks, Jack.”

“He’s probably in the bathroom or something. Don’t worry.”

He squeezes my arm and continues on his way to the kitchen. I just stand awkwardly in the room as the countdown to the New Year begins. When the group hits the 30 second countdown, that’s when I get nervous. Where could he possibly be?
“29…28…27…26…25…”

Alright, whatever. So I don’t see my boyfriend at midnight on New Years. No big deal, right?

“11…10…9…8…7!...6!...5!...4!...”

“Hey, gorgeous. Why you look so sad? Did you miss me?”

I turn around and I swear he is so lucky he showed up when he did.

“Happy New Year,” Alex whispers and leans in to kiss me when the crowd reaches ‘1’. We kiss for what seems like forever but in reality was only a minute. When he pulls away, he has a huge grin on his face.

“Where did you go?” I ask.

“I had to pee so badly! The line was so fucking long. I made it back to you just in time, though, didn’t I?”

“Yeah, you did. Hey, I love you.”

“I love you more,” he teases, wrapping an arm around my shoulder. “So that was our first new Year’s party together. How was it?”

“Good. I’m glad I spent it with you.”

“I have known you for 2 months and a week. How can I possibly feel the way I feel about you?” he wonders out loud and I blush.

“Yeah… well…”

“Do you want me to get you a drink?”

“Sure.”

“Stay here. Don’t move from this spot.”

“I won’t.”

“Promise?”

“Promise.”

***

The weekend after New Years is the 9th of January. Tonight’s the bands first real gig and I can tell that they are extremely nervous. Jack is pacing the backstage hallway and Alex is just staring into space in his seat next to me.

“Don’t be nervous, baby,” I say and put a hand on his shoulder. “You’re going to do fantastic.”

“I know… I’m not nervous about performing… I’m nervous about… you know… panicking.”

He whispers the word ‘panicking’, and now I’m getting nervous. I kind of forgot about his Agoraphobia. When he told me he suffered from it, that’s the only time we really went into detail about it. That was 2 months ago. Every now and then Jack would make the occasional joke, but it was never fully discussed at length.

“Oh… Hey, don’t think about it.”

He laughs and shakes his head. “That’s kind of hard to do seeing as symptoms cause me to constantly think about it… but I’m trying. It’s just… what if it happens on stage?”

“Jack is up there. You said he knows what to do.”

“Yeah, he does, but I don’t want it to happen. Especially not tonight, at our first serious gig.”

“You’re going to be fine.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. I’ll be right here. You just look to the side of the stage and I’ll be here. I won’t move.”

“Oh, don’t tell me that. I won’t be able to look anywhere else,” he says and kisses me on the cheek.

“Okay, you guys are up,” the owner of the club says and Alex stands up and grabs his guitar.

“Good luck, guys!”
**

“So, no panic attacks. Life is good?”

“Life is fucking fantastic, Lex.”

“The crowd loved you.”

“Yeah? I don’t know, I wasn’t sure. I tried not to pay too much attention to their reactions and just, you know, play.”

The boys just got off stage and we’re now in the backstage dressing room. They’re all sweaty and gross. Alex and jack peel their t-shirts off at the same time and Alex calls the shower first. I wait outside while they get changed and stuff. Rian’s girlfriend Cat sits next to me. I don’t really know her too well, and I’ve only really hung out with her once and that was a while ago.

“Hey,” she says and offers me a stick of gum. I take it and thank her. “They did so well tonight. I really hope something comes out of this.”

“Yeah, me too. They definitely deserve it.”

“Are you coming out with us tonight? Or are you and Alex doing something else?”

“No, we’re going out with you guys. Where are we going?”

“Just out to dinner and then there’s this house party going on near my house. It’ll be fun.”

“Okay, sounds good.”

The dressing room door opens and Alex steps out in his new jeans that I bought him for Christmas and a plain white t-shirt.

“Can we go and get drunk now?”

“Of course,” I say and pull him out towards the car.