She's No Good for Me

He could see her coming across the parking lot with a box held securely in her hands. He had seen her do this every day for about two weeks, watched her load and unload merchandise from the back of the trailer. She was always so careful, almost graceful as she made the trips back and forth alone.

He had yet to say hello, but she had yet to introduce herself to anybody besides Dylan. He had heard that her name was Owen, or something along those lines, finding it a strange choice for a girl. Who was he to judge though? He had such a common name, John.

“Dude did you hear me?” Josh questioned loudly, nudging John with his elbow to get his attention.

“Huh?” He asked, taking his eyes away from the strange girl to look at his band mate.

Rolling his eyes, Josh began to walk off. “You know,” he said, turning around to smirk at the guitar player, “it wouldn’t kill you to say hi.”

With that Josh left John alone, his eyes falling back towards the person they had been on for a good ten minutes. Maybe Josh was right, maybe saying hello wasn’t such a bad idea. On the other hand, maybe he would wait for her to say hello.

John noticed that she was now carrying two boxes, trying to be careful like she always was and watching where she was going. But soon enough, she stumbled; lost her footing while the top box came crashing down to the pavement.

Without thought John’s feet began to move towards her as she bent down to pick up the stray t-shirts. Kneeling beside her he began to quietly help her pick up the merchandise, flashing a smile when she glanced up at him.

“Thanks,” she mumbled underneath her breath, not bothering to keep eye contact with him.

“No problem, I assumed you could use some help,” he continued to smile even though she wasn’t looking at him. “You know, with the box on the ground and all.” He was trying to be funny, which obviously wasn’t working because of the stone like nature her features held.

Putting the last t-shirt in the box, she made eye contact with John once more. “Thanks again,” she nodded, swooping the boxes back into her arms and standing up straight.

“You’re welcome,” he nodded politely, watching her feet take two steps. “Uh, my name’s John. I’ve seen you around,” he added, wanting to keep the failing attempts at conversation going.

I’ve seen you around; could that be any more stupid?

She stared at him momentarily, eyes a little bit wider than before. Licking her lips, she shook her head and turned on her heels to walk into the building, leaving John standing there stunned and slightly dejected.

He heard a laugh pierce through the thin and quiet air, felt a hand grip him on the shoulder sympathetically.

“Don’t mind my cousin dude; she’s a frigid ice queen. You get used to it really,” Alex shrugged.

“She’s your cousin?” John questioned, not sure which confused him more.

Alex was one of the nicest guys he had ever come across while on tour, he was genuine, always smiling and trying to make someone laugh, while this girl just avoided everyone and made little effort to be polite.

The other thing was the blatant difference between them physically, and not just the fact that she was a girl. The slightest resemblance couldn’t be seen, and John knew that wasn’t rare but he just couldn’t make sense of it.

Alex was more compact, he seemed to be shorter than he was; his more muscular top half seemed oddly placed against his bottom half. His cousin on the other hand was tall in every sense of the word, she was long and lean, not very muscular and slightly on the frail side. Her hair was a honey color, stopping right at the middle of her back and it was pin straight, as opposed to Alex’s dark curly hair. Her fringe hid her lightly colored eyes and the manner in which she dressed seemed to be more fitting for a night out then a girl selling various items of merchandise behind a table.

She stuck out like a sore thumb sometimes, and acted like she would rather be shoveling horse shit when John would walk passed the merch tables.

“It’s hard to believe I know,” Alex chuckled as he cut through John’s thoughts and held open the back door so they could enter the venue. “You get used to it though, really. She’s a pain in the ass but, as you can tell, she keeps to herself.”

“Is she shy or something?” John questioned.

“Not at all,” he threw John a sympathetic look at the attempt to justify his cousin’s attitude. “I’ll see you later dude,” he added, leaving John to wonder if the time he had spent over the last two weeks wondering who this girl exactly was, was worth it at all.

&&

Owen was bored, she had done all of the necessary things that she assumed needed to be done and staring out at the empty venue just wasn’t cutting it for her anymore.

She was avoiding the back, as usual, preferring to be alone than to deal with her cousin and his obnoxious band mates. It had been two weeks and she still wasn’t used to spending twenty four hours with them, or in other words Owen was still pouting about the way she was spending her summer.

But she had to use the bathroom; it was either the back or the bathrooms the public would be using later on that night. She had learned from experience, about a week or so ago, that no matter what the staff neglected to clean the bathrooms. She had no idea that girls could be so disgusting, and boys were no better. It made her skin crawl just thinking about it.

She casually slid out from behind the tables, tugging at the hem of her black high waisted skirt before she sauntered off towards the back stage area.

She ducked into the first room, making sure that nobody was in there. She just had to use the bathroom, she was sure that nobody would mind if they were using the bathroom in their dressing room. But she looked anyway, not entirely wanting to see anybody without any clothes on.

Making it safely into the bathroom Owen placed her hand on the door knob, suddenly feeling the door fling open and drag her with it, causing her to practically fall face first into the toilet because of the four inch heels she was stupidly sporting.

“Oh my god,” the voice shrieked, grabbing at Owen’s arm to keep her off the floor.

“I am so sorry, I h-had no i-idea that anybody was…” she stammered, regaining her balance and brushing the hair from her face so she could get a good look at the person who had sent her flying.

A dark haired girl stood in front of her, clinging onto her arm with a worried expression painted all over her face.

“Are you okay?” She questioned.

“Yeah, I had no idea that anybody was in here, I’ll find another bathroom,” Owen mumbled, tugging her arm lightly away from the girl.

Before the stranger could say anything else, Owen turned quickly and began retreating from the room. Hitting the door with lightning speed she opened it and felt her shoulder connect with someone.

“You have got to be kidding me,” glaring at the person she had just walked into, Owen recognized his face. “Watch where you’re going,” she snapped, tearing off down the hallway.

If John hadn’t been paying attention, he would have never noticed the deep shade of red her face had suddenly taken on before she practically ran down the hallway.

Shaking his head he entered the dressing room and spotted Jess with a dumbfounded look on her face. “Did she come from in here?”

“Who is that?”

“Alex’s cousin, she’s doing merch for The Cab apparently,” he shrugged.

Jess let a chuckle escape her lips. “I guess she really had to go to the bathroom.”