Was I The Only One?

Joe and I walked side by side down the corridor in silence, “It’s going to be cold outside.”

I nodded slowly in agreement. “Yeah…” Joe and I stopped at backstage door, he shrugged out of his jacket and held it out for me. I felt my heart flutter as he held it out for me.

I pushed my arms through the warm sleeves and smiled at the weight of it as he dropped it on my shoulders. Just when I thought he was done, I felt his fingers graze my neck as he gently removed my hair from under the jacket. I shuddered under his ghost like touch.

“Thanks.” I managed choke out.

His lips up turned slightly, “No problem, keys?” I reached into my purse and pulled them out for him.

One of the securities opened the doors for us and we were struck by a wall of screams and shouts, in the dark the flashing cameras were blinding and I almost fell over. Joe placed his hand on the small of my back and guided me towards my car, he strolled as if it were broad day light; but it just reminded me that he did this all the time, he was used to all the flashes. But eventually my eyes adjusted and I could make actually see where I was walking.

When we reached the car, Joe opened the door to the passenger’s side and closed it for me once I was in. He waved to the fans that were waiting at the gates then jogged to his side of the car and climbed in.

“And off we go.” He said starting the car up.

Music played at the normal volume through the speakers of my car as I watched and tried to memorise the route to Joe’s own house. The area was nice, the houses weren’t large and all were spread quite far apart, it was definitely a high class area too; many of the cars were BMW or Audi.

Finally, we pulled up to a house. Joe parked my car in front of a garage outside of the home, I followed him to the front of the home where there was a solid brown gate, he punched in a key code and it unlocked and swung open. The house had a large wall around it and many beautiful trees on the outside to block some more views from nosey paparazzi and passersby. He kept his front yard tidy with the lawn trimmed and a large plant pot right next to the front door.

When we reached the large white door, Joe pulled out his set of keys and unlocked it. As soon as I stepped inside the whole home seemed like Joe. It wasn’t white and modern but was warm and welcoming. As soon as you walked into the home there was a set of stairs against the right wall and a door right by it with another door opposite on the left wall. Joe opened the door to the right and revealed a closet, I took of his coat and my heels and tossed them inside. My feet were cold against the hardwood flooring that was laid but from what I could tell, up the stairs was all carpet and so was his living room which was through the door on the left. I could see a door at the end of the hall that was left open, from what I could see it was a kitchen.

That appeared to be where he was heading. I followed him towards the door at the end of the corridor only to spot another room behind the stairs that appeared to be a mini gym/games room. But I continued into his kitchen.

The kitchen was very simple but quaint. All the cupboards were pine and the oven, fridge freezer etc were all stainless steel. The work tops were all dark marble surfaces, scattered on them were numerous appliances; a toaster, knife holder that was also pine, kettle, chopping board. The microwave was up a height. His stove was quite large with an extractor fan above it, I noticed a few marks on it from the steam consequential of his cooking. There was also an island with stools on it obviously where he could eat as there was place mats still set out.

“Nice…” I whispered running my hand over the counter. “So, want to show me the rest of the house?”

He nodded and I followed him into the multi purpose room behind the stairs, inside the floor was carpeted black and the walls were white with red paint flicked all over the white. It looked amazing. He had a pool table, ping pong table and pin ball as well. His small home gym included a stepper, a treadmill and weights too. It was a good room, I liked it a lot.

Then I was shown his living room. There was a soft cream carpet to welcome my bare toes and cream walls to comfort me too. One black leather sofa was pushed up against the wall to my right with another on the south wall, both were facing a large plasma TV that was in the corner of the room with DVD, video and blu-ray players on the shelves of the stand each with their remote next to them. Black and white pictures of New York were hung on his wall, they made the room look more homey and brought a smile to my face. He also had a stone fire place and some wood in a metal basket next to it. Joe walked over to the fire and began to mess around with it, after a minute or so the fire was burning beautifully and brought such lovely warmth to the room.

From the living room he led me up the stairs and to the bathroom, the floor tiles were brown and the walls were white. There was a large oval shaped stand alone bath in the middle of the room and a near white toilet in the far right corner with the sink in the far left corner with a mirror above it. Next to the mirror were some wooden shelves that had things like his tooth brush and cologne on.

Once I’d examined that room he quickly showed me his spare room where all this guitars were hung on the wall, he had a large keyboard and a set of drums along with a box of random instruments such as tambourines and cymbals etc.

He used one of the smaller rooms as a walk in wardrobe and got a door but in the wall that connected it to his bedroom. The bedroom was very Joe, his walls were an olive colour and he had hard wood flooring down; I noticed as soon as I stepped on it that the floor was heated. He had a large king sized leather bed that had four white pillows on it, he had made it sloppily; the pillows were all askew and the white cover wasn’t on straight either. There was a full length mirror on the wall next to his walk in closet door and also another large TV was on the wall to the right of his bed. An acoustic guitar stood on a black stand with a note book next to it near his bed making me grin. There was a large rack of CD’s with over 100 for sure, there were lots of other things in the room such as his laptop.

“Do you want to borrow some clothes?” Joe asked me.

I spun around on the balls of my feet to look at him, he looked pretty nervous to have me in his home; I nodded with a smile and he seemed to relax some more. I watched him as he walked into the closet, it brought a huge smile on my face to see his signature ‘Joe strut’ again. I pulled out my blackberry from my clutch then threw the clutch onto Joe’s bed.

Juliharrr NJATA were amazing, blew me away!

After I’d sent out that tweet I turned off my phone and threw it on the bed next to my clutch, it bounced pretty well. With a cheeky grin I looked into the closet to see Joe no where in sight. I ran towards the bed and jumped up on it, once I’d tested out how it held weight I began to jump up and down on the bed laughing gleefully. The bed was soft but had a great spring to it, what I didn’t notice until I looked towards the door was a small black device that I quickly worked out was a flipvideo camera, the red light on the front was on.

I stopped jumping; one of those deer caught in headlight moments. “Hey!” I shouted and grumpily crossed my arms over my chest.

“What?” He questioned with a smirk.

“No taping! If this skirt wasn’t pencil I’d be flashing all sorts!” I exclaimed.

Joe let out a laugh and turned off the camera, he took a run up then jumped up onto the bed with me. “Wanna know a secret?” He teased.

I put my best flirty eyes on, “Yes…”

“The only reason I bought this mattress was because it was perfect for jumping.” He admitted with a cheeky smile.

I bent my knees to begin jumping again but he placed his hands on my shoulders to stop me, my breath hitched in my throat at his touch. Joe must have seen my cheeks flush pink as his did also.

“One second.” He stated.

Curiously, I watched him as he jumped down and walked over to his large sound system where one of his iPods sat in the docking station. Suddenly DJ Earworm’s remix of the top 25 billboard songs blasted through the whole of the house. I laughed loudly and joyously as he ran back over to the bed, jumped up onto it and jumped up and down with me.

We jumped up and down for a full 4 minutes and 38 seconds and once the song was drawing to a close I was very out of breath. Joe was too but definitely not as badly as me. I bounced down to sit on the bed and sighed, letting myself fall backwards. Joe did the same next to me.

“Ah, we haven’t done that in a long time.” Joe said.

I turned my head to look at him to find he was looking at me too, I smiled at him and he smiled back. I let mine gently fade away as we just looked at each other. My heart felt warmer than the blazing sun as I took in all his features I’d missed ever so greatly. From the scar in-between his eyes to the scrumptious lips that I’d yet to feel against mine, they looked as tempting as a juicy red apple hanging from a tree or a glass of ice cold water in the desert. There was so much temptation just to inch myself forward and feel him again instead of living with my memories.

After what should have been an awkward amount of time I sat upright, sharply followed by Joe.

“So, urm…” I cleared my throat, “did you get me some clothes?”

“Oh right, yeah, I did.”

I watched from the bed as he wandered back into the walk in closet. He returned with a small pile of clothes, in true Joe fashion he threw them towards me hitting me directly in my face.

I peeled them off and left them on my lap, with a glare I said, “It’s nice to see you haven’t changed.”

“Of course I haven’t, I’m still incredible handsome, charming and impeccably hilarious. Just ask my fans.” He said then made a model like posed with a handsome

I laughed noisily. “Oh yeah, you’re hot.”