There's A Possibility

As I walked out of the Starbucks café, the book in my hand and a smile plastered on my face, I felt like I was on top of the world.

I had scored a date with Lindsey.

Lindsey…

Her name was beautiful against my lips.

I was walking in a haze. Not that I knew my way around vast New York City, but I was significantly more lost now than I would have been before.

Locals were giving me dirty looks and I kept running into people and walking into the street before traffic halted.

But I didn’t care. I was on a high. Nothing could take this smile off of my face.

The wait for Saturday was going to agonizing, I would be counting every minute, watching the clock, waiting for the sun to set and rise as the days that stood in my way passed.

The hotel was just around the corner and my excitement grew. I can’t wait to tell the guys about the wonderful girl, Lindsey, I had met and the date that we had.

Pat and Jared would be congratulatory, Kennedy would probably want to meet her, and best of them all, John would be jealous. Seethingly jealous.

That’s just how John was. John wanted anything and everything all to himself.

If someone else had something that he didn’t he either a) had to take it from them or b) have to ruin it for them.

But this was Lindsey. Sweet, little, book-wormy-with-bad-taste-in-books-and-coffee Lindsey. And I couldn’t let John ruin it for me, and I certainly wasn’t going to allow him to take her from me.

As I walked into the hotel, I found all of my friends sitting at a table in the lobby, sipping coffee and eating some breakfast consisting of fruit and various bran cereals.

“Hey.” I said to them as I plunked down in the empty seat beside Jared.

“Where’d you go?” Pat asked as he took a sip of his orange juice.

“I just went down to the Starbucks,” I said casually. “You know I can’t stand hotel coffee.”

Pat nodded, accepting this instantly and returning to his breakfast.

John on the other hand was not so easily swayed. He sat looking at me skeptically, his hands folded and held before his chin. “And what’d you do there?”

I tried to keep my face blank as I answered him. “I… drank coffee? What else would I do at a Starbucks.” I followed this with a small chuckle. Casual, easy.

“You drank coffee?” The other guys had halted in their breakfast-activities and were now staring between the two of us.

“Yeah…” I said, reaching over and pouring myself a glass of milk. John made me nervous, he made me feel like I was a bug about to be squashed. I avoided his eyes, I can’t ruin this.

“Then why are you glowing like you’ve just met a girl…” John had seen this look on all of us at least once, every time one of us met a girl. He recognized the stature, and he pointed it out.

“How could I have met a girl?” I asked, looking up at him and rolling my eyes.

John shrugged, sitting back in his seat, never breaking his intimidating gaze. “Big city. Lots of females. What’s her name?”

“Lindsey.” It just fell out of my mouth. I instantly wished I could take the word by its syllables and stuff it back into my mouth. It was too late.

“Dump her.” John said, taking a sip of his coffee before standing up and gathering his coat.

My head shot up to look at him. “Wh-what?”

“You heard me. Dump her.” He put his coat on. How could he be telling me to toss a girl aside as if he were talking about the weather?

“Why?!” I asked, standing up. “Why do you always do this, John? I’m allowed happiness. The rest of us are allowed to be happy, not just you!”

John snapped then. His hands smacked against the table and he leaned forward, his face in mine. “Do you care about this band, Garrett?”

He waited for my answer.

“Yes. Of course I do, but I don’t see-”

“Do you want this band to go far, Garrett?”

Once again, he waited for my response to his seemingly rhetorical question.

“O-of course, but John-”

“Then you should realize why none of us can be in relationships right now!” John yelled, standing up straight again. “Committed relationships distract people. We can’t afford any distractions right now.”

I looked around at the other guys, looking for their support. I found nothing, they all were looking down at the ground or the palms of their hands.

“You were with the band first.” John said. “If you want to be in a relationship with some girl you just met at a fuckin’ Starbucks, then fine. But if that’s your choice then you’re out of the band.”

I looked up at him. I hated him so much.

But The Maine is the most important aspect of my life. I couldn’t just leave it.

“Fine. I’ll get rid of her.”