Sketch City

“Band peoples! I’m alive!”
A chorus of ‘aw, man…’ echoed through the bus.
“Oh, fuck you guys. Maybe I won’t tell you about how I met Jack Barakat.”
Four curious heads immediately popped up, completely alert. If there was one word to describe my band, it was nosy.
Leo, our drummer, spoke up first, “Did you totally freak out when you met him? I bet you did!”
Then Lacey spoke up; she played keyboard, “No way! Was he as hot in person as he is in pictures?? He’s probably so much hotter!”
Call, the bassist: “How is good old Gabe anyways? He was the one who introduced you to Jack, right?”
Finally Cody spoke; our quiet guitar player, “Would you all just shut up so we can hear her story? Jeez.”
“Thank you Cody. Yes, Call, Gabe was the one who introduced us—if you could even call it that. Lacey, he is very good-looking. You can meet him yourself if you want to. Apparently, he and Zack are fans of our music.”
Jaws dropped. All Time Low? One of our musical idols actually liked our music? This was cause for much excitement among my friends.
Call and Lacey were still giggling (yes, giggling--didn’t I tell you that Call is gay?) amongst themselves when the door to our van opened and Gabe and Victoria climbed in.
They were immediately swarmed with ‘hello’s’ and ‘how are you’s’ from my bandmates.
As soon as their attention was away from me, I made a break for it. There’s nothing worse than a small van trying to fit seven people in it on a ninety-degree day.
I didn't get six feet from the bus when Gabe jumped out of it, looking like he, too, had snuck away.
"Nice ninja skills there, Gabe."
His head snapped up, surprised, "Oh, thanks," he smiled, "I've been practicing. Can you tell?"
"Yeah, totally. I didn't even see you just walk off that van."
"You definitely didn't. In fact, I'm not even standing here right now. I'm a thousand miles away in Utah."
"Utah? Really?"
"Yes. Why, do you have a problem with Utah now?"
"Maybe I do. Maybe I don't. Who's to say?"
I turned and walked in the general direction of the catering tent. I need some serious calories right now. This heat will be the death of me.
Even though he didn't talk for the whole (what, thirty feet or so?) to catering, I knew Gabe was right on my heels. This is what it was like last summer. Except for the first three weeks when I was the one trailing him. I wish I could tell you all about last summer: the hot days, crazy nights, amazing music, funny people... This year, though, was going to be so much better--so much...different.
As I pondered this over my food, my Shadow (Gabe's nickname from last year) chatted to random passers-by about the upcoming tour and about all the great bands--who partied hardest, who could perform best under pressure, who was going to hit it big this year, etc. It was all standard stuff, really, you just had to get used to the fact that everyone around you had some kind of status. It's not too bad for me now, because I've done this before.
When I got up to toss my trash, Gabe abruptly cut off his conversation with Jason Evigan of After Midnight Project and immediately jumped up after me.
I had just dumped all my stuff when Gabe's hands snaked around my waist. Before I even turned I thought, what the flip is he doing? I mean, we're friends and all, but come on. This is just a bit much for me.
"Gabe, what are you doing?"
"...Giving you a hug?"
He said it like he was asking me, which is weird. Gabe tackles me when he hugs me, he never puts his arms around my waist like he is now. Me facing him like I am now is so awkward because we are really close and he is almost a head taller than me and I have to look up and he has to look down at me, and that makes it more awkward because our faces almost touch and ohmygod, this is soooo freaky, what is happening here?
So I take a breath and step back, breaking his grip.
"Yeah, okay. Gabe, 'hug' isn't in your vocabulary. It has been replaced with 'tackle'. What gives?"
You all know what happens next right? The famous rock star hottie blushes and stutters out how he is in love with the newbie girl who just-so-happens to be new to the tour and also friends with said rock star. Right?
Well, I am not perceptive of things like this, nor am reading some story about this all happening, so even after he told me, "I really want you." I still didn't get it.
So I say: "You want me for what?"
And then, when I finally got it, I turned a near shade of purple because I was even more embarrassed then Gabe was, and he said he 'wanted me' and I asked 'for what' which, now that I look back, was a totally sexual and flirty thing to say, and that was totally not what I meant and now I'm scared because I don't like him like that. I really need to start using more punctuation when I think. I'm sorry.
So now we're both just kind of standing here, looking at each other and I don't know how to tell the kid that I just don't like him that way. Which is hard because he's my friend, and a bunch of fangirls are probably yelling at me right now because he is gorgeous and talented and famous or whatever. But I can't speak, which makes this whole thing so much more awkward.
It got even worse when Call came running over and pulled both of us into a huge hug so my face was almost touching Gabe's again. Today totally sucks.