Hallelujah

"Brian!" I literally screamed, abandoning my coffee and launching out of my seat. This deserved enthusiasm, I mean, he was (hopefully) soon to be mine... He put one of his hands up, effectively stopping me, and put his coffee on the table.

"Okay, you can tackle me to the floor now," Brian said with his customary smirk. I felt butterflies come alive in my stomach. It was amazing how easily he could do that to me. I walked forward in a much calmer fashion and hugged him tightly, responding in a sing-song voice,

"I missed you," With a start, I realized he smelled as amazing as Matt. But it was a different smell, sweeter somehow but yet maintaining a manly musk. I could get really used to this.. I pulled away after a long moment, but Brian caught my hands to delay me, pecking my forehead and playfully nipping my nose. I giggled and squeezed his large hands.

"Well I missed you more," he challenged. I smirked and shook my head. I doubt that.

His hands loosened and I slid back to my chair. My coffee was calling me, what can I really say in defense of its caffeinated goodness?

We sat and talked about nothing for almost and hour. I'd document it, but other than a few sweet gestures, like him reaching across the small table to put my hair behind my ears, and all of those perfect smiles he kept flashing me, it wasn't anything that would really interest you. Except for this one point...

"So..." Brian started, looking at his coffee as though it was the real thing he was interested in holding a conversation with.

"Yes?" I asked. He was making me nervous.

"Matt drove you from the airport, right?" He glanced up at me. I nodded and felt myself tense immediately. "Sorry about that, I just needed to finish recording the solos for a song... and Matt was done for the day."

"Oh... It's okay, I guess..." Brian's hand slid across the table and held my right one. Goddammit, why did he have to be so fucking sweet? It made me incredibly guilty and unable to look him in the eye. He knew I was still in pain, but cared about me anyway. Maybe he could be the one sew my broken heart back together. I swirled my coffee around with a stirrer, a lull in the conversation making me realize I'd run out of espresso and had to get more (then doing so, of course.).

We were sitting directly below the speaker, so every song that came on Brian and I could hear quite clearly. I'd been bobbing my head for the last twenty minutes unconsciously to the beat of whatever song. A familiar guitar line cut into the ending of some euro-dance beat.

"Oh!" I gasped. Brian looked up in alarm, then chuckled and rolled his constantly sparkling brown eyes as I quickly explained my love for Audioslave. You see, music is my one passion in life, even though I can't have a career in it. But I guess that's why I know the people I do, huh?

Brian's cell rang and he excused himself to the outside patio, I waved and concentrated on the lyrics, suddenly realizing they had a decent amount of weight.

Someone falls to pieces
Sleeping all alone,
Someone kills the pain.
Spinning in the silence,
To finally drift away.

Someone gets excited
In a chapel yard,
Catches a bouquet.
Another lays a dozen
White roses on a grave.

I got a flash of my father's burial. Every instance I remembered blurred since I was constantly crying that day. Goosebumps rose on my arms; I recollected throwing white rose after white rose on the retreating coffin while my severe mother stood statuesque in black satin next to me, the polar opposite to my every thought and action. I shook my head hard to get rid of the vision.

To be yourself is all that you can do.
To be yourself is all that you can do.

True, I thought distantly in regard to the lyrics, but acting helps a lot of the time...

Someone finds salvation in everyone,
And another only pain.
Someone tries to hide himself.
Down inside himself he prays,
Someone swears his true love
Until the end of time.
Another runs away.
Separate or united?
Healthy or insane?

If this is an inference to my fucked up love life, I'll choose insane.
I find salvation in most, but pain in only one. True love...

No thinking allowed on that term anymore.
True love isn't real to me. I bit my bottom lip, realizing it was still slightly sore and bruised from earlier today in the rainbow-filled entryway.

Running away is something I'm getting better at doing whenever things get tough. That's also quite 'insane,' I guess.

To be yourself is all that you can do
To be yourself is all that you can do..

And even when you've paid enough,
Been pulled apart or been held up,
With every single memory of the good or bad faces of luck,
Don't lose any sleep tonight.
I'm sure everything will end up alright.

You may win or lose.

But to be yourself is all that you can do.
To be yourself is all that you can do.

The song ended. I wonder if Chris Cornell's right; Will everything end up alright?

I stood up and drank up the last dregs of my fourth coffee before throwing it lightly into the trash can. As I watched, Brian came through the glass doors again and walked over to me, I smiled widely, butterflies again exploding inside. He leaned down and pressed his lips lightly against mine in a chaste kiss.

"You taste like coffee," I mentioned when he pulled away. He shrugged causally and put his hand on the small of my back as we walked out the front door.

"I couldn't imagine why," Brian said with another grin. Those butterflies need to tame themselves.

Maybe everything could actually turn out okay. But only if I followed the condition of staying as far as possible from Matt and hope that just made every feeling I had for him go away.

Could that work?
Maybe.
Would it?
Even the most optimistic voice in my head hesitated on that one.