Original Love

Alex's POV:

“Dude, where are we going?” The older boy asked, following his friend down the sidewalk hurriedly as the group of fan girls got closer.
 
They had been running for what seemed like hours when in reality it had only been about five minutes. But nonetheless they were out of breath and needed a safe place to hide before the girls caught up with them and demanded more pictures and questions. Should they be used to this by now? Yes, but they had never been bombarded with that many girls before without security or at least their crew around to help with crowd control. And it was a little scary to be honest.
 
The taller boy stopped and looked around searching the buildings. It was nearly ten at night and all the buildings and shops around were closed for the night so it was strangely unusual that the one building had its lights still on. But it looked safe enough to hide in so the younger boy grabbed the others arm and dragged him across the street toward the building, praying to whatever God or deity that the door was unlocked. The sound of the girls was getting closer and they needed to find a place to hide quickly before they were screwed.
 
Giving the door a cautious pull, they found that it was actually unlocked and the younger grinned as he pulled the door open and rushed inside with the other boy behind him. As soon as they were inside, the older boy turned to shut and lock the door, shoving his friend away from the windows so the girls didn’t see where they went.
 
The room they were in was like a waiting room and they quickly walked through it, turning the corner that lead to a hallway and into the dark so that they were out of sight. They stood there with their back against the wall of the hallway, catching their breaths and listening to hear if any of the fan girls saw where they went.
 
After a few moments when they realized the coast was clear, they finally allowed themselves to relax a little and find out exactly where they were and what they were going to do next.
 
“Shh, do you hear that?” The younger asked just as the older was going to suggest getting out of there and heading back to the airport.
 
The older gave his friend a look as if to ask why it was important.
 
“No seriously, just listen.”
 
Knowing that the younger wasn’t going to give up until he did what he asked, he shut up and strained his ears to listen to whatever the other was hearing. But as soon as his ears caught the noise, he couldn’t help but smile as he recognized it. He would know that song anywhere. Only, he had never heard that version of that song before.
 
The younger was singing the words under his breath to the instrumental version of Miss You by Blink-182 as they traveled further down the hall to find the source of the noise. There was only one other light on coming from the end of the hall and since the music grew louder as they walked closer to the light, they knew that that was where the music was coming from. But they were not expecting what they saw in the room the light and noise was coming from.
 
When they were at the doorway, the older boy couldn’t help but gasp lightly with his jaw open as he watched the figure inside. The room was completely bare save for the few chairs shoved up against the wall and the bag lying a few feet from it. The floors were made of shiny hard wood, glossed perfectly and the walls were covered from floor to ceiling in mirrors all around the room with a wooden railing placed in the center of the wall also circling the room. It was a dance studio. Ballet to be exact judging by the way the woman was dancing in the middle of the room.
 
She was the only person in there, save for the two boys, and was gliding gracefully though the room, in her own little world not even noticing them. She was wearing the standard ballet uniform, black leotard, light pink tights, and grey legwarmers over the bottom of her leg while her hair was twisted back into a tight bun.
 
All her movements flowed together perfectly with grace and precision. He could tell that she was a seasoned pro at this just by her movements and partly by her age. She looked at least early twenties with brunette hair with a slim and tall build. She didn’t really look like a dancer until you watched her land perfectly on her feet and her muscles push and glide across the floor, leaping and landing and spinning perfectly. He was in total awe of her. She was incredible and was totally mesmerized by her dance.
 
When the ending of the song came and the sound faded out, they stood in total silence as they watched the last steps of her dance. She still didn’t know that they were there and there was no other song that started now that Miss You was over and the only noise filling the room was her steady yet slightly hard breathing.
 
“Holy shit,” the younger boy said, low enough that it came out as a whisper, but yet loud enough that the girl heard in the silent room.
 
Her head instantly jerked up and over to their direction as she saw the two of them standing there with wide eyes. As if she had been caught doing something wrong. The three of them stood there staring at each other for a few moments before she snapped out of it first and took a few steps forward, clearing her throat.
 
“Can I help you?”
 
The older was the first to snap out of it. “Um no, sorry, we didn’t mean to interrupt. We were looking for a place to hide; um we were being chased by a group of girls and saw the lights on here. So we thought we could hide out until they were gone. We didn’t mean to intrude.”
 
The slight blush to her cheeks told him that she recognized him but was either too shy to say anything or didn’t really care. Either way he was thankful since he had had enough of screaming fan girls for the night. If she had turned out to be one also, it would have been a nightmare. And judging by the look on the younger boys face, he was thinking the same thing.
 
“I’m Alex by the way,” the older boy continued before gesturing to the younger. “And this is Jack, sorry again by the way for barging in here.”
 
The girl just shook her head and gave a small laugh, “no don’t worry about it. It’s really not a big deal. And I’m Charlie.”
 
“You’re really good by the way,” Jack added, a huge smile on his face. “I’ve never seen someone dance as well as you.”
 
Charlie blushed more, “I’m really not that good, but thank you anyway. I was just about to leave actually so if you guys want to stick around while I change and I can go check to make sure there are no crazed fan girls around anymore.”
 
They nodded and she grabbed her bag and disappeared down the hall. Jack, being the one with the short attention span, began to poke around the room. There really wasn’t anything to snoop in because it was basically an empty room with a table up against the wall with a nice stereo system set up. But with Jack, anything was possible, and he began going through the iPod hooked up to the speakers.
 
Multiple songs and a few minutes later, Charlie returned to the room with a shy smile on her face. When Alex looked up from his phone, he nearly fell over. He had thought she was pretty when she was dancing and wearing her dance clothes, but now she was beautiful. Her hair was hanging down her back in small waves and she was wearing a pair of skinny jeans and a plain black shirt. Sure it was nothing special really, but for some reason his breath caught in his throat when he saw her.
 
“Um so, I’m ready whenever you guys are.” She said quietly, pulling him from his thoughts.
 
He nodded as she went over to where Jack was and unplugged the device and turned off the stereo and putting it in her pocket. She grabbed her bag and then flipped off the light and Alex followed behind her towards the door at the front of the studio with Jack next to him. Once they were outside and waiting for her to finish locking up, Alex rubbed the back of his neck, praying that this wouldn’t get awkward
 
“Yeah let’s go,”
 
Charlie flicked off the lights after grabbing her bags and they followed her out of the room and down the dimly light hall to the front room where they had first come in to. She went behind the counter to flip a few more switches and the rest of the lights, save for a small one behind the counter, were off leaving the place in darkness. Alex followed her toward the front door and she held it open for them letting them step outside first while she closed the door behind her and pulled out a set of keys and found the right one to lock the door. She began fiddling with her keys as she began to make her way over to the only car in the parking lot in front of the studio and glanced back to them standing there a few feet away.
 
“Sorry about the whole sneaking in thing,”
 
Charlie smiled and waved it off, “no it’s totally fine. The night was boring and repetitive anyway. It was kind of nice to have something random happen. Even if it meant being chased by fan girls.”
 
“Yeah, this night has been pretty interesting,” Alex agreed as he glanced to Jack behind him and then back to the girl. “But it was really nice to meet you, hopefully we’ll see you around sometime?”
 
She nodded, giving a small smile along with a wave as they began to turn to head down the walk back towards the airport as she turned to her car. They were only just getting back on the sidewalk when they heard her call out again and they both turned to see her climbing out of her car, behind the driver’s door with a nervous expression on her face.
 
“You know, if you guys wanted to stick around a little bit longer, I can drive you to the airport later.” She suggested with a nervous smile which Alex knew was due to the fact that she probably didn’t do things like that often.
 
The older boy looked behind him, meeting his best friends eye and noticed that Jack almost looked like he was peeing himself with excitement. Taking that as a yes, he looked back to Charlie, smiling and nodding in agreement as the two of them made their way back over to her car. She got back in the driver’s side while Alex walked around to get in the passenger’s seat while Jack got in back. The car was already running so when he climbed in, he heard the all too familiar sounds of Yellowcard’s new album playing in the background.
 
“So how long have you been dancing?” Alex asked as she pulled out onto the road.
 
She blushed lightly, “Um, since I was five.”
 
“Wow, you can tell! You’re really good!” Jack added from the back as the tell tale sign of Jack snooping came as a zipper opened and he began going through her stuff in the back. Alex glanced at Charlie and figured that she either didn’t know or didn’t care that Jack was going through her stuff as he pulled out her wallet from her bag next to her dance bag in back. “Your real name is Charlotte?”
 
Charlie looked in the rearview mirror to see what he was doing before nodding and going back to looking at the road. “Yeah, my dad gave me the nickname Charlie when I was a kid. I was sort of a tomboy so Charlotte didn’t really fit me. My mom tried to get the nickname Lottie to stick but it really didn’t so Charlie just stuck.”
 
“I like it, it suits you,” Alex added earning another blush from the girl.
 
She cleared her throat and glanced over to him once again, “I am actually starving right now, do you mind if I stop to grab some food before I drop you off? It’ll be really quick I promise.”
 
“That’s fine; we have about two hours before we need to get back anyway. We were cursed with getting a stupidly long layover in the middle of the night.”
 
Charlie just nodded as she continued down the road to wherever she was planning on stopping. A few minutes later, she pulled into the parking lot belonging to Subway and found a parking spot easily since it was nearly ten at night and no one would really be out this late. Once the car was off, they all got out and headed for the door.
 
When they were inside, they let Charlie go first in line and she stepped up and began to place her order to the young girl behind the counter. With one look at the younger girl and the way she kept looking at them, Alex could tell that she recognized them and was trying to keep herself together as she made Charlie’s sandwich. He knew that Charlie and Jack also knew that the younger girl was a fan girl but neither of them said anything as they continued in line.
 
The poor girl couldn’t be more than 16 and obviously a fan girl judging by the looks and the fact that she was nearly shaking as she handed Charlie her change back. After Charlie had her food, she mentioned that she was going to find a table and Alex noticed the look of jealousy on the poor girls face when she realized that they were all together. But he just ignored it as he stepped forward to place his order.
 
Once both of them were through line, Alex easily found where Charlie was sitting and then took the seat across from her and Jack taking the seat next to him and they opened their sandwiches to take the first bite. The three of them were quiet for a few moments before Jack started to fidget in his seat and Alex knew it was a tell tale sign that Jack was getting uncomfortable with the silence much like he usually did. And it was only a matter of seconds before he was going to break the silence.
 
Charlie must have picked up on that fact since she smiled slightly at Jack before being the first to break it. “So, what exactly are you two doing here?”
 
“We’re on our way back home from Vegas,” Alex explained as Jack nodded enthusiastically. “But we weren’t expecting the airline to screw us over and give us a four hour layover. So we decided to just leave and come back a little while before our flight left to get food but got mobbed by people. It’s a very interesting way to start off the week before tour.”
 
Charlie’s eyes widened, “oh right, your cd comes out soon right?”
 
Jack just shrugged and nodded like it was no big deal, “yeah, and then we start tour a few days later. Are you coming to one of our shows?”
 
“Yeah, my friend is a huge fan and so she’s taking me along with her because she doesn’t want to go alone.”
 
Alex smirked, “and you’re not a fan?”
 
“I am, just not as big of a fan as her. Your stuff is good, I’m just not going to throw myself at you guys and ask you to make a baby with me.”
 
Both Jack and Alex burst out laughing at that while Charlie smirked a little as she took another bite of her sandwich. “So you’ll be at the Milwaukee show? How long have you lived here?”
 
“Yeah I’ll be there, and I’ve been here my whole life. Parents were raised here and I was born here.”
 
They continued to talk as they ate. Talking about their new record, friends, her studio, basically anything and everything they could think of. Before they knew it, they had been there for nearly a hour and a half and figured that they might as well get going since Jack and Alex needed to get back to the airport soon. Throwing their trash away, they followed Charlie out to her car and Jack yelled shotgun and then ran nearly tripping over himself as he stood in front of the passenger door waiting for her to unlock it.
 
“Dude! Your car is so cool!” Jack said as Charlie was pulling out of the parking spot. Alex noticed that he was holding the Bane and Batman figures that she had in her cup holder and was moving their arms and playing with them like he was a little kid.
 
Charlie laughed as she also saw what he was playing with, “thanks. I take care of my Nephew Noah every now and then and he actually forgot them here last time he was inside. I also think that there is a game of Barrel of Monkey’s somewhere in here.”
 
Alex laughed as he picked up the blue plastic barrel and showed her in the mirror making her laugh as Jack snatched it from him and opened it making the monkeys spill everywhere. He muttered an apology but Charlie just waved it off mentioning that at least someone was getting entertainment out of them since it had been in there since she had bought it a few months before not getting any use.
 
The signs for the airport began to appear as Charlie drove closer toward the all too familiar place. And for some reason, Alex was dreading it and he actually didn’t want to leave. This was the most fun he had in a while. The last few weeks had been dedicated all to press and preparation for the new records release and tour. To say that it had been stressful was an understatement and for the first time in what seemed forever, Alex actually wasn’t thinking of all the things he needed to do and just forgot it.
 
He was pulled from his thoughts when the car stopped and he looked out the window to see they were at the drop off area at the airport. Sighing, he opened the door and climbed out along with the others and gave a small slightly embarrassed smile.
 
“So I guess this is it?” Charlie asked breaking the silence.
 
Alex nodded and shrugged, “yeah. But we’ll see you when we’re back in Wisconsin right? You’ll have to come and say hi at the show. Or we can come and stalk you at the studio again when we’re here!”
 
None of them knew if that would really happen, if they would really keep in touch. If this was more than a one night thing. But it was ok to hope, right? Alex really did want to keep in touch with her, she was different than any girl he had met and he was intrigued to get to know her more.
 
“Thank you for saving us!” Jack said as he pulled Charlie in for a hug. Alex saw the faint smile playing on her lips as she hugged him back. Once they let go, Jack suddenly had a sheepish look on his face as he held out his hand and opened it revealing the little Bane and Batman figurines he was holding. “I almost forgot to give these back to you.”
 
Charlie laughed as she took his hand and closed his fingers around the little toys, “keep them. My Nephew won’t miss them at all. Maybe it’ll be a good distraction so you don’t annoy Alex and all the other passengers on the flight back.” She teased as Jack grinned and hugged her once more.
 
“Thank you for that!” Alex said as he took his turn to hug her. “And thank you for saving us earlier, we had fun!”
 
“Haha it was no problem. I had fun tonight! Hope you guys have a safe flight,”
 
“Thanks, we’ll see you around ok? When you come to the show you’ll have to come by or wait afterwards or something so we can catch up again ok?” Alex asked as she nodded and they hugged once more before they turned and began to head inside the airport.
 
Once they were inside and they began to make their way toward the escalator to head up to their gate, Jack turned around and began waving and Alex turned also to see Charlie still standing there. He gave another wave and then they both turned and got lost in the crowd unable to see the girl anymore. Alex pulled his ticket out of his back pocket and read the gate number and began making their way through the familiar airport to where they needed to go.
 
By the time they got back to their gate, there were more passengers around and they found two empty seats by the window. Alex noticed that their plane was already there and the last of the passengers from the previous flight were walking off the ramp and heading where they needed to go which meant that didn’t have that much longer to wait. Glancing over to his left, he saw that Jack was already busy entertaining himself with his phone while still holding on tight to the little figures he hadn’t let go of since they had gone through security moments before. He knew that the younger boy was already attached to them, always going to remember this night and consider Charlie a friend even if they never saw each other again.
 
Suddenly, Jack was leaning in close to Alex with his phone extended out towards them like he was taking a picture. Alex just smiled as he leaned in closer again and felt the figures on top of his head as Jack positioned them and then expertly took a picture as the posed for the camera.
 
Once the picture was taken, he flipped the phone over to see it and Alex laughed as he took in each of their expressions and how Jack had put the figures on his head. Bane and Batman were having a epic dual on top of his head while he wore a shocked expression and Jack was wearing a smug expression.
 
He watched as Jack opened up a new text and selected an number that Alex didn’t know to send to picture to. Usually Alex knew the numbers that Jack had in his phone since they had all the same friends but this one he had never seen before. The younger boy must have seen the confused expression on his face and he smirked as he finished the text, adding a caption to the picture and then pressed send.
 
“It’s Charlie’s number,” Jack explained once it sent.
 
Alex just raised a eyebrow, “when did you two swap numbers?”
 
“We didn’t,” Jack replied with a shrug. “I stole it when I was going through her bag when we were driving.”
 
“And she has no problem with this?”
 
Jack just shrugged again, “dunno, but we’ll find out soon.”
 
The older boy just shook his head in response as he grabbed his own phone and stole Jack’s to put the number in his contacts. Now that Jack had Charlie’s number and she was ok with them having it, he wasn’t going to let Jack be the only one to have it. That meant that now they could keep in touch and not become the distant strangers that knew each other once like the had thought they might be. Now that had each other’s numbers and could talk and make sure they saw each other again when they were back in town.
 
Alex had to admit that even though he gave Jack a lot of crap about being dumb and weird, he was a genius at that moment. Not that he was actually going to say this out loud since Jack would never shut up about it, but really. For some reason he was really taken with Charlie, she was cool and collected and didn’t throw herself at him like many of the other girls did whenever they recognized him. She was truly different.
 
Just as he finished putting the number in his phone, Jack phone rang signaling a new text. As soon as he heard it, the older boy snatched it from him and eagerly opened the text to see who it was from and what it said. When he did, Jack instantly started laughing at what it said and handed it to Alex so that he could read it also.
 
From: Charlie
Creepy stalker. I can’t believe you stole my number. Lol Just kidding it’s totally fine. Now we can keep in touch like we wanted to! Make sure to give the number to Alex too and you don’t hog it. I’m glad that Batman and Bane are having fun! Make sure to not annoy Alex too much on the flight back.
 
Alex laughed also when he read it, instantly opening up a new text on his phone as Jack went back to reply to his own text. Their flight number and destination was announced on the loud speaker and the woman announced that they would begin boarding in a few minutes so Alex knew that he needed to be quick.
 
To: Charlie
Hey girlie, it’s Alex. I also stole your number. Hope you don’t mind. Thanks again for tonight and for giving Jack his entertainment for the flight. He’s not stopped playing with them since we got to our gate! Just about to board our flight, talk to you soon.
 
Once it was sent, he smiled as he heard their zone called and then stood up and shut off his phone as he began to walk to the ticket area to get it scanned. Jack was right behind him also turning off his phone as they handed their tickets so that they could get on the plane and head for home. And as they walked down the ramp, Alex knew that Milwaukee was going to be one of his favorite places to play now. Since it meant that he would be able to see Charlie again.