Someone Like You

Frank sat at a table next to the window of the coffee shop, holding but not drinking his cooling cup of caffeine and merely staring outside at the rain cascading down on the tarmac outside. There was barely any noise inside the shop anymore, due to the lag in customers, and so it meant the sound of the water tapping against the windows was even more prominent than it would usually be. The sound relaxed Frank and he grew comfortable in the calming repetitive nature of the slight hum, to the point where even found his eyelids begin to droop. He hadn’t really slept much the night before. His pathetic excuse of a band had been out playing a show, and afterwards the group of four boys would always crawl around the variety of New Jersey bars until they were kicked out of every single one for that particular night. Despite the threats to never let the troop return, the next night they were always let back in. They were playing another show tonight, too, which meant a repeat of the alcoholic haze and pot induced buzz was guaranteed, so Frank knew that he really should be at least trying to get some sleep at home right now. Instead he had chosen to come to the coffee shop this morning, despite the fact that he wasn’t working. He couldn’t even rationalise to himself why he did; he just did.

The chair across from Frank screeched loudly, jumping him out of his dazed state suddenly and snapping his mind back into focus on the real world. Gerard was holding his own coffee to go tightly in one hand, whilst his other hand hesitantly pulled the chair out from the table, clearly unsure. “Um, is it… do you mind if I sit here?” Gerard stuttered out, blushing profusely. His clothing was a lot neater than it had been the day before, now simply consisting of tight jeans, a black dress shirt with the top buttons undone and a thick wool coat. Frank simply nodded in answer to his question and flicked his small fringe over the front of his eyes whilst glaring down at the table, trying his best to hide his own blush from the fact that Gerard was talking to him. Why was Gerard bothering to sit with him? He can’t seriously have thought that the dorky awkward coffee boy was actually interesting enough to sit with, could he? But yet, there he was, across from Frank at the table in front of the coffee shop window. Albeit, he was sitting rather awkwardly, rubbing his hands nervously along his thighs as his eyes flickered from side to side, unwilling to meet Franks. Frank couldn’t help but be incredibly confused by the entire situation, which thankfully calmed his blush at least a little.

The two boys sat in a tense silent for a while, neither having a clue what to do from there. All Frank could seem to think of was idiotic conversations about the, as usually, cruddy New Jersey weather, or the quality of coffee they both seemed to be drinking; both being entirely shit topics of conversations to choose. Their short morning conversations always seemed to run so smoothly. It probably had something to do with the fact that both knew the conversation wouldn’t have to stretch on for too long, so there wasn’t too much pressure to find something that would last. Now though, this situation called for something a little more substantial than ‘so, what are you up to this morning?’. Finally though, Gerard decided to take the plunge, figuring that he had forced himself to get this far, there was no point in holding back now. He had been lucky so far today, so maybe his streak would continue.

Gripping his coffee that sat on the table tightly with both hands, and finally raising his eyes in an attempt to meet Franks, which happened to be cast downwards, he mumbled, “Uh, hey, Frank… um, I was wondering if um… if…” Gerard stopped and sighed loudly, unable to force the next few words of the simple question out. Franks entire head had down risen upwards to get a better look at the boy in front of him, unable to believe that this was actually happening. He desperately wished he hadn’t horribly misread the conversation too, otherwise that could be incredibly embarrassing. However, so he could avoid embarrassing himself in front of Gerard, he made no attempt at carrying on his question, and instead waited patiently, desperately hoping that Gerard would finish the way he was expecting. Gerard shuffled around in his seat slightly, his vision still flashing from side to side as he let his bangs fall over his face. “Frank,” Gerard started again determinedly, “Will you, maybe, if you’ve, y’know, got nothing better to do or anything, would you maybe um, wanna go out… tonight… like, with me… would you wanna go out with me tonight?”

Gerard still refused to look up, scared shitless of Franks reaction, as the question hung in the air between the two. Frank’s mood was sky high for a brief few seconds under the realisation that Gerard had asked him out, although his mood dropped again slightly when he realised that for all he knew, Gerard could only be asking him as a friend. He decided that the least potentially embarrassing thing to do, would to just sort this out before either of them made any assumptions. Clearing his throat before he said anything, Frank mumbled, “Like, as friends, or…?”
“Like… well, yeah… if you want,” Gerard reluctantly mumbled, “Or… or as more than that, y’know… if, if you’re up for that.” The blush across his starkly pale skin was only growing with every word that spewed out of his mouth, but Gerard was determined that now he had started, he wouldn’t stop. He had lost far too many opportunities in the past, and he wasn’t going to mess up the most important opportunity to date. I mean, this was Frank for god’s sake.

Frank was finding it hard to believe what he was hearing. He was certain that this must have just been a dream and that he was going to wake up any second. But as the seconds past, he didn’t wake up. The rain continued to batter the window, Gerard still continued to shuffle awkwardly in the chair opposite him, and the question still hung heavy in the air between them. Frank was just about to burst out with a very excited yes, unable to hide his happiness, when his mood was dampened considerably again. He had a show tonight. It was a fucking important show too, as it was one of their biggest venues yet and they were opening for some big band that was actually popular. He couldn’t miss it; not tonight. “I… I can’t,” Frank sighed, clearly disheartened. Gerard immediately read Frank’s sullen mood as something else though, thinking that Frank was simply trying to make Gerard’s rejection as little hurtful as possible.
“Oh my God,” Gerard gushed, “I’m so sorry. I knew I shouldn’t have bothered asking! It’s just going to make things really fucking awkward now, isn’t it? Fuck. I’m sorry.”
“Hey! Hey! Don’t be!” Frank desperately tried to calm Gerard as he now freaked out before him, “You haven’t messed anything up! Believe me, I’m so fucking happy you asked me, I just… I really am busy tonight.”

Gerard looked back up at Frank now to see the sincerity in the smaller boys eyes, and a small glimmer of hope grew in him again when he saw how genuine Frank was. “Oh,” was all he said. There was a lag in what could already barely be classed as conversation as both boys tried to grasp at some way of finding a solution to their problem.
“Hey,” Frank said, a thought that he was surprised didn’t occur to him earlier crossing his mind, “Um, I’m busy tonight because I’m playing a show…”
“A show?” Gerard asked. He didn’t know that Frank was in a band. In fact, he didn’t know much about Frank at all, other than he seemed to be a nice guy and he was unbelievably attractive.
“Uh, yeah… My Band are playing as a support act for some other ‘famous’ band. Uh, you’re meant to have a ticket or something, but I figure I could maybe like, sneak you in the back or something, and then we could hang out after my set?” His voice rose at the end of the question, making it clear just how nervous he actually was about the idea. If Gerard saw how terrible his band was, then there may be a chance that he could be put off forever. He would just have to hope that wouldn’t happen.
“Really!? That’s awesome!” Gerard gushed, genuinely impressed and already extremely excited, “Yeah! That would be…um, that would be great, yeah.” Gerard hadn’t realised he had literally almost burst out of his seat at his outburst, surprising Frank a little and causing him to accidently flinch back in his seat, and so Gerard did his best to calm down and look normal by the end of his sentence.

“Um, cool!” Frank replied eventually, unable to stop the smile from spreading across his face. Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed Hambone weaving between the tables as he moved towards him ready to give him a lift back home. He realized he had very little time to get everything sorted so, as he rose out of his seat in a panicked rush still smiling, he spluttered, “We’re playing at eight, so if you meet me outside the back of The Cobra at like, half seven?” Without giving Gerard a chance to answer, Frank scribbled down his number quickly on a scrap piece of paper he found in his pocket and then spun around to leave.
“Yeah,” Gerard replied anyway, in somewhat of a daze that this had actually gone so well, as he watched Frank walk away. He picked up the valuable piece of paper and ran his fingers gently over the digits whilst grinning, probably looking like a complete idiot but not caring either way. Apparently he really was having a fucking lucky day; he could only hope that his luck lasted for tonight too. If it did, who knew where it could all go.