While She Breathes

Day 14:

“You like her,” smiled Whitney the 3rd time I walked into the café in two weeks.

“What? Why does everyone keep telling me that?”

I was genuinely confused, but I did admit that my behaviour borderlined between creepy and desperate. I had been going back so frequently and asking for Riley that even I started to feel ridiculous. But she hadn’t been here for two weeks in a row- I even came back on a Saturday, to make sure I didn’t miss any secret shows.

“Well, I haven’t seen anyone hound her down like you do-“

“I do not,” I scoffed, rolling his eyes and Whitney laughed.

“Got a girlfriend?” she asked and I just shrugged because I didn’t have one and I wasn’t proud that I was still single.

“Then you are definitely hounding her. Anyway, like I was saying before you so rudely interrupted me, I haven’t seen anyone hound her down like you do since Jason,” she said, her lips forming an ugly grimace as they wrapped themselves around his name. I raised a brow and leaned further across the barista counter, feeling the wood chaff against my chest. It whirred gently and I was reminded that I had scheduled an appointment with my doctor for my regular check up.

To make sure that my tinkers were well-greased and not malfunctioning inside of me. You know, normal stuff.

“Who’s Jason?”

“Her boyfriend,” Whitney sniffed, looking once around the café to see if anyone needed her assistance. But honestly, no one hangs out at a café on Friday nights, especially with the Grand Prix happening right now.

I never was into sports, basketball was the only thing tolerable when I was high on alcohol.

“You don’t like him?”

“Like him?” Whitney laughed a bitter laugh and I wondered if she was lesbian, but pushed the stupidly shallow thought away. Sure I was disappointed that Riley was taken because come on, I’m 25- I appreciate a girl with some kind of chic artistic flair.

“He’s… I don’t know. He’s probably the reason why she wasn’t here last week, or this week.”

I felt like laughing at that. It was 2020, what kind of boyfriend did Riley have?

The world had fought so hard for equal (almost) rights for homosexuals and transsexuals and everyone else. Everyone could love whoever they wanted, and it was a peaceful time in Bio-Gaia.

Jason sounded like some kind of historical nightmare pulled out from every old-school romance novels that were left to settle in dust.

“Will she be back next week?” I asked, not really wanting to know more even though I really was quite curious to find out about how bad Jason really was. Whitney shrugged, sliding a tiny cupcake over to me.

“Who knows? She comes and goes. That girl loves music to bits, so I don’t know why she does this to herself.”

I looked at the cupcake and pushed it back to her and Whitney told me to take it since I was the only one who bothered to talk to her. Shrugging, I wrapped a napkin around it and looked around. When I turned back, Whitney looked disappointed but smiled anyway.

“You keep coming back Luke, she’ll be here sooner or later.”

*

Day 15

“Well if it isn’t my main ass hat Luke. Never thought I’d live to see the day you walked through here.”

I turned to see Kai walk in, a smug look on his face, with his arm linked around Lola, his fiancé. She was a tiny little thing, and I secretly knew that Kai was trying to pull a John Lennon-Yoko Ono thing with her.

I also admit to have googled a little bit more about The Beatles and all that old-school music jazz. But now I was caught, with my fingers stuffed between racks of tiny CDs, browsing for something that sounded gentle to cover up my lack of Riley’s voice.

“Did Riley do this to you? How hard do you have it dude?” Kai asked, coming to my side as Lola gave me a smile as she wandered around.

“I do not like her, god, how many times do I have to tell you?”

“Ah, but you are interested.”

“Yeah, in her voice.”

“Singers and songwriters are hot man, I’m not judging.”

“I’m not talking to you unless you’re going to help me find some good music.”

Kai pursed his lips and peered over my shoulder at the section of ‘Female Vocals’ and whistled.

“You got it bad.”

“There are literally a thousand female singers in the world,” I rolled my eyes, hating that my actions were so misleading. It wasn’t that I liked her, I just- it felt like I had chanced upon a new favourite food, or a new porn site (sorry, boys will be boys) and I needed to get my fix of it.

“Whatever man, but if you’re looking for her kind of style-“ I shot him a look and Kai just shrugged it off.

“You wanna go for someone like Ingrid Michaelson. She’s been out of the scene for a few years, but while she was in it, she was amazing. Pretty hot too, if you’re into the librarian chic kind.”

He pulled out her album and tossed it to me. I glanced at the CD cover, finally understanding why CD shopping still remained a rather relevant hobby to many music enthusiasts. Digital music had always seemed to be the staple supply of music into my iPod- it was always download, and transferred straight into the little box and into my ears via ear buds.

I never really got to touch anything, never really owned anything tangible. And here it was- Ingrid Michaelson’s final album, for sale at 5 dollars. It was a steal really.

“-and you have Alanis Morissette if you’re into a grungy, hipster kind of yodelling. Or maybe you could try some Lights, I mean she did electronic music, but her acoustic stuff was pretty gold. I don’t know, there’s so many man.”

I turned to Kai who had his arms filled with chick-music and looked at him before tapping the album in my hand against my palm.

“I’ll take note,” I said lamely and he gave me a sarcastic eye roll.

“Don’t be a bitch, I will. Alanis Morissette and Lights? But I think I’m just gonna try this one first,” I said and Kai smiled. A kind of smile a father gave to his son when he hit a home run for the first time or something.

“You still have the hi-fi set I gave you for your birthday?” Kai asked and I laughed. When I turned 23, he had given me a monster of a CD player- complete with two speakers and I had been mad when he dumped the gigantic box outside my house and refused to take it back.

“No one wanted it when I tried to sell it.”

“You’re a little bitch you know that Luke?”

“I’m kidding. I’ll use it, for this,” I said, waving the CD in the air as I paid and left Kai alone to jerk off to whatever he and Lola liked doing. They were notorious for spending hours in the CD shop and spending hundreds of dollars on records which would eventually end up clogging up the spaces in their house.

I on the other hand, got my first vintage, hard-copy album today. And I was going to give music another try, thanks to Riley.