A Note for My Head Asking What My Heart Said

“Dude, Alex, you’ve been staring off into space for, like, five minutes,” Zack announced, prodding his friend’s shoulder. Alex snapped out of his trance and knocked his hand away. “Where’s your head vacationing?”

Alex leaned back against the couch, ignoring the guitar in his lap. “I keep thinking about that girl at the bar last Saturday night. I can barely remember what she looks like, but she keeps popping up in my mind.”

“Why?” Rian asked, trying to keep the suspicion from his voice. He knew what happened when Alex took a special interest in a girl; he’d seen it and, despite the years of separation, he wanted to save Zel from that. “Because she’s the only chick who showed no interest in you since we got signed?”

“I dunno, bro,” he said, ignoring the snipe with a shrug. “I mean, I don’t even know her name. I went back to the bar a few times, but I guess I just kept missing her.”

“Stalker,” Jack sneezed into his fist. He only grinned when Alex shot him a glare.

“Why don’t you just check the other places she works?” The other three band members turned slowly to look at Zack, each with a different slough of emotions on his face: Alex looked stunned and confused, Rian looked mildly horrified, and Jack looked ecstatic that for once he wasn’t the one who gave away a secret. Zack frowned slightly. “What?”

Rian sighed and shook his head while Jack did a little celebration dance. “Dude, where does she work?” Alex asked excitedly. “When did you see her? Did she tell you her name?”

“Uh, yeah, man, she cut my hair,” he replied, eying his drummer curiously. “Her name’s Zel; she works at that place on Union.”

Jack laughed. “Dude, Hair Razors? You got your hair cut there?” He threw his head back with a cackle. “My mom gets her hair done there!”

Zack rolled his eyes. “Yeah, well, Zel found it pretty hilarious how you were so hung-over Sunday morning that you couldn’t even remember that you’d seen her before,” he retorted.

Alex and Rian swung their heads towards Jack, who took on an innocent expression. “You saw her again too?” the former exclaimed. “Bro, why didn’t you tell me?”

“She told me not to!” Jack looked around for something to free himself from guilt, or at least attention. He pointed at Zack. “He asked her out!”

The two heads swung back again, and Zack’s eyes widened. “Well, Rian went to her house!”

Alex’s neck cracked, spinning to the guy beside him, who groaned under his breath. He knew he shouldn’t have let it slip. “We used to be really good friends,” Rian explained, “Back when we were kids. After--” No, he couldn’t tell; it wasn’t his right. “--Some shit happened and we sort of stopped hanging out.” His eyes trailed up to Alex, staring at him so intently that he decided the floor was more interesting. “When Zack mentioned her name, I went by to see if it was the same Zel.”

Silence descended over the practice space, and it stretched for such a time that eventually everyone was looking at Alex, waiting for a reaction. But he was staring off into space again. “So I’m the only one who hasn’t met her since the show?” The rest of the band nodded. After a moment Alex blinked and stood up. “I’mma go get a soda. When I get back, someone’s gonna have called her and whoever that is, is gonna tell me where to find her.”

“Ugh! I am so sick of this song,” Katrina complained, cleaning a pint glass.

Zel raised an amused eyebrow. “Not a Liz Phair fan, Kat?”

“It just got way overplayed when it was popular.” She shrugged. “I guess it’s an okay song. It just makes me think of this guy I was crazy over at the time.” She looked over at Zel busying herself with an order. “Hooked up at a college-sponsored dance, hung out at school, but never actually went out officially. Turns out he already had a girlfriend.” Kat laughed ruefully. “Don’t you hate when that happens?”

“I wouldn’t know,” Zel replied, strolling past her with a tray of beer and snacks. “I never went to college and I didn’t really go to dances in high school.”

“You didn’t?”

“Nope.”

The younger woman came back after serving her customers and was mildly surprised to find Kat studying her. “So what were you? One of those rebellious ‘fuck school functions’ kids or one of those nerdy shut-ins who preferred to stay home and do homework or play D&D?”

Zel scoffed, shaking her head as the front door opened and shut noisily; it was one of the things she’d grown used to, working at Monday’s, as well as the stench of stale beer and the din of whatever sport was playing on the television. “Neither,” she replied, hoping to get away from the subject. “I just... never went.”

“Red Stripe,” the latest patron requested, sitting down on a stool.

She nodded without looking at him and set about retrieving his drink. “I never really saw the appeal,” she continued, pulling a bottle from the fridge. “I mean, I went to one or two as a freshman, but it was just people’s excuse to rub up against each other in hopes of distracting themselves from the pathetic emptiness of their meaningless hormone-driven lives.” She set the beer on the counter on top of a napkin. “Here ya go.”

“Funny, I wouldn’t have pegged you for a chick flick type of girl.” Zel’s head snapped around to find the very drunk, very self-assured underage guy from Saturday night-- only now, not drunk and still incredibly self-assured-- giving her a half-grin. “But hey, you learn something new every day.” She smiled politely, realising she was staring at him, and made to go back to work. “You’re really hard to pin down, you know that?”

Pausing, Zel turned back to him and, after a moment, recalled his name. Alex. And then the light went on. Marty and the other girls had told her several times in the past week that a mysterious-- and hot, most of the girl added-- ‘Alex’ had come in nearly every night asking after her. Yet somehow they’d always eluded each other.

“You’re the one who’s been in here so much?” she asked in disbelief. Zel had never expected to see Alex for a long time, though some meeting was inevitable as she’d befriended half his band.

Alex’s grin quirked with feigned modesty. “Yeah, pretty much. So.” He took a swig from his bottle. “Want to make up for being so hard to find by going out sometime?”

That set off a scoff as she tugged down her tank top from riding up. “Sorry,” she said unapologetically, “I don’t date the type of guys who ask out bartenders while they’re working.”

“Well, when do you get off? I’ll ask you then.”

Zel raised an eyebrow but couldn’t help chuckling at his positive grin. Oh, this was a guy who was used to getting what he wanted. Well, Zel couldn’t, so why should he be able to? “Much after your bedtime, little boy.”

Kat hooted while Alex looked mildly offended. “Hey, I can’t be that much younger than you.”

“Honey, you’re probably older than our little baby here,” Kat laughed.

Alex blinked between the two women. “I know you’re not supposed to ask girls this, but exactly how old are you?” he queried, almost scared to know the answer. There was no way anyone would hire someone who was under eighteen to serve alcohol. That just had ‘lawsuit’ written all over it.

“Between seventeen and none-of-your-business,” Zel replied coolly, strolling to the other end of the bar where someone was trying to get her attention.

Surprised but still determined, Alex got up and followed her on the other side. “So you’re legal then?” he asked, leaning against the bar as she popped up from retrieving a beer. Zel jumped, startled, and rolled her eyes in annoyance before returning to her post. He walked back and sat down against in front of her. “I’ll be honest, the guys told me they’d met up with you again.”

She blinked up at him expressionlessly. “And you got jealous at our chance meetings and decided you should harass me at work?” she sniped in an overly polite tone.

“Well, for the guys and me, mi amigos are su amigos.”

“That is so far from the original saying-- and correct Spanish-- it’s not even worth correcting you.”

“But you just did.”

Zel leaned onto her fist, batted her eyelashes, and sent him a vicious smile. “Has anyone ever told you you’re an incredibly annoying individual?” she asked sweetly.

Alex tilted forward on his elbows, making her straighten up to put more space between them; he grinned up at her. “A lot of people, but apparently I’m also really charming.”

“Could’a fooled me,” Zel replied chirpily.

He chuckled-- which she hated to admit was pretty attractive-- and continued to drink his beer. “You know,” Alex said, casually reading the label on his bottle, “I can see why Zack asked you out.” He sent a gleaming smile and a wink her way. “You’re really gorgeous when you’re being sarcastic.”

Arching an eyebrow at him, Zel smiled to herself, despite wanting to be annoyed at the cute bassist for having such a big mouth; first Rian, now this. “I didn’t have to be sarcastic with Zack. He was entirely gentlemanly, entertaining, and didn’t ask me out--” she shot Alex a sharp look “-- Until we’d had a nice conversation for half an hour.”

“Yeah, that’s Zack for you,” Alex said, rolling his eyes.

This, if anything, only ticked her off more. “Maybe you should take a pointer or seven from him,” Zel said archly, putting her hands on her hips. “Now, you’re really starting to bother me, so I suggest you leave before I have our bouncer Ashley throw you out.”

Alex cracked up, almost choking on a mouthful of beer. “Your bouncer’s name is Ashley? Man, I should totally tell everyone I know about this place if the entirely of your staff is made up of hot chicks.”

“Not quite,” a deep voice corrected.

Alex’s smile dropped, eyes going wide, as Zel’s grew smug. He turned and stared up at the 6-foot-8 bearded, kilted goliath of a man peering down at him seriously. Alex looked down and back up and pointed at the kilt. “Are those things comfortable? I’ve always wondered.”

“Far better’n trousers,” Ashley stated, unfazed by the subject change. “Are ye botherin’ the young lady?”

“Uh… nope! I was just going.” Alex smiled nervously, standing up; edging around the wall of muscle behind him, he caught Zel’s eye again. “Rian and Zack both have my number. Ask them for it and call me sometime, huh, sweetheart?” Ashley lurched towards him and Alex quickly made himself scarce.

A few seconds after his beanie had disappeared, Zel burst out laughing and Ashley smiled warmly at her. “’E seemed an interestin’ one, lass,” he said, strolling back to his post near the door. “Per’aps ye should take ‘im up on tha’.” She groaned and slumped over the bar as Kat giggled. Everyone was against her when it came to boys.