Completely (Un)expected

"Have you ever been here before?" Frank asked, getting to his feet and reaching out for me. I grabbed hold of his slightly rough hands as he pulled me up, off the steps to stand with him.

"Here, where?" I asked, not sure whether he meant New York City or the club specifically. "The city isn't new to me, but before tonight, I never knew that this club even existed."

"So you've never been to the balcony?" he asked and smirked while taking a step up the stoop back toward the club's interior where his dad's band was still playing their set. I gave him a look that encompassed the fact that I thought he was an idiot. If I'd never been to the club before, of course I'd never been to the balcony before, but he was turned around, so he didn’t get to see my judgmental expression.

After a beat, I hadn't responded, seeing as I figured his question had beenrhetorical, but still he turned around just as I moved to follow him and asked, "So no, then?"

"No, moron."

"Feisty," Frank retorted jokingly, managing to finally get a chuckle out of me. "Follow me."

Frank turned and hopped up to the top step, but I hesitated for a moment and stayed firmly on the ground a few steps below him. When he realized I wasn’t following, he looked back and sighed before reaching down to me and grabbing my wrist. The sudden contact shocked me slightly and I froze at his touch, resisting slightly and when he made to continue walking his hand slid down to meet mine from my lack of compliance.

He pulled away quickly when he realized he was now holding onto my hand and not my wrist. "Sorry," he promptly apologized before reaching out again and yanking on my wrist with a notably firmer grip this time. I complied this time and followed where he led back into the side entrance of the club.

Instead of going straight into the middle of the floor, and instead of turning right to head up the stairs back to my dad's sound station, Frank and I hung a left and climbed up a much larger staircase that I was surprised and a little dumbfounded for having previously missed.
He still held onto my wrist even though I was now fully cooperating with him and following him up the steps, but I didn’t mind. I liked the feeling of Frank's hand holding onto me, keeping me close as a reach's distance.

Half way up the steps, I had regained my composure, still having been in a daze from Frank grabbing hold of my hand. "You're not going to kidnap me or anything, right?" I asked in joking to him to lighten the tension I had noticed rise a little.

He halted his steps and turned to me, a serious look on his face. "Yes," he answered before a lame smile broke out on his face, giving him away. "No, just trust me." And for whatever reason, I did.

The music progressively got quieter and quieter, and for a while I thought that the song was just fading out, but then I realized that we were entering the farthest reaches of the club's infrastructure and we were merely just moving high up into the ceiling's inner workings.

I started to become a little worried seeing as how we were getting up pretty high and also because I was in a strange place with a rather strange boy I'd just barely met not half an hour ago. A slight twinge of relief washed over me as I started to hear the sound of music returning, reassuring me that Frank hadn't taken me too far from where I was supposed to be.

Then I saw the lights. Red and blue, just like on the stage before, and then it hit me. We were on the stage, sort of. We were above it. Way above it.

Frank had taken me up to the stage's light box where all the lights were housed snugly inside large metal cages high above the performing space. I looked down and was able to see the band still playing and the crowd still cheering. Frank let go of my arm but, instinctively, I reached back out to take hold of his once again. I wasn’t scared of heights so much as I was nervous that I'd lose my balance on the narrow walkways of the ceiling girders.

"Don’t worry," Frank assured me. "Nothing's going to happen." He took a few more steps out onto the high-rise, taking me reluctantly along with him. I kept a firm grip on his arm, holding it, and him, close to me, ignoring the fact that I barely knew him. He didn’t seem to mind the closeness, doing his part to keep me near him and feeling safe, and he was doing a pretty good job.

"I thought you said we were going to a balcony?" I asked, shaking slightly as I felt my nerves overtaking my body.

"Uhm," he defended."Well, I just didn’t know what else to call it." I narrowed my eyes at him and he smirked at me, knowing full well he'd been caught but doing nothing to justify it. "Cool, right?"

For as nervous as I was so high up on such unstable footing, it was pretty cool. You could see the whole club, the whole stage from up there. Everything looked surreal at the augmented angle and, though I was scared shitless, it was sick.

"My dad would kill me if he knew I was up here, that is, if I don’t fall off."

"You're not going to fall off, I got you." As Frank said this, he took a step toward me, closing the foot or so of space that had previously separated us and holding me with his arm around my shoulders. I felt my cheeks start to warm and I blamed it on everything from the heat of the lights to my anxiety of how dangerous it was to be up so high, but definitely not on the fact that I was being held so closely to Frank.

I shifted uncomfortably for a moment, not because I didn’t like Frank because, come on, let's face it, I was falling for him, but because I was certain we weren't supposed to be up there and god-forbid anything happened, we'd be the ones to blame.

Frank looked down to me and I stared back into his eyes. I knew that I was starting to like Frank. He was cool and nice and funny and drop-dead-gorgeous. His bad boy exterior contrasting his boy-next-door attitude was enough to make any girl's heart melt, so there was no wonder why I'd fallen so quickly for him, but that was the last thing I wanted to have happen.

After tonight, my chances of ever seeing Frank again were slim to none. Unless by some chance my dad didn’t go on tour and I was able to stay with him all year so that we could continue our little musical adventure together where coincidently he'd once again work the board for another of Frank's dad's concerts opening an opportunity for me to possibly see Frank again, this was probably the first and last time we'd meet.

"We won't get caught, I do this all the time," Frank defended. "And if we do, you can blame it all on me."

"I wouldn’t do that," I replied as I began to adjust to the feeling of being so high up on the columns. I made to step away from Frank a little to take hold of the metal bar in front of us. He released me from his hold while still keeping a protective hand resting on my shoulder blade.

I took in the view as a song closed up. I saw Frank's dad hit the cymbals one last time, letting the sound ring out as it was replaced by the cheering of the audience. "It is pretty cool up here though."

"Yeah," Frank agreed and continued to explain. "I used to come up here when I was a kid. It's much better than being stuck with nothing to do around the adults all night."

"Definitely," I said. "I like it up here with you." The words slipped out before I could filter my thoughts. The phrase came out sounding much more awkward than it seemed in my head, which is why I would have rather not have said it, but it was too late.

Frank looked down to me, eyes locking with mine. At first I hoped that he hadn't taken it to mean anything, but it was clear that he knew what I meant.

Then it hit me. If I was never going to see Frank again, I might as well take a little advantage and have some fun while I can. So I decided to just go for it.

I steadied my balance and when I was absolutely sure my footing was totally solid, I inched up on my toes,bringing my lips to Frank's. I blocked out every inhibition, every second thought that didn’t have the time to process as I moved my lips in time with his.

His lips were soft and warm under the hot lights, and his smooth metallic lip ring brushed against my skin in a sensation so new to me it made me shudder before I could find my bearings once again. It took a moment for him to respond and I was worried for a second that he wouldn’t at all, but eventually instinct took over and he lifted his free hand to hold onto my face.

His lips parted causing mine to do the same as he slid his tongue just slightly into my mouth. I could taste the now fading staleness of his previous cigarette. His hold on me moved from my shoulder blade down to my hip, where his hand found its way just under the hem of my shirt, lifting it slightly and resting on my bare skin.

Just as I was about to find my own bit of Frank's exposed arms to touch, I snapped out of bad-girl-mode. I pulled away abruptly and stared at Frank with a look of shock and pure regret. I had messed up, I knew it. What was I thinking?

Frank looked back at me, equally as shocked, but more at the halt of action as opposed to the initiation or the act itself. It took him a moment, but soon I could see in his eyes the realization that this had been a mistake.

"Henri -" he started, but I cut him off.

"I'm sorry," I blurted out. "I don’t know what I was thinking." I stepped away, freeing myself from Frank's intoxicating touch, a cold feeling instantly replacing the spaces he'd just been holding me.I nearly lost my footing, and Frank reached out to grab me, but still I avoided his touch.

"No, it's okay," he plead. "I just -"

"I have to go." I turned to leave down the large staircase from which Frank and I had reached the high-rise. Once on the steps, I booked it downstairs as fast as I could. I heard Frank calling after me as he tried to follow, but I ignored his pleading and made a bee-line to find my dad.

The show had ended and my dad was packing away the last few wires into his bag when I found him just where I'd left him by the sound board. I steadied my breathing before making my presence to him known. "Hey, dad."

"Hey, Hen. I'm almost done packing up here, you ready to go soon?"

I looked out, far across the floor where my eyes met Frank's pleading ones. We stayed for a moment and I apologized silently to him before replying to my dad with my eyes still on Frank. "Yeah, I'm ready."

I was more than ready.

Notes

I'm trying a rather different approach to this story than those of my previous ones. This chapter was actually kind of a bitch to write cause I don't actually know what it's like to be up in the girders of a club ceiling. Also, sorry I'm so late posting; I keep forgetting that this story get updated on Wednesdays and I'm on spring break right now so my schedule is off, and I was also writing a few more chapters to be edited for the next update.
ANYHOO, enjoy the reading, comment whateva you like just be nice, and I'll see you back here next week!!