Turns out Miles is pretty cool, he’s into the good stuff…by good stuff I mean the stuff my dad and I like. Then he started talking about Mindless Self Indulgence, and the huge crush he had on the bassist. Things got uncomfortable.
“But dude, she’s so badass!” He exclaimed for the hundredth time, and I took more than a generous lungful of smoke and hummed in agreement, wishing he’d shut up.
“Yeah, it’s a cool band,” I bleakly agreed, as I twirled a purple chunk of hair around my finger.
“But no! Lyn-z! How could you not love her?!” Oh if he only knew…“She pulled matches from her fucking pigtails and struck them on her fucking guitar and breathed fire!” He waved his hands wildly in the air, as if I didn’t already get his point.
“She’s pretty cool.” I nodded, exhaling smoke through my nostrils, counting the stars that had fought their way through the light pollution.
“But dude! You don’t even know! I’ve loved her since forever, since I could understand music, like she’s been my crush for like, ever! Dude, you say you know them, but I don’t know how you can know them, and not be lesbian for her.” He inspected me like I could possibly be an alien, and honestly this is the first time around him that I felt uncomfortable and ready to break his face. “You kind of look like her,” he said offhandedly, not to me…just one of those thoughts that derailed off the thought-track, and shoot out of your mouth. I felt tears prick at my eyes, but at the same time, there was a bout of maniacal laughter boiling within me. Both wanted to spill. I opted out of either option and settled for stubbing my cigarette on his leather jacket.
“Hey man!” He flinched and swatted at his shoulder, spreading the ash around as he frantically rubbed at the burn mark that melted itself into dead cow skin. “Dude this is my Dad’s! Do you have anger issues or something?!”
“First of all, unless the girl is lesbian you don’t fucking rave about how ‘sexy’ another woman is. Like if this were a date you’d be screwed, and not in the way you’d want to be. Second, you still wear your Dad’s clothes? What are you? Sixteen?! Third, I do not have anger issues, the first time you saw me angry was completely warranted, Asshole wasn’t backing off though I asked him to, and then he started to rub his boner on me. What would you have done? And this time, you’re being an asshole.” I finished, glowering at him as I awaited his response. He just rubbed his shoulder thoughtfully and guiltily bit his lip.
“First of all, sorry, I’m stupid. Second, I don’t see a problem wearing my dad’s clothes, I like them. We like the same bands, so I borrow his band shirts time to time whenever I see him, and I’m actually eighteen. Third, I’m sorry.” He ducked his head, I carefully looked him up and down and decided he seemed sincere enough, so I nodded and then I let the silence ensue. It wasn’t awkward…just stretched out like a hammock, and we were just two people lying back on it. Suddenly he perked up and flipped the hair dramatically out of his face, so I could finally see his eyes. How smart of me…hanging with a stranger, and I haven’t even seen his eyes, completely. In my opinion, if you know the person’s name but haven’t seen their eyes, they’re still practically a stranger. So I took the time to look into his eyes, they were like pools of hazel; open and honest. He also had really nice eyebrows, I never thought much about eyebrows but I think his could be considered “perfect,” except for the fact they’re furrowed.
“Wait…so, is this a date?” I blanched at his out of place question.
“Dude!—,” I moved away from him, and he cut me off.
“Shitshitshit that sounded weird!” I scoffed in agreement, “but I-I mean earlier you said, ‘if this were a date—.”
“If!” I stressed.
“O-okay, sorry, sorry I’m being a creep.” I laughed, not really at him, just at something else about this that the whiskey found funny. He just looked at me. “What?”
“You’re a weeeirdooo,” I sang.
“What the Hell am I doing here?!” He caught on.
“You don’t belong here,” I finished for him, and one more laugh escaped him before we lapsed into silence once again. He had honest eyes, and he liked the same music as me, and he joined in on the moment I burst into song. “You’re okay,” I affirmed for him.
“Oh, uh…good,” he laughed nervously, taking another drag from his death stick.
“Except for the fact I wasted a cigarette on you,” I stated matter-of-factly.
“Well that’s your fault, and I wasn’t even talking about her legs, which I could do, I thought girls dig it when you talk about personality.” He rambled, and I tuned him out paying more attention to the ants that hurried along the cracks in the pavement, he noticed and went silent again. “We could always share…?” He breached the silence, dragging my attention back to him. I looked at him quizzically before he handed the cigarette to me, and I didn’t take it so I left him awkwardly hanging.
“Ew, you probably have cooties.” I made a face.
“What are you? Five?”
“21, idiot,” I scoffed. The cigarette dangled loosely from his middle and index finger, discarding little sprinkles of ash between us as it slowly burned. As enticing as it seemed, I still refused it. “My Mom warned me about boys with cigarettes and cooties. What about yours?” I asked. A thin trail of smoke led to his mouth as he took another drag.
“Well, she told my sisters that all boys have cooties, so that means my dad must’ve and she was married to him and he had cigarettes, I think my dad’s alright, and he raised me.” He threw out there along with the last of his cigarette, which he stamped out as he stood himself up.
I don’t know what compelled me to ask, I shouldn’t pry too much. Maybe it was the way he suddenly gave up on his cigarette, or the fact that he decided right then was the end of conversation. Something in his eyes went far off as well that queued my next question.
“And your mom didn’t?” I asked bluntly.
“What…?” Confusion swept through his dark hazel eyes, his lips parted as if he couldn’t look more confused.
“You’re implying that your mom didn’t raise you…” I explained to him carefully, also making sure I understood him correctly. His eyes widened before he tilted his head to the pavement as if he were unrolling his lengthy sigh down the sidewalk.
“Well…she did. My parents divorced when I was about 5, and it was really angry at first, and my mom wanted custody and my dad was unwilling to take part.” Miles scuffed his feet at a crack in the pavement, hands stuffed deep into jacket pockets. My confusion must’ve radiated, because without looking at me he continued.
“For a good couple weeks, mom hated him, it was horrible and it was terrifying, and then one night she left us with Gran and in the morning Mom and Dad were suddenly best friends again. There was no trial for custody; they were just two friends raising their three kids, and we became a different kind of family, and we were happy. Of course, as I grew older I realized a lot of divorces didn’t happen that way and I asked my dad ‘why?’” He paused for a moment. “Oh my God, that sounded terrible! I love my mom and dad, and of course during that time it was hard for all of us, but I mean I learned different things from both of them.” Miles stopped and bit his lip, suddenly aware that he was rambling, and went back to hiding behind his hair again.
“Why?” I breathed out softly, gently nudging him forward to continue talking. Miles took a deep breath and ran his fingers through his hair exasperatingly.
“So…for example: two friends are in a band together that they both truly love, and they play in it with all their best friends, they fall in love; but then, there’s a fallout between the two romantically involved friends, and they start to argue but then they realize that they love the band more than they can ever hate each other. So they go back to rebuilding a platonic relationship, rather than tearing every single thing down with them.” He finished with lots of nervous hand gestures then went back to nervously bouncing on the balls of his feet. I carefully pieced together what he was trying to say, amused at the situation he described for some odd reason. I decided to keep my smirk in the back of my mind, he almost made it all sound complicated.
“So, basically…why tear down the whole house when all it needs is some remodeling…?” I questioned slowly. Miles froze, looking slightly ridiculous with only one saucer-sized eye visible beneath his messy hair.
“EXACTLY!” He nearly shouted. He threw his hands up to the sky and spun around. “I spent FOREVER exacting a decent analogy, and you come in and fucking figure it out in seconds?!?!” He kneeled down in front of me on one knee. “Bandit. Will you be my friend?”
The sudden sincerity in his eyes made me do a double-take. They were so open.
“First, I get it from my dad and second…uh yeah, friends… I guess.” I stuck out my hand to shake his, as if we were sealing a deal.
“You guess?” He raised an eyebrow.
“Well yeah…we talked about music, smoked together, and somehow got talking about your personal family shit, and well you even burst into ‘kind-of-song’ with me, and even though that other than that stuff I don’t know a lot about you and you don’t know me, but if my definition of ‘friends’ is the same as yours, we could be.” There was something playful that briefly flashed behind his eyes and it pulled his lips into a one-second smirk. “What…?”
“Is speaking all your thoughts out like that something you only do when you’re ‘tipsy’?” He asked, but not like it was a bad thing, and it actually made me think.
“Well…I’ve only been tipsy three times counting tonight…and I was in my apartment alone the first two times.” I looked down at my nails, and chipped away at the black paint, thinking about how much I can say. “Um, actually I try to stay away from alcohol, I felt really bad about doing that those first two times, and tomorrow I’ll probably hate myself for doing this.” I trailed off, suddenly interested in a hole that was forming on one of the knees of my jeans.
“Why?” Miles asked thoughtfully, I could feel eyes speculating upon whatever emotions that were poking around on my face. I didn’t look at him.
“It’s not something I feel comfortable sharing right now,” I confessed, maybe it was a bit unfair considering that he told me about some of his personal life, but really…just because I was tipsy doesn’t mean I have to fully confide in the first nice guy that talks to me about bands and all that. A few more seconds of silence, and him observing the invisible barrier I was setting over myself, and then he spoke.
“It’s okay. This is the first time we met, if you want to be friends then you can tell me more stuff later on…but only if you want to of course.” I looked up, surprised he wasn’t set on prying, and he had a soft, and almost nervous smile on his lips that was set slightly to the side.
“Maybe I will…”
And I meant it.

Notes

Whoooo SECOND CHAPTER!!!!
Now I'm gonna work on the third one...
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