"I swear, I didn't mean anything that I said earlier. I was just hurt and she told us she was on our side so I didn't know who to believe and-"
"Dan, it's fine. I've heard enough, I believe you." I smiled a small, reassuring smile and he let out a small sigh of relief. "I won't tell her anything and nothing will happen between us, okay? They won't know anything about us so nothing can get in between us."
He nodded slightly before he practically tackled me, wrapping his arms tightly around my waist. I laughed, laying my head against a pillow that was on the couch since I was now pressed against it thanks to Dan. He pulled back from the hug after about a minute and looked down at me with a massive grin, "so we're all good now, I'm guessing?"
I reached a hand up to brush some of the strands of hair that had fallen in his face to the side, smiling at the sight of his happiness. "Yes, we're all good now. You have nothing to worry about because everything's going to be alright between us from now on. Janna, management, and whoever else tries to get in between us won't be able to. I promise."
Before Dan could speak, we heard a loud whistle and I looked over to see a couple of the boys laughing and whispering things to one another. One of them eventually shouted out "get a room you two" which caused the group of them to start laughing even harder.
Dan sat up quickly, his cheeks burning red with embarrassment and Woody spoke up, "We're only joking, Dan. Now do you two want to go out and meet fans with us? Or, I suppose we don't have to leave right away so you can come out whenever you feel like it if you're still talking things out."
Dan stood up, probably to go follow the others outside but I grabbed ahold of his arm before he could do so. "Let's go out later, I want to do something with you right now."
He raised his eyebrows questionably but I ignored it. I stood up and took his hand so I could quickly lead him out the backdoor into an alleyway. "Are you going to tell me where you're taking me?"
"Nope," I smiled as we walked down the alley, lacing our fingers together, "I'll give you a hint though. We're going to go on something that rhymes with late."
Even though it was dark on the walk to the place except for the occasional street light, I could see his face brightening in excitement. "Aren't you worried about somebody seeing us there? Or what if somebody sees us holding hands? I feel so rebellious right now."
"Hm.. I guess none of those thoughts really occurred to me. I don't really care about what anyone thinks though, I bet most of our fans are out with the others anyway," I stopped talking for a moment to open up the door to a small ice cream parlor, "plus, it doesn't really look like this place has a whole lot of business at this time of night."
Dan nodded slowly as he looked around the room, taking in his surroundings. There wasn't much to look at, the palor was pretty small and the walls were painted white. At each of the four booths, there was a picture of what the city used to look like around 75 years ago to give the customers something to look at. "I know this isn't the ideal first date, but we still have to be somewhat careful and I've heard that they have really good ice cream here too. I promise that someday I'll take-"
He cut me off with a kiss, only pulling back slightly to mumble, "it's perfect," against my lips.
I led him over to the counter where a teenage looking girl was waiting to take our orders. She smiled once we stepped closer and pulled out a notebook to write the orders down, "Hi, I'd like a.. hmm," I glanced up at the menu above, noticing how there wasn't that much to choose from, it was mainly just basic things, "a twist ice cream cone, please."
She quickly wrote it down and glanced over to Dan to see what he wanted. "I'll just have the same thing."
"Alright, your total is $3.50," she said cheerfully and I quickly pulled out my wallet to pay for it before Dan could. I handed her the exact amount of money and she put it in the cash register. "You know, we never really have celebrities visit this place."
Dan looked over at me with wide eyes and I just laughed nervously, "we're not celebrities. I'm guessing you think we look like those two members of Bastille, right? We get that all the time." I glanced back over to Dan who had his hand on his face, facepalming so I dropped my voice to a whisper so only he could hear, "hey, I'm trying."
The girl laughed while putting ice cream in the two cones, shaking her head. "I'm not stupid, you know. I would've been at your concert tonight if I didn't have to work." She handed us the two cones then looked down at the hand I was holding. "Your secret is safe with me by the way. I've always thought it'd be cute."
"Thank you," Dan mumbled with a smile, a small hint of nervousness showing through in his voice before he turned to look back at me. "Did you want to stay here for a bit or go back to where everyone else is?"
"There's a little room in the back where all the workers can hang out on break or while they're waiting for business. You guys could totally stay back there in case a fan comes in or something like that," she mentioned and opened up a door to show the room to us.
I glanced over at Dan again who nodded, "yeah, we'll stay back there. Thank you so much for all of this, it truly means a lot."
"Don't mention it," she shot us a friendly smile then led us into the little room. There was a couple of chairs, a table, and a magazine rack filled with outdated magazines. "Do you mind if I stay back here with you guys since it doesn't look like anyone's going to come for a while? If you don't want me to, I'll go back out there and leave you alone."
"No, no. We don't mind at all." Dan answered and the three of us sat down. "What's your name? I'm Dan and this," he pointed to me, "is Kyle if you didn't know."
"I knew. My name's Emma. It's lovely to meet you both." She glanced around the room and Dan and I both started to eat our ice cream. "So, I have to ask, how long has things been like this between you two? Don't you have a girlfriend too, Kyle? Does she not know about you two?"
"Janna? She's a fake girlfriend. It's a long story but basically, management doesn't approve of Dan and I so we have to keep things a secret," I sighed before continuing on, "Janna's the devil in disquise."
Emma frowned, she must not have been expecting that kind of answer. "I'm so sorry, guys. Well, if it makes you feel any better, I'm completely on your side and those assholes who don't approve shouldn't stop you from being together."
Assholes. The fact that a fan thought the same thing we did made a smile form on my face.
