Guitar Strings

10

Chan
Phase 2 of Plan
The next morning I enacted phase two of Operation Felix. I just had to get him to my house without him being suspicious, which meant getting food to get him out.

"Felix!" I yelled when he finally answered the phone.

"What do you want, Chan" He mumbled. He sounded like crap, not at all like himself.

"Guess where I ammmm!" I said trying to sound excited.

"I don't know." He still sounded monotone and irritated.

"I'm home! Wanna get food?"

"No." He said bluntly.

"C'mon. I know you probably haven't left the house since you got here. Just get lunch with me today, we can go down to the pier. I know there's that waffle place you're always obsessed with."

"No" he said again, still sounding like he couldn't be any less interested. This might be harder then I thought, but I'm determined to make this work. I had to get them back together. I wasn't going to easily give up on that.

"Great! I'll pick you up at one" I said quickly.

"No, Chan, I said I--" He started before I hung up the phone. I can't give him a chance to protest. Phase 2 was officially in progress.

***
"Lina!" I said as I ran up the stairs taking them two a time to the spare room where she was staying.

"What?" She asked leaning on the door frame.

"Here's the plan for today." I said rubbing my palms together. "I'm going to get lunch with Felix, provided he manages to leave the house and get in the car. When we're leaving lunch, I'll text you. The place is like thirty minutes away, then I'll drag him back here, and we can go from there." I said excitedly hopping from one foot to the next.

"You think that's going to work?" She asked raising an eyebrow.

"He doesn't have any reason to doubt me. He's never going to guess that you're here."

Lina sighed loudly and nodded her head "Ok."

I walked up to her and put my hands on her shoulders, "Trust me. I'm going to make this work."

She looked up at me still unsure, but she nodded "I trust you"

***

I showed up at Felix's house exactly at 1:00pm and rang the doorbell, and rang it twice before Felix finally came to the door and crossed his arms.

"I said no" I'd never seen him like this, and trust me, even after a four month tour with countless nights of staying up til four am, he'd never looked like this. There were dark circles under both eyes, and his face was a bit swollen, his clothes were wrinkled and his hair was sticking up all over.

"Did you just wake up? Go change, you look homeless." I said walking into the house. He rolled his eyes at me and trudged back up the stairs and came back down a few minutes later like a slightly less wrinkled homeless person that had possibly brushed his teeth.

"Can we just get this over with?" He said as he walked past me and out the door to my car, and sliding into the passenger side.

"Ok" I mumbled under my breath as I followed him to the car.

***
Felix

I have no idea why Chan seems so eager to get me to lunch, but honestly what else was I going to do today. I had slept til noon, then spent another hour staring my phone hoping Lina was going to message me at some point. She didn't. I came here so I could get away with staying in my room all day and not have seven other guys trying to tell me to 'cheer up'.

"How are you?" Chan asked as he set his menu down and folded his hand on the table.

"Fine"

"You realize I'm trying to be your friend, right? I told you I'd always be there for you. Remember?" he said looking across the table at me. I focused on the menu in front of me. It was the only thing I could focus on besides looking at other people or Chan. "I know part of this is my fault, but it wasn't intentional, Felix."

"It's fine." I said still staring down at the menu. I can't cry anymore, I didn't have anything left in me to cry. I think I was starting to go numb, that was what was best for now. Numbness at least meant I didn't feel sad, I didn't feel anything. I just wanted her back in my arms where she belonged.

"It's not fine. I caused this." he said sitting back in the booth and crossing his arms in front of him. I knew exactly what he was talking about, but I could tell when I glanced up at him that he felt horrible about it, but that didn't change the fact that I let it get to me, and it didn't change the fact that I did kind of partly blame him.

"Why? 'Cause of what you said back on tour? Yeah, thanks for that by the way. You think I was able to think of anything else when I was stuck in quarantine for five days?" I mumbled looking up at him.

"I know. I'm so sorry, Felix. Believe me when I tell you I didn't really mean it that way. I just meant my first love didn't last forever and I got my heart broken. You and Lina are solid. More solid then my relationship ever was."

"Not anymore." I said as the waitress came to table to take our order.

"What can I get ya?" She asked with far too much pep in her voice, it made my brain hurt.

"Nothing for me." I said handing her the menu and sitting back, noticing Chan roll his eyes.

"Two originals, please." I said handing her the menu back before she walked away.

"You extra hungry or something?" I looked at him in annoyance, knowing that he was going to force me to eat.

"You're eating, mate, even if I have to spoon feed you in public." He said winking at me.

***
After lunch Chan dragged me back to his house, something about his parents wanting to see me while I was in town.

Great. Now his parents get to know what a fucking mess I am. Just what I always wanted.

"Is that person really so important? Can't you text them when I get this over with?" I asked, annoyed. My social meter was on empty. I really just wanted to go back home and get back into bed. I wanted to just throw my blankets back over my head and pretend I didn't exist. Was I being a little dramatic? Yes. Did I care? No.

"It's Han. He had a question about something" He mumbled as he texted back and locked his phone. Yeah, I didn't believe for one second that's who he was texting so excitedly.
We got out of the car and Chan dragged me inside, I was starting to feel like a hostage at this point.

"Hi Mrs. Bang" I said bowing as I walked in.

"Felix! Oh we wanted to see you! I can't believe you've been here a week and haven't come to visit!" She said pulling me into a hug. The hug she gave me felt like she was trying to make me feel better. The way she looked at me made me feel like Chan had told her what was going on. Anytime I came home I'd come over at least once for dinner, even if Chan didn't come with me.

"Ah, just haven't felt well." I lied, well it was a half lie. My whole life falling apart counted as not feeling well, right?

"Hey, Felix. Can you run upstairs to the guest room and grab my laptop? I wanted to show you something." Chan asked.

"Then you go get it." I said bluntly, why did I have to go get the stupid thing? The longer he kept coming up with weird stuff for me to do, the more I felt drained and really just wanted to go home.

"I gotta help my mom with someting real quick. Can you?" I rolled my eyes and slowly went up the stairs turning to the left and walking down to the end of the hall. I swung the door open and stopped dead in my tracks.

Lina....