The Extraordinary Friday Night

Sarawat's POV

It's an ordinary Friday night. Sarawat and his fellow band members of CTRL+S are winding down with a few drinks at a local pub after a particularly long jam session. They have a battle of the bands' competition coming up, and between working their everyday careers and fitting practice sessions into every spare minute in between to prepare for it, they've been pushing themselves harder than normal. The pub is rowdy, which is to be expected on a Friday night. The place is full of young working adults and local university students who are enjoying the beginning of the weekend with friends, parties and mirth.

The atmosphere is cheerful and warm, with golden lights, friendly banter, clinking glasses, and twinkling laughter bounding through the place. He lazily sips his beer. As much as he enjoys hanging around his bandmates, he's strung out and he's wondering how soon he can excuse himself for some much needed sleep.

Just as he gets ready to make excuses, an unfamiliar face approaches their table. Looking over, he sees Earn's face light up and she stands to greet the new face. Earn introduces her to everyone as her girlfriend, Pear. Earn's been talking about her for a few months now. It's a good thing. Earn's heart had been crushed towards the end of their university days, and this is the first time she's gotten this excited about someone since then.

Sarawat knows it'll be rude to leave now. Considering it's been so long since Earn has shown this kind of enthusiasm for a relationship, he wants to be sure to show he's supportive. Swallowing his exhaustion back to show support for his fellow bandmate, he attempts to make polite conversation before slowly lapsing back into his trademark silence and internal musings.

He's always been this way. He truly cares about the people he spends time with. They share similar interests and hobbies and can get caught up in conversations here and there, but he's just naturally a more quiet and introverted person. People always assume he's arrogant or stoic, but in reality, he's just awkward and finds more comfort in smaller crowds or just being alone.

That's probably why the very few relationship attempts he's made over the years have never worked out very well, either. He's a normal, healthy 28-year-old male, full of hormones and a right arm that's slightly more muscular than his left, for obvious reasons. He'd even been considered a university heartthrob back in his school days with his naturally cool vibe, guitar talent, and being a formidable soccer player. Being the epitome of tall, dark, and handsome didn't hurt, either. Or help, depending on how he looks at it.

He's had a plethora of offers, invitations, and confessions, sometimes overwhelming him in just how many he's received over the years, but most of them were just unappreciated and uncomfortable. While he's taken a couple of offers over time; he's always found people's attraction to him being based solely on his looks and nothing deeper to be off-putting and bruising to his ego. The real reason why he rarely dates and his handful of attempts at a relationship never lasted more than a month or two is simply no one has ever wanted him for him. They never wanted anything deeper than the physical aspect of the relationship. None of them ever cared to know him past his face. There had to be more to him than just a handsome face, right?

As his inner musings take a dark turn, they're interrupted by a twinkling, warm laugh that carries over the din of the crowd. The warmth and musical quality of the sound does something to him. He doesn't know how to explain it, it's just the sound is warm and his tummy flutters with it. It reminds him of wind chimes and warm afternoons; Christmas and nostalgia, fireplaces and fleece blankets. It sounds like home, and he looks towards the source with interest.

His eyes widen slightly as they land on the most bewitching face he's ever seen. His breath hitches and the air of the room changes its flow as his pupils dilate at the sight of the ethereal man in front of him. Man? That's new. But he can't deny the strong surge of attraction he feels towards the alluring man, and he can't remember ever having felt an attraction even close to this strong towards the few women he's dated over the years either, so maybe this realization was just a matter of time.