Metronome (FOB FanFic ft. Tyler Joseph)

Chapter 7

It was later that night and I was rubbing down the tables at the coffee shop. I was the only one in there, since my coworker, Jenna, asked me to cover for her while she went to this show the college was having tonight. It was a tradition here at the University, where all the students and some staff members in the music department played a couple of songs for the other students and staff members, either performing solo or in small groups. I even heard a few teachers were participating this year.

Why I wasn't attending? It's not that I didn't want to, I just really wanted to go home. Plus I'd been to the thing before and, although it's amazing, it kind of dragged on after the first couple of acts.

Anyways, there I was, rubbing down tables mindlessly. I wasn't even checking if they were to my boss's liking. My mind was elsewhere as I tried to figure out what Patrick's deal was. I was so out of it that I didn't even realize when the bell above the door rung.

I shrieked in surprise when someone "tasered" me. I turned around and saw Joe standing in front of me, a wide smile stretched across his face.

"Don't do that!" I exclaimed, smacking him on the arm with rag I still had in my hand.

He chuckled, "Sorry, I couldn't resist."

I noticed the two men behind him and I blushed in embarrassment. "So, Joe, who are your friends?"

"Oh, these are my old friends, Pete and Andy," He retorted, looking back at them as his he needed to make sure they were still there, "Pete and Andy, this is my new friend, Evelyn. But she likes to be called Evie."

The stronger-looking of the two with ginger hair stuck his hand out, flashing me a kind smile. "Andy." His voice was higher than I expected.

Nonetheless, I placed my hand in his and smiled, "Evie."

"I'm Pete," The other one introduced himself, slipping his hands into his pockets. He had sleek black hair that covered one of his eyes, which both had dark black circles drawn around them.

I guess handshakes weren't his thing.

"So what are you guys doing here?" I inquired, picking up the bottle of cleaner and walking behind the counter to put the bottle and rag away. The three of them followed me.

"We're here to see Patrick perform," Joe told me.

I looked up over the counter, "Patrick's performing? And you're going to watch him?"

"Well, yeah, that's what friends are for," Andy chimed in.

Patrick has more friends? I thought to myself, snickering, Wow.

"Plus we haven't seen him in a really long time," Pete remarked, shrugging his shoulders, "I kind of miss the little fucker, you know?"

I stood up and brushed the knees of my pants off.

"You should come with us, Ev," Joe tried to persuade me, "It'll be fun. At least ten times more fun than whatever you're doing here all alone." He looked around at the deserted coffee shop.

"Well this is my sad excuse for a job, thank you very much, and I don't have much of a choice," I replied before untying the dark red half-apron from around my waist and shoving it underneath the counter with the rest of them. "Anyways, I was just about to go home. I'm super tired and-"

"Hey, how are those lessons going for you?" Joe interrupted me.

"Lessons?" Pete repeated.

"Yeah, she wanted to learn how to play piano to impress her boyfriend and I referred her to Patrick," The guitarist explained to his friend, causing my cheeks to blush in embarrassment. If there was one thing Joe was good at, it was embarrassing the shit out of me, no matter what the situation was.

"But he's not a lesson teacher," Andy contributed to the conversation, disregarding my embarrassment, "He's not even a teacher. I don't even know what he's doing here."

"You know, I don't know either," The bassist replied, crossing his arms, "I never would've thought, out of all of the things he could've become, he'd become a teacher."

I heaved a sigh and walked into the back room, grabbing my bag and jacket and checking my phone for any text messages or calls - neither of which I had.

I walked back out to find the guys immersed in a conversation about Patrick. I hadn't even answer Joe's question, not that I was complaining. I wasn't sure I was up for sugar coating how harsh Patrick was. I couldn't even think of one nice thing I would say about him.

Okay, that was a lie. If I really thought about it, one nice thing I could say about him was that he wasn't too bad looking. He was actually pretty attractive. And I'll admit, he kind of looked cute with that hat of his. And the suits he wore didn't hurt him, they actually kind of made his ass look-

"Oh my god, what am I talking about?" I muttered to myself, but loud enough for the three of them to hear me.

"What was that?" Andy asked.

"N-Nothing," I stammered, snapping out of my thoughts and adjusting the strap of my bag over my shoulder, "Well, I better close up, guys. It was really nice meeting you two," You two being Pete and Andy, "I hope to see you again soon."

"You sure you don't want to join us, Evie?" Pete questioned.

I nodded my head, "Yeah, like I said, I kind of just want to go home. I've really had a long day and all I want to do is take a shower and go to sleep."

"Okay, your loss," He murmured before brushing past me and out of the coffee shop, Andy following suit and flashing me a kind smile.

Joe was the last one to leave. He pulled me into a quick hug, "I'll see you tomorrow morning, okay?"

"Yeah, see you tomorrow," I replied, stepping out of the embrace and looking up at him.