Fruit Snacks

13- Practice

A/N- Since this story hit 4K, Apartment hit 15K, Live Twice is almost to 12K, and I'm just feeling really generous, here's a surprise update!! Song for the day is Puppy Love by This Wild Life

I was driving to Tyler's house as I hummed the tune of his song Air Catcher, my personal favorite so far. We were having our first official practice, and I'm honestly a little bit nervous.

Admitting out loud that I was crushing on Tyler a bit made it seem that much more real and that much more terrifying. The closer I got to his house, the more nervous I got.

When I got there, I turned off my car and just sat there for a few moments taking deep breaths. Ok Josh, you can do this. Just act normal.

Or as normal as you can act.

I got out of the car and walked up his driveway and noticed there was only one car in the driveway; last time I was here there were three cars. Oh God, does that mean we're here by ourselves? Stop being weird Josh, this is ok! It doesn't change things!

I really need to stop talking to myself...before I realized I was doing it, I was knocking on Tyler's front door and patiently waiting for him to come open it.

When he opened the door, it took everything I had to not coo at how adorable he looked. His eyes were sleepy and his hair was sticking up in random directions. He was wearing a pair of worn out jeans and a plain black t-shirt.

"Hey sorry, I accidentally fell asleep on the couch. Come on in," he said, his voice was thick with sleep and I thought it sounded adorable. I really have it bad...

He stood aside so I could walk in and shut the door behind me. Walking slightly ahead of me, he led me into the kitchen.

"Do you want a water bottle or something before we go downstairs?" he asked through a yawn.

He stretched his arms above his head causing his shirt to rise up a bit and give me a quick glimpse of his v line. Oh sweet Jesus I can't do this I'm going to mess things up so bad. I realized I had yet to answer Tyler.

"Oh, um yeah sure that'd be great. Thanks," I cringed a bit because I knew I sounded a little awkward. Hopefully he'd just blame it on me being uncomfortable in a new place or something.

He nodded his head and opened up the fridge to pull out two water bottles before leading me over to a small set of stairs that led to the basement.

As we descended, I couldn't help but notice all the pictures and crafts that were obviously made by Tyler and his siblings when they were younger hung on either side of the stair well.

"Sorry about those, my mom is very nostalgic," he chuckled as we reached the bottom.

"Nah, it's cute," I responded, smiling slightly as I saw a picture of Tyler as a toddler; even as a kid he was freaking adorable.

I walked over to my drum set and took a seat on the small stool. I grabbed the sticks off of the snare drum where I'd left them last and stretched out my arms and wrists a bit.

"So, which song do you want to do first?" I asked. He thought for a moment as he turned on his keyboard before giving me an answer.

"Um, let's go with Air Catcher. So, did you have any ideas?"

We began to discuss what I had thought of in the few days I'd listened to the song, and what Tyler was originally imagining when he wrote the song. I tried out different patterns and combinations, trying to mesh the two ideas together until we finally found a way to do it that we both liked and thought fit really well into the song.

We began to try to play it, and slowly we were able to get used to one another's rhythm and work together. We spent over an hour on that one song, making small changes here and there and coming up with new ideas that were better than the previous ones.

Eventually we got the song just how we liked it. We played it all the way through together and when we finished, I was out of breath and we were both smiling from ear to ear. We were actually able to work together to create something.

And it wasn't a total disaster in the process.

We looked at eachother for a moment before cheering. I jumped up from my stool and Tyler came around and pulled me into a big hug, which of course returned.

But then, we paused. We realized what we were doing. We quickly let eachother go and took a couple steps away from eachother, awkwardly clearing our throats and I scratched the back of my neck.

"Um, good job man," I said refusing to meet his gaze.

"Uh, yeah you too it sounded great. Um, I guess that's enough for today, I'm wiped so I'm sure you are too. Um, same time tomorrow? We can work on Friend, Please."

"Yeah, that sounds good. So, um, yeah I'll see you tomorrow then." I said as I picked my hat up that had been knocked off my head when I jumped up.

"Yeah, see you. Oh wait, I'll walk you out." Tyler said.

We walked up his stairs together in an awkward silence. When we reached the front door I gave him a slight nod, which he returned before I walked out the door. I quickly walked down the driveway and hopped into my truck.

To make matters worse, when I tried to hit my head on the steering wheel, I accidentally hit the car horn instead. I felt a blush cover my face as I quickly did up my seat belt and pulled out of that driveway as fast as I could. Hopefully something like that doesn't happen again tomorrow.

I groaned. Oh God why did I agree to see him again tomorrow?