But Who Would You Live For?

Taco Bell

Tyler:

Josh was nervous.

He hadn't touched his food at all. He just kept staring at me when he didn't think I was looking (I was always secretly looking), and sipping his drink.

I wanted to tell him that there was nothing to be nervous about. I was told that I was a pretty cool guy once you got to know me. Or maybe he wasn't only nervous about having dinner with a stranger in Taco Bell. Maybe David wasn't teasing when he said he was a fan of ours. I don't remember ever seeing him before though.

He didn't seem like a friend of David's. David was a pretty rough looking guy, no offense. He was a little short and cubby. His face always looked a little messy and his beard was never trimmed neatly. He was always wearing all black. From his leather jacket to his biker boots. Josh was nothing like that. Josh was clean cut. His dark hair was combed to the side. His face was free of any manly facial hair. He was even wearing a plaid button up, perfectly ironed.

"Are you going to eat that?" I motioned to his untouched tacos.

"Oh, um yeah." He lifted it up. "Unless y-you wanted it."

I didn't. I still had some of my food in front of me. But I did want to mess with him a little. "I kind of wanted to taste it." I trailed off.

"Oh, Um okay." He held it out towards me. "Here."

Instead of taking it from him, I sat my hands in my lap. Leaning across the table to bite it. Josh's eyes widened and I laughed. Trying to disguise it as a cough. He timidly sat the taco back on the tray.

"Thanks." I sipped my drink to wash it down. "That was delicious."

"Y-You can have it if you want."

"Don't you want it?"

"I'm not hungry."

"But I thought you said you were."

His eyes widened again when he realized the mistake. "I-I was." He picked the taco up again. "I am. See." He bit it.

I couldn't help it. I laughed. A few droplets of my soda flew from my lips. I covered my mouth with my hand. Trying to silence my laughs. He just looked so uncomfortable, I couldn't help it.

"Josh, relax dude." I managed to say through the laughing fit. "I'm just messing with you."

"You are?"

"Yeah." I used one of the napkins to wipe the moisture from my eyes. "You need to relax."

"Relax?"

"Yeah. Like be cool. We're just two normal guys having delicious tacos. I'm just a person. You're just a person."

"You're just a person?"

"Of course." I balled the napkin up in my hand and sat it on the table.

"No." He shook his head and I frowned. What did that mean? "Not when you sing. Y-You're not a person. Not a regular person. You're so much more than that. So much bigger than that."

Any response I would have had, stuck in my throat. No one had ever said anything like that to me. Of course I'd been complimented on my voice but never to that extreme. And never so genuinely. He wasn't kidding. I could tell by the intense way he was staring into my face. Like he was looking for some sign that I wasn't just like everybody else. Poor Josh, he was going to be so disappointed when he found out how plain I really was.

"Dude that is so sick." The obnoxious remark broke through the veil Josh's words put us in.

My head turned towards the door where a group of teenage boys were rushing out. Most of them had long, shaggy hair, Some form of beanie or baseball hat, shorts and sneakers. Three of them were holding skateboards. One of them was still riding his.

"Kyle, is fucking sick dude." The tallest one nodded slowly.

"The sickest dude to ever be like sick ever." The last one out the door agreed.

"Kyle is so sick." I mocked their slow drawl once they were gone.

Josh laughed. "The sickest dude ever!"

"Like super duper sickly sick." I continued, wanting Josh to continue laughing. He wasn't nervous when he laughed.

"That dude is sick as frick."

"Sick as frick?" I repeated, letting myself join him in laughter. "I like that."

"Yeah?" He pinched at the taco in front of him. Looking down at his hands as he did. Shy again. Darn!

"Yeah it was really funny."

"I just thought of it." He shrugged.

"Hey." I tapped my finger against the table to get his attention. He tilted his head up slightly to look at me. "Thank you for what you said. About my voice." The left side of my mouth quirked up into the ghost of a smile. "I think it may be the nicest thing anyone has said to me. Ever."

"Well, it was true." He shrugged again. As if what he said wasn't a big deal. As if it wasn't something I was going to think about for the rest of the night. For the rest of my life. "Your words. Your voice. It changed me and I was only there for about two minutes. Imagine what you could do in hours. Days. Years." He brought his cup to his lips. Biting the straw but not drinking anything from it. "You're going to change the world, Tyler."

I grinned. Showing my full set of teeth, which was rare for me. "I like you, Josh."

"Y-You do?" He sat the cup down. His thin eyes looking at me in earnest.

"Yeah. Even more than I like tacos." I grabbed his half finished toco. Biting it again. "And I love tacos."

"Me too." He copied my actions with his untouched one. "I like you too."

"This is going to be the start of a beautiful friendship."

"Sick."