Ask Me Anything

Chapter 23 - The Very Good Day

It's 10:47 exactly and I'm sitting in my car, parallel parked about 2 shops down from the café. My heart is practically beating out of my chest. I keep straining to look up and down the block to see if I can spot her.

This is it. Will she recognize me from the band or not? I know I look totally different when I'm not on stage so most people don't recognize me, but she is definitely not most people. The video of me on YouTube was taken from the back of the club, so even though she's watched it, it's still next to impossible to see me clearly since the room was so dark. In my mind, the best case scenario is that she won't recognize me. With any luck, our texting connection will translate over to real life as will my grand YouTube romantic gesture. Hopefully that will be enough so when I tell her about the band it won't matter. I can do this.

I look up, and there she is walking down the sidewalk to the café. I can't get over how beautiful she is. It's so hard to wrap my mind around the fact that she is the girl on the other side of those texts. A wave of sorrow washes over me as I watch her enter the cafe. Whatever happens when we meet, everything we've had up to this point is gone. For better or worse, it won't ever be the same once I walk through that door. This realization absolutely guts me. These past two weeks woke me up and made me feel alive again and I don't want to lose that. I had been a ghost among the living until I saw her for the first time.

10:55. It was time. I open my car door and step outside into the sunshine. Closing the door, I step up on the sidewalk and slowly start taking steps, feeling like I'm walking through molasses. I want so badly to hang on to what I have now that my mind briefly tries to convince me to turn around and walk away from the whole thing. But that wasn't an option. The idea of leaving her in there waiting was unthinkable, so I continue forward.

I stop at the glass café door and wrap my fingers around the handle. My eyes immediately find her before I can even open it. She is sitting at a table in front by the window. I watch as she reaches up with her left hand and tucks a stray bit of her hair behind her ear. Her phone is on the table in front of her and she's scrolling slowly as she reads. I haven't been this close to her since that day in the record store. One last deep breath as I push the door open.

I step in and she immediately looks up with wide, hopeful eyes. When I give her a grin and take a few more tentative steps toward her table, a look of understanding washes over her and a smile spreads across her face. I pull out the chair across from her out and sit down, my senses almost too overwhelmed to keep my eyes on her. Her hair looks so shiny and soft, I have to make a conscious effort not to reach out and touch it. I can smell that same intoxicating scent I remember from that first day. How is it possible that she feels familiar?

"Hi," I say, overwhelmed by my own awkwardness.

We lock eyes, and both try and fail to not break out in a flood of nervous laughter. I can't help but think about how absurd this whole thing is, us, sitting across from each other, not talking, but laughing.

Once our giggles die down, she gifts me with the most radiant smile I've ever seen. Her eyes are lit up and her cheeks are pink and flushed from laughter.

"So, mystery admirer, do I finally get to know your name?" she says with a smile.

"James," I answered. "My name is James."

"James," she repeated with a thoughtful look on her face. "I like that. It sounds right. Well, James, I have a confession to make."

I raise an eyebrow at her as she takes a deep breath and wait for her to continue.

"I was really scared that you wouldn't show up," she says nervously. "My cousin Molly is camped out in the bookstore next door. That way if you were a no-show or a weirdo she would be there to console me."