The library

June 10th 2003

"I turned on my lights and my curtains weren't closed."

I sat cross legged on the floor of Alex's garage, drawing in my sketchbook as Arctic Monkeys played in front of me, acting as background music.

Matt had messaged me and invited me along to what would be one of the boys' last rehearsals before their gig at The Grapes.

I made my way to Alex's house after school with Alex and Matt, the drummer attempting to break the awkwardness between myself and the guitarist which was caused by our falling out the day before.

So there I sat, on the cold concrete floor, drawing another cartoon version of Alex; this time I had imagined him as a greaser from the 1950's with slicked back hair, sunglasses and a cigarette poking out the corner of his mouth. He was equipped with a black leather jacket and a matching pair of skinny jeans. It looked cute.

The song stopped and I looked up at the band who were fiddling with their instruments and preparing them for whatever song was next. I kept my focus on Alex and watched as he bent down and fiddled with his small pedalboard.

Exactly at that moment his big brown eyes looked up at mine. I didn't know what to do so being the socially awkward person I am, I stared straight into those big brown orbs with a small smile. Alex returned an equally small smile as he stood up before turning around and talking to Matt. I looked back down at my sketchbook and began to draw a more realistic sketch of Alex while still managing to make it look somewhat cartoonish.

"That's cool."

I slammed my sketchbook shut and looked up to see Alex standing above me with a smile.

"I liked the one that looked like Elvis." Alex said and sat down next to me, crossing his legs. I slowly felt my cheeks go red as I remained silent.

"Can you show me them again?"

"Haven't you got more songs to rehearse?" I said, a little more harsh than I had intended on it sounding.

Alex frowned at this. "We finished our set."

I nodded and stood up with my sketchbook.

"Where are you going?" Alex looked up at me confused.

"Home." I shrugged as I looked down at him.

Matt, Andy and Jamie shuffled to the garage door. "We'll see you later then Al." Matt said with a smile. Jamie grinned at me and winked.

"We'll see you 'round Al." Andy smirked. No more than a few seconds later, me and Alex were left alone in the messy makeshift rehearsal space with Matt's drums taking up a good half off the room.

"Why you going 'ome?"

I turned around and looked at Alex on the floor. He reminded me of a little lost schoolboy as he looked up at me with those big brown eyes.

"Your rehearsal's finished," I shrugged, "there's not much point in me still being here."

"Yes there is. We can chill n' that. I wanna see your drawings. You're really good." Alex cracked a half smile that pushed up the right side of his mouth.

"I thought you were annoyed at me." I said coldly and shrugged.

Alex kept quiet and looked around. I gave in with a loud sigh and dropped my bag on the floor before sitting next to him and opening the sketchbook in my lap. He glanced at all my different drawings ranging from crowded scribbles to detailed flowers to cityscapes and finally to doodles of him.

"Is that meant to be me?" He pointed at the cartoon drawing of himself and looked at me with a glint in his eye. I simply nodded and allowed him to carry on taking it all in. "This is the one I saw earlier." Alex nodded as he looked over the drawing of him as a greaser from the 50's.

A small smile tugged at my lips and a blush came to my cheeks.

Alex reached the end of everything I had done so far in the book and closed it, laying it on my lap. I was still wearing school uniform, a black skirt with a white shirt tucked into it while Alex had changed into some black jeans and a white and blue striped muscle fit shirt which was weird because he didn't have much muscle on him. This thought made me giggle quietly.

"What's funny?" Alex smiled at me unknowingly. I couldn't give him an answer and instead started laughing harder as I pointed at him. Alex furrowed his eyebrows together. "What?" He demanded. When I didn't answer him again, Alex decided to take matters into his own hands. He pushed me down onto the floor and tickled me. My sides, my armpits, my stomach, my knees: no part of my body was left untouched.

"You gonna tell me now or what?" Alex grinned down at me as he straddled my waist. I giggled and shook my head. Alex sighed and tickled my sides once more until we were both gasping for air due to laughing too much. As I recovered, I watched Alex who was still on top of me and he watched me. It stayed like this, in silence, for a few seconds until I spoke up.

"This is a pretty suggestive position to be potentially caught in." I said quietly.

Alex nodded and quickly jumped up from me before holding out a hand to me, pulling me to my feet. I put my book in my bag and slung it over my right shoulder before standing to face Alex. We were stood very close together.

"Sorry." I spoke first.

"For what?"

"For yesterday."

"It's fine. Honestly, it's fine. I know people say 'it's fine' when in actual fact it's not fine a lot of the time so I just wanna make it cl-"

"Alex...you're waffling again."

"Sorry, sorry." He said quickly and looked away. I rolled my eyes and smiled. Getting up on my tip toes, I cupped Alex's face softly and kissed his cheek, pulling away after a couple seconds and smiling at him.

"You played great today. You're gonna be brilliant on Friday." I smiled softly and walked to the garage door, leaving without another word.