CHOICES (Matty Healy fanfiction)

Chapter Two

"Well fuck me, this is nice!" Adam grinned, staring up at the townhouse building in front of us.

"Stop gawking, it'll be obvious that we're not supposed to be here," George snapped, "There's Anna, come on,"

We followed him towards the steps leading up to the front door of the building. There stood Anna; George's current fling. She was very pretty, and definitely out of George's league. She was tall, blonde, skinny, tanned and smiley in a way that made you constantly question whether she was genuinely happy to see you or whether the whole thing was a facade.

"Hi boys!" She beamed at us. "Just follow me through,"

She turned sharply on the heels of her high-top converse and marched into the building. We followed her down a hall and up a short flight of stairs. Anna stopped abruptly outside a dark, mahogany door with a sign reading "Practise Room 1" and knocked on it sharply.

After a few seconds of waiting, the door was flung open and a girl stepped out and closed it behind her. She had the same build as Anna but that was where the similarities ended. This girl was pale but in a sparkly, glowing way. Her hair was a short, messy black bob that stopped dramatically at her chin. Her eyes were an unusual deep shade of green and were encased by black eye makeup. She had sharp cheekbones and rosebud lips and was dressed in a vintage cream summer dress, black fishnets with various holes in them and a well-worn pair of dr martens. She was fucking incredible.

"This is Rach, she works at the studio, she'll be mixing for you," Anna announced.

"I'm really sorry guys but the other band are still recording," she said, looking at each of us in the eye in turn. I like to think she held my gaze for longer than the others but that's probably not true.

"Shall we just come back another time then?" Adam said, sounding disheartened.

"Oh no, not at all! Just come in, you can watch them record and get a feel for the place!" Our faces must've shown that we weren't convinced by this, because Rach rolled her eyes, pushed the door open and held her arm out for us to enter.

The studio was decked out in rich brown wood and everything looked expensive as fuck. As the other boys fumbled around for a place to put their stuff, I noticed a balcony through one of the doors and quickly headed towards it, I was dying for a cig.

As I lit my fag, I rested my arms against the balcony and stared out over the back-gardens of the surrounding London townhouses and was in the middle of thinking about how this city has taken every penny I own when I was interrupted by the door opening behind me.

"Not very talkative, are you?" Rach said, lowering herself into one of the metal chairs set out on the balcony.

"We can't all be as warm and welcoming as you," I smiled, sitting down in the chair opposite her. I opened my packet of cigs to offer her one but she shook her head and instead produced a pouch of tobacco from the pocket of her leather jacket and began rolling herself a fag. She lit it with a cheap turquoise lighter and took a drag, before lowering a pair of Ray-bans onto her face.

"Who said I'm warm and welcoming? I'm just doing my job," she wasn't looking at me as she said this, so I stared at the table instead.

"Working at a studio is a pretty fucking cool job I must say," I replied, instantly cringing at the pleading nature of my comment.

"I'm just an assistant. It is what it is. It's not long-term." She tapped her cigarette ash out as if to re-iterate her point.

"Long-term is a scary word. I don't want to think about long-term,"

"Ok, what's short term for you then? This band?" She asked, this time she was looking directly at me.

"I guess so. There's nothing else out there for me but music,"

"Yes there is. Nobody is assigned to just one thing. If you lost your ability to play an instrument right now, you'd find something else to do. Sure it'd be boring as fuck, but you'd still find something," she ashed her cig again and continued to look at me. I was silent.

"What's your name?" She asked.

"Matty. Matty Healy,"

"Have I offended you Matty?" She took a final drag of her cigarette before ashing it on the table.

"No not at all, I like a pessimist,"

We smiled at each other for a second until she stood up and walked towards the door.

"Are you coming in?" She asked.

I nodded and followed her, not because I wanted to go back into the studio but because I wanted to be near her. She made me fucking nervous and I liked it.