Dedication Takes a Lifetime (Jalex boyxboy)

xii. In The Chill Of Your Stare I Am Painfully Lost

“So Alex, when do you plan on actually stepping foot into the studio for more than five minutes and actually recording something?” Rian asked me as he joined me on the couch. I had my guitar resting on my hands which I was practicing in-between Zack tracking his bass parts.

“Today. In a minute actually. I’m tracking the guitar parts when Zack come out and then hopefully next week I'll be able to start recording my sing songs. But it depends on how much we get done this week,” I replied.

“That’s so nice of you to grace us with your presence. What the hell do you mean by sing song though; you sound like a five year old.”

“I mean vocals, but you’re always calling me a child that I thought I’d live up to it.”

“Child.”

“Exactly.”

“Alex?” Zack asked.

“What?” I asked slightly confused as I looked up towards Zack when I heard his voice by the door.

“Are you feeling alright?”

“Yeah, why?”

“Your other half isn’t with you.”

“We’re not attached at the hips you know,” I replied with a hint of sadness in my tone that I hoped no one else had heard.

“Could have fooled us, you’ve barely been away from him for the last couple of months,” Zack answered.

“Yeah well he’s my boyfriend and my best friend and I like spending time with him. Is that so wrong?” I asked, my voice coming off more hostile than I meant it to.

“Sorry Alex, it’s just you’ve gone from being glued to Jack’s side to barely seeing him,” Rian stated. “What’s going on?”

“Nothing.”

“Bullshit. What’s going on?” He asked me.

“It’s nothing Ri, don’t worry about it,” I told him firmly as I stood up, picked my guitar up and made my way into the recording booth. I spent most of the afternoon messing around and recording the best sounding versions, finally walking out when everything I played started sounding the same.

“Same time tomorrow?” I asked as I left my guitar on a stand and started to make my way out.

--

“Morning guys,” I called as I walked through the studio doors.

“You’re chipper this morning,” Rian commented as I joined him on the couch.

“Mhmm, I have no reason not to be.”

“That’s good. Zack’s just finishing up and then he should be completely finished, unless any adjustments and changes are needed later.”

“Alright cool. Have you seen Jack today?”

“No I haven’t. But I think I heard him in one of the practice rooms earlier.”

“Thanks,” I replied as I started to walk in that direction.

“Alex, is everything okay between you two?”

“Yeah, why?”

“It’s just that you seem to be spending less and less time together, that’s all,” Rian shrugged.

“We’re just busy.” I replied.

“Okay.”

“Thanks Ri, come tell me when I’m wanted to record?”

“Sure, but I think that it might actually be Jack recording today as we’re beginning to fall behind. But I'll come find you both later and let you know what’s going on if you want?” He asked.

“Yeah, that would be great,” I told him before walking off in the general direction of my boyfriend. I found him in the last room I checked, which had caused me to disrupt some of the other people that were practicing various instruments. Jack had his back to the door and so he didn’t see me walk into the room behind him. He still didn’t know I was there until I covered his eyes while yelling.

“Guess Who!”

“Zack is that you?” He asked sarcastically.

“Rude,” I called as I removed my hands and walked round to face my boyfriend.

“I’m sorry Lex, I knew it was you really,” he replied as he leaned in to kiss me.

“How are you?” I asked.

“I’m alright. What do you want?”

“Just wanted to come and see you for a little bit as I haven’t seen you all week. Problem?”

“No, no, no, I was just wondering what brought you here because I’m just going to be practicing as I hear I’m apparently that I might be recording today and I don’t know half of the songs.”

“Eh that’s alright, I'll just watch you and ‘help’ you learn them,” I air quoted as I took a seat on the floor, leaning against the wall.

--

It was our last week recording and the stress was reaching a new high. I had just finished recording the last of the vocals and now all we needed to do was make sure that everything sounded exactly the way we wanted it to, before it was all edited together to make our new album.

“Hey, Vic’s just sent us his vocals,” I announced to everyone in the room as I looked up from the email Vic had just sent me containing his vocals for the song we were collaborating on.

“Let’s hear it,” Zack called back as I quickly went about opening the attachment. We all listened in silence and for a couple of minutes after it had finished, stunned by how good it sounded.

“This is going to sound totally awesome!” Jack called loudly from the corner.

“You bet it is,” I grinned.

“Alright guys I think that we’ve got everything. We’ll review it all in a few weeks when it’s all been pulled together and we can make any changes then, but for now you’re free to go.” Our producer pulled his headphones off and addressed the group of us sitting around waiting for the okay to leave. Slowly the room began to empty as one by one people started to leave, eventually leave Jack, Rian and I in the room.

“I’m going. Next time I see you I want you to be the overly hyper couple I know you are.” Rian told us as he stared to get up from the couch and gather up his stuff.

“What do you mean?” Jack asked.

“It doesn’t matter; Alex knows.” He answered before looking directly at me. “Sort it out.” I gave him a small smiled accompanied with a nod to show my friend that I had understood what he had told me, before he turned around and left the building leaving a heavy silence in his wake.

“What did he mean?” Jack asked turning to face me.

“No idea.” I replied looking down and basically anywhere but at Jack.