Not Just A Fan

Chapter 12

Drew's uplifted mood from her agreeing to help, made band practice easy, Ester played away but went somewhere else, mostly about Brad. She wonders how he would take the news about cancelling, the more she thinks about it, the more worried she gets. As the song finishes, the band are happy that the song, but Ester expression was different and he notices.

'You ok there?' it broke her train of thought, and she looked at him.

'Yeah, it's good. Happy we got it right.' she planted a fake smile, which was odd to him, and he needed to know. Usually Drew never cares, but did with her.

'All right, let's do my new track after we have a 5-minute break.' he tells the guys, and they all shifted into the lounge area. As she moves away from the keyboard, Ester was caught off guard by Drew walking towards her.

'Is there something wrong?' he quietly says, she shook her head.

'No, I am fine.'

'Is it about what I said earlier?' He sounded anxious.

'No. Nothing like that.... it's just... I'm having difficulty reading somebody, and I don't know if we're on the same page.' she said, at the end of giving up hiding. 'You don't need to worry, I'm still fine coming on Saturday.' Drew looks at her confused and is curious if the aim is at him, it almost sounded like it did.

'You can tell me, I promise I won't judge.' He held onto her arm and rubbed it from comfort, a little spark hit his whole body, and so did hers. Ester never got that with Brad, but somehow with Drew, it felt right. She looks down at his hand, and he moved away quickly.

'I'm overthinking it, nothing to worry about.' she tells him with a smile.

For the rest of band practice, Drew gave her some breathing space as he feared something happened between them that he never thought he would have felt in a long time.

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Next day at work and to tell him to reschedule might not make him happy but the music came first in her eyes, Brad catches her again in the staff room before their shift started.

'You're playing hard to get. Not answering my messages.' he whispers, the desperation has been hard, and by sending over ten messages asking to come round, Ester has been ignoring them.

'Yeah, would you stop doing that too please?' she says with caution, his eyebrows drawn in.

'Why? What's wrong with me doing that?'

'It makes you a bit clingy and desperate.' she says without hesitation,

'I can't get enough of you, is that a crime?' he raised his voice a little.

'No, I'm not into that, sorry.' Brad places his hands in his pockets and looks to the floor in silence, and she takes a deep breath. 'I can't stay over this weekend either.' she says with guilt.

'Why not?'

'I've been called in to rehearse on Saturday, it's just this once.'

'Fuck sake Ester!' he yells, 'How are we suppose to date, if you're always busy?' she thought his intake was being unreasonable.

'It's just this once, we'll do something next time?'

'When will that be?'

'Next weekend, I have a gig on Saturday that evening so we can do something during the day.'