terrible things e.s.

7 quite the opposite

On the night of my twenty-first birthday, a few friends and I took a night on the town. There was a band of some sort playing at a bar a few blocks away from the university was. In the last year, I'd moved from the dorms into a sorority with eight other girls. Katherine didn't join, instead rented a flat with her boyfriend, because "sororities aren't my thing. Too much.. girl." We still talked and hung out regularly. It was nice, everybody respected each other's space, but was always there if you needed to talk. I consider them all pretty close friends, and a few of the girls, Cameron, Amber, Beth, and Luna, wanted to take me out on my birthday.

"This guy is amazing, he writes all his songs about a girl he wished he wouldn't have let go. He says it's, like, the biggest mistake he's ever made," Cameron says as we walk down the street, the winter winds picking up my hair.

"Yeah," Amber chimes in, "He literally quit uni to become a singer. Put him out on the streets for a while, too. I heard he moved to London to come find her, and is playing in local pubs to see if she'll show up. And for money, too."

"I swear, he's going to be huge one day. The first time I heard him was a few months ago, when he did this gig at this bar during the summer. I fell in love with his voice immediately!" Cameron pipes back up.

"Wow, that's crazy... I hope finds her."

"I know it's so adorable."

All I can think about as we get closer to the little bar, is Ed and how amazing his voice is and how much I miss hearing him sing to me. Oh, what I would do to hear him play again.

My fingers play with the little bird around my neck, the one he gave to me when we were sixteen, as I join in on Beth and Luna's conversation.

As the bar comes closer, I can see the over-flowing amount of people that have come to hear this guy sing. Amber and Cameron never told me his name, but he seems to be a hit. We all move through the crowd to find a place to stand, while Amber orders us drinks at the bar.

After a few minutes of watching guys move stuff around on the stage, placing a microphone in front of a plain wooden chair, Amber finally comes back with a waiter handing us all beers. I sip mine sparingly, holding the cool bottle in my hands.

"To Rory," I look to see Cameron holding her glass in the air, "The bitchiest, most annoying, mysterious, funniest, sweetest, smartest, girl on campus. We are so glad to call you our sister and we love you so, SO much! Happy Birthday, girl!" They all cheer and take a drink of their beers.

"Awe, guys..." we pull each other into a group hug.

"Hey, he's starting!" Amber says as the crowd dies down, everyone turning their attention to the stage. Eventually, I turn as well my eyes going wide.

He was taller than the last time I'd seen him. He'd lost a bit of weight and his chest and arms looked more toned. His ranga hair stuck to his forehead, which was coated with a light layer of sweat. He was wearing black jeans and a gray shirt, with a plaid flannel over top. The three-day-beard he was sporting looked sexy and fitting on him, and his eyes still shined with a deep blue. He held the guitar in his hands, playing random chords as he talked and I could barely listen to him because he was right there and I hadn't seen him since the fight and, God, his voice was deeper.

"-and so she was basically just like 'wicked! Let's fix this chicken' and her being her and me being me, all I wanted was a cup of tea and to sleep, we took the chicken back home and I got my tea and she fixed her chicken and we went to sleep and a couple hours, uh, later, I got up and the chicken was dead. I feel really bad about that really, so I wrote it a little song. Here's for my Little Bird," in between him talking, the crowd laughed along with him and I found myself laughing, too, at the memory. He was so pissed that night.