AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Finally, the phone was ringing.
“Hallo,” came a pleasant but rough voice.
My mouth moved but nothing came out.
“Hallo? Is anyone there?”
I panicked; my brain stuck on pause.
Say something, you idiot! I yelled in my mind.
“H-hi,” I managed, with all the breath in my tight chest.
“Who is this?”
“A-Ashe. Ashley O’Connell. You left a message, Mr. Ibsen.”
I immediately blushed from the embarrassment of being so formal.
What the hell was I thinking?
The facepalm stung, but no more than I deserved. “Mr. Ibsen!” Jesus Christ!
I heard a faint chuckle, and then his warm voice.
“Indeed, I did, and please, call me Varg. Peter, if you must, but only my family calls me that, usually.”
“I like Varg.”
“Me too. So, I go by that even though it’s my middle name. Anyway, a friend at the label told me you emailed. She even forwarded me a copy. I think we should meet. Officially, I mean. We had a moment in the pub, at least I thought we did,” he said.
My heart soared. He’d noticed me!
“I-I think so too,” I said, cautiously.
“That we should meet? Or that we had a moment?”
I could hear his grin.
“Both,” I said.
“Good, then we’re on the same page.”
“When works for you?” I asked, hitting my stride finally, after almost dying of humiliation.
“How about tonight?”
I should have said no. Work should come first. It was what kept me in clothes and food.
This reasonable desire was outstripped by a deeper need, a hunger that would not shut up until was sated. My cheeks burned at where my mind went, but I couldn’t deny it was what I wanted.
The best option would be to just give it a try and see where things went. I was used to taking risks or I wouldn’t have been going for an art degree.
“Sure. What works for you? I get off work at five,” I said.
We worked out the details, and then he rung off, leaving me to figure out how I was going to weasel out of my project.
It didn’t matter, though. All I could think of was how I was actually going to see Hot Guitarist up close and personal… tonight!
Chapter Seven – Varg
There were times I wished I had girlfriends. Not in the polyamorous sense but literally friends who were girls, and able to let me in on the female way of thinking, at least in general.
Everyone was an individual, but I barely knew how society worked in the abstract. That was one of the blessings, and curses, of being a natural misfit. Most things basically came down to guesswork.
This became less of a problem as I slowly stopped caring what people thought. Most of my encounters were both brief and finite. What did I care about the opinion of someone I didn’t know and would never see again?
A concert venue offered a million possibilities, but the reality was the van ride the next morning, to the next gig. It was really none of my business, and I was not one to engage in thought crime.
I took off my beloved jacket that I had owned since I was big enough to wear it. I almost never took it off, and planned to be buried in it. It was my own badass version of a Linus blanket.
Leaving it aside, just for a few hours, hung neatly on the back of the bedroom door, I went for the most basic version of my usual outfit. No greasepaint or other accoutrements, coming out with a more low-key Goth look. Able to fit it almost anywhere but the opera.
Hair down or back was the question. She’d seen both: up in the pub, down at the show where she’d gotten the album.
Mentally flipping a coin, I went with up, feeling quite nervous, which was really saying something.
Not wanting to be late, I ended up getting to our appointed spot early.
The thought crossed my mind that I should get her a drink, but I didn’t want to assume what she might want.
Coin toss number two.
Still, I could always drink it myself, if she demurred.
Then I remembered what she had been drinking at the bar, or at least I thought I did.
I shrugged and ordered.
“What can I get you?” asked the barkeep.
“An absinthe and a Guinness.”
“Bottle or can for the Guinness?”
“Bottle.”
Sipping my absinthe, I pondered the little gold harp on the Guinness bottle, trying to focus my thoughts, which seemed more disorganized than usual.
What was I getting myself into?
Suddenly, I knew she was there. It was her scent, the same as the pub the night of the show. Sweet and delicious.
“Hi.”
“Hey?”
I was so happy to hear her lilting voice.
“What can I get ya?” I asked her.
“Guinness?”
The proper choice.
The bottle scraped lightly on the counter as I turned it so she could see the label.
“Made you look.”
“You remembered,” she said, sitting next to me.
“So it would seem.”
