Coming Home

Chapter 21

I woke up the next morning feeling embarrassed. But I soon decided that I had learned from my mistakes, and didn't want to let a drunken snog come between Alex and I - after all, we weren't teenagers anymore.

I took a long shower, thinking about what had happened the night before, and how weird Alex had been when he had decided to break off the kiss. As I stepped out of the bathroom, I checked my watch and saw that there was 5 minutes before I had to meet up with the lads for breakfast. I hurried up and found myself in the lift to the restaurant a few minutes later.

Nick and Matt were already sitting at the table and I spotted Alex and Jamie at the buffet. Alex had a mountain of food on his plate but Jamie was more polite and hadn't filled his plate to the brim with scrambled eggs and crumpets.

I took some fruit and a bagel before I sat down next to Nick and Matt. Alex soon joined us and greeted me with a nod without giving away what had happened the night before. The other guys didn't seem to know anything - if they had known, Matt definitely would have said something.

Both Alex and I ate our breakfasts in silence, leaving the conversation to the others.

"You're awfully quiet, Al," Matt suddenly said.

"I'm fine. Rough night, is all.." Alex said and shot Matt an unconvincing smile.

"What about you, Is?" Jamie asked, "I heard weird noises coming from your room after we had said goodnight."

I felt my face going completely red. The heat was rising to my cheeks and I desperately looked to Alex who just cleared his throat and took a sip of his coffee, totally unaffected by the scene unfolding in front of him.

Jamie and Matt looked at me and Alex suspiciously but Nick was too busy stuffing his face with breakfast to notice that my body language had just given away that Alex had been in my room after we had said our goodnights.

"It was probably just the telly" I lied.

Jamie went back to his watermelon with a shake of his head but Matt still eyed me suspiciously.

As we were done eating breakfast, we packed the car and headed for Sheffield.

In the car, Alex quickly fell asleep causing Jamie to lean in and whisper to me, "so, are you and Alex a thing now?"

"Absolutely not!" I spluttered as I felt the heat rise to my cheeks once more. I was grateful that Matt and Nick seemed too occupied discussing which pie was better.

"So he wasn't in your room last night?"

"No!" I spluttered once more, "well - I mean -
he was. But he left after a few minutes. Nothing happened - pretty uneventful, I would say," I spoke so fast that even I could hear how bad a lie I had just told Jamie.

"Alright," he said without sounding too convinced. But at least he leaned away from me and rested his head on the window.

I spent the rest of the car ride home thinking about how Alex had ignored what had happened between us. Had I put more meaning into it than he had?

-

As we pulled up outside my flat, I hugged the lads goodbye and went inside. I knew that the clever thing to do probably was to get some work for NME done but the first thing I did was to find 'Suck It And See' on Spotify. I listened to the album several times and found new references that I recognized everytime I heard it through. There were clear references to mine and Alex' friendship but he had twisted the truth a bit to make the lyrics fit.
I liked his writing style and could clearly see how much he had evolved since that album.

Next, I put on Humbug. Weirdly enough, I found only one reference on that album: a song about how he had seen me everywhere he went and how he often pictured me next to him: Cornerstone.

Favourite Worst Nightmares, on the other hand, was full of references!! They weren't as nice as they had been on Suck It And See and in Cornerstone and I understood why he had wanted me to listen to listen to especially Suck It And See first.

Sent at 09.36 p.m. to Turner:
Listened to it all

Received at 09.41 p.m. from Turner:
What's the verdict?

Sent at 09.43 p.m. to Turner:
I can't believe you wanted me to break your nose!
Apart from that, I like the stuff you said about me in Reckless Serenade - even though I was the one who tried calling you. Not the other way around.

Received at 09.49 p.m. from Turner:
Yeah, I know.
I twisted some stuff around to make it sound better.
Sorry!

Sent at 09.53 p.m. to Turner:
Don't worry about it.
It does sound better the other way around
- for the sake of the songs anyway

Received at 09.56 p.m. from Turner:
Glad to hear it

Sent at 10.01 p.m. to Turner:
What happened with your thoughts of me between recording Favourite Worst Nightmare and Suck It And See?
On FWN you are clearly angry with me and  with yourself aswell.
On SIAS you suddenly sound as if you understand everything from my point of view.

Received at 10.12 p.m. from Turner:
Well, for one; I got older.
It was getting harder and harder to pretend that everything was your fault when it clearly wasn't.
And then I realised some things about us. Loads of the songs on SIAS were actually written alongside the tunes on FWN. It just took me quite a while to get the courage to actually do something about it - because I was embarrased of how I treated you, given everything.

Sent at 10.14 p.m. to Turner:
You realised some things about us?
What things?

Received at 10.16 p.m. from Turner:
Someday, I'll tell you.

I got annoyed with his vague reply but didn't have the time to force an answer out of him before he sent me yet another text:

Received at 10.17 p.m. from Turner:
Btw. Matt's flying home to Breana on Monday.
Maybe you could take the night off at the bar on Saturday and come say goodbye at the old pub?
I know he'd appreciate it

Sent at 10.19 p.m. to Turner:
My manager owes me a couple of favours so I'm sure I can pull it off.