Total pages in book: 65
Estimated words: 60750 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 304(@200wpm)___ 243(@250wpm)___ 203(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 60750 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 304(@200wpm)___ 243(@250wpm)___ 203(@300wpm)
“Just give me a moment!” I nervously laugh, as I hastily close my bedroom door. I then lean against its wood, my heart racing in my chest, every part of me suddenly feeling like I’m being weighed down with bricks, except my stomach which is strangely up in the air.
What the hell is happening right now?
It’s not like people listening to my music is something I didn’t want. And yet, I kind of feel like a bunch of strangers just walked into my bedroom, like they just stormed into my personal space and started flipping through the pages of my diary. And while having a successful music career is literally one of my wildest dreams, I seriously don’t know how to process the possibility that I might’ve just gotten exactly what I always wanted when I was least expecting it.
“Take a deep breath, take a deep breath,” I murmur, even though it doesn’t seem like my lungs are working at all, or that they are even part of my body. “Just take a deep breath and breathe right through it…”
I close my eyes as I force down a breath, my heartbeats responding, now falling into rhythm with the way Marina is tapping on my door, all the noise in the room swirling into one overwhelming sound.
“You’re going to be faaaamous!” Marina shouts from her place beside me at the bar. She’s in the middle of ordering another round of drinks for us, her hand signaling for the bartender to come back toward our end of the counter.
I smile at her, then scan over the rest of the patrons. Marina was eventually able to pull me out of my anxiety spiral at the idea of newfound fame and attention. Just the notion of it was making me feel a little nauseous and off-kilter. She mostly just reminded me that fame and attention is exactly the kind of thing it’s going to take for me to have a career as a songwriter, even if it comes when I wasn’t expecting it to happen. She also reminded me that I’m not in control of the universe, even if it sometimes feels like I’m in control of something when I’m able to get the truth of things out on paper.
Control is an illusion.
I’ve been repeating the mantra to myself the whole night, even as my fingers anxiously tap against the bar’s counter.
Control is an illusion. I’m not in control and that’s okay. Control is an illusion—
“Hey there.” There’s suddenly a voice beside me at the bar. I look over and notice a really cute guy standing right in front of me, his gaze locking on mine.
“Hey.” I smile back at him, before I nod over at Marina. “We don’t have to go through this whole thing, by the way.”
“What whole thing?”
“The whole thing where you pretend to be interested in me because you’re trying to gauge what’s up with Marina,” I explain. “It’s so much easier if we just skip that step and you just talk to her directly—”
“Who’s Marina?” he chuckles. “The only girl I’m interested in talking to is you, Alyssa.”
“…You know my name?” I squint, wondering if I’ve seen the stranger somewhere before. It’s a small town, sure, but that doesn’t mean that everyone knows everybody. Especially not if they’re just visiting someone else while they’re passing through.
“Of course.” He grins. “And…I know you have a thing for guys in plaid, too.”
“A thing for guys in plaid—” I stop myself as I give him a once-over, now noticing that the cute stranger is dressed in plaid from head to toe, with the pattern taking over his shirt and his pants, too. I’m at a complete loss for words, my brain desperately trying to connect the dots between the weirdness of his clothing choices and the words coming out of his mouth. And his proud posture, like he’s displaying himself in a store window.
And then, my brain finally puts all the pieces of the puzzle together.
“Oh my God,” I mutter. “You’re…you think that I like guys in plaid because of ‘Guys in Plaid’? You listened to the songs on my Soundcloud?”
“That was pretty much the whole point of the song, wasn’t it?”
“No, because the whole thing was kind of a response to one of my exes. He was wearing plaid the first time I caught him talking to another girl,” I reply. “And he was wearing plaid when I caught him talking to another girl…for a second time.”
“Oh. Wow.” The stranger shakes his head. “Kind of sounds like you have shitty luck with guys.”
“Doesn’t everybody?”
“Well, you won’t have to worry about that anymore, Alyssa,” he continues. “Because the perfect guy for you is standing right in front of you.” He stretches his plaid arms wide.
“Oh, thanks but… I’m not really looking for anyone right now—”