My need to be alone vanished right away. You hear about romantic moments like this, where two people are tugged together, like God is aggressively knitting your wool into the same jumper. Walking with him to the music block was the most exciting journey I could ever imagine. J. R. R. Tolkien couldn’t even dream up a quest more enticing than going to the music block with Reese Davies. I unpeeled myself from the wall and we fell into step naturally, already weirdly attuned.
“I like your hat.” The words tumbled out and I shook my head as I said them, blushing.
“Cheers, it’s one of my favourites. I call him Old Faithful.” He flicked the brim with his finger and we laughed together. I kept sneaking glances at him as we walked over, taking tiny gulps of him in. I liked everything about the way Reese dressed – like an old-fashioned British dandy. His hat matched his waistcoat, which finished just on the top of tight black trousers. He looked like he’d walked out of a different period of history. Everything about it should have been wrong, but it was so very right somehow.
“Were you hiding?” he asked. “Sick of people telling you how absolutely incredible you are already?”
“I wasn’t hiding. I was just…” I blushed again. “…hiding.”
He really laughed at that. “Shouldn’t you be lapping up all the glory, rather than running from it?”
“I’m shy,” I admitted. “Attention is my hell.”
“You wouldn’t be able to tell from that set. You are incredible though.” He laughed again as he watched me struggling to accept the compliment. “I’m Reese,” he added. “I’ve seen you around. I’ve always wanted to say hello. So, hello.” He waved almost goofily.
“Oh, okay. Hello.” I was so freaked out by the charged atmosphere between us that it was impressive I managed even that.
He grinned. “Hello yourself! It’s Amelie, right?”
I nodded, dumbfounded. How did he know my name? How had he seen me around? I hadn’t noticed him. Surely I would’ve clocked the hat?
We reached the music block and stood there, just staring at each other under the orange light. I kept giggling to punctuate the loaded silence, though Reese seemed more comfortable with it than me. “Where’s your band?” I asked. “I liked your set, by the way.”
“Thank you, and god knows. I saw you leave and I followed you out here.” He scratched his neck, which had a hint of a blush creeping up it. “Sorry…” he stammered. “I sound like a stalker now. This is going well, isn’t it?”
“What’s going well?” I asked.
“Trying to get to know you.”
A wave of overwhelm crashed into me and I was suddenly unable to handle what he’d just said. “We should probably get our stuff.”
Reese ignored what I’d said. “What are you doing now?”
“Umm, going home?”
“Carrying that guitar all by yourself?”
“I’ve been doing it for years.”
“Yes, but you’re probably exhausted from being worshipped all evening. You should let me walk you home.” He grinned in a way that said he knew I wasn’t going to say anything other than yes. Which I wasn’t. He held open the music-block door like a gentleman, and I giggled for about the trillionth time as I walked in. Mrs Clarke was surrounded by piles of instruments and dumped bags, trying to sort them into proper piles. She looked wrung out, but perked up when she saw us step through the door.
“Amelie! Congratulations, you were amazing. Just amazing,” she said. “I watched from the back and it blew me away.” Then she spotted him behind me. “And you too, Reese. Was that a new song you opened on?”
“It was,” he confirmed. “The others didn’t think it was ready, but I overruled.”
She raised both eyebrows. “Well, I’m a very proud music teacher tonight, that’s for sure. You two come for your stuff?”
I picked my way through to my guitar, keen to give myself something to do that wasn’t getting static shocks from the sparks flying between us. I picked up my case with an oomph. Alfie’s bumper sticker was still plastered across the top:
I’M NOT SHY, I’M JUST HOLDING BACK MY AWESOMENESS SO I DON’T INTIMIDATE YOU.
The room faded out as I stroked the edge of the sticker and touched my heart. Then I remembered the total lack of a message from him on my phone, stood up, and hoicked my case over my shoulder.
“You all set?” Reese asked, nodding at me like we knew each other really well already.
“You not taking your guitar?”
“I’m leaving mine here. I’ve got music first thing on Monday, and it frees me up to help you with yours.”
I wrinkled my nose for a second, thinking I don’t need help, but also simultaneously thinking Please help me so we can continue standing near each other.
“Bye, Mrs Clarke.” I waved goodbye to my teacher and scuttled after him.
“Bye, Amelie. Congratulations again. Make sure she gets home okay, Reese.”
He saluted.
“Where do you live?” he asked once we were outside again.
“Umm. Cherry Hill Gardens.” The words still sounded foreign on my tongue. That wasn’t where I lived. I lived at number twenty-six Turners Hill, Sheffield. Well, I used to…
“Yep. I know it. This town is so tiny it’s pretty easy to navigate.” He took my guitar off me without even asking, swinging it over his shoulder, then guided us out of college and towards my house.
It should’ve felt weirder than it did – walking home with a complete stranger in a waistcoat and hat. And yet there was something about him that made it feel weirdly right. Oddly normal, like Fate had drawn a line along the ground and I knew I had to follow it.
“So, you’re not from around here, are you?” Reese asked, as we left the aftermath of the talent show behind.
“Is my accent really that strong?”
He laughed. “Yes. It is. But also everyone knows everyone here. I can probably tell you at what age every single person in college got chickenpox.” I watched him roll his eyes. “Where are you from?”
“Sheffield.”
“That explains your musical talent then,” he said. “Home of the Arctic Monkeys, Pulp, The Long Blondes. And now you, Amelie.”
I smiled and shook my head, impressed. Most people didn’t know where Sheffield was on the map, let alone our home-grown music talent. I told him as much.
“If there’s one thing I know, it’s music,” he said. “Who are you into?”
“Oh my GOD, that’s always the hardest question ever!”
His grin was lit up as he walked under a streetlight. “Okay, I’ll narrow it down. Songwriter you most wish you could be.”
“Laura Marling.” The answer came out instinctively. How else would I have developed a full-blown obsession with cardigans?
“I knew you were going to say her,” Reese said. “You’re so like her! I was thinking that throughout your set.”
As compliments go, it doesn’t get much better than that. I shook my head and denied it almost automatically.
“It’s true. I’m not a liar. I wouldn’t lie about something like that.”