Wait until the music's over

31. Glory days

"Nah, it can't be... I was mistaking for sure" I tell myself when the silhouette of the long haired guy disappears behind the one of his friend.

I shake my head and try and focus on the funny exchange between Meg and Laura, but the man who stole my whole attention is now visible again. Fully visible.

It's really him.

Either it's him or somebody put LSD in my glass. And considering I'm not holding any glass in my hands right night, nor did I before because I haven't been drinking anything the whole evening, I can easily discard that theory.

Fuck, that's him. Dave. Less blond than two years ago, the rest is exactly the same: same puppy eyes, same smile, same lips that...

"What's wrong?" a voice in the distance, which is actually just a few inches from me, brings me back to present.

"Huh?"

"Is everything ok?" Eddie must have noticed my temporary zoned-out state and got into dad-mode again.

"Yeah... excuse me for a minute" I hear myself answer and, always as if I were only a spectator of my actions, see myself get up and leave our not so small circle to walk up to Dave.

I don't even know what the fuck I'm doing, what I'm up to, he probably doesn't even remember me and I'm about to make the poorest figure of Seattle's history... well, at least of this club's history... well, the poorest one after mine at the last show. Wow, I'm gonna rank both both first and second! I'm still pondering on this when I find myself behind his back and my mouth opens itself against my will.

"Hey... excuse me?" there's music in the background, Running from the law by L7, but I can't figure out when it comes from, because the volume seems too low for the club's sytem and too loud for somebody's stereo. In both cases, it prevents Dave from hearing me, because he doesn't bat an eye and keeps talking to his friend.

"Ehm... excuse me?!" I try again and slightly lift myself up on mly tiptoes, as if a few inches more would amplify my voice.

Nothing.

"Excuse me... Dave..." I get back with my feet on the ground and give him a light pat on his back, finally catching his attention.

Dave turns around with one eyebrow alread raised, and it raises more and more as I talk to him.

"Ehm, hi! I... well... I don't know if you remember, we met some time ago..."

"Really?" he answers and starts chewing a gum, which must have stopped there in his mouth for a while as he was trying to figure out who was this fucking dwarf breaking his balls.

During the week I spent with him, that summer of a couple of years ago, I think I didn't see him for more than five minutes straight without a gum in his mouth, except when he was sleeping. Well, sometimes he even fell asleep chewing and I panicked because something like a month before there was this terrible news on tv about a kid who had died because he had fallen asleep with a chewing gum and suffocated in his sleep. That's why I used to steal the chewing gum from him with a kiss before going to bed when we were together... I even found myself rummaging in his mouth and palate when he was sleeping, searching for the potentially killer gum. He never knew, at least I hope so. I was such an idiot at sixteen. Anyway, Dave must think I'm still an idiot, because seeing him chewing noisily has instantly brought back a series of memories that put a huge and apparently senseless grin on my face.

"Yeah... a couple of years ago, in... ehm... in Italy, you were on tour with your band..."

"In Italy, huh?" Dave squints at me, then looks up at some indefinite point, as if he was trying to remember, scratching his chin with his fingers.