A Change (of heart)

Chapter 21: Let's Sing

"Hey James. Look what I brought"
I grabbed my bag that I brought with me and pulled out food that I had baked this morning.
"You've been cooking!"
"Yeah, just a few snacks. I brought choc-chip biscuits, brownie, and a few muffins"
"Sweet!"
Wow, that grin he had on his face then, why did he think that was so funny?
"James, no more dad jokes thanks"
"Fine"
"What should we do now?"
"I don't know, how about some karaoke?"
"Seriously?" goodness, I'm such a horrible singer, well, we both are, I'm not sure why he even suggested that.
"Yeah, why not?"
"Okay then, what ya got?"
"Well, I'm old fashioned so I have a PS2, we have a few Singstar games for it"
"OK, what are the options?"
"Well..."
He reached over and grabbed the different types of Singstar he had, and I saw a Disney one.
"DISNEY!! We're doing Disney!"
"OK then, I'll get it set up"
We took turns choosing songs and I let James choose first, he chose a whole new world from Aladdin. Such. A. Cheesy. Song. It's actually one of my least favorite ones, but I joined in anyway.
Well...  When I say join in, I don't mean, actually sing. Don't get me wrong, I had the full intention of singing, but when it got to my part, I just, kinda, stood there with my mouth open, with a sort of shocked expression on my face.
He. Can. Sing.
James. Can. Sing.
He can sing?
James can sing!
Goodness! His voice is amazing! Whatever happened, it must have done something to his vocal tract, first his normal voice sounds different, and now this! I swear, he should audition for the Voice or something! Amazing.
I realized that I'd been staring at him for a long period of time, because the song was actually over and he was giving me a weird look.
"Shell, are you alright?"
"Yeah, yeah...  Just, just need to sit down"
"What's wrong" he asked, as I sit down onto the couch.
"What's wrong? Nothing's wrong, it's just..."
"What?"
"Your voice..."
"C'mon, I don't sound that bad do I?"
I could tell that he was being sarcastic, his ears weren't back. I came to learn that his ears would be back if he was actually sad or dissapointed or any of those sort of feelings, but they weren't. It didn't stop me from reacting though.
"What! No! No, no, no!"
"No?"
"No!"
"Shell, no what?"
"No way you sound bad! I don't know what happened yesterday, but you sound amazing! Your voice is now, well, I can't put into words!"
Now this was interesting, I had just paid him a compliment and his ears went back, I was confused on how he could feel negative about what I just said. Until I realized that he also folds his ears back when he's embarrassed. Cute. Yes, that was my first reaction. Cute. I was pretty surprised but I decided to tease him, to make the situation less awkward for me.
"You're cute when you do that!"
"Do what?"
He went up to self consciously feel what his ears were doing, and as soon as he felt they were down he tried to cover his ears as much as he could.
"You look even cuter now"
He was blushing real hard from that comment, he was basically a tomato.
"Th-thanks. Do you want to do anything else?"
"Is there something you have in mind?"
"Arm wrestle?"
What? He'll thrash me! Was my first thought. He probably would've beaten me beforehand, but now, with his new physique! There was no way I'd win. But he requested it, so I decided that I may as well see how strong he is.
"Okay then, but I'm going to get you to sing for me later"
Once again blushing, he replied.
"Okay"
We walked to the dinner table and held our own little arm wrestle competition. It was good, closely matched, but I could tell he was going easy on me.
"Come on! Actually try!"
I regretted saying that, within half a second of starting he had already bet me. Yeah, he was way stronger now.
"OK, now I want you to sing for me"
"Do I have to?"
"It wasn't a question"
I got on YouTube and found some karaoke videos of some songs I like, such as Who's that girl - Guy Sebastian, Hotel Ceiling - Rixton version, Break up in a small town - Juxtaposition, and others. He was amazing no matter what he sang. His range was way better, his tone and, just, uh! I was so jealous. Oh! I also made him sing Jealous - Labyrinth. After hearing that one, I knew there was nothing he couldn't sing!
After that, I had to go home. I had something planned for tomorrow, but I needed him to do something first. Before I left, I asked him.
"Hey James, are you going to come to school tomorrow?"
"I, ah. I haven't thought about it yet. Why?"
"I'm curious, message me tomorrow morning?"
"Okay"
"Bye!"
"Bye!"
Then he shut the door, and I left. I hoped he came tomorrow, I want to do something, but he has to come to school.