Obstruction

Only you

- Yazoo, Only You -

- January 5th -

We were rigged and ready for our first gig of the new year.
Ethan was as usual pale and nervous and I was wondering what I could do to ease his mind.
So I was sat on an amp box next to him as he was twisting his fingers and looking lost.
My usual encouragement of asking him to focus on me had him looking at me with a tilt of the head and a dry smile.

"Yeah... you know that's not going to work," he muttered.

I frowned.

"Why is that?" I asked.

"Izzy... just... don't!" He mumbled.

"Don't what?" I asked feeling genuinely confused.

"Because you're doing my head in," he said and shook his head.

I frowned. He obviously didn't need me.
For the first time since I started in the band he didn't want me to talk him through the nerves.
There was still that urge to touch him. That intense hollow feeling that felt like it could only be removed by skin contact. So I stood and ran a hand over his head as I walked past him towards the stage. As my fingers slipped through his hair his hand came up to grab mine.
Without looking up he squeezed my fingers.

"I wish you wouldn't do that," he said.

"Why?" I asked.

He looked straight at me with a warning look before letting go of my hand.
Standing up, close enough to touch, he stared straight into my eyes with an upset expression.

"Cos you're messing up my hair," he said on a heavy exhale.

I looked at his hair, falling messily over his forehead as usual and brought my hand up to "fix" whatever I had messed up. Not that he had ever really cared about the hair before.
But I did.
It was the perfect kind of wavy, thick hair to run my fingers through.
And my mind was full of ideas for situations where my fingers and his hair would become more closely aqainted.
His hand clamped around my wrist and his mouth was in a tight line, stopping my dirty train of thought before reaching gutter-station.

"Just... don't," he muttered as he released my hand and walked away.

Leaving me staring after him wondering what the hell I had done wrong.

On stage he made me feel like the biggest fool going. I was doing my usual stage flirting and getting absolutely no response.
He was being downright grumpy and annoying.

Thankfully Simon was enjoying himself and with him I was doing some seriously dodgy back-to-back moves and jumpy dancing as normal.

We had "Freak like me" as a standard on our setlist and suddenly I felt like amping it up a notch.
Just to see if I could.
I already had the show down to strutting and some shimmying moves, but I needed some new tricks.
I trusted Simon to get my idea.
He knew me well enough to nod when I at the first chorus locked my eyes on his with something between a challenge and a question.
I sauntered over and got right into his face while grooving along to the bassline. I made sure the audience caught the play-flirting as I pretended that Simon was the hottest guy on earth for a few beats.
I ran a finger up his chest, along his jaw and generally acted sluttier than I ever had in my life. And he was playing it right back at me.
Leaning into me as I walked behind him and loving the attention.
But this was Simon.
Someone I trusted with my life. So play acting was safe. I could trust him. And it suited the song.

I turned away from him to face the audience and spotted Ethan looking at me with a tight look on his face.
I raised my eyebrow and decided it was only fair to give him some attention too.
Besides he was acting all weird and I decided to loosen him up.
With or without his participation.
We were on stage and paid to entertain after all.