Finally Free -- JATP Luke x MaleOC

Chapter 31

Jay set his backpack on the foot of the siars that led to the second story and walked back to the living room, where his aunt sat working on her laptop.

"Ray called and told me where you were," his aunt said, her voice gentler than normal, but it still had the hardness that Jay had come to accept as normal. "What now?"

"I have a meeting today," Jay said. It was a lie, a story he had rehearsed earlier in the day. "We're doing a project in psych and I'm meeting with my group tonight to work on it."

"Where will you be going?" his aunt asked.

"Some cafe downtown, Freddy sent me the address," Jay said, pulling out his phone and waving it as if to validate his statement. "I can drive down and back."

"Pick up your uncle on the way back, he's working late today," Jay's aunt said, her eyes never leaving her laptop screen.

"Okay," Jay said simply. He wasn't sure if he would be able to pick up his uncle tonight, but he would definitely try. He could hide the guitar he would be using in his trunk, it wasn't as if his uncle would check.

Jay walked away, leaving his aunt alone in the living room. In one swift motion, he picked up his backpack from where it sat and swung it over one shoulder, speeding up the stairs and going straight to his room. He set the backpack down beside his desk, sitting in his swivel chair as he pulled out his laptop.

There was a lot of work to do before tonight. He had a prewrite for AP Literature, a quick worksheet for college trig, and notes for AP Psychology alongside his part of the class project among others. Jay worked continuously for about three hours, taking little to no breaks in between assignments. His only motivation was tonight's gig, both the anxiety and excitement pushing him to finish his work.

The work distracted him from his anxieties about tonight: the fact that they were doing such a public gig worried him. Eat & Beats wasn't a place that either his aunt or uncle would stop by under normal circumstances, but there was always a what if. What if today he stopped by Eat & Beats and saw Jay performing with Julie and the Phantoms? What if he had heard from some friend or coworker that his nephew was part of a band? What would happen next?

Jay wasn't the type to get stage fright. He rarely did. The idea of performing for an audience excited him and he felt confident enough in his ability to not feel that much worry. Of course, there was the typical concern of "what if he messed up" or "what if there were technical difficulties," but Jay believed in the band.

His excitement was another motivation for him, pushing him to finish all of his work quickly so that he could go to pickup both Flynn and Julie and head down to Eat & Beats. Jay wanted to get there early to watch the other performances during the open mic, but he knew that Flynn and Julie wanted to go, perform, meet some managers, and then head home.

By the time he had finished his work, it was almost time for Jay to head out. He quickly powered off his laptop, making sure to plug it into its charger. Jay dug in his closet for clothes to wear tonight, coming to the realization that he was still wearing Luke's clothes.

He was going to have to give those back at some point.

Jay quickly picked out an outfit that would fit him: a red shirt with a blue dragon printed on it with black jeans with rips by the knees. He kept the top two buttons of his shirt open, keeping it loose and showing his prominent collarbone. It was an outfit that he never would have worn before getting with the band, he would have worried too much about sticking out and drawing attention to himself. But as he looked at himself in the mirror, putting a small amount of pomade in his hair, he never felt more comfortable or confident in his body. He felt genuinely good about himself, a foreign feeling that would take some getting used to.