Inseparable

“No problem Brad! I really hope that you can manage to find a way past the walls my best friend has built around her heart… It will be for her own good,” Stacy says and shakes my hand before walking outside with me. Jenny is still nowhere in sight and Stacy promises that she won’t mention our talk to her best friend.

“Thank you so much, I owe you big time,” I say with a grin before waving Stacy goodbye and getting on the back of my Harley. I drive home, feeling like there is hope again for me and Jenny to get together after all. I now know exactly what the next step for me is going to be. I think back to the advice my good friend Trevor has given me and realize that I now have a golden opportunity in front of me to do the exact kind of thing he suggested. I can come to Jenny from a different angle and find a way of really entertaining her, which will probably truly impresses her at the same time.

Come hell or high water, I’m going to get a guitar somewhere and ask someone to teach me how to play it!

I make my way towards a local music shop and take some time to look at all the various guitars they have there. A shop assistant walks up to me and helps me pick out a nice guitar. I ask him about the easiest way to learn how to play it and he directs me to a local music teacher, not too far away from his shop. I thank the guy and pay for the guitar before carefully putting it in a protective hard case and setting off on the back of my Harley towards the music shop he’s told me about.

I have to wait for a while before I can see the music teacher, but when he finally comes out I can see that we are going to get along just fine. He’s got some tattoos on his forearms and he looks like the kind of guy who might enjoy becoming a member of my motorcycle club himself. He tells me that he has a spot open and we go inside the practice area where he shows me how to hold the guitar and press the basic chords. I discover that I actually have quite a knack for this and it’s not long before I’m able to play three basic chords on the guitar. My strumming is still a bit uneven, but I get the feeling that I’ll be able to get the hang of this very quickly. The guy tells me that he used to play in a band and assures me that there’s nothing like playing a guitar to get inside a girl’s pants. I thank him for the lesson and make arrangements to come and see him again during the week, after I’ve had some time to practice everything he’s taught me.

I drive home excitedly and Rawlins, my trusty Butler, looks quite impressed by the fact that I carry a guitar into the house.

“Good heavens sir, have you decided to become a musician now?” he asks with an incredulous expression of his on his face.

“Why not my good man?!” I exclaim, “we only live once and I have decided that it would be nice to be able to serenade the woman of my dreams!”

“What a splendid idea Sir!” Rawlins says and takes the Harley’s keys from me to go and park it in the garage. I rush inside, sit down on the couch and start practicing the chords which the guy at the music school has taught me. I suddenly realize that I never asked Stacy exactly what kind of music Jenny likes, but decide that me being able to play the guitar will be enough of a way to impress her without necessarily playing a song she specifically knows. I start practicing the song which my music teacher has taught me how to play, a little ditty from the seventies called ‘Leaving on a Jet Plane’. It’s not long before I can play the chords and sing the tune at the same time.

I look up and see old Rawlins standing in the doorway, looking at me with great admiration.

“That actually sounds very good sir,” he says and his compliment spurs me on to practice even harder.

Chapter 11: Jenny

I’m sitting at my desk and I’m busy with a very important article about a new restaurant that’s just opened up on the platinum mile, right on the beach. It specializes in Mexican food and I’m trying my best to look up all the correct spellings for the various Mexican dishes which they offer. It would do me no good to write a wonderful article and get some of the names of the dishes misspelled along the way.

While I’m busy, I hear the sounds of guitar music coming from outside in the street, but I pay no real attention to it. I figure it’s just a street musician plying his craft and I expect the sounds to die away soon as the musician continues walking down to the town square where most of these people play for whatever coins the locals and visitors care to cast their way. I’m so engrossed in my article that I don’t realize there’s a familiar voice singing along with the guitar music. After about ten minutes, when am finally done looking up all the correct spellings for the Mexican dishes, I still hear the music coming from outside and I decide to go and take a look. I figure I might as well give the musician a couple of dollars just to encourage him to keep playing. When I get outside I see Stacy already standing there and from the look on her face you would have thought she was at a rock concert, watching her favorite rock star performing.

“Looks like I’ve been missing out on the show,” I say and smile at Stacy. But she doesn’t even look at me and continues to stare at the musician. I finally decide to take a closer look at the guy who’s been playing the music and for just a second my mind refuses to accept the signals which my eyes sent its way. Surely this is impossible…

It’s Brad!

I looked over at Stacy and she stands there with a huge grin on her face, almost as if she wants to say, “I told you so.”

I look over at Brad and he just stands there grinning like a schoolboy while he keeps playing his guitar and singing.

“I guess there’s a bit more to your male admirer than you first thought,” Stacy says with that same grin on her face as we both stand there listening to the song Brad sings. It just happens to be one of the songs my dad always used to play to me… ‘Leaving on a Jet Plane’. As I stand there listening

to Brad playing guitar and singing it takes me back the days when my dad used to sing to me when I was just a little girl. For the very first time in my life I find myself drawing a favorable comparison between my late father and a guy who is interested in me.

When Brad is finished with his song he takes a little bow and Stacy and I applaud him wildly.

“That was beautiful! I’m so sorry I didn’t come out earlier to hear the other songs you were playing,” I say.

“Don’t worry, I’ve been playing that same song for fifteen minutes now… was kind of wondering whether you were ever going to come out and listen to it,” Brad says and we all burst out laughing.

“But you never told me you were a musician… I mean, you were so secretive about what you do for a living and I never knew that you could sing and play guitar like that!” I say and don’t even try to hide my delightful surprise.

“Well, I wouldn’t call myself a professional musician or anything, but I do enjoy playing the guitar… especially for two beautiful girls like you,” Brad says with a beautiful smile on his gorgeous face and I feel my resistance melting away inside me. This was the very last thing I was expecting from him and I find myself thinking that I’ve been far too hard on Brad… that I’ve seriously misjudged the man he is. By now there’s quite a crowd of people gathered around us and they ask Brad to play them a song. Not surprisingly, he starts playing the same song which had gone done so well with Stacy and myself and everyone starts singing along… “Leaving on a Jet Plane, don’t know when I’ll be back again!”

This time Brad gets a thunderous round of applause from everyone listening and I can tell that he is a bit blown away by the enthusiasm of everyone standing around. Stacy and I rescue Brad from the new admirers and he follows us inside the office to sit down and take a rest.

“Be honest Brad… That’s the only son you know, isn’t it?” Stacy asks and Brad nodded his head in such a funny way that I can’t resist laughing.

“I’m going to be perfectly honest with you,” Brad says, “I heard a little birdie tweet that you like guitar music and I decided to take guitar lessons and learn how to play that song just to impress you!”

I look over at Stacy and she just stands there with a wicked grin on her face. “It was you who told him, wasn’t it?” I say with a note of mock anger in my voice.

“Yes it was me who told him and you can thank me later for helping this gorgeous hunk break through your ridiculous defenses!” Stacy says.