Do it for the memories and for Baltimore

Chapter 9

I told Alex a lot about myself, and he encouraged me to continue talking whenever I stopped. I told him about growing up in Illinois, moving here pretty much 2 weeks ago, and mentioned some other little anecdotes about myself here and there.

“Shut up! Okay it sounds like you live like 10-15 minutes from me” Alex said excitedly as I told him where my new place was.

“Okay no fair, first you want me to continue talking about myself and now you tell me to shut up! Make up your mind!”

He laughed at my joke, “hah, cute.”

I blushed and hid my face behind my coffee mug. “Anyway, so I think I covered enough about me, what about you, Smelly Feet?” I giggled remembering the day he had dog poop on his shoes.

Alex rolled his eyes, “clever…well where can I start? I moved to Maryland when I was 10 with my parents, we originally lived in England, not that you could hear my accent. Ummm, my last name is Gaskarth, I work in a local record store in Towson, I had lived there for almost 8 years until pretty recently tragedy struck when I was out of town with my friends…” he said trailing off.

“Oh my that’s terrible, if you don’t mind me asking, what happened exactly?”

“Well it was less than a year ago, and like I said, my friends and I were out of town and I had gotten a phone call from one of my neighbours saying that my house had caught fire, and pretty much the entire place burnt down,” he explained very sadly “we were all the way in Philadelphia so I couldn’t just rush off to see the house, so my parents went over and salvaged as much as they could. Luckily, I didn't have a whole lot of important things in there at the time, but a lot was lost. I had lived with my parents again, and eventually I found another house…”

“Oh I’m so sorry that happened to you Alex. I wouldn't wish that kind of thing on anybody, let alone a great guy like you.”

“Thanks, but at least it didn't take me long to bounce back from it.”

“So on a brighter note, what else can you tell me about yourself?”

“Hmmm…” he looked up at the ceiling thinking, “well I didn't tell you that I happen to have another job other than working at the record store? I, uh, happen to be in a band as well” he said giving me a huge smile.

“And by band I’m assuming you mean playing on the street corner for some extra cash?”

“Nooo Ms. Smarty-Sarcastic-Pants. I’m in a legit band with my friends Jack, Rian, and Zack. Wanna hear some of our stuff?”

“Hm I guess it wont kill me.”

“Alright cool.” he said grabbing his phone out of his jeans pocket and putting the volume up. I heard the song, and I recognized it. It was an All Time Low song from the album I had listened to on my drive from Illinois. I nodded my head along to the song, it was this song called Shameless, and it was great. When it ended, Alex took his phone back turning the music off and looked at me, “so? what did you think?” he asked happily.

“Okay, so now that we listened to an All Time Low song, you gonna show me your band’s stuff?”

Alex laughed loudly and hard, gaining quick glances from other customers and workers, and honestly, I didn't understand why he was laughing as hard as he was. “What are you laughing so hard at?” I asked him kinda confused.

He continued laughing but slowed himself down to speak, “That WAS my band! I’m the singer and I play guitar! I’m in All Time Low!”

------------

Alex’s POV

Rachel had the cutest expression on her face when I told her that I was in All Time Low, it was priceless. It looked like she was trying to process the fact that I was in an actual band, and she just looked speechless.