Somebody to Love - A Joe Mazzello FanFiction

Chapter 11 - The First Date Part 2

We pulled into the parking lot of a small Italian café/diner. It did look kind of fancy, but nothing too special, just like Joe had said. We got out of the car and walked up to the front door, which he held open for me. He quickly half-jogged back in front of me to get to the front desk and spoke to the hostess. I stood back and took in the atmosphere of the restaurant. You could tell that it was family owned in the best way possible. It was small, but they used their space wisely, decorating the walls to look like we were sitting outside in Italy. The lights were also dimmer than normal which made every bit of this place feel like a dream.

"Come on," Joe said with a laugh. I guess I hadn't noticed the hostess walking away from us, taking us to our table. He put his hand on my back and pushed me forward. Every time he touched me, I wanted to kiss him. He shot chills up my spine. I hadn't even known him for that long and he had such an effect on me. I had never felt this way before.

We were put at a booth that was near the back. There were only a couple other people in the place, but none of them were near us. I secretly wanted this. I wanted our date to feel private, and to not be disturbed by anyone else, except the waiter of course. I grabbed a menu and started looking through it. Everything looked so good. We sat there reading out some of the menu items and remarking about how good they looked. I didn't want to get anything too expensive or eat something that was a lot of food. I decided to go with a half order of fettuccine alfredo with grilled chicken. Joe got some chicken dish that I had never heard of. Once the waiter had left, it was just us. I wasn't used to that phrase yet. Every other time I had been with him before today had other people around. This was just us two.

"Tell me about singing." He said trying to start a conversation to fill the silence.

"I told you about it already," I laughed. "Remember, at the dinner party?" He laughed too.

"Ok, let me rephrase the question." He thought for about 2 seconds while looking up at the ceiling and then looked back at me. "Tell me about the music you sing. The music you like. Why do you like it?" This was a new question I hadn't heard before. Every one of my friends knew how much I loved music, but they also knew that if I got started talking about it, I would never stop.

"Ok." I paused before I began talking some more, "I might start rambling. Are you sure you want to hear this?" He put his elbow on the table and laid his head in his hand. He nodded as he became more relaxed in his chair. "Alright then. But, if you find me boring it's on you." I pointed at him as I spoke.

"I'll take that chance." He said in a light tone of voice. He seemed genuinely interested in me and what I had to say. His eyes staring at me wanting to take in every movement and every word. He was hyper-focused on me; something I wasn't used to. Even in friend groups, I was the one in the back. The one person people would go to for a quick laugh, but overlook when someone better came along. I was no one's first choice, let's put it that way. But, Joe made me feel special. Like I was the only girl in the world who mattered. When I thought that, I had realized that I should be careful. I had been told my whole life about charismatic guys who just want to sleep with you and then never see you again. Not that I thought Joe was like this, but he could have been. So, I want to tread lightly. I decided that if he tried to sleep with me tonight, he was one of those guys, but if he didn't; then he really cared about me.

"Well," I started. I had to think hard to answer his question. "I was raised on classic rock. You know, like Queen and the Temptations, Peter, Paul and Mary, Simon and Garfunkel. All those guys. And I loved it." I started talking with my hands now. I couldn't tell if I was just very excited to be talking about this, or I was just overly nervous. "When I was 13, I decided to listen to a Beatles cd that had been in my house forever. I was bored and had nothing better to do. The first song on the cd was Yesterday. I had never heard anything like it. I replayed it for about 4 hours. I had no headphones or anything, so I'm sure I annoyed the hell out of my family." We both laughed. His eyes were still glued to me. He hadn't lost interest at all.