Page 46 of Shrapnel

“Who’s playing?”

Owen jumped, turning to see Jamie standing beside him. He had snuck up when Owen had been distracted by the doors opening.

For a moment Jamie was standing in front of the fading autumn sun. A halo of light blinded Owen and he couldn’t see Jamie until he stepped to the side, blinking stars from his eyes.

“It’s my favorite band. They’re European and rarely tour the US, let alone coming so close. I’ve had the tickets for a while.”

Jamie nodded, looking over at the poster plastered to the doors announcing the band.

Owen finally got a look at the assassin.

He looked…normal. With a plain green t-shirt and jeans, battered sneakers, and his hair wild and curly, Jamie looked like every other twenty-one-year-old in line. Without a single weapon visible he could have been a classmate in one of Owen’s classes or someone behind him in line for coffee.

It shouldn’t have been a shocking change. Outside of the Weaver’s uniform, Jamie was the same. But as Jamie smiled, the evening light refracting off his hazelnut eyes, he looked like someone else.

“Want to get in line?”

Owen nodded dumbly, following Jamie around the corner of the building towards the back of the line. He stared at the back of his head the entire way, transfixed by the messy curls in what was essentially a mullet.

“Why do you like this band?” Jamie asked conversationally.

“Uh,” Owen almost tripped over a crack in the cement, he mentally slapped himself to get himself together. “All their songs tell a story.”

“A story? Like country music?”

“Less broken hearts and knocking boots and more famous historic battles and people.”

Jamie smiled crookedly. “Cool.”

They found their way to the back of the line and Owen looked at Jamie out of the corner of his eye. “Did you really not bring any guns?”

“You told me not to.”

“I didn’t think you’d do it,” Owen admitted. “Thought you’d manage to have some sort of…origami folded single shot handgun you could whip out and take out like…forty guys.”

Jamie stared at Owen for a minute before bursting into laughter. It was a soft and hoarse kind of laugh, nothing like the uproarious whoops he usually did. This was subtle.

That led to them discussing the logistics of a folding gun. Owen was horrified to learn that there was such a thing, although as far as Jamie knew it couldn’t be folded into an origami crane. Their discussion on the engineering of guns led to Jamie’s saltiness at not being able to curve bullets like they did in that one movie—something he spent an entire summer trying to perfect much to Elijah’s horror.

“A shark could outswim me, but I’m reasonably sure I could outrun a shark. Which means in a triathlon, it would all come down to who is the better cyclist.”

Owen rolled his eyes as they entered the concert venue.

It was a grassroots kind of place. Small and open to the air, it looked like a courtyard more than anything else. On the far end, a large stage had been built into the brick walls. Uneven cement bricks lined the courtyard floor, weeds poking through the cracks to tickle their ankles and drag at loose shoelaces.

In the middle of the open space, a gnarled tree sprouted from between the hastily installed benches. This close to winter its branches were barren, but they tangled over the heads of the masses clustered underneath it. People were already leaning against its trunk, using the tree as a meeting place or as a block against the undulating crowd.

“What kind of music do you listen to?” Owen asked as they made their way to stand at a decent spot to stage left.

“Polka,” Jamie answered breezily. “Or anything with a good yodeler.”

Owen rolled his eyes. “Right, sorry. Not sure why I even bothered.” He mumbled under his breath, stuffing his hands into the front pocket of his hoodie.

Jamie watched him for a moment, eyes hooded.

“EDM and rock, mostly.” He finally answered, much to Owen’s shock. That unreadable shadow was lurking behind Jamie’s eyes and Owen had to wonder why it was so difficult to tell him the type of music he listened to.

“Isn’t this a date thing?” Jamie asked, the shadow disappearing and his shit-eating grin returning. “Why didn’t you bring someone?”