This is one I have promised for what seems like years. The idea of this story came from watching a rock band sing acapella. Twas beautiful. I am working on it as I go along, so there will be no regular updates at this time. I wanted to have 5-10 chapters under my belt before posting, but I kept re-reading this, making changes and adding, and deleting. I figure by posting, I can't keep messing with it. The joy of finding yourself again can be tiresome. Enjoy!

Only God Can Judge Me

"Bella! Tonight, me and you, Club Amplify. There's a new band playing and I heard they will be amazing!" Alice was bouncing as she spoke.

I pushed my glasses up my nose, mildly annoyed that I was being interrupted, and looked at my best friend and roommate, Alice.

"I have to study. I can't." I turned my gaze back to my book. Ever since leaving high school, I devoted myself to my studies. Other distractions were not what I needed. Yet, Alice tended to be a constant distraction.

"Bella." My book was slammed shut on me. "You already went to college for six god damn years to get your masters. You can take a break. It's one night!"

"Alice, I don't have a masters. I have a bachelors and am about to finish with med school. That happens to take a while. It also happens to require me to be focused." I reached for my book, but Alice shoved it across the table.

"Bella, for me. The drummer is hot as fuck and, please!"

I rolled my eyes at Alice. I should have known this was about a guy. When Alice really wanted something, it was always about a guy. I hadn't dated since high school, and it was best that way. Men were not something I wanted to attract in my life. They never led to good things. Alice sadly didn't understand that part of my life since I refused to provide her with details from before we met.

"Alice."

"Bella." She batted her lashes at me. "I won't ask you for anything else ever again."

"I highly doubt that."

"Well then, if you don't come with me, I will bother you all night long and you won't be able to study and so it would all be for nothing."

She smiled at me and pulled her hands up to a praying position. I knew if I didn't agree to go, she would hold true to what she said and bother me all night. I wouldn't be able to get anything done toward my med school work, so I might as well give into her. I debated if I could really afford to give into her. I needed to pass my clinicals before fall, so I could get the residency with the medical examiner that would be opening at the local hospital. Yet, I decided to have Alice as a roommate and I knew that would impact my studies to a degree. Alice made studying difficult. She didn't quite understand the meaning of school and education. I wasn't sure how we were best friends – we were nothing alike.

Deep down, I knew why we were friends. I lived vicariously through her. She reminded me of myself at eighteen. Except we were now both twenty-four. I grew up, she did not.

"Fine, but I don't want to stay long. I have things I need to do."

"Bella, you are such a nerd. You really need to live a little."

Alice flitted down the hall to her bedroom. "Oh, and Bella, make sure you shower. You smell like dead people."

I looked down at my vintage Pepsi shirt. I pulled the collar to my nose. "I don't smell like dead people!" I yelled at her.

Alice laughed as the water in the bathroom turned on.

I flipped my middle finger toward the bathroom, even though I knew she couldn't see me.

"I don't smell like dead people," I muttered to myself, picking my book back up.

Two hours later, I had gotten a bit more studying done, and Alice finally came out of her room, club ready. She had on a hot pink tank, skinny jeans and heels that make my ankles hurt just by looking at them.

"Bella! We need to leave! You aren't ready!"

I pulled my glasses off, placing them on the table and looked down at my shirt again and paint splattered jeans. "What's wrong with what I have on?"

"Bella, this is a club, not a dive bar. At least put on something clean."

"These are clean. I washed them the other day."

"Bella! What am I going to do with you?" Alice walked behind me, and pulled my hair from its ponytail. "Let your hair down, maybe you would have a few guys take interest in you then."

I reached back and took my hair tie out of Alice's hands. "I don't want guys take notice to me. I'm not like you."

"Yet I don't know why." Alice stomped down the hall and turned into my room. I knew an Alice makeover was about to take place, but I also knew she wouldn't find anything suitable for me in my room. She never did.

"Bella," she yelled, "we need to take you shopping. Do you shop in the men's section or something? You have nothing that is form fitting." I mimicked her words as she said them – it was the same lecture every time we went out.

Alice came back down the hall with a pair of jeans without paint on them and an old Linkin Park shirt, the one without a hole. "At least you will look like you like music this way."

I rolled my eyes and quickly changed into the 'Alice approved' clothes. I pulled on my newer pair of tennis shoes, as she sprayed me with perfume to cover up the smell of death she said I had on me, and we headed to the club.

OGCJM

The music was pumping when we got to the club. There was a line of people waiting to get in, and I couldn't help but sigh. We would wait all night to get in, miss the band and it would have been a bust of a night for both Alice and me. As I headed to the back of the line, Alice walked up to the bouncer and the next thing I knew, we were both allowed immediate entrance.

"Alice, what was that?"

"What was what?"

"Why didn't we have to wait in line?"

"Alice Brandon doesn't wait in line. Plus, I know Felix, the bouncer." She giggled.

I rolled my eyes at her. Of course she knew the bouncer.

As we walked in, the DJ was playing some crap new age pop music. I prayed the band wasn't anything like this crap, or I would have rather been at home getting nothing done than here. Club thumping music wasn't my favorite.

Alice spotted someone she knew, and with a wave was off. I attempted to call for her, but she was gone before I got a word out. I should have known she would find someone she knew and ditch me. It always tended to happen. She was a butterfly and I no longer was.

I tried to make my way to the bar, sure I would need a few drinks to make it through the evening solo, but with the amount of people in the club it was making it difficult on me.

"I heard this band was going to be the next big one," some girl said as I walked toward the bar.

"I heard the singer is beyond fuckable. I hope I can get in his pants before they make it big," her friend giggled.

"Rope him in and get knocked up." They both giggled. "What does he look like?" the first girl inquired.

"Not a clue, but that doesn't matter as long as he has a cock and money."

"Make me vomit," I muttered to myself. With a shake of my head, I did my best to ignore anyone else until I had a drink in me. This was why I hated going out with Alice. She knew everyone – I knew no one anymore. Not that I cared that I knew no one; I liked it that way. Except, she would socialize and I would be stuck sitting at the bar, milking a drink all night.

"Hey, bartender! Down here!" I yelled out. I sat down on a barstool and waved my hand out to the over muscular guy behind the bar.

"What can I get ya, pretty lady?"

"Miller light."

"Are you opening a tab?"

Someone grabbed my ass. I turned and looked, ready to punch, but the guy kept walking, looking back only to wink.

"Yeah. Keep 'em coming." I pulled my wallet out of my tiny shoulder bag and handed my credit card to the guy.

The bartender slid my beer to me and I took a drink.

"Hey, Linkin Park, you a fan?" someone yelled from behind me, right as I swallowed.

I turned, sure I was the only one in a Linkin Park shirt, and the guy behind me had his Corona bottle to his lips, ready to take a pull.

"Me?" I asked, honestly shocked that anyone paid any notice to me. I tended to stay under the radar, always, but especially when in a club full of guys looking to get laid. After all, was there really any reason to go to a club besides looking for a fuck?

"Yeah, you a fan of theirs?" I looked the guy over, he was in jeans and a hoodie, not very 'club dressed', just like me, but guys could get away with dressing down and still looking amazing. And amazing this guy did look. He had light brown hair that seemed to go everywhere. His face was covered in two day stubble, but it was clear that was how he wanted it, not because he was being a bum by not shaving.

"Yeah, I guess." I ran my fingers thought my hair, pulling it into a ponytail.

"Awesome." He took another drink of his beer.

Using that as my opportunity, I turned back on my stool, cutting off any more undesired conversation with the guy next to me. Frankly, I wasn't sure why he wanted to small talk with me, and I wasn't looking for a club fuck in the bathroom. No matter how good looking he was. If this had been a few years earlier…

I looked to the stage and a few guys were setting up for the band. I was thankful they would be on stage soon, because the beat of the club music was giving me a headache the beer wasn't going to help it go away.

"I have to go, but maybe I'll see you later," the guy said to me, touching my shoulder.

"Don't count on it," I mumbled into my bottle, as I took a drink. I pulled the rubber band back out of my hair, letting it fan around my face. Maybe it would make me invincible.

There was a tap to the mic and the pop music turned down to a level that didn't make me want to scream.

"Welcome to Club Amplify!" The whole crowed cheered like the bunch of drunken idiots they were. "I am Rex, the host for the evening and I'm here to announce the live band we have playing for us. They are a local group of four guys, on their way to making it big. Ladies, gentleman, give it up for Only God Can Judge Me!"

The house lights above the stage dimmed as the four guys set up at their equipment. There were a few beats to the drums before the lights came back on, and the most beautiful voice I had ever heard before began to sing. Coincidentally, he started singing Somewhere I Belong, by Linkin Park, and his voice sounded mildly familiar. My eyes focused in on the singer, straining a tad since I didn't have my glasses, and it was the guy who had been sitting next to me. He no longer wore the hoodie, but had a wife beater on, exposing his beautiful tatted arms. His jeans hung low on his hips and the top band of his boxers showed.

The girls earlier were right, he was very fuckable.

I looked at the other band members. There was a skinny guy playing the keyboard. His hair was in a short buzz cut. The drummer had hair similar to that of the singer. It was long, and all over the place. The guy on the bass guitar was built like a house with a shaved head. They were all pretty fuckable, but the singer, he was the most desirable in my mind. If I was the type of girl to date, I would be all over him in a heartbeat.

The song ended, and they started on a song I didn't know. It very possibly could've be an original of theirs. Either way, it was a beautiful song about life, love and death. Mr. Fuckable sang as he strummed the guitar that hung over his shoulder. I watched as his fingers moved on the strings. I watched his lips as he sang the words into the mic. He knew how to play music and excite a crowd with no strain. He went from one song to another and another; minor breaks between each one for the crowd to cheer. As for me, I drank and watched him like a stalker. I was completely sucked into him and my beer.

"Bella! There you are!" Alice ran into me, pulling me from starting at the beautiful man on stage. "Do you see him up here?"

"Yeah." My eyes back on the singer.

"Do you see how he works those sticks? And his hair. God, how I want to run my fingers through his hair as I cum. He would be amazing to fuck."

"What?" Alice talking about fucking someone pulled me out of my thoughts of the singer. I prayed she wasn't talking about him that she wanted to fuck. I forgot which band member she found hot. I really should pay more attention to her when she talks about guys.

"Were you not paying any attention to me?"

I tapped my hand on the bar to get the bartenders attention. He slid a new beer my way. "I was paying attention. You were talking about fucking, uh, someone."

"Yeah, the drummer, Jasper."

A wave of relief washed over me that we were not after the same guy. I knew if it was me and her pining after the same man, I would lose for sure. Not that I would even attempt to go after him anyways.

"So, do you know the whole band, or just Jasper?"

"I don't even know Jasper. But I want to know him. Badly."

The band stopped playing, making Alice and me end our conversation.

"It's been lovely playing for you all tonight. This will be our last song. It is for you, girl." He winked and looked around the club, searching. All the girls in the club cheered. You would have thought it was the sixties and the Beatles were on stage.

He swung his guitar back so it was behind him. His hands took hold on the mic and he slowly began to sing.

It was a soft, gentle song, unlike some of the others they had played. The keyboard player was light on the music, as was the guitarist. Jasper, the guy Alice had the hots for was intently listening to the music before him. His drum sticks put away.

The lyrics had feeling behind them. About loss. About not wanting to lose who he wanted. About what he would do if given one more chance to have her.

His hair draped around his face, although shorter than mine, it reminded me of myself, when I was trying to hide from the world around me.

Desire and love radiated through the words he sang. I knew he had to have someone special he sang the words to. If someone sang a song of such emotion to me, I would have a hard time denying them.

For now, I lived in the moment, knowing it would soon pass. I watched him sing and imagined the words were being sung to me.

It never hurt to imagine.

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