If I Was Perfect Then This Would Be Easy

"That knucklehead brought it on himself," Brian mumbled as he helped me get up from the sand. I chuckled lightly seeing him so troubled over something so unimportant. He noticed me and a small smirk appeared on his face.

"You're enjoying this, aren't you?" I stopped smiling and tried to look at him seriously.

"Absolutely not," I replied in a matter-of-factly tone. "Jimmy should have totally seen it coming. In fact, I don't even know what he was thinking when he stole your beer. Taking him down was the only option." I nodded with every statement. Brian looked away for a moment as a smile formed on his lips. His attention was then turned to me.

"You'd tell me if something was wrong, right?" he suddenly enquired.

"Of course I would, Bri, you know that." I honestly didn't understand why he was asking that, but whatever...

"Seriously, if Michelle told you something..." and he left that sentence hanging as a tanned woman in a short dress passed us. As his eyes shortly followed her, my stomach did several twists. What the fuck? Brian brought his attention back at me and by the look on his face, I could tell he had forgotten what he had been saying. I smiled weakly.

"It's okay, Bri." He smirked before pulling me against his chest and kissed me.

""I should better take you home," he stated after he double checked the sky filled with stars. Brian gave me a smile and I did the same.

"Yeah, I can't wait for tomorrow," I muttered. This was probably the last day I would be spending entirely with Brian, seeing that soon enough I would start recording with my band and Avenged Sevenfold were to organise several concerts or something like that.

I got in the car followed by him. Of course, Gates had to turn on the music and start humming along as he drove. I once again began daydreaming. Well, it wasn't exactly day, but I was still staring outside the window and thinking about...everything. I couldn't help it, because with every day I spent with Brian, I became more attached to him. I sighed inaudibly as the all too familiar block of flats came in sight.

Brian acted quite like a gentleman and helped me get out of the car before walking me to the entry hallway.

"I'll catch up with you tomorrow," he whispered before kissing me, yet another of his loving kisses that had no effect on me other than that it made me so vulnerable and weak right there in his arms.

He winked before walking back to his car and leaving. I tried to feel rather happy, but I failed as some sort of anxiety took in. I wasn't a weak person, myself. Quite the contrary, I might say. But Brian was one of the few people who made me literally let go of who I was desperately trying to be. I realised that after the night we slept together. I admitted to myself that I had completely abandoned myself in his arms that night, no questions asked. And that scared me.

I sighed sadly before walking inside my small apartment. There was silence, which led me to believe that Jack was either asleep, or over at Val's. So there was nothing else I could do then just go to sleep and allow myself to forget about everything that troubled me.

***

I woke up the next morning running terribly late, as my brother had told me. I ran into the kitchen after taking a quick shower and getting dressed, where Jack was already set for our meeting with Jerry.

"You gonna be late, miss!" he warned and I rolled my eyes. Jack winked mischeviously. "You spent a lovely evening with your boyfriend yesterday?"

And from some odd reason, I stopped looking for my shirt right on the spot and fell silent as my brother made kissing sounds. The term boyfriend made something tick inside my head and I looked at Jack decisively.

"He's not my boyfriend," I muttered in a tone that clearly told him to drop the subject. He gave me one of his weirdest looks. I could picture some clone of mine staring at me and bursting out laughing at that ridiculous statement. A moment of silence followed and I was thankful that he had given up our conversation.

"Then what is he?" Or not. I groaned, rolling my eyes and stared at him.

"He's..." I tried to keep an imperious tone, but failed miserably. I had no idea what I was saying. "Look, Jack, I don't know, alright? This is just...I don't know...some thing." I walked back into my room, leaving a bewildered brother behind me. Heck, I was bewildered.

His curiosity raised some question marks inside my head. I began to wonder what Brian was to me and what it was we were really doing, thoughts which I had to completely erase out of my head. It was too soon to think of such things. I was somewhat aware that my thoughts were ridiculous since I had yet so much to learn about Brian

Fortunately, I didn't have time to sink into these thoughts, seeing as we had to go meet the rest of our band.

***

"Hi, guys!" Cate greeted happily as Dom, Jack and I walked in Jerry's office. She was already there, Corey by her side.

"Hi, Cate. Jerry, nice to see you." He gave me a thumbs up from behind his desk as we all got seated.

"So...I hope you're all ready to start this." Jerry stood up and rearranged his Ralph Lauren shirt before pacing around the room.

"So...I've talked to some friends and I got you some time in a studio right here in Huntington. So I guess you'll be close to home, too." He stopped in his tracks. "Not that you'll be home too much. Especially if your album has success."

We were honestly hoping to be succesful. The whole month we had been taking care of papers, signing deals and getting the studio set up. We had cd's with our songs ready, lyrics written down and everyone was getting ready for when we would finally start the whole thing.

The phone on the desk began ringing and Jerry excused himself before answering. Just then, Cate plopped herself on the leather sofa next to me.

"You're quiet," she muttered. I 'hmm'-ed in response. "You sure your okay?" Honestly, I wasn't sure. I knew I wasn't okay, but neither did I know what was going on with me. It just felt like I was falling in some thinking pit.

"Yeah, sure. I'm just feeling a little...odd." She nodded and paused.

"You better not be pregnant," she whispered and I almost choked on my coffee. She giggled. "Sorry, that was not a good one." I nodded with my eyes wide open, shocked by her words.

"We should have another one of those girls' nights," Cate suddenly stated and I smiled lightly before muttering an incoherent 'I'd like that'.

"Okay, those were my guys from the studio. Their getting their stuff ready. As promised, we're going to check out the studio today and tomorrow your work begins. I'm warning you, though: it's not going to be easy."

***

And boy, hadn't Jerry been right. But with all that, we were willing to make things happen. I think each one of us knew that if we had made it that far, there was no way in hell we weren't going to work.

During the first week of recording, Jerry introduced us to some other people in the crew: the guitar tech, whom I was eager to work with and some other guys who were supposed to help us with the more techincal stuff. Suprisingly, we had already finished recording one of the tracks.

Jack had gone with Gerard and Dom to start their work in another studio, while Cate, Corey and I were in the main studio. I sat at the chair next to Craig, facing all the buttons and computer screens. He told me how to use most things and I grabbed my guitar as Cate took a seat closer to us.

"So, Lexa, what I want is something to go with that beat Jack discovered," she explained. I nodded and random notes came to my mind.

"Alright, just give me a sec. Craig, could we record something?"

"Sure thing, Ace."

Craig and Gerard were the best, to say the least. We were around them all the time, them being sort of the more important people. I personally enjoyed working with Craig alot. He was a really patient type of person and would let me do my own thing. He'd let me, Corey or Cate record the same thing over and over again, until he was finally convinced that it was the right thing. Gerard was great, too. He worked more with Dom and Jack more, but he still came by and help us out. Gary, my guitar tech, was one crazy dude and had experience when it came to guitars.

And I was happy. As always, I never had any problems fitting in and if there was noise and movement, I could easily blend in and feel good. Still, I kind of missed Brian. He did call me almost every day and him and the whole band would drop by our studio to bring some atmosphere.

I sighed as I plopped myself on the couch and yawned. My phone began ringing and I quickly picked it up noticing the caller ID.

"Hey, babe," that oh so gorgeous voice rang.

"Hello there, stranger. I take it you couldn't keep yourself from not calling," I joked.

"Are you fucking kidding me? I should've been out of my fucking mind not to call you." I chuckled. "How are you?" I smiled to myself. "Oh, you're smiling." My jaw fell. "You're gasping...and now you're laughing out loud."

"Jesus, Brian, do you have some cameras around here or something?"

"No, but it's a good idea, now that I think about it," he contemplated and I chuckled. Over the phone, I could hear the unique voice of Zack yelling after Brian, who gratiously told Z to go fuck himself.

"You should probably go, Bri," I chuckled lightly. He sighed.

"Oh, not you too. They've been working me like a dog the whole day, baby. Please don't tell me you're on their side," he whined.

"I'm not and you know it. But you should get some rest, because you sound tired." And the yawn on the other end proved me right.

"Yeah, I guess you're right. Besides, Jimmy probably is too lonely in that king size bed." I started laughing at that image.

"Uhm, yeah...I'm not so sure about that..."

He laughed. "Don't worry. I won't go gay on you. I'll talk to you tomorrow, rockstar."

"Yeah, see you." And we both hung up.