Come Around

"Hey, you wanna hear some of the new songs?" Bert asked in the middle of the interview.

Cassie smiled. She remembered from the last time that Bert had trouble focusing on the interview for too long. There was no rush. They had the rest of the day to finish.

"I would love to," she said, reaching over and stopping the small device that was recording them, "You guys have awhile before you're done with the record though, right?"

"Yeah," Jeph said, nodding, "We take forever in the studio."

They all headed into another room in the studio. Dan played with some of the equipment for a minute before music came from the speakers. The songs were only rough demos, but for Cassie, it was like hitting the jackpot. Some of her favorite versions of songs were demos.

She leaned against the wall and as she did, her phone buzzed in her back pocket. Normally, she would just ignore it, but it vibrated loudly against the wall and all the guys looked at her. Her eyes rolled and she retrieved her phone, not bothering to read the message when she saw who it was from. Instead, she turned the vibrating alert off and held onto her phone.

"Sorry," she mumbled and they all shrugged. "The songs sound great. This record is going to be incredible," she said.

"This is nothing," Bert said, "Come back when we have finished versions and we'll play them for you and then you can tell the world how much the new songs slay."

Cassie laughed, "Is that an invitation?" she asked.

"You bet your sweet ass it is, darling."

"I'll see what I can do about that," she said as they all made their way back to the room they were previously in.

They resumed the interview. About an hour later, in the middle of Bert telling a hilarious story, he suddenly became distracted. Cassie followed his line of vision and saw the screen on her phone flashing, indicating that someone was calling her.

Bert reached across the table and grabbed her phone, "Who's Alex? Can I answer it?" he asked, and before Cassie could object, he had pressed the talk button and put the phone to his ear. "Hello?" he said.

"Who is this?" Alex asked, clearly confused.

"It's Bert McCracken, motherfucker. Who's this?" Bert said.

"Uhh," Alex began, "Can I talk to Cassandra?"

"Who?" Bert asked.

"Cassandra," he repeated, "The girl whose phone I called," Alex said.

Bert grinned mischievously, "Oh, she's busy with Quinn and Jepha. Really busy, if you know what I mean," he said.

Cassie groaned quietly and dropped her head. Around her, the guys snickered to themselves. She should've known better than to leave her phone on the table.

"Alright," she heard Bert say, "I'll pass along the message. Later, bitch," he said and slid the phone across the table to Cassie. "Was that your boyfriend?" he asked.

She shook her head, "No, he's just a friend," she said.

"Good. He sounds like a douche."

Cassie sighed, "That could've been anyone. I can't believe you did that."

"Believe it, baby!" Bert exclaimed.

"What did he want?" she asked.

Bert shrugged, "He just said to have you call him back when you're not busy anymore. He sounded pretty bummed when I said you were with Quinn and Jepha. Are you sure he's not your boyfriend?"

"Positive," she said, "But you have no idea how much damage control I'm going to have to do anyway."

"Why?"

"Long story," she said, "And we have an interview to finish, which means there's no time for me to tell it. So, you were saying?"

With a little help from his band mates, Bert picked his story back up. Cassie scribbled down notes as each of the guys talked and nearly three hours later, they finally started to wrap things up.

The screen on her phone flashed again, catching not only her attention, but also Bert and Jeph's. Bert reached across the table again and grabbed her phone.

"Don't do it," Cassie said, mentally kicking herself for not learning the first time.

Bert ignored her request and answered the call, "Helloooo?" he sang.

"Where's Cassandra?" the voice on the other end of the call asked.

"Who's this?" Bert asked.

"It's her brother," he said rather aggressively.

Bert held the phone out to Cassie, "Your brother. He sounds grumpy."

Cassie groaned and took the phone from Bert, "Hey Rian," she said, trying to sound cheerful.

"What the fuck is going on, Cassandra?" Rian demanded, "Why is everyone telling me that you're whoring it up?"

Cassie tensed up at his accusation and the way he spoke to her and immediately changed her tone, "First of all, you need to adjust your tone. Second, I am most definitely not slutting around. And third, I'm working, so maybe you should tell your little friend that when I tell him that I take my job seriously, I mean it and he should chill the fuck out and stop bothering me. Now if you don't mind, I'm going to finish up this interview and if you have any other questions about my day, I can call you back when I'm at the hotel and we can discuss it," she said and pressed the end button, hanging up on him.

Jeph, Dan, Bert and Quinn all stared at her, clearly dumbfounded. She calmly turned her phone off so it wouldn't cause any further distractions and tossed it into her purse.

"Thank you, Bert," she said, "You have no idea the kind of night I'm going to have now."

"Anytime. I like to keep things interesting for people," he replied.

She laughed, "There has been so much more drama in my life since I met Alex and I haven't even known him that long. I was actually enjoying being away from it," she said, closing her notebook and gathering all her things.

When she got back to her hotel room, she fell on the bed, feeling around the inside of her purse for her phone. She finally found it and turned it back on, resetting the vibrating alert. Within seconds, her phone was buzzing incessantly. She ignored all the text messages and called Rian.

"Hello?" he answered.

"I'm sorry for yelling and hanging up on you," she said.

"I deserved it. I'm sorry for being a dick," he said.

Cassie laughed, "You're forgiven."

"Thanks," he said, "I really freaked out when I got that text from Zack though. I read-"

"You heard it from Zack?" she interrupted.

"Yeah," Rian said, "He sent me a text that said you apparently do very thorough interviews with some bands and that we seemed to have gotten the short end of the stick. When I asked him what he was talking about, his text just said threesome. Then I got one from Jack that said basically the same thing. And when I called you, I didn't mean to make it sound like I was accusing you, I was really just freaked out."

The more Rian talked, the more upset Cassie got. Her blood was boiling by the time he finished explaining and it was all she could do to not break something in the hotel room.

"I have to call you back, Rian," she said and hung up before he could respond. She opened a recent text message and hit the call button.

"Yo," he answered in the middle of the third ring.

"You've got a lot of fucking nerve, asshole," she seethed.

"Excuse me?" he said.

"You told Zack and Jack a vicious lie about me all because of something someone you don't even know said to you as a complete joke. What kind of person does that, Alex?"

"How was I supposed to know he wasn't serious?" he asked.

"You didn't even wait for me to call you back and tell you!" she screamed.

"It's been over three hours since I called you," he said, "What was I supposed to think?"

Cassie gripped her phone tightly, resisting the urge to throw it against the wall, "That I was working," she shouted, "I told you that's what this weekend was. And I also told you how seriously I take my job so why would you even think that calling me was a good idea?"

Alex didn't say anything. The line was silent for a good ninety seconds before Cassie finally spoke again.

"You're a fucking shitty person, Alex," she said, quickly nearing the point of tears, "Rian was so right about you."

Alex winced at her words. And before he could say anything, he heard the sound that indicated that she had hung up. He kept his phone to his ear for a few minutes, not moving at all. Finally, he stood, grabbed his wallet, keys and hoodie and headed for his car.