Love Is a Losing Game

Angie sang along with the music playing on her iPod as she got herself ready for an afternoon watching basketball with the guys while Stuart went shopping with the girls.

“Let it go, it'll all disappear, nothing is real inside this masquerade, we're all just living in a dream” she sang along with James and Burn Halo as she roughly dried her hair, allowing it to take it’s natural wavy style against her shoulders.

As she continued to sing along she began to apply her make up, giving her eyes a thin layer of eye liner and dusting her eyelids gently with navy blue eye shadow and finishing off by applying mascara and finally lip gloss.

“Since when do you dress up to go and watch basketball?” Stuart’s voice interrupted her as she looked over her appearance in her mirror. She looked up at him with a blank stare.

“I don’t know what you mean.” She said quickly turning and picking up her bottle of Euphoria perfume.

“Are you even aware of what you’re doing right now?” Stuart asked taking a step further into the bedroom as she sprayed the perfume onto her pulse points.

“I’m trying to get ready to go watch the game.” She replied setting the bottle back down on her dresser.

“You know what I mean. If we were going out somewhere to watch it I wouldn’t be saying anything, but you’re going next door, with a bunch of very attractive men who remember, all have girlfriends.” He replied, the emphasis he placed on the word ‘girlfriends’ was very apparent.

“So what? Just because I’m only going next door and all the guys there are taken, I can’t make an effort to look good?” she retorted. Stuart sighed and took another step closer to her.

“Look, honey, remember how long I’ve known you. And just for the record, you know you’d make a garbage sack look good.” He began calmly, stopping as Angie blushed. “I just don’t want you getting hurt again. Brian has a girlfriend Hun, and you’re just building yourself you for a heart break if you let yourself fall for him.”

Angie opened her mouth to say something in protest but knew that he was right. She was doing it again and yet again she wasn’t even conscious of the fact that she was doing it. She took a deep breath and took a step forward towards Stuart, wrapping her arms around his slim waist and resting her head on his chest.

“What would I do without you hey Stuie?” she asked quietly with a small smile.

“Fuck knows! But I bet you wouldn’t have half as much fun!” he said lightly.

“What should I do about this?” she asked as she pulled away from him, indicating towards her appearance.

“Tie your hair back and tone down the make-up.” he said running his gaze over her body thoughtfully. She smiled and turned to grab a hair elastic off her dresser. Without brushing it through she grabbed her hair and pulled it into a messy ponytail.

“Better already.” Stuart said with a wink as he turned to leave the bedroom.

Stuart reached his right hand up and knocked confidently three times on Brian’s front door. As they waited for it to be opened he turned and gave Angie a reassuring smile and a wink.

“Hey guys, come on in.” Aimee greeted as she opened the door, standing to one side for them to enter into the house.

“Brian, Jimmy and Scarlet are out in the kitchen if you want to join them. I’ll be down in a minute.” She said pointing in the direction of the kitchen as she turned towards the foot of the stairs.

“Ok.” Angie replied simply with a smile. They both walked out towards the kitchen, following the sound of chatter.

“Said that we’ve just got to keep an eye out around the other bars, oh hey guys.” Jimmy said as they walked into the kitchen. Scarlet and Brian both turned at the sound of his greeting and smiled.

“Hey, can I get either of you a beer?” Brian asked slowly swinging the one he had in his hand back and forth.

“Damn right you can, seeing that I donated them.” Angie replied raising her eyebrows and pressing her hands to her hips.

“Oh yeah.” Brian replied, his cheeks turning a slight shade of pink as he turned and took out two bottles of Bud from his fridge.

“No thanks dude, I don’t drink and shop.” Stuart said as Brian offered one of the bottles to him. Angie giggled as Brian, Jimmy and scarlet each gave him a bemused look as Brian offered a bottle to Angie who took it with a smile and placed the other one back in the fridge.

“It’s one of his strange… habits I guess you could say. You’ll get used to them.” Angie said as she took a sip of her beer.

“You’ve got to have a clear head when you shop! Remember that awful shirt you bought after we shared a bottle of wine at lunch?”

“You told me to buy it!” Angie exclaimed, pointing her finger accusingly at him.

“Oh yeah!” Stuart laughed in realisation just as Matt, Aly, Zack and Jenni walked into the kitchen.

They all exchanged greetings with one and other and Zack and Matt were both given a bottle of beer. Brian then led them all back into his living room where there was a large plasma TV hanging on the wall opposite the large sofa and a large bowl of chips on the coffee table.

Angie shot a glance around the living room, judging the seating arrangements, spotting the love seat the was adjacent to the sofa on the other side of the room. If she could sit there she’d be away from close contact to Brian, just what she needed to avoid. However, fate wasn’t on her side, as before she could take a step forward towards the seat Jimmy ran over to it and jumped onto it, stretching his legs out in front of him. With this option lost, Angie reluctantly sat on the sofa, discreetly pushing herself as far into the arm rest as she could. To her relief Zack sat between her and Brian. No sooner than they were all sat down, there was a knock at the door.

“Come in short shit!” Brian yelled as he pressed buttons on the remote to put the sports channel on. The door opened and Johnny walked in with Beth following closely behind. “Beer’s in the kitchen, as are the girls.” He added.

Moment’s later Johnny returned from the kitchen, beer in hand, making Jimmy move his feet so he could sit next to him. Excited chatter followed as the girls, and Stuart, made their way into the living room. Each of the girls made their way to their respective boyfriends and exchanged a brief kiss good bye.

“Oh now I feel left out!” Angie mocked, pouting out her lower lip.

“I’ll never leave you out Hun!” Stuart said, leaning over the sofa to place a sloppy kiss against her forehead. “Love you.”

“Love you too, buy me something nice.” She replied with a wide smile. He gave her a wink and a smile as he followed the other girls out of the house.

“That was a clear foul!” Angie yelled at the TV as the referee ignored her shout and David Monds, a Lakers forward, got back up off the floor.

“Fucking Ref!” Brian muttered from the other side of Zack.

Moments later there was a loud cheer around the living room when the Lakers scored again taking them further into the lead.

“Another beer guys?” Angie asked as she pushed herself off the sofa. There was a unified ‘yes’ from the guys as she made her way to the kitchen with her empty bottle. She took six beers from the fridge and made her way back to the living room, passing each of the guys one. As she passed Zack one she noticed he’d moved over to the end of the sofa, meaning she now had to sit next to Brian.

As she sat down she tried to get closer to Zack so that she wasn’t touching Brian, but that proved too uncomfortable and she found herself adjusting herself, her thigh brushing Brian’s.

“Yes, that’s just what we need!” Matt said talking about the lay-up shot the Lakers had just scored.

“Less than a minute left dude, Lakers have it.” Brian said taking a sip of his beer.
When the buzzer sounded on the TV to signal the end of the game, a small cheer broke through the living room. Angie’s heart leapt when she felt Brian’s hand clapped down on her thigh.

“You still want to have that bet on Thursday’s game?” he asked with a smirk.

“Why wouldn’t I? The Grizzlies were all over you in the first quarter. Luck won you the game today, the Nuggets will beat you.” Angie replied with confidence.

“Guess we’ll see on Thursday.” Brian replied, still smirking.

Angie returned the smirk as she took a sip of her beer, her eyes not leaving Brian’s until Jimmy spoke.

“Anybody joining me outside?” he said getting up off the love seat and heading towards the kitchen.

One by one, the others all followed, heading out into Brian’s back yard where they talked about the game, about Thursday’s game and Angie listened to the guys talk about various things she was surprised they would be openly willing to talk about in front of her.

“So, were you well behaved earlier?” Stuart asked later that evening as he watched Angie prepare them a meal.

“Hey, I’m always well behaved.” She protested looking up at him from where she was chopping tomatoes.

“You know what I mean, you didn’t flirt with Brian?” he replied raising a questioning eyebrow.

“No, I was good. I even tried to sit away from him.”

“Yeah I did notice, listen I’m sorry if I gave you a hard time earlier, I’m just-“

“Worried about me, yeah I know, and I’m grateful. But you don’t have to worry about me. Nothing’s going to happen between Brian and Me.” she said with a confident smile.