This Is Primetime

It was late when we got back to my apartment. Mike and Ian immediately dove onto the couches, claiming them without saying a single word. I gave them some spare pillows and blankets while Matt and Josh pumped up the air mattress.

"This is mine," Josh said to Matt as he pressed the plug into it firmly. He reminded me strongly of a small child trying to keep his favourite toy away from everyone else. "You get the floor."

Matt looked up at me. "Told you I would end up stealing your bed."

"Fuck off. If you're lucky, I'll let you share it." I shot back.

"That works for me," he shrugged, then faced Josh. "If you'll excuse me, I have a date with a real bed."

"And I'm sure that the pretty girl who happens to be sleeping in the bed with you has nothing to do with it," Mike murmured as he pulled his blanket around his shoulders.

Matt and I looked at each other with disgusted expressions, then we both burst into laughter.

"Me and Matt?" I giggled. "You're hilarious, Mike."

Ian surveyed us with tired eyes. "Really? Nothing happened between you two? Ever?"

Matt shook his head. "Never. She had a thing for troubled, scrawny little guys like Josh. How can a good-looking guy like me compete?"

I punched him on the shoulder. "You're an idiot."

"You don't seem all that smart if you're willing to share your bed with an idiot," he countered. "And speaking of your bed, can we go there now? I'm really sleepy."

"Yeah, me too. Night, guys," I waved as I headed down the hall, Matt close on my heels. He pushed past me as soon as we were inside my bedroom.

"Holy hell your bed is comfy!" Matt exclaimed as he wrapped himself up in my blankets.

"That's why I refused to give it up," I replied, crawling in next to him and fighting for a share of the covers. "Come on, Matt. I agreed to share, why can't you?"

He rolled over and wrapped his arms around me, enveloping me in sudden warmth. "Better?"

I found myself staring deeply into his rich, warm brown eyes. "I'm not sure," I admitted, knowing that my own inhibitions about my friendship with Matt were keeping me from enjoying the intimate moment.

A smile pulled at his eyes. "It wasn't that long ago that you would have hugged me back. And then I would let go and give you some blankets. Relax, Beck, I'm not actually hitting on you. I'm just trying to creep you out a little bit."

I laughed lightly and snaked my arms around him. The gesture actually felt nice. It had been a long time since I'd hugged someone and felt that they actually cared for me this much. I buried my head in his shoulder, and before I knew it, there were tears dampening the rough fabric of his shirt. I didn't get it; I hadn't been the least bit emotional until this point. Maybe everything from the rest of the day had finally just caught up with me.

"Beck? Are you okay?"

"I'm sorry," I whispered, forcing back the sobs that were trying to escape my chest. "I'm just so happy to see you. I still can't really believe that you're here."

"Don't cry," he cooed. "It's real. I'm here."

"But you're leaving soon."

"I already told you that I've got a spare room. I know that you thought it was a joke, but I was serious. You can move back to Vancouver if you want. The offer still stands."

I pulled back and looked at him once more. "You were serious? But my whole life is here. My job and my parents and Markie-"

Matt gently wiped away the traces of tears left on my cheeks. "And there was a time when your life was in Vancouver, too. Do you really think that you couldn't find a job in a mall there? Look, I'm not saying that you have to. Don't feel any pressure here. It's just something to consider. I miss you. I'd love to have you around more."

"Thanks. I'll give it some thought. But... will he think it's such a good idea?" I hesitated. I didn't know if Matt would still be so open to talking about Josh. They seemed to be pretty much best friends nowadays.

"You're making a huge effort to be his friend," Matt comforted me. "It's impossible not to see that. It's only going to get easier if you spend more time with him."

"I guess that makes sense. I'll sleep on it. I'll have an answer for you by the time you leave, I promise."

"Don't rush it. You've got my phone number now. You can always call me."

I nodded, resting my head against his chest and feeling my eyelids drop lower with every blink. "Hey Matt?"

"Yeah?"

"Will you stay here again tomorrow night?"

"I'm not sure. Maybe. Do you want us to?"

I nodded again. "I miss being able to stay up at night talking to you like this. I guess we could do that all the time if I lived with you, huh?"

A low, breathy chuckle was Matt's only response.

I was awake as soon as Matt was the next morning. He had to shift me in order to get free, and the movement jostled me into consciousness.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to wake you up," he apologised in a whisper, as though the low volume would somehow reverse the past few moments. "You can go back to sleep; Josh won't be up for a solid two hours."

"No, it's okay. I'm up," I sat upright, looking over at my alarm clock. It was nine in the morning. I stretched. "I should call into work anyways."

"You're actually skipping work?"

"Do you think I should? If I go, then I miss our only full day together. But I can always use some extra cash," I added, trying to make a concrete decision.

"Go to work. Markie will kill you if you leave her there alone. We can go to the amusement park or something. We'll come visit like we did yesterday."

I groaned and flopped back down on the bed. "I wish I didn't have to. I hate work."

"It can't be that bad. I'll bring you a present."

I smirked at him. "Bribery always helps."

"Get up, then. What time do you work?"

"Eleven."

"Let's go wake Josh up. We could just take you to work and hang out all day so that we can bring you home again. Then, if everyone else is okay with it, we can just stay tonight again." Matt planned out the day.

I tucked my hair behind my ears. "Sounds like a plan to me." I crawled out from under the covers, noticing for the first time that both Matt and I were still in our clothes from the night before. "Do you guys need to use the shower or anything?"

"Are you saying I smell?" He laughed, not even bothering to take offense.

"If you reeked that badly, would I have been able to stand sleeping in the same bed as you last night?"

"Good point," he conceded, leading the way out of my bedroom.

"Morning," Ian greeted us as he raided my fridge. "Josh is still sleeping, but Mike's up."

I nodded and headed out into the living room. Mike had found some cartoons on TV, and Josh was on his knees, trying to deflate the air mattress.

"Ian thought you were still asleep," I said as I sat down on the vacant couch. "You don't have to put that thing away. You guys are welcome here tonight, too."

Josh released the air mattress immediately. "Thank God. I hate taking the air out of these stupid things."

"Did you sleep well?" I meant it as a question for everyone, but I found my gaze lingering on Josh.

"Yeah, I had a pretty good night."

"How about you?" Mike asked with an evil grin. "Still in your clothes from last night, I see."

I saw Josh's jaw clench tightly, but otherwise there was no indication that he was even listening to our conversation. His reaction left me confused. Why did the topic upset him? Really, if he had a girlfriend, couldn't I date Matt if I wanted to? The absurdity of the thought almost made me laugh out loud. I couldn't imagine ever having something romantic with Matt. Of course, if this whole current situation made me finally get over Josh, who knew what would happen?

"Very funny, Mike." I sprawled out on the couch. "If anybody needs the shower, you'd better get in there before I do. I'll wind up taking forever."

Ian happened to be walking out of the kitchen with a glass of juice in his hands as I was speaking. He dropped the glass down on an end table so fast the he nearly knocked it over, then took off down the hallway in the direction of the bathroom.

"Towels are in the closet!" I called after him, fighting back laughter over his departure.

It took a bit longer than I'd expected for everyone to get ready to go. It wasn't like one person took ages in the bathroom, it was just that there were five of us waiting for the same room. By the time everyone was ready, we were racing out the door and jumping carelessly into the van.

Traffic wasn't very bad at that time of day, so Ian was able to get us to the mall relatively quickly. I ran through the mall, tearing through the store and arriving behind the counter out of breath.

"Whoa," Markie held up her hands as though she was afraid that I would crash into her. "Where's the fire? I would have covered for you if you were a bit late. What time did you get home last night?"

I shrugged. "I don't know. It was pretty late, though."

"Where did everyone sleep? You've only got two couches."

"Mike and Ian got the couches, and-"

"Where did the other ones sleep?" She interrupted, her eyes alight with interest.

"If you let me speak, I'll tell you," I narrowed my eyes in irritation. I hated it when she did that to me. "Josh slept on the air mattress, and Matt slept in my bed."

"So where did you sleep?" She nudged me slyly with her elbow. "On the air mattress?"

"No. Josh has a girlfriend, remember? I slept in my bed."

Her jaw nearly hit the floor. "With Matt? Details, Becky, I need details!"

"Calm down, Markie. We just..." I paused, searching my brain for the right word. "Cuddled? Is that what I would call it?" I asked myself rhetorically.

"You cuddled? Why? If I had him in my bed-"

"I'm going to have to stop you right there. I don't want to hear it." I shuddered at the thought of whatever was running through Markie's mind. "Nothing happened between us. And nothing is going to happen, either. Even if I take him up on his offer."

"What offer?"

I gave her a hesitant smile. "I skipped that part, didn't I?"

Her lips flattened into a thin line. "Spill," she commanded.

"He kind of asked me to move to Vancouver with him."

"What? You're leaving me? Becky, this place would blow chunks without you! Why would you want to go to Vancouver? I thought that you liked winter. You can't go snowboarding in Vancouver." She rattled on, trying to reason with me.

"You can stop trying to give me reasons to stay. I haven't decided on anything yet."

She looked immensely relieved. "Good. I really don't know why you would want to go back there. Wouldn't it just be worse if you had to see Josh every single day? Where is he, by the way?"

"Somewhere around here. Matt promised that he would come and visit me. And possibly bring me a present. But I don't know if he was actually serious about that or not."

"So let me get this straight," Markie sat down on her stool and held up a finger, as if she required absolute silence in order to piece something together. "He spends all day at work with you yesterday, gives you free stuff from his band, cuddles with you, asks you to move in with him, and promises to buy you presents. Yet you still believe that you're just friends? Sounds like love to me."

I snorted. "Not the kind of love that you're referring to."

She raised her eyebrows. "Fine, don't believe it. But someday, when you finally realise that you and Josh are over, who's going to be the guy that's there to put you back together?"

I fumbled over my words, trying to come up with a logical response. "I already told you, I'm not even sure if I'm going to move in with Matt."

"Trust me, you will," this time she didn't sound so upset. "But just promise me that you'll actually stay in touch with me. And when he's all rich and famous, fly me out to visit you from time to time."

"Markie, stop being so-"

"Honest?"

I sighed. "Yeah, that. You're starting to sound like Amanda."

"Who's Amanda?" Markie pulled an elastic from around her wrist and pulled her platinum blonde hair back from her face.

"Matt's sister. She had the same crazy ideas about Matt and I winding up together as you do," I explained, holding out my hand so that she would give me a ponytail holder, too.

She placed one gently on my waiting palm. "Sounds like a smart girl."