Nothing Has Changed. Nothing at All.

“Hey, Gabe, you ready to go?” Vicky T asked. She grabbed her purse and stood next to Nate. They were going out shopping – much to the boys’ dislike.

Gabe looked from Vicky to Aria thrice and then pouted. “Go,” Aria urged. “Have fun. I’ll be here when you get back, promise.” She kissed him on the lips forcefully.

“Alright,” he said. Gabe grabbed his wallet and then they left the bus. Aria watched Nate raise his eyebrows in concern.

“Why aren’t you guys going?” Aria asked Ryland and Alex. Mostly Ryland, though, because she was still avoiding Suarez.

Alex took the liberty of answering her, though. “We wanted to work on This Is Ivy League. That’s our other band, y’know?”

“Can I join?” She figured that even though she would be in the same room as him, she wouldn’t have to talk to him. She could just speak to Ryland.

“Sure!” Ryland exclaimed. “We’re gonna be using the back room. On today’s schedule: songwriting!”

“Yay!” she exclaimed just as excitedly as Ryland had.

They gathered some snacks and piled into the backroom. Ryland and Alex began talking about song lyrics while Aria watched them. She noticed that he kept giving her looks, looks that said, “What the fuck are you doing? I thought you were avoiding me.”

“Hey Aria?” Ryland asked when Alex had left the room to get drinks.

“Yeah?”

“I don’t want Alex to know just yet, but I want to write a song for my girlfriend…well she’s not really my girlfriend anymore because she didn’t want me to come on this tour. The thing is… what does a girl want to hear in a song written for them?” he admitted.

“Well, what do you want to tell her?” she said simply.

“I want to tell her that… I still love her and I miss her. When I left, she cried. And I guess…I just want her to know that I’ll never leave her.”

“Awww, that’s really sweet, Ryland. I bet she’s really luck to have you. So, why don’t her something along the lines of that?”

“Will you help me with it?” he asked feebly.

“Of course I will!” she said and Alex walked back in with refreshments.

Everything was awkward.

“I, um, have to go,” Aria said and pretended to look at a text message. “We’ll talk later, okay?” she directed at Ryland and left the room.

Ryland sensed something was wrong. “Dude you ain’t gonna another chance to fix whatever’s wrong. Go.” He does this little flick of his hands which tells Alex to leave. “Go on. I have work to do.” So Alex left the room.

He heard Aria slam the kitchen cupboard loudly. She was getting her favourite orange juice. The one Suarez would always buy even though no one else liked it.

“Uh, hi, Alex. Why aren’t you with Ryland?”

“He kicked me out.” He put his hands in his pockets.

“Oh, sucks. I guess he had work to do,” Aria assured and looked away, drinking her orange juice. Alex stood there awkwardly.

“Why are you avoiding me?” he asked and looked at his shoe while he kicked it on the floor.

“Huh? What do you mean?” she asked and pretended like she didn’t know anything.

He took a step forward. “I mean, you never talk to me! You’re on tour with us, and we don’t know what it would be like without you. But…you’re ignoring me. Why? Is it because we had an awkward conversation, or because Gabe asked you not to. Why?”

“Because I think you know my secret,” Aria sighed.

“What do you mean?”

“You mean, you don’t know? You’ve never guessed?!” she said, dumbfounded.

“No,” he crossed his arms. “But now you’re going to have to tell me!”

“I…can’t.” They were pretty close now.

Alex put his hands on her arms. “You can.”

She sighed again. “We fucked,” she said, hoping he wouldn’t hear.

“What? I didn’t hear you.”

“I said, ‘We fucked’.” She said a little louder.

“Uhm, yeah, you guys are going out…we kinda already knew…” he started.

“Three years ago. We fucked… three years ago.”

“Are you serious?! You have got to be fucking kidding me!” he laughed sarcastically and looked at her. His laughter slowed down when he looked at her and saw that she was in fact, serious. “You’re the girl.”

“Yeah. But please, you can’t tell Gabe!” she pleaded.

“So you’re going out with him just so you can fuck him again? I know I don’t know you that well, but that’s low, Aria, even for you.” He said disappointedly.

“No!” she begged. “That’s not it. I just… I didn’t want to be one of those girls Gabe would forget! I wanted him to remember me. I wanted a chance… that’s all. Just a chance!”

“Well, you’ve succeeded,” he replied dryly.

“So…you won’t tell anyone? Especially not Gabe.”

“But…Gabe. He’s my best mate. I can’t do that to him. He needs to know.”

“You can’t! It’ll break his heart, knowing I was the one who changed him! Please, you can’t.” A tear fell from her cheek.

He thought for a moment. “Fine, but only if you talk to me. I want the air cleared. Friends?”

“Yeah. Thank you.”

They hugged each other tight and Aria dried her tears.

“Stop crying. Don’t worry. You can trust me with this. But just know that pretty soon, he’s going to find out.”

“Yeah, I know.”

“So when he does, he’s going to get hurt. I think you should be the one to tell him,” he said solemnly.

“I said, I can’t,” she looked at Alex again, to let him know she was telling the truth.

“Gabe has never been one to hold a grudge. He won’t be angry…just hurt. Please, think about it?” he asked.

“Fine.” And it was settled.