Right Now, I'm Anyone's

Work was extremely tedious that day; that’s what I was completely certain of.

John wasn’t around all day Monday, and for most of the day on Tuesday, so we basically had free reign over the entire club. Most of the festival stuff had been organised by the staff that worked weekends anyway, and everybody was relaxing a little bit more because there were only three more shows left – Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday – before the majority of the bands left after Halloween.

I managed to avoid Dean for the most part of Monday – of course, there were times when he would walk into a room, which I would then find a quick reason to vacate. I managed to switch my backstage shift with Maddox, who had been working on the bar – I said I wanted to see the show properly again.

I knew Dean wanted to speak to me, most probably about what happened between us on Saturday night. But it was a little bit too soon for my liking, especially when I was still all shaken from how Levi had spoken to me. I spent most of my time alone, or with Johnny, Lee, James or Maddox. I didn’t like being alone so much; I started thinking of how much I wanted to speak to Levi and try and fix things. I got closer with James – which was actually kind of a blessing, because he always came up with ways to piss people off and entertain the both of us.

After lunch on Monday, he and I had done the classic bucket-full-of-water-on-the-door trick and lured Chris Pennells – Deaf Havana’s second guitarist – into their dressing room and got him soaked in the process. He chased James around Flux for an hour while I laughed. Later, after Chris had given up the hunt, I found James hiding in one of the industrial bins at the side of the building.

It was a Tuesday afternoon and I had agreed to let James sit around in the office with me – probably because he’d managed to annoy Frank Carter of Gallows and was scared he was going to get him back worse – while I finished a couple of pieces of paperwork that John insisted were crucial. I gave him strict instructions to keep quiet, so I could finish faster, but he kept getting bored and grabbing one of the dry wipe markers and writing messages to me on the board hung on the wall opposite where I sat at the desk.

The latest one said:

It’d be actual amazing if we could have a chat. Finish the stupid fucking thing later!

I laughed and wrote the last of my sentence, before closing the folder the paperwork belonged in and putting it away in its assigned drawer in the desk. James pushed everything off of the desk – thank God, this was the office without the computer – and jumped up onto the table top, crossing his skinny legs in front of him, his jeans shifting up and revealing his bony ankles.

“You can talk now,” I laughed as he gave me a look.

“Decent!” he laughed. “I wanted to talk to you anyway.”

“About what?”

“Just wondering if everything’s alright now, y’know, after yesterday,” James said, shrugging his shoulders nonchalantly and twirling a pencil between his fingers.

“I’m fine,” I lied when he raised his eyebrows at me expectantly. Honestly, not speaking Levi was just about tearing me to pieces, and I hadn’t stopped thinking about him telling me I was practically worthless. I wasn’t even sure if we were together after that – I distinctly remembered telling him that we were over during my rant. Physically, I was fine. My wrist had stopped hurting an hour after it started. I was still a little bit scared about it, but I suppose anybody would be scared if their boyfriend practically tried to break their wrist.

“Man, Dean was livid,” he laughed a bit. “You should’ve seen him.”

“What happened?” I asked, feeling the colour drain out of my face. James noticed it and gave me a small smile of encouragement.

“He said he saw your prick of a boyfriend dragging you around by your arm,” he explained, scoffing slightly. “I didn’t see that bit, I just saw them arguing.”

“Oh, no.” I put my face into my hands and sighed. “They didn’t fight did they, James?”

“Almost, but not quite, love,” he said. “I wish they had. Any scum that puts his hands on a woman that way deserves a smack or two.”

I cracked open my fingers to take a peek at James. He looked completely serious, his eyes fixed down on his phone while he fiddled with it. I said, “Anything else?”

“Nothing that bad,” he said. “Dean told him if he touched you like that again, he wouldn’t know what happened to him. Then, your bloke went for Dean.”

“I’ll kill Levi,” I groaned.

James laughed to himself and shook his head. “No worries, Jake and me stopped it before it got anywhere.”

I leaned back in the chair I was in and pushed my hands through my loose hair, resisting an urge to start pulling it out violently from the roots. I jumped slightly when I heard James’ phone vibrating on the desk. He practically pounced on it and left me alone in the office, calling back that he’d see me later on.

We discovered that when James disappeared the week before, he’d gone to collect his girlfriend from the train station. He hadn’t bothered to tell anybody where he’d gone because he thought they’d arrive back before anybody noticed he was gone, but he didn’t take into account that her train may have been delayed. So, he waited for her for hours and upon realising they had missed the show, the two of them went out for the night.

I stretched my arms up over my head and checked the clock on the wall – almost show time. I got up out of my seat and collected all of the discarded office material off of the floor, putting each item neatly back in its rightful place on the desk. I closed the door behind me and walked along to the staff room, pulling the sleeves of my cardigan off of me so I could get rid of it – as I couldn’t bribe my way into switching with Maddox, I was working backstage that night.

Once I was downstairs, I went straight to the stage – giving Zoë and Maddox a small wave on my way – and clambered up onto it. I sat on one of the disused amps with my legs pulled up and crossed in front of me, just as Gentlemen & Liars were setting up for their performance. Their guitarist called me over to help him fix his amp and microphone, before I was left alone for another couple of minutes, sitting on my amp.

It felt like my phone was burning a hole in my pocket. I was dying to text Levi, or call him and apologise for whatever happened the previous day. I got angry at myself for wanting to apologise – he hadn’t called or texted me to apologise, or even hint at making it up, and since I didn’t do anything, it shouldn’t be me apologising. But still, I wanted to speak to him again.

I sighed and leaned back onto my hands, curling my fingers over the edge of the amp behind me. I sat through more than half of their set and felt my mind move in full circles, going over every little thing that had happened since Saturday night. It kind of felt like it had happened weeks ago, rather than days, and I still couldn’t believe that so much shit could happen to me in that short amount of time.

With the first set of the night almost over, I dragged myself up off of the amp and walked down the stairs to the cold corridor, where the cooler full of fresh water bottles was stored. I collected eight bottles and took them back onstage, waiting until Tony – Gentlemen & Liars lead – announced Ella Sera, before walking onstage to place the appropriate amount of bottles out.

When I turned to walk back to my amp, somebody was leaning against it. I grimaced to myself, knowing almost instantly that he’d find me sooner rather than later – he had that power – and make me talk to him. Whether it was about the kiss, or about what happened with Levi, I didn’t know. I kept my head down and walked back over.

“Can we talk somewhere, please?” Dean asked, his face calm as the members of Ella Sera brushed past us to set up and start their songs. Dean had his hands buried deep in the pockets of his rolled up skinny jeans and he was wearing a pale grey Your Demise vest.

I just sighed and nodded my head. I turned and walked towards the back of the stage to tell Gary that I’d be back in a few – he agreed and told me to take my time, as everything was being handled perfectly. Dean – who had been shadowing me while I spoke to Gary – lead the way down the stairs, along the corridor and to the door of his empty dressing room. He opened it and stepped aside so that I could walk in first.

I walked across the room to the refreshments table and leaned against it awkwardly, listening to the click the door made when it shut, then a slight creak as Dean leaned against it and bent his leg at the knee, balancing his foot on the wood. I looked everywhere in the room except for Dean’s eyes. He cleared his throat impatiently and sighed.

“Since you’ve done this amazing job of avoiding me, I thought the best idea was to corner you,” he said, his tone clipped and sharp. “And you aren’t leaving this room until we’ve talked properly.”

“Maybe I don’t want to speak to you,” I said, quiet as a mouse. “You can’t keep me locked in here with you all night, Dean.”

I felt like a small child, rather than a twenty-two year old, an adult. Adults were supposed to talk about things they fucked up, rather than choose the easy option to run away and never mention it again. That’s what kids did, and I wasn’t a kid anymore.

He laughed condescendingly. “Want a bet?”

“You’ll miss your set.”

“Got that covered,” he countered. “I want to talk to you, and running away from me isn’t going to get you out of it, so stop being ridiculous.”

I stayed completely quiet for a while and thought about that. If anybody else had said that to me, I would probably argue and be all outraged about them calling me ridiculous. But, really, I knew he was right anyway. I was being ridiculous, and childish, and stupid trying to put off talking to him about what happened. Well, what shouldn’t have happened.

I took a deep breath and said, “Okay, let’s talk.”

When I looked at Dean again, he was staring intently at my face, removing his foot from the door behind him and walking over to sit on the small plastic table set in front of the sagging couch. He inclined his head to the couch and I obediently sat down and waited for him to begin.

“I need to know one thing,” he said. I waited expectantly for him to finish thinking of how to approach the question he wanted to ask me. I watched his face shift from expression to expression – each one I remembered vividly, then felt stupid upon the realisation that I’d actually committed them to memory. Eventually, he said, “When I came over yesterday, what was going on? With you and Levi, I mean.”

“Nothing,” I answered quickly. Too quickly, really. Dean caught onto that and remained oblivious to my confusion. I was so certain that he’d want to talk about us kissing on Saturday night, but apparently not. I watched his balled up fists tighten as they balanced on his knees and saw his strong shoulders flex slightly. He frowned at me in irritation.

“I still know when you’re lying to me, Leila,” he said, keeping his voice calm. “It might’ve been six years, but I still know.”

“I don’t really see how it’s your business anyway,” I snapped, leaning back into the couch and folding my arms over my chest.

“I make it my business when a friend of mine is treated like that piece of shit boyfriend treated you yesterday.”

“He isn’t a piece of shit!” I said indignantly. “We just had an argument, Dean. Fucking hell, are you and Zara so perfect that you don’t argue every now and then?”

Dean’s head jerked slightly like I’d slapped him. “You think Zara and me are perfect?”

I just looked at him, deciding I didn’t want to answer that, because talking about him and Zara made me feel all queasy. He put his face in his hands and proceeded to push them through his shiny hair, letting it fall back into place afterwards.

He eventually just shook his head. “There’s a difference between arguing and trying to rip your girlfriends arm off.”

“Dean, he wasn’t trying to rip my arm off.”

“Looked like it,” he muttered. “Seeing people I care about being treated like shit isn’t something I’ll put up with.”

I shrugged and sighed. “I think we’ve pretty much ruined the friendship thing anyway, now.”

After I said that, I wished I hadn’t said anything at all. He brought me in here to talk about how my boyfriend treated me, not about our unfaithfulness. He froze and the small crease between his eyebrows deepened in his confusion. Somehow, in some weird way, he didn’t catch on.

“What does that even mean?”

I inhaled deeply before speaking again, thinking of how to word it properly. “I mean that friends don’t kiss. Especially when said friends have partners and a very significant history together.”

Dean groaned and brought his hand up to his forehead, rubbing his temples lightly with his thumb and index finger. “I was hoping that you would’ve forgotten about that.”

I raised my eyebrows and gave him a look; how could somebody not remember someone they once loved kissing them against the side of a van, really? I went to respond, but Dean ignored it and kept talking.

“I thought that if you didn’t remember, then I wouldn’t bring it up,” he said. “And then I could act like it never happened.”

Even though that part about acting like it never happened really hit a nerve, I said, “It shouldn’t have happened.”

“Wait,” he said. “Was Levi grabbing you because he knows what happened?”

“No,” I said, shaking my head. “I’ve only told Dimitri about it.”

Dean gave me a confused look for a couple of seconds before shaking his head. “I didn’t tell Zara about it, either. Just James.”

“So, what are we going to do?”

I watched him as he thought for a couple of minutes. His eyes occasionally bounced back to my face for a couple of seconds at a time, before darting back down to the floor. As he thought, I couldn’t help but scan him over and over again, looking at his face and the bare skin of his arms.

The small crease between his eyebrows was deeper than I remembered, and his cheekbones were angular, and definitely the most prominent feature of his face. They looked hard under the bright lighting of the dressing room. They contrasted well with his lips, which, basically, looked as soft as they felt.

“Nothing,” he said, breaking through my reverie and making me remove my intense stare from his face. “We keep it between me, you, James and your friend, and forget it even happened.”

I felt another little internal pang on my nerve, but externally, I nodded my head as enthusiastically as I could possibly manage. It was enough to satisfy him, it seemed, because he stood up from the plastic table and held his arms open to me. I walked gladly towards him and let him hug me while I wrapped my arms around his waist. I closed my eyes and pretended I was sixteen again; he smelled the same.

My only problem was that I didn’t know if I could forget what happened with us. It just swam around my mind, replaying over and over again until I knew everything by heart, even the exact shade of blue his eyes were in the dark. I took in a little more of his scent in the last few short breaths I had before he pulled away from me.