Then It Led to Hollywood and Vine

I slowly turned back to Anne, feeling Joe’s stare on the back of my head. Then I stupidly asked her, “Will you please tell me that it’s a Joe Jonas look alike beside me, and not the actual one?”

She gave me a small frown, letting me know that was a negative. I sighed, while trying to think of something as to what to do about this, still consciously aware of Joe’s stare on the back of my head. I honestly wanted to leave, but how could I? This was a movie premiere for something I was in; I obviously couldn’t leave without looking like a total diva.

That was not the best first impression to set.

Thankfully, Anne was able to come up with something. “Sophia, is that your cell phone ringing?” She announced this quite loudly, which was kind of embarrassing, but I understood why she did so. I grabbed my purse, the funny thing being that I could actually hear my phone ringing. I looked at Anne oddly, and she just opened the purse she had on her lap to show that she was indeed calling me.

This would only excuse my presence for a couple of minutes, but that would at least give me time to think of something.

I quickly got up out of my seat, sending Anne a questioning glance. She just motioned for me to keep going and then put up five fingers, meaning for me to come back in five minutes. I slowly turned around and walked out of the theater, getting my phone out in the process. I then walked out into the small entrance-lobby, standing along the wall, watching other celebrities walk by as I pretended to be on the phone.

Unfortunately, a moment later, someone walked out of the theater and came over to me. Someone I didn’t really want to see.

I sighed, and took the phone away from my ear, presuming they knew I actually didn’t have a phone call.

“What do you want, Nick?” I asked him. He looked at me sadly, as if he was hurt.

“I understand why you didn’t talk to Joe this whole time,” he stated, than asked, “but why didn’t you talk to me? All I did was tell you the truth.”

“Nick, it’s complicated...” I trailed off. “Did you honestly expect me to drop everything I had with Joe, and just decide to be with you? Ever since you told me, I’ve been so confused on how I feel. I mean, I don’t even know if I actually loved Joe the whole time, or if it was just lust or something. And I thought I loved you like a brother... but now I just... I don’t know.” As I was explaining all of this, I couldn’t help but feel my voice crack and feel a tear slip from my eye.

Just what I needed.

“I’m not expecting you to be with me,” he finally said. “God, Sophia, how could you think that? I realize that you’re not ready to, even if it’s not me, date anyone yet. If I was in the same situation, I would feel the same way. All I’m asking is why didn’t you talk to me, even as a friend? It didn’t even have to be about this, just... to keep in touch.”

I thought about it, and then realized that he was right. Why didn’t I call or talk to him this whole time? Probably because I was just thinking of this one problem, and was afraid to talk to him feeling that he would pressure me into being with him.

When in reality, I know he would never do that. To anyone. I believed him because unlike Joe, Nick seems to tell me the truth with everything.

Or so I knew, anyway. I didn’t really give Joe the chance to explain anything, seeing as how upset and confused I was.

“I’m sorry,” I said to him, being honest. “I just couldn’t think of anything but that one problem, and thinking the worst about it, making me be afraid of talking to you...”

“It’s alright,” he said. He then looked at me thoughtfully. “Why don’t we just remain friends for now? Then, if we happen to lead into something more, we’ll just go with it. If something is fated, it will happen. If not, then we’ll just remain friends. Agreed?”

I smiled, liking how he phased it. I nodded, signaling my agreement. “Okay. Sure, I guess I can work with that. So... buddy... what should we do now?” He laughed at the nickname, before speaking.

“We should probably get back into the theater,” he suggested. I started to walk to the doors, but he stopped me before I got to them. I turned to him, seeing what he wanted.

“What?” I asked, smiling a little.

“I wanted to ask if you wanted to go to this charity thing tomorrow,” he said, making me raise an eyebrow before he continued. “This whole crowd is gathering at these football and baseball fields near each other outside of L.A. We’re going because it’s going to raise money for charity. I’m going to play baseball, Joe’s going to run, Kevin’s going to play football...” He trailed off, looking at me expectantly. “So will you go? The more people we have, the more money we’ll raise.”

“Um... sure,” I agreed, but then said, “there’s only one thing, though. I’m not too good at baseball, running, football, or really any sports in general.” He laughed at that, and shrugged his shoulders.

“You don’t have to be good,” he said, “But I can help you with baseball, Kevin can with football, and Joe... well, you’ll probably want to avoid him, seeing as you two aren’t on the best terms and you just want to avoid him when dealing with anything involving sports.” He said the last part jokingly, which caused me to laugh. I didn’t blame him for saying it, though, seeing as with Joe it’s kind of true.

“Okay. I’ll go. And just for the heck of it, I’ll bring Anne with me, so we can both suck at the sports together,” I said, earning a chuckle from him. “But now, we should really get back in there. We’ve been out here long enough.”

He agreed, and we both walked in. I was out there longer than I thought, because when we walked back in, the movie had already started.

Anne’s plan turned out to be for us to switch seats. When I sat down in her seat, I looked over at my previous one where she was currently sitting. I didn’t see where Nick sat, just somewhere on the other side of Joe.

“What took you so long?” She whispered to me.

“I’ll explain later,” I whispered back. She nodded, then focused her attention back on the movie. When I glanced on the other side of her at Joe, I noticed her was focused on the movie as well.

It made me wonder how tomorrow going to turn out.

But I was going to have to wait in order to find out.