First You Fall

Toni’s P.O.V.

Damn it I’m such a whore.

That was my first thought before I opened my eyes. I lay in what I knew was Zacky’s bed, hoping that when I woke up I’d be wrong. Hoping that I hadn’t slept with Zacky. Again.

Twice. And I haven’t even gotten a real first date yet.

I opened my eyes and rolled over in the huge bed. I was surprised to feel the space next to me empty. I sat up quickly and looked around for Zacky. I scanned his enormous bedroom with my eyes but didn’t find him anywhere.

Sends someone to practically kidnap me. Drags me on a date. Then leaves me alone in the morning. I really know how to pick em.

I wrapped the sheet around me before climbing out of the bed. I grabbed my clothes, threw them on and then left the room. I wanted to find Zacky and give him a piece of my mind. The minute I stepped out of the room I was confused. The only direction I knew was to get out of the big ass house. After debating for a minute I gave up on the idea of trying to find Zacky in this place. He was not worth getting lost. I headed downstairs and towards the front door. Just as I had the door, I heard a voice behind me.

“Leaving already?”

I smiled and turned around.

“Going to stop my escape, Johnny?” I asked.

“Not at all. Just wondering why you would want to escape all this?” He gestured to his body, making me smile. “I’m guessing you enjoyed yourself last night.”

I shot a fake glare at him and opened the door to leave again.

“I think you’re forgetting something, Toni.”

“What?” I asked, turning around yet again.

“You don’t have a car. And you don’t have cash for a cab either.”

It was then that I realized that I didn’t have the purse I had come with.

Fucking hell.

I could hear Johnny’s footsteps behind me as I stomped up the steps and back into Zacky’s room. I looked around for my purse but it didn’t take me long to realize it was gone.

“Okay, what the fuck happened to my shit?” I snapped at Johnny.

“Well, Zacky took it. Apparently he thought you’d try to sneak out without saying goodbye to him, though I assured him you wouldn’t try that. Looks like I was wrong.” Johnny said between laughs.

I pushed past Johnny and went in search of Zacky. I hadn’t made it two steps away before Johnny had a hold of my arm.

“This isn’t somewhere you can just fucking run around.” Johnny said, all laughter gone from his face. “Unless you’re looking to get hurt.” He dropped my arm.

“Where the fuck is Zacky?” I asked but didn’t move at all. Johnny’s statement had made me realize where I was. The last fucking thing I needed to walk in on was someone getting the shit beat out of them.

“He’s busy.”

“Well I need my shit so his business can wait.”

“Don’t count on it.” Johnny said, grabbing my arm again. “Let’s go.”

I’ve been dragged around more in these last few weeks than I have in my entire life.

I followed Johnny into what looked like some sort of incredibly equipped living room. There was a huge plasma T.V. on the wall. Matt sat on a black leather couch, watching a basketball game. On the other side of the room was a massive stereo system that looked like it could deafen everyone in a twelve foot radius. In the corner was a pool table and a couple of leather recliners. Jimmy was bent in front of a mini fridge and came up with a beer in hand.

“Hey, Toni.” Jimmy greeted me.

Matt turned around and gave me a nod before returning to the T.V.

“Okay where the fuck is Zacky?” I asked once again.

“Busy.” All three guys responded at once.

“You have got to be shitting me.” I frowned.

“Oh for fuck’s sake have a seat and relax. You watch basketball?” Matt asked.

“He better show up soon.” I walked over to the couch and sat down.

It had been fifteen minutes before I heard the door open.

“Finally!” I shouted and jumped up from the couch.

“I don’t know you.” A blonde chick responded, walking into the room.

“Fucking hell.” I threw myself back onto the couch.

“Almost. It’s Val.” The blonde said, stretching her hand out to me.

“I don’t want to be here.” I said giving her a blatantly fake smile and shaking her hand.

“Really? I couldn’t tell.” She took a seat on Matt’s lap and kissed him before turning back to me.

“So this is Toni?” Val asked and Matt responded with a nod.

“How’d you know that?” I questioned.

“Eh, I’ve heard a thing or two.” Val climbed off of Matt’s lap and sat next to me. “Not enjoying yourself around these guys yet?”

“Not exactly.” I said looking over at Johnny and Jimmy who were playing pool then looked over at Matt who was practically hypnotized by the basketball game.

“Yeah, it takes a while to get used to.” She laughed.

“What makes you think I’ll be around to get used to it?” I asked.

Just then Zacky walked in and I forgot about my question.

“Finally, you jackass. Where’s my shit?” I ran up to him and held my arm out.

“Hey to you too.” He said before pushing my arm down and grabbing me around the waist. Before I had the chance to react his lips were pressed to mine, his tongue running along my lips. I managed to fight it for all of two seconds before I gave in to the kiss. I was running out of breath when Zacky finally pulled away. I was so dazed that I didn’t realize Brian walk in behind him.

“Hey, Toni.” Brian said with a nod in my direction.

“Glad you’ve been waiting for me but I’ve got to run. I’ll see you later tonight.” Zacky let go of my hips. “Guys let’s go.” Zacky said and with a wave of his arm all the guys were standing. At this point, I snapped out of my slight daze.

“What the fuck do you mean ‘you have to run’? Where’s my stuff?” I asked, sticking my hands in Zacky’s pockets as if I’d find my purse hidden in there.

“We can play later.” Zacky smirked, wrapping his hands around my wrists and removing them from his pockets. “Val do me a favor and take Toni out. Go shopping or whatever chicks do with each other. Just make sure she comes back here.”

“No problem.” Val said, jumping up from the couch and walking towards us.

“What? No I don’t want to fucking come back here. Zacky, Give me my shit!”

“Here.” Zacky said, pulling out a credit card. “Take this, go out, enjoy yourself, and then come back.”

“I don’t want your money.” I said, crossing my arms. Zacky just raised his eyebrow.

Who am I kidding, I should take the card. He’s monopolizing my time when I should be looking for a job. So in a way I’m entitled to his money. It’s not like he’ll miss it anyway.

When I was done rationalizing with myself I took the card from Zacky.

“Come on, we’ll get to know each other. Let’s start with lunch.” Val said, grabbing her discarded jacket and purse.

I followed Val out the door with one glance back at Zacky who just smiled.

“So where do you want to go for lunch?” She asked as we climbed into her car.

“I don’t really care.” I shrugged.

“Applebee’s it is then.” Val drove off.

Val and I talked a lot over lunch and I decided I really liked her. She was cool and easy going and kept up with my sarcasm and jokes. I usually found it hard to make friends. I just didn’t click with most people. This made me think about how easy I found it to click with Val, Johnny and even Zacky. I was more comfortable around these guys then I was around most people and I barely knew them. I pushed the thought to the back of my mind as we finished up lunch. When we were done we paid and left.

“So where to now?” Val asked as we got back in the car.

“I don’t know, what do you want to do?”

“We could go shopping, we could go watch a movie.”

“Or we could do both.” I smiled, patting Zacky’s card in my pocket.

Val laughed and started the car up.

“Let’s start with shopping.”

A couple hours later we were still in the mall. I had one bag that contained three pairs of jeans. Val on the other hand was struggling to carry about 7 bags.

“Okay let’s drop these in the car and then come back in.”

“Jesus Christ” I groaned, “you clearly have an addiction.”

“We all have our flaws.” She smiled. “Besides you barely have anything. Come on you have the credit card of a very rich man and all you’ve bought is a couple pairs of jeans.”

“Okay, Zacky and I barely know each other. As much as I’d love to run around blowing his money, what little conscious I have is nagging me not to.”

“Ugh, a conscious, you learn to ignore it after a while” she shrugged and I laughed. “Besides, I think Zacky really likes you.”

I stopped laughing and looked at her.

“What makes you say that?” I asked

“It’s pretty fucking obvious. You’ve been around longer then his ‘easy’ fucks and he’s keeping you around. I know Zacky and the man is well on his way to being obsessed.”

“Val I am an easy fuck. I’ve slept with him. Twice. He might just be keeping me around because let’s face it. I’m damn good at sex.” Val burst out laughing.

“I don’t doubt your sexual skills.” She managed between laughs “but if Zacky was keeping you around for just that, he wouldn’t take you out to dinner, he wouldn’t let you hang around the guys so much, he sure as hell wouldn’t give you his credit card.”

I stood there for a moment thinking about what she said. As much as I hated to admit it I liked Zacky in more than just a sexual attraction way and I wanted to be more than his fuck toy.

“Now come on” Val snapped me out of my daze “I wanna get these in the car before I fall over.”

Another hour later and Val had finally deemed herself done shopping. I was ready to drop from all the walking and my stomach was starting to growl.

“God Val can we get something to eat. You wore me out.” I groaned.

“Sure. We’ll grab some pizza and take it back to Zacky’s place. The guys should be back by now.”

A half hour later we had 6 pies, which Val insisted was necessary to satisfy the guys, and we were on our way back to Zacky’s place. When we finally reached there Val grabbed half the pies and I grabbed the other half. We went inside and took the pizza over to the lounge where I was earlier. The guys were all sprawled out across the room. Johnny and Jimmy had returned to their pool game with Brian watching, Zacky was in the corner on his phone, Matt had found yet another basketball game to watch. The minute we walked in with the pizza the guys looked up. For a minute I thought I was going to be trampled. I followed Val’s lead and managed to get the pizza onto the coffee table before the stampede began. When all the guys had finally moved away, I reached over and picked up a slice before sitting down on the couch. Zacky came over and sat by me.

“Have fun?” He asked between bites of pizza.

“It was okay.” I swallowed and responded, pulling out his card and giving it back to him.

“Just okay?” Val said from her spot on Matt’s lap. “You know you had a ton of fun.”

I couldn’t stop myself from smiling because I knew she was right.

“Johnny, pass me two beers.” Zacky said and a couple of seconds later Johnny came over with two beers.

Zacky handed one to me before taking a long swig from his.

“Is basketball the only thing ever on?” I asked Matt.

“Let’s watch a movie.” Zacky said before Matt could respond. “Come here.” Zacky took my hand and led me over to a cupboard. He opened it up, revealing the biggest movie collection I had ever seen.

“What do you want to watch?” He asked.

I couldn’t decide on a movie and eventually just asked Val what she wanted to watch. She walked over and pulled out The Prestige. Seconds later the guys were all groaning.

“Babe we always watch that when you pick a movie. Not again.” Matt complained.

“Oh stop whining.” Val said, putting in the movie anyway.
I laughed and took my seat back on the couch. Moments later I felt Zacky’s arms wrapped around me.

“You’re spending the night here. Don’t argue.” Zacky whispered in my ear.

I didn’t respond and just moved around a little in his arms. Just as I was getting comfortable I realized I liked being next to Zacky. As cheesy as it sounds, and as much as I didn’t want to admit it to myself, I liked being in his arms.