Friends, Lovers, or Nothing

“I see him!” Danielle exclaimed as the escalator brought us and our luggage down to ground level.

And I did too. I smiled as I took in his disheveled appearance because of the early hour and the sign he held in his hands that had Danielle’s name and mine scrawled on it in his messy writing. He waved the sign in the air when he caught our eyes, his other hand busy holding a drink carrier full of coffees. When we reached him, the three of us moved off to the side so we were out of the way of all the other people.

“MIssed you, sis,” he said, enveloping me in a hug.

I smiled at him and nodded. “I missed you too Max. Please tell me one of those is for me,” I asked gesturing to the hot coffees.

He laughed and handed on to each of us before discarding the carrier in a nearby garbage can. “So where to now?”

We gathered up our bags and headed out of the welcoming air conditioned air port and into the blistering LA heat. “How’d you get here?” I asked Max, my curiosity getting the best of me.

“Cab. We’re throwing around the idea of getting a rental car while we’re here but we don’t have it yet obviously.” I watched as he effortlessly hailed a cab and we threw our luggage into the trunk before climbing in.

“So,” Danielle spoke up, “Where are we headed, Max?”

“The apartment the lads and I are staying in while we record. The record company got it all lined up for us, and it’s massive,” he grinned. I watched as he dug a pack of cigarettes out of his pocket and smacked the pack in his hand before a cigarette fell out. “Can I smoke?” he asked the cabbie, who just shrugged.

“Your lungs, kid. Just roll the window down,” he replied. Max laughed and did as he was told.

Suddenly, it dawned on me that Max wasn’t taking us to our hotel. The hotel I had booked for a five day stay for Danielle and I. “Max...” I started, my voice in full on warning mode.

He just grinned as he took one last puff on his cigarette and motioned out the window at the building the cab driver was stopping in front of. “Here we are!” he exclaimed, his mischievous grin never once leaving his face.

I just groaned.

We paid the cabbie and piled out, not forgetting our luggage in the trunk, before we headed into the building.

“Now, I’m warning you. It’s nothing special. Its just one of the apartments the record company uses for bands who record here. But it is pretty huge, so I mean...” he trailed off, but I still caught what he was trying to say.

“We are not staying here, Max. We have a hotel, and that will be more than fine for right now.”

Max dramatically rolled his eyes. “Fine Peyton. Fine. But you have to come see the guys, at the very least.”

I mocked his eye roll but followed him to the elevator anyways.

It didn’t take us long to get to the fourth floor, where the boys’ apartment was located at, and it took even less time to get to their door located only two doors away from the elevator. While Max dug in his pocket for the key, I gave Danielle and skeptical look. She just shrugged and mouthed back, how bad could it possibly be?

I wanted to laugh, except it wasn’t funny. Not at all.

When Max finally found his key, we ventured inside. He was going on and on about the new record and how excited they were to record and all the new material they had, but it was going in one ear and out the other. I was too busy keeping my sense on high alert for Josh. I didn’t see him though, and I didn’t hear him, so I prayed that maybe, just maybe he was out and about.

“Max, that you?” someone called out.

“Out here Dan!”

I let out a sigh of relief at Max’s response, and smiled when I saw Dan’s familiar bleach blond locks. “Peyton! Danielle!” he exclaimed, genuinely surprised to see the two of us. “What the bloody hell are you doing here?” he laughed, coming over to hug the two of us.

“I have a job interview in a couple days! Max didn’t tell you?” I questioned.

Dan shook his head. “No, but it’s great to see you. I’ve missed having you around, Peyt,” he smiled.

I smiled back, while Danielle cleared her throat. “What about me?” she exclaimed. “Does no one love me anymore, or what?”

Dan laughed, hugging her again.

The four of us headed into the living room and took seats in various spots before beginning to catch up. Dan continued Max’s joyous rant about the next album, which they were all clearly excited about. I tried to listen, as I did with Max, but I was even busier thinking about Josh. I felt even more vulnerable now that I knew that he did not in fact know that Danielle and I would be there.

Danielle took over the conversation for awhile, telling the two guys what we’ve been up to lately, which admittedly was not much, but job searching was exhausting, and at least when Danielle was talking there was less of a chance to have the subject turned to the other guys which would inevitably turn the entire conversation to Josh and probably myself. I really didn’t want or need that.

“So where are you girls staying?” Dan asked during a lull in the conversation. I guess I wasn’t the only one who didn’t really want to touch that subject.

“Our hotel,” I informed them, giving Max a pointed look. “We’re only going to be here for a few days, and then we have to head back home. What we do from there is all going to depend on jobs, I guess,” I shrugged, looking at Danielle for help.

She nodded. “If Peyt gets the job, we’ll move out here, and then go from there I guess.”

“What about you then?” Max asked Danielle.

She shrugged. “I’ll find a job. Magazines are always looking for photographers,” she bluffed. I knew better. She was extremely talented, but it was extremely hard to find a job in the photography industry. I didn’t want to think about that though, because the idea that I may have to be without my best friend terrified me. We would cross that bridge if and when we came to it.

“Well, we should probably get going,” I spoke up then. “We need to check into our hotel still.”

The guys nodded and followed us to the door. “We should have dinner tonight! All of us, yeah?” Dan suggested.

Danielle and I looked at each other and shrugged. Why not? I’m sure she was thinking, so that’s what I told the guys. We made plans to have them come to our hotel to pick us up and we would go from there.

But it couldn’t be that simple, because if it were that simple my life would be a completely different story. That much I was sure of.

Because as I reached for the doorknob to open it, it started to turn the opposite way in my hand. I took several steps back so I wouldn’t get hit with said door, and watched as it opened, only to reveal Matt and Josh.