Diamond Days

My black sued heels were destroying my size sixes and it was only 10pm, I hadn’t even danced yet. I’d been at this New Years Eve party since 8 and I knew it would carry on long into the early morning. It was Lea Michele’s party where practically the whole cast of Glee were in attendance. I’d been working on the shows advertising team as the promotional photographer since the beginning when my brother Cory had landed the role as quarterback Finn Hudson and had put my name forward to the team. I’d worked closely with all of the cast members on various shoots and hangouts, so over time they had become my close friends. Despite being off duty, I still had a camera attached to my side in order to capture the true essence behind Glee, the photographs wouldn’t be made public but it would sure cause a lot of laughs in the morning once the party had sobered up.

“I knew you would pull McQueen off better than anyone ever could.” Chris Colfer spoke behind me, tipping a cup of what was likely to be Diet Coke to his lips, smiling as he eyed my dress by the late Alexander McQueen.

“I wonder what genius pointed me in the direction of this wonderful dress.” I mused and I tipped my own drink, finally pouring alcohol in my system after 2 hours.

“Hmm yes, I wonder.” I laughed at the younger boy who had been my saving grace when picking out a dress for this evening, I knew he was the perfect person to help me fashion wise. I was good. He’s better.

“Thank you though, I actually feel pretty for once.”

“You always are my dear, but now every guy in this room will actually take notice and fall for you,” He slung his arm around my back and leant his head on my shoulder; I blushed at the boy but kissed the crown of Chris’ head in adoration, “You really do look beautiful.”

“You are such a sweetheart; THIS is why you’re like my little brother. And you look stunning as always.” It’s actually not fair for one guy to be so utterly perfect..

“Always,” he mused, glancing around Lea’s living room at Naya, Amber, Mark and Lea dancing, “look at their dancing, good lord. It’s a good thing that Cory hasn’t tried yet, he would blind someone with his dancing.”

“You should stop giving my brother a hard time; you’re always so cruel to him.” I playfully scolded, hitting Chris upside the head.

Chris simply just sniggered in response, lifting his head, “You know I adore Cory but his moves scare me.”

“You’re an ass,” I stuck my tongue out at him, “or maybe I’m just an overprotective sister. Probably the latter.”

“So enough about your awkward and uncoordinated brother, do you have your eyes set on anyone for the traditional NY kiss.” I rolled my eyes, of course he wanted to talk about that, it was in his nature.

“No, I’ll probably just laugh at everyone else making out and take pictures to blackmail you all in the morning.”

Chris sighed, “You have to enjoy yourself Chess, you deserve some happiness for once. Pick any boy in here and they’d be more than happy to assist you.”

“Well besides you and Jonathan.” I winked, they clearly weren’t on the list, not unless they were well and truly wasted or it was a pity kiss.

“If no one has reached you by midnight then I’ll give you your first kiss of 2012, I promise that you will be kissed.”

I pulled Chris into a hug, “You’re one in a million Christopher Paul Colfer.”

“Are you sure there isn’t anyone? I’ve seen you eyeballing a few of the cast, I know there’s one in particular.”

My eyes averted from his as I looked everywhere but him, drinking more of my cocktail, “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“Oh, so you deny anything that leads to you having a crush on Darren?” I quickly looked at Chris before scanning over the room again, my reaction told him he’d won but I wasn’t prepared to give up so easily.

“He’s cute, I won’t deny it but I have no intention of jumping him or anything, besides, he’s a good friend of mine.” What a fucking understatement.

“Good friend? Seriously, that’s all I’m going to get? You’re quite possibly closer to him than you are to me.”

“Fine, we’re very close but that doesn’t me a thing Chris, you and I are close but that doesn’t turn heads.” My frustration was slowly starting to seep through my words, I hadn’t admitted this before but Chris was persistent once he’d figured something out.

“Yes, but I’m gay, Darren isn’t. People aren’t meant to think anything of our friendship, but it’s hard not to with the pair of you.”

I sighed, “Fine, I kind of like him but it doesn’t matter,” I shrugged, trying to seem completely unaffected by what I was expressing, “I can handle being in the friend zone Chris. He won’t talk to me right now anyway, he’s avoided my calls this past week and every conversation I’ve had with him recently has lasted no longer than a minute. This hasn’t happened since he was last with Lisa; I guess this is his way of telling me that either they’re back together or he’s with someone else, without directly telling me. To make matters worse, I have a shoot with him, and only him, next week.” Lisa was Darren’s ex-girlfriend, she had always hated me with a burning passion, I was seen as the ‘threat’ to their relationship and that was before I even started developing any sort of feelings for Darren. Everyone knew how much she hated me, it was blatant, and she made no secret of it.

“Darren hasn’t mentioned Lisa; well to me at least, you know they stopped contact 6 months ago.”

“I know, I know. These things happen though, Darren keeps relationships to himself, he never tells me about love interests or anything.”

Chris quirked an eyebrow in surprise, “Really? Nothing at all?”

I shook my head.

I dared to look in the direction of the front door when I noticed Darren and Lisa had entered the room. The pair made their way over to Lea, saying their ‘hello’s and proceeded to engage in a conversation with the girl. Lisa soon wrapped her arms around him, causing him to press his lips to her cheek. Chris hadn’t seemed to have noticed, he was too busy watching Chord make a fool of himself alongside Dianna.

“C-Chris, Darren clearly didn’t cut her off.” His head snapped back to look at me, wondering what he’d missed.

“What do you mean?”

“Li-” I cleared my throat, “Lisa is here. With him.” Chris’ eyes followed mine and there they were now laughing at Ashley & Heather who were talking animatedly.

Chris had nothing to say about them, he shook his head, “We need to dance, drink and hook you up with someone and let Darren see what he’s missing.” I looked at him with an appalled expression before deciding that I didn’t even care about Darren or Lisa, they can have each other, I just wanted some fun; it had been too long since I had done something for myself.



Once on the makeshift dancefloor I had danced with practically the whole cast including Lea, Kevin, Naya, Heather, Grant, Chris and even Cory. Whilst dancing with Grant, Chord has politely asked to dance with me with his infamous and contagious smile in tow.

"You look really pretty tonight. I mean- not that you don't normally, but tonight you really do." I couldn't help the blush rising in cheeks not could I stop my face from beaming, no one ever openly admitted that to me.

"That's super cute Chord, thank you. I- no one ever actually says things like that to me. But you look wonderful as usual." The song had changed to a much slower paced one causing Chord to loop his arms around my waist and mine around his shoulders as we slow danced.



An hour had passed and I had torn myself away from the dance party much to the distaste of others. I had another drink in hand and I was rested against the connecting wall to the kitchen, letting the buzz from the music pull me in.

“Is there a reason you’ve been ignoring me all evening?” Darren asked, appearing from nowhere as I hadn’t noticed him walk my way. He knocked my shoulder with his and offered me a small smile. I glanced at him before deciding my sloshing alcohol in my red cup was much more fascinating than forcing an expression on my face.

“Is there a reason you’ve been ignoring me all week?” I retorted, there was no way that he was getting away with trying to blame me, he sighed but didn’t make a start to explain, “I was just wondering when the secrets started between us, Darren?” He looked at me blankly, like he had no idea what I was accusing him of not telling me.

“What secret?”

“Why didn’t you tell me that you were dating Lisa again?”

“Lisa?” his triangular shaped eyebrows were arched and his eyes squinted in confusion, he looked almost horrified that I had even proposed such an idea.

“Yes, you know the girl who broke my best friend’s heart earlier this year? The girl I had to console you over because she had treated you like you were worth nothing? Do you know how hard it is to see her walk in and watch you acting like everything is fine with her. When she hurt you, she hurt me too.” Darren looked stunned and genuinely speechless. His beautiful brunette curls bounced as he shook his head.

“I-I..-“

“Don’t… even explain Darren, you clearly don’t want to tell me what is really going on- whatever. I just don’t know if I’m more annoyed that you’re giving into her after what she put you through or the fact that you felt like you couldn’t tell me. Regardless of the fact that her and I despise each other, I’d be here for you but you couldn’t even talk to me about it. Not even Chris, I thought he’d be next in line to know with you both being su-” My heart was speeding up a little and I started to feel dizzy at how fast my brain was moving alongside my mouth, I didn’t want to seem like a pathetically jealous person but I didn’t want his heart broken again, he deserved better.

“For fucks sake Francesca! SHUT UP!” I was stunned into silence, he never spoke to me with such force and frustration, he was a pretty easy going and calm guy. Chris passed the pair us and squeezed my shoulder in comfort. I didn’t know whether to hit Darren for shouting at me or cry at the fact I was still fighting a losing battle. “It’s New Year’s Eve and the last thing I possibly want to do is argue with you over something so pathetic. Lisa and I are not back together Chess; she’s merely here because I’m a loser without a date.” I clicked my tongue and bit the inside of my cheek in embarrassment.

“You had to choose her as a date though?”

“Well I didn’t have any other offers.” He weakly laughed in attempt to lighten the mood. It didn’t work.

“What bullshit Criss, you could have any girl you wanted; all you have to do is ask.”

“You um-you already had a-er, you already had a date so- there wasn’t anyone else I wanted to ask hence the reason I brought Lisa.”

“You’re my best friend Darren, I’d have accompanied you, I only came with Max because neither of us had dates.”

Darren sighed and rubbed his hand over the back of his neck and then his face, “So you don’t have a crush on Max then?”

“How middle school do you want to make me sound? No I don’t, I just didn’t want to be alone,” My head was spinning and I wanted to stop this conversation before I told too much, I really hadn’t prepared myself for this which is why I needed to leave for a moment or two, “I-um, I’m going to step outside for a few minutes, I need some air and a refill.” I shook my empty cup at him as he nodded and clicked my heels along the floor as I made a getaway.



Once outside I kicked the wall with the toe of my shoe, narrowly avoiding breaking my toe in the process.

“Man up Francesca, for fuck’s sake girl.” I scolded myself.

“Talking to yourself won’t make you man up, it’ll just get you a life sentence into a psychiatric ward.” I turned to my oversized brother and wrapped my arms around him. Darren and Chris aside, Cory was not only my brother but he was also my best friend. We weren’t typical siblings that fought for eternity and stole each other’s possessions, we had always been close and as we got older, the closer we became.

I pulled away from him and rested my head back against the building’s brick work and watched at the city around us from the balcony I was currently leaning on, “What am I going to do Cory? Darren says he only brought Lisa because I already had a date yet he knew that would hurt me and he shows no signs that he wants anything more with me. I keep telling myself that I’m honestly fine with just being the boy’s best friend, but I’m almost sure that I’m just kidding myself.”

“Do you want my honest opinion Chessie?” I nodded, wanting him to continue, “I think you’re both so blinded by love that you don’t know what you are doing or where you are going-”

I scrunched up my eyebrows before interrupting him, “I don’t- we don’t – love-.”

“-Let me finish. We both know that he doesn’t just care about you because you’re my little sister or because you have some strange understanding. There’s been more to that since the moment I introduced the pair of you, you have this strange connection to each other. I think you both just need to figure out what you want on your own. You’re perfect anyway Francesca, you’re a Monteith and if he realises that he doesn’t want to be anything more than what you already are then he’s a fool and you deserve better. Don’t settle for anything less than you deserve, okay?” I wiped away a few stray tears that had seeped from my eyes and flung my arms around him again as he stroked my hair and kissed my head.

“I love you Cor, I honestly couldn’t have asked for a better brother, remind me to thank mom and dad for doing the nasty and having you.” I felt his chest shake and I looked up to see him grinning down at me.

“I love you too, you make me proud to call myself your brother.”



The countdown to midnight had suddenly become painfully loud, the whole party’s occupants were standing around as the seconds dwindled towards a new year. Another year full of advertising and Glee.

7-6-5-4

I didn’t dare to even glance around the room; I didn’t want to see the happiness of couples surrounding me. I stood still, clutching my cup of Jaeger and Kick, thinking how many I could down before I just forgot where I was and what I was doing.

3-2

New Year always has been a shitty time of year, I seem to have issues with letting the go of the years, hating the fact that I’m growing up. Turning 25 was a scary prospect to stomach.

1

“HAPPY NEW YEAR!” Everyone cheered, people throwing themselves at the person they had secretly seeked out in the crucial seconds of the countdown, ringing in the New Year with kisses from friends, potential partners and actual partners. Cory had Jennifer. Dianna had Nick. Mark had Naya. Lea had Caleb. Kevin had… is that Heather? And regardless of what Darren said, he had Lisa. Jealousy was seeping through my veins, I don’t really know what I expected, did I honestly believe for one second that Darren would all of a sudden think this was what he wanted?

Where the fuck was Chris?

I felt a light tap on my shoulder, the feel of someone’s presence looming over me. I cautiously turned, with only a second to realise who it was; lips had captured my own and were caressing mine in the gentlest way yet also oddly passionate. I gripped the back of his head, pushing him further into me; this was what I had been craving. Threading my fingers through the boy’s blonde locks, I parted my lips letting his tongue delve into my mouth, out tongues sliding and colliding without a sense of direction. This kiss had been completely unexpected but it felt right, I felt wanted and needed in that moment.

I could faintly hear catcalls in the background, no doubt a fair few cast members had noticed this current lip lock and were genuinely surprised but cheered it on nonetheless. After a moment or two more of sheer bliss, we pulled away, grinning at one another. The cutest smile adorning his face.

“Francesca Monteith!” Chris shrieked in astonishment from behind me, playfulness pouring through.

“I’ll talk to you later.” My former kissing partner smiled, kissing my cheek. I waved at him as he turned and emerged into the party. I reluctantly spun on my heel with a grin spread across my face; I looked at Chris only to have my smile falter slightly by an uncomfortable looking Darren.

“Oh- I -um..hi.”

“You sucked face with Chord Overstreet?!” Chris chortled, still amazed. I nodded, my eyes flickering to Darren again for a second, his whole face was as stone like as a brick wall. Chris hadn’t seemed to notice this and continued with interrogating me about Chord, “Hot damn, I knew you would have the boys wrapped around your finger.”

“Let’s just say, it was VERY unexpected but I both welcomed, and embraced it. As Rachel Berry would say, ‘his face tasted awesome’.” Darren visibly blushed; it was his character that Rachel had said it to after all. I know it’s something I would say given the chance to kiss my best friend, “Besides you bailed on me and I thought I’d have to go NY like every other year.”

“Yeah, I um- I’m super sorry about that.” He scratched the back of his head nervously as the colour started to rise in his cheeks, ”So was that honestly the first time he’s even shown any sign of interest in you?”

“Yes, other than dancing with him before, although it was probably just the alcohol taking over, it was still a kiss, a very fucking earth shattering kiss.” I couldn’t help the smirk that covered my face.

“He tried to eat you.” Darren muttered.

“I suggest you keep your unwanted thoughts inside your head Darren.” Asshole.

Chris looked between us nervously, unsure of whether to change the conversation or leave us alone, “I could do with a refill, I’ll leave you two to talk.” The younger boy hastily left, the tension surrounding us was slowly suffocating me.

“Chord, huh? Do you like him or something?”

“If I do then what is it to you?”

“I’m your best friend; this is shit we talk about, right?”

“No it’s not; you don’t ever talk to me about girls so I don’t see why I should start baring my soul.”

“Is this about Lisa again? For Christ’s sake Chess, I told you that there’s nothing going on.”

“It’s not about Lisa, it’s about you feeling like you can’t just be honest and open with me. Just ignoring me when you feel like you can’t be bothered with our friendship. I’m sorry that this is something that upsets me but I’m a girl, these things do affect me Darren,” the pair of us sighed, knowing that we both hadn’t been truly committed to this friendship the past couple of months, “besides, I’ll bet you kissed Lisa at midnight didn’t you?”

“Francesca, I didn’t kiss her, and do you want to know why? Because I didn’t want to. I didn’t want her to think that she may have another shot with me, because she doesn’t. I moved on a long time ago.”

“I- this is what I mean when I say that you don’t talk to me, you just keep it bottled inside, let it fester in there until you reach breaking point.”

“Just listen to me, listen to what I’m saying!”

“Fine, you moved on. Good for you.”

“Mere months after I started dating her, I don’t think I ever truly loved her like I should have. I thought I did in the beginning but then there was someone else, no matter how hard I tried to push whatever I was feeling aside, these feelings were constantly still resurfacing. I think that’s why she broke up with me, she knew I was living this lie and in turn, I was causing her to live it too.”

“I don’t- I don’t understand where exactly you are taking this Darren.”

“This other person, this girl that was getting to me had been there for me but I just didn’t want to believe that I could feel something for someone who wasn’t my girlfriend. I tried to push whatever it was away, telling myself I was being silly and it was just some crush that would fade with time. It hasn’t faded, it’s just turned into something more.” My heart was breaking with every word he spoke, he had fallen for another girl, a girl he spoke so highly of, a girl he was clearly in love with. A girl who evidently wasn’t me.

“Are you in love with her?” I hopelessly tried to stop my voice cracking as I asked that simple question but I wasn’t fortunate enough

“Yes.” My breath caught in my throat, my throat felt dry and I wanted to throw up. I felt like I was going to start pouring my heart to him, beg like a fool to stop loving her and just face some unknown feelings I wanted him to have for me.

“Does she know?”

“Not yet.”

“Well I suggest you go and tell her, it’s the New Year and – god Darren, you deserve this happiness. You deserve to be with someone who will love you and treat you like you are their world; I just hope she’s the right one for you because I can’t stand to see you get your heart broken again.” I smiled my most convincing false smile, hoping this offering would be enough for him, enough to convince him to he could leave me be. “I have to go, my apartment is calling me, it’s late and I drank a bit too much.”

I lied a little but moved as quickly as I could away from the boy, launching into the night air and speed walking my way down the couple of blocks it to for me to get to my apartment complex.

Once I was successfully inside my home I dropped to the floor, my bag falling and connecting with the hard wood flooring, sending the contents all over the room. I clutched my knees as my body shook, warm water pouring from my eyes, burning my tear ducts. I had never felt so broken or empty in my life, I genuinely felt like my whole world had been ploughed into by a freight train. My heart had never ached so much as it did right then, I then knew that there was no way I could be just friends with Darren. I was hopelessly in love with him. If there was one way I could get over this it would be to quit my job and cut off all ties with Darren. I had no choice.

My phone vibrated harshly on the wooden floor, picking it up with a shaking hand I checked the caller ID. Cory. I pressed the green button, trying so hard to control my sobs.

‘Cory?’

‘Chess, where the hell did y-‘ I let out an exhausted breath and sniffed, ‘Hey hey, what happened? I’ve just seen Darren and he’s a wreck.’

My sobbing started again at the mention of his name.

‘I’m so fucking path-pathetic and weak C-Cory. I feel l-like my heart h-hates me and ran away fro-from me. There’s nothing there!’

Cory cleared his throat before daring to speak again. Whenever I was uncontrollable like this, it always hurt him. ‘W-what happened?’

‘Darren- he-he is in love. With some girl I don’t even know. He doesn’t love me Cory. I was so fucking stupid to think he would.’ My tears were subsiding and anger was pouring through my words.

‘Don’t even say that! What happened after he told you?’

‘I made some bullshit excuse and left. I’m at home now. I-I couldn’t stick around Cory, I’m sorry I didn’t say goodbye.’

‘That doesn’t matter right now, okay? As long as you’re safe.’

‘What- what’s wrong with Darren?’ I felt that, as the boys best friend, I should find out what’s up with him. I then wondered if he had already spoken to the girl and she turned him down.

‘I don’t really know. Chris is trying to calm him down, he’s a mess.’

‘Well I don’t really see why he’s so upset. I’ve been sobbing my heart out for the past half hour. I’d happily die now.’

‘Shut up Francesca. There’s something really wrong with him and pretending like you don’t care will only hurt more in the long run.’

‘I’m not just going to come running back, Cory. I can’t even look at him. I um..I’m gonna quit Glee tomorrow, I can’t go through this.’

‘You’re going to throw your life, your job, your friends, everything away before you even hear what he has to say?’

I was at a loss, I knew he was right but I was stubborn and hurt. Maybe I just needed to sleep this away and tomorrow I could have a clear mind and be able to approach this situation a lot better.

‘I don’t know. I really don’t want to talk about this now, I just need to sleep.’

‘Okay, just look after yourself and think about what I’ve said. I’ll be round before noon, I think we ought to chat before you make any rash decisions but please talk to Darren first.’

‘I’ll try, for you. I’ll see you in the morning then.’

‘Thank you. Love you Chessie, please smile too.’

‘I love you too.’

‘Sleep well.’

‘T-thank you for everything Cory.’

‘What are big brother’s for?’ The pair of us hung up, I was left to sit on the floor of my hallway, make-up smeared down my face and my head resting back against the wall with my eyes closed. Despite how exhausted I was, I knew I had to drag my ass up off the floor and sort myself out. I managed to gather enough strength to grip onto the door handle to pull me up, once I was standing I wearily walked to the bathroom.

One look in the mirror and I wanted to cry all over again, my face was tear-stained and my hair was a nest. I sighed and ran some warm water, ready to steam my face and wash away tear tracks. As soon as I had turned off the tap and sat on the edge of my bathtub, I heard a slight knock at my front door. My watch told me it was 1:14, I figured no one would seriously be knocking at my door at this time so I played it off as my distressed mind playing stupid tricks on me again.

I grabbed hold of the wash cloth and dunked it in the soapy water and wrung it out.

“Chess?” I whipped my head around, thinking I was hearing voices. Darren’s voice. Within a second or two he located me in the bathroom. I let out a breath I had no idea I was holding but refused to look at him. As I looked back in the mirror, there he was, looking back at me. He looked almost as bad as I did.

“How the hell did you get in?”

“You gave me a key the day you moved in.” He waved the offending key at me and I scowled in return clearly forgetting my moment of stupidity a year ago in which I gave this fool a key to my apartment anytime he liked. It was really dumb. I know that now thank you very much.

“What are you doing here?”

“You ran out so quickly, I didn’t get chance to even say goodbye to you.” Darren shifted between feet uncomfortably before setting the toilet lid down and sitting on the closed lid.

“Well you said it now, so I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“Stop shutting me out, stop thinking that I don’t even give a damn about you anymore, you’re the most fucking important person to me right now so don’t even pull this shit on me.” I started welling up again, he was hurting too, I just had no idea why. I dared to look at him but I knew that it was a bad move as soon as we made eye contact. “Baby, please don’t cry. What did I do?” I shakily stood up from the bathtub and flung myself into his arms, finally letting the sobs take over again. Despite the fact I was crying over him, he was the only one who could stop the tears and the numbing pain.

“Shh.” Darren tried soothing me, pulling his fingers through my shoulder length, auburn hair. I could feel him shaking and I felt water seeping into my scalp which only told me that he was crying to. I clung to him even more as we held each other, s scared that if I didn’t I would just lose him completely.

“I-I-I’m so-sorry Darren.”

“Y-you ha-have absolutely n-nothing to be s-sorry for, just p-please stop c-crying, you-you’re killing me h-here.” I raised my head to look up at him and wiped my eyes. He pulled off some toilet roll off the holder and folded it before raising it to my eyes and wiped away my tears.

I inhaled deeply in hopes of being able to breathe properly so I could actually speak without stumbling, “I was so rude to you today, I was completely out of order, you really didn’t deserve that. I just miss you so much, our lives have been so busy lately that I just missed being around you.”

“I missed you too, so so much,” he smiled down at me and pulled me back into his chest and stroked the side of my face, “now tell me why you looked so devastated when I arrived.”
I could feel the colour draining from my face, there was only one reason and I sure as hell wasn’t going to explain that to him.

“Just feeling rough.”

“Hey now, I want honesty, you blew up on me.”

“Well you tell me why you were so upset then; Cory rang me and told me you were a complete state back at the party.”

“I poured my heart out to a girl and she completely bailed on me. I’m in love and it hurts to be turned down, even without words.”

“It didn’t go down well then I take it?”

“Well you should know, you’re the one who left.” No. No way was I that girl. No way was I the girl Darren had ben professing his love about.

"I don't know what you're trying to say here, I left so you could go and deal with this, so you could tell this girl that you were so damn crazy about her."

"That's what I mean, I was trying to tell her but she didn't give me chance."

"Oh, I'm sorry, did she bail on you?" I bit my lip and started feeling bad that this girl hadn't even given him a chance.

"For a beautifully smart girl you can really act dumb." I scrunched my face up at him hoping he would continue and not just insult my intellect and leave it at that. "It's you I was trying to tell, dummy. It's you that I fell head over heels for." my body turned stiff and I almost felt that if I moved I would be paralysed.

"I-I-I - wow. Why me?"

He simply shrugged, "We can't help who we fall on love with." I was stunned into silence and debated what to say to him, I seemed to have completely lost the ability to tell him the same.

“And you’re being completely serious about this? Chris or Cory didn’t put you up to this right?”

He took my face in his hands and forced me to look at him, “I’m not heartless Chess, I love you, I mean it. I know you feel the same.”

“It was my brother wasn’t it?”

“Chris may have also let something slip to me.” He smirked, “they wanted to kick my ass into telling you, I wasted too long and it’s a new year, I figured I wanted to try my luck.”

My face was suddenly burning up and I grinned at Darren, “Well your luck is going well tonight. I really like you Darren, like really really. This is so insane.”

Darren brushed the hair off my forehead, “What’s insane? Having your best friend fall in love with you?”

“Falling in love with your best friend.”

He started shaking his head and looped his arms around my back, “Weird, huh? Kind of good when it’s not one sided though, right?”

“More than good.” This was real life, this is exactly what I wanted and now it’s happening I actually feel even better than I originally thought I would feel, “can I…kiss you now?”

"Do you really even need to ask?" he took my face into his hands and inched forward, parting his lips and pressed them to mine. Kissing him was surreal, in a really incredible way. You know when you want something so bad that you imagine how it would be and then you think that there's no way it could actually live up to your stupendously high expectations? Well as clichéd and cheesy as it sounds, this kiss actually surpassed my expectations. The whole fireworks exploding and magical essence was honestly there, it was then that I figured that this is what true love is, its being with one person and feeling so many emotions that you don't know how to feel anything less than ecstatic and…home. The puzzle pieces in my mis-matched world seemed to finally fit together, like Darren really was meant for me. Once the pair of us had pulled away from the kiss I leant my forehead on his, "Can we possibly move from the bathroom. Sitting on the toilet together is finally sinking in and it's a bit of a mood killer." he sniggered in response and picked me up, carrying me to my bedroom. I squealed and flung my arms around his neck as he kicked open my door and placed me on the bed, gently kissing me once more before lying beside me and taking my hand in his.

"I really do love you Francesca, you've stood by me through this past year when I needed a level head and someone to talk to. You've been my best friend and my shrink and I really can't thank you enough for all of the happiness you have provided me with in just a short space of time. You waltzed into my life and I didn't expect to fall for you so quickly, I didn't expect to fall for you at all but you made it so impossible not to. You were the part of my life that was missing; I thought my life was perfect before I met you. I had achieved so much already and I had just landed a role in Glee and then when I met you and actually built a friendship with you , I realised that my life hasn't been perfect, I didn't have the right girl beside me, I had Lisa and she always felt like the right girl but she wasn't. I know this sounds so stupid and clichéd and I sound pathetic right now so please feel free to stop me at any time-"

"You make beautiful points and I love you. None of it was stupid or cheesy; it was really fucking perfect you fool. Meeting you felt so right.. I was never a believer in fate nor did I believe that everyone had a soul mate, maybe they don't, maybe not everyone is so lucky, but I know I am. I never believed in love, I thought it was a myth until I realised that I didn't just like you anymore, nor was it a crush. It was most certainly love.”

"How did we get so lucky to meet at such a young age? We could easily have met at 60 and not had the chance to live these years in love, I mean thats if you actually want me."

" 'You know for a beautifully smart person-' " I mimicked what he had said earlier and chuckled at him.

"Hey hey, I was giving you an option here."

"I love you, okay? I want to give this- our life a shot. We could be beautiful you know." I winked, not giving any of this a thought because if I let it process I would probably squeal and that would send him away quickly.

"You already are." I captured his lips with my own once again and melted into his arms.

I had never believed in fate, or soul mates or even fairytale endings, maybe they are just myths and I got lucky, but right now, the life I was now destined to live, was as close to a Disney fairytale ending that the pair of us, both wanted, and most certainly deserved.

“Happy New Year Chess.”

“Happy New Year Darren.”