Desperately Reaching for Something in the Dark

A week later I was getting ready to go to dinner with the guys at TGI Friday’s. It was a celebratory dinner since they had just released their newest album, Dirty Work that’d be released on Interscope Records. To say I was proud of them would be an understatement.

I always told them, from the beginning, that their careers as musicians would go far. Of course, they doubted me, but look at them now. I was right.

We were meeting at the restaurant at 7:30. Currently, it was 6:45 so I had little under an hour to get ready. I had already taken a shower and dried my hair, but now I was sitting in my robe, waiting for Cassadee to come over so we could get ready together.

Cass and I became friends instantly. We had the same interests and enjoyed being the presence of one another, so I invited her over to my parent’s place to get ready for the dinner tonight.

My parents dibbed today as “Charlie, grandma and grandpa day” so they’ve had her all day long, taking her to the park, and probably spoiling her with anything she wanted, no doubt. It was their first grandchild, of course they were going to spoil her.

10 minutes passed and I heard a car door shut. I ran down the stairs and opened the door, revealing Cassadee with a bag of clothes and a frantic look on her face. She walked in, giving me a quick hug and I shut the door.

“What’s with the look on your face?”

“I’m late!” She exclaimed, making her way up the stairs, turning around and noticing that I hadn’t moved a step, she ushered for me to come up with her and I did.

She pulled out a navy dress with a bottom like my skirt I was planning on wearing tonight. She held it up to her frame and turned to face me.

“Does this look good?” She asked. “I don’t wanna be too dressy, though, you know? It’s just a casual dinner with the guys. But they’re wearing button ups and ties! I just don’t know what to wear!” She rambled on.

“Cass!” I exclaimed, causing her to stop and take a deep breath. “The dress is amazing. It’ll be fine and I know Rian will love you in it. I actually have a pair of black heels that’ll look perfect with it.” I told her, walking over to my closet and pulling out said heels.

“Those are perfect!” She ran over to me and snatched the shoes from my hands, tossing them on my bed and grabbing the dress, running into my bathroom and changing.

I laughed before turning to face my closet again. I found the high-low skirt I had planned on sporting tonight and after a few minutes of searching, I pulled out a simple, tan tank top from my dresser that matched the color scheme of the skirt. I changed into the outfit just in time or else Cassadee would’ve seen me in my bra and underwear.

The dress she chose to wear looked fabulous on her small body. It fit her in all the right places and when she slipped the heels on, the dress looked 100% better.

I fastened the sandals on my feet and stood up, fixing my skirt before looking at her again.

“How do I look?”

“Alex won’t be able to keep his hands off of you.” She said.

I rolled my eyes. “That’s not gonna happen, Cass. Rachel’s coming to the dinner tonight, and she’s his girlfriend, remember? As much as I’d like for that to happen, it won’t.”

“You know, I’ve known Alex for a good two years now, and even when I first met him he talked about you… and he hasn’t stopped.” She told me. “And now that you’re back it’s all that comes out of his mouth. You, Charlie and the band are all he seems to care about.”

“I bet girlfriend’s not too happy about that.” I laughed.

“She’s not, but she deals with it, I guess. Can I tell you something?” I nodded for her to continue. “Nobody likes her, to be honest. She just… rubs people the wrong way, you know?”

“Then why’s he with her?”

“Because her personality is almost the same as yours.”

--

That sentence Cassadee said dragged through my mind the entire car ride to where we were meeting the guys. If he’s dating a girl with the same personality as me… why didn’t he just try and find me? Get a hold of me? My mom’s not that hard to crack—you just have to ask the right question at the right time and she’ll tell you almost anything.

When I pulled into a parking spot at the restaurant, I saw the guys waiting by the doors. They were all dressed nicer than normal. Button-up shirts and ties, Alex and Rian were the only two with their sleeves rolled up halfway.

That’s when I noticed the girl attached to Alex’s arm. Her long, blonde hair was flawlessly curled, reaching down to her breasts and her eyes were a piercing green color that left you breathless. She was… flawless, for lack of a better word. Her small frame was covered by a tight black number, accompanied with a pair of red high heels.

Cass and I walked up to them after I shut off the car. I sucked in a deep breath before I met Alex’s gaze. His arm left the girl’s waist and he took a few steps over to me, encasing me in a hug. He was warm.

“You look great.” He whispered in my ear, his hot breath sending shivers down my spine.

“Thanks.” I smiled at him as he pulled away, going back over to stand by his girlfriend and Jack.

Things suddenly became awkward.

“So!” Jack broke the silence. Thank God for Jack Bassam’s loud personality. “Who’s ready to celebrate!?”

A chorus of ‘me!’ and ‘I am!’ rang through the parking lot. Even though there were only 10 of us, we were definitely a loud bunch of people. Except for Rachel, she seemed to be really quiet and tense.

We filed into the restaurant in a long line one-by-one. A hostess led us to a large table. Rian slid in first, Cassadee next to him, then Zack and his girlfriend, Emily, and Matt. The other side was Vinny, Rachel, Alex and then me.

I felt bad for Alex. He was sitting between his current girlfriend and his ex, whom he has a daughter with. Awkward.


Right as I was about to slide into the booth beside Vinny, Rachel went in first. Great. I had a feeling something like this would happen. I gave Aria a small smile before sitting besides my girlfriend and giving Aria enough room to slide in as well. This entire dinner had to be awkward for her. Especially since her and Rachel haven’t officially met before now.

An elderly woman was our waitress. She wrote down all our drinks and went to go get them ready. Conversation easily flowed between everyone at the table. I took a deep breath before grabbing Rachel’s attention.

“Rach,” I said, tapping her shoulder. She turned to face me and smiled. “This is uh, Aria, my friend.” I didn’t exactly want to tell her ‘hey, this is my ex-girlfriend whom I have a three year-old daughter with’.

She smiled at her. “It’s nice to finally meet you, Aria. Alex has said a lot of things about you.”

“Nothing bad, I hope.” She smiled at Rachel. Good, they were getting along. At least for now, I thought to myself. Once Rachel found out about Charlie I’m sure she’ll flip out.

“Only good things.” She assured Aria.

The woman came back and gave us all our drinks. Jack commended her, slipping her a dollar bill with her show of carrying ten drinks on a tray on her own. We all laughed at the tip he gave the woman, and especially when she handed it back to him.

“Keep your dollar, honey, I don’t need it.” She told him, grabbing a notebook from the pocket in her apron and pulled a pencil from behind her ear. “What can I get ya’ll?”


After everyone ordered, the woman, whose name was Deborah, said “I’ll go hand these to the cook and they’ll get started.” I just sat there, minding my own business, sending a quick text to my mother asking how Charlie was acting since she was a bit cranky when she woke up this morning.

My phone vibrated against the table.

Mom: She’s in a perfectly good mood, sweetheart! No need to worry! We got her some ice cream and a few toys so I bet that’s why she’s not cranky anymore! Have fun tonight!

I replied to her text quickly and jumped when I turned my head to see a pair of brown eyes staring at me. I brought my hand to my chest to try and calm my rapidly-beating heart down.

“You scared me.”

He chuckled. “Sorry about that. Charlie was cranky this morning?” He asked after he checked that Rachel was busy in another conversation.

“Yeah, she woke up asking about you and when I said you were busy today she threw a tantrum. That’s all.”

“Damn, I’m sorry about that.” He said, causing me to smile. “I wish I would’ve been there so she didn’t do that.”

“Eh, you get used to it.” I laughed. “Charlie’s a handful; I’ve already told you that.”

“Speaking of Charlie,” he leaned down towards me, “do you think I could keep her for the weekend? Rachel has a go-see in New York.”

“U—uh, I think we can work something out. She hasn’t been away from me for more than a few hours.”

“I’m sure she’ll be fine spending time with her dad.” He told me, smirking as he sad ‘dad’.

“Who’s dad?” His girlfriend butted in after the waitress gave us a plate with our food on it, turning her attention to the conversation between Rian, Zack, Matt and Cass towards mine and Alex’s.

“Uh, um, I was asking Alex if he thinks it’s a good idea to let my daughter stay with her dad over the weekend since she hasn’t been away from me since she was born.”

“You have a daughter?” Her eyebrows rose up in confusion. “But you’re so young! We’re the same age!”

“Yeah, I do.” I told her.

“Do you have a picture of her?” I nodded, grabbing my phone from my purse and finding a picture of Charlie. Hopefully she didn’t see how much she looked like Alex in the picture. “Oh my, she’s adorable!”

I smiled. “Thanks.”

“What’s her name?”

I took a bite and swallowed. “Charlotte.” Now everyone at the table was looking at me. They all knew about Charlie except for the girl currently questioning me. Hell, even Zack’s new girlfriend knew because it accidentally slipped his lips one day.

“That’s cute.” She replied. “Maybe someday we’ll have a baby…” She trailed off, rubbing her finger against Alex’s chest.

His eyes widened, sneakily glancing towards me, giving me a weary and apologetic look before looking at the girl lying her head on his shoulder. “U—uh, m—maybe.”

“Alex already has a baby!” Jack blurted, instantly covering his mouth after the words flowed through his mouth.

Rachel’s eyes widened.

This isn’t good.