Right Here Waiting

Eliza woke up several times that night, each time because Brian had been teasing her awake.

Finally, around eight, she woke up on her own, tangled with Brian. She looked up at his face to find him awake, staring at the ceiling.

“What’s got you thinking so hard?” Eliza teased.

Brian smiled. “I was just thinking I wish I didn’t have to leave.”

“Then don’t leave,” Eliza said and cuddled up to his side again.

Brian pulled her into the crook of his neck and kissed the top of her head. “I wish I didn’t have to. We were supposed to go to Chicago on Saturday, but because of your dad, we pushed it back. Our flight leaves this afternoon.”

“How long are you going to be gone for this time?”

“About the same amount of time, but you don’t have to worry. I’ll call you all the time. I’ll remember the time difference this time, and we won’t miss each other.”

“Yeah, I think it’s time that I have a talk with David.”

“Are you talking about breaking up with him?” Brian asked, leaning away from her to get a good look at her face.

“Yeah,” she said and smiled. He kissed her again.

One wasn’t enough, and rolled himself on top of her.



Later that afternoon after the Val and Eliza had dropped the guys off at the airport they stuck around in Los Angeles to do a bit of shopping.

Eliza had wanted to stop in a book store, and Val walked around trying to find her. Looking through the shelves, she found her with an armful of books.

“You’re really going to buy all of those?”

“Yep,” Eliza said, smiling.

She turned the corner out of the aisle and ran into a guy, knocking all the books from her arms.

“Holy cow, I’m so sorry,” the guy said and bent to help her pick them up.

Unknowingly, Amber had also entered the same bookstore, and was about to come out of another aisle when she recognized Val and Eliza. Immediately, she ducked back behind the shelf.

“It’s okay, I promise,” Eliza said and bent down.

“Eliza?” the guy asked.

“Hey, Joseph,” Eliza said, recognizing the guy.

“Wow, fancy running into you here, huh? I thought you were still in Boston.”

“Nope, not anymore. I’m back in California, now,” Eliza said, hoping he would stop talking to her.

“Well that’s cool. Hey, maybe we could get some coffee or something?”

“Actually, we’re in a bit of a hurry,” Val said, seeing the distress on Eliza’s face.

“Nice to see you again, Joseph,” Eliza said as Val directed her away.

They ducked down an aisle, and Eliza loudly exhaled her breath.

“Who was that guy?”

“His name is Joseph Morgan. He was in a few of my classes at Berklee. He’s that typical guy who thinks he knows everything about everything. He followed me home one day because he said he was walking me home and he came over like every day after that.”

“Sounds like a fucking drag.”

“He’s more annoying than anything.”

“So like stalker-annoying?” Val asked, peaking around the corner to make sure he was gone.

“Yeah, pretty much. It’s pathetic after a while, you know? He just never got the hint I didn’t want him at my house.”

“And you’re not that mean of a person to tell him to leave.”

“No, not really. I mean, he didn’t do anything wrong, but the way he always came around, begging for my attention or whatever finally got annoying. He really thinks he can play guitar, when he couldn’t tell an F from a G.”

“That’s fucking ridiculous,” Val said, and they moved away from the aisle to pay for their things and leave.



Amber walked away, pressing the “STOP RECORDING” button on her phone. She made a beeline for her car and drove like hell, a plan forming in her head the whole way there.

She pulled up in front of Eliza’s house and knocked on the door.

A curly-haired girl with glasses answered the door and Amber was taken aback.

“Is Eliza here?”

“No, she’s out right now.”

“Well, my name’s Amber. You must be, Katie, right?”

“Yeah. What do you want?”

“I know you’ve probably heard a lot of bad things about me, and trust me, I take full credit for them. I wasn’t the nicest person to Eliza and I’m really sorry about that. I can see how close she and Brian were.”

“They still are.”

“Well, that’s why I wanted to warn her.”

“About what?” Katie asked, crossing her arms.

“Brian’s games. I thought he was over them, but apparently he’s not.”

Katie was immediately reminded of the night before when Val had said something about “Brian’s game” and her attention perked up.

“I’m listening.”



Eliza waved bye to Val and walked to the door, her arm weighed down by the bag of books. Before she could get the key in the lock, the door was ripped open by Katie.

“Whoa, there, speedy. What’s wrong?” Eliza asked making her way into the house and seeing her best friend look out the door before she closed it.

“Where’s Val?” Katie asked, angrily.

“She went home to pack. She’s flying out to meet the guys tomorrow,” Eliza said slowly, setting her things down to look at Katie.

“Well, let me tell you how that whole group has some fucking nerve.”

“What are you talking about, Katie?”

“Did you sleep with Brian last night?”

“I don’t see what that has to do with any—”

“It has everything to do with everything!” Katie burst out.

“Yes, I did sleep with him last night.”

“FUCK!” Katie hollered and fell onto the couch.

“Can you just explain to me what happened?”

“Can you explain why Amber just showed up here about half an hour ago with a video of Brian and Matt talking and making a bet on sleeping with you?”

“What?!”

“Yeah, she showed up here, talking about Brian’s games and how she thought they were over but apparently they weren’t. She had a video of Brian and Matt talking, making a bet about some girl, and Matt didn’t think Brian could pull it off. They bet fifty bucks on it.”

“What the fuck,” Eliza breathed, and pulled out her phone. “No, that doesn’t sound like Brian.”

She scrolled through her contacts until she found his number and tried to dial it. She got an automated voice response. She dialed again and got the same message. She dialed a third time and let Katie listen to it.

“He blocked your number,” Katie said, shocked.

“Are you fucking kidding me?”

“You know, I knew something was strange when Val mentioned something about Brian’s game last night.”

“Val is in on this?!”

“I’m assuming so. She was talking about Brian’s game last night, too, when ya’ll were kissing on the beach.”

Eliza looked shocked for a minute before she dialed Val’s number. It went to voicemail. Biting her nails, she paced around the room. She dialed all of the guys’ numbers, but they all went to voicemail.

“So what the fuck is this? I get their symbol tattooed on me. There’s no way that could’ve been about me.”

Two days passed and she still hadn’t heard anything from them.

On the third day, she had a missed call from Val, but when she called her back, she didn’t answer. Each day, she called Brian’s number and each day, she got the same message.

On the fifth day, she got in touch with Johnny.

“Hey, Eliza, what’s up?” Johnny asked, picking up.

“Hey, Johnny. Uhm, is Brian around? I tried calling his phone, but it’s not going through.”

“He’s uh, actually…he’s busy at the moment.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah, but I’ll tell him you called, okay? I gotta go.”

“Don’t worry about it, Johnny,” she said and she pressed the “END” button on her phone.
She looked up at Katie and shook her head.

“I can’t believe it’s true.”

“We don’t know that yet, though,” Katie said, trying to pacify her best friend.

“He hasn’t answered. Johnny’s making excuses for him. Val won’t answer my calls; it’s true, Katie. All of it is true.”

Katie watched as Eliza brought her knees up to her chest and wrapped her arms around them.

Eliza laid her head on her knees and in her line of vision from her bed she was able to see Brian’s Fedora sitting on her lamp shade. That was enough. Before she knew what was happening, she felt something wet on her face. She lifted her face up and Katie’s heart nearly broke.

Reaching up, Eliza wiped her face and realized she was crying. She looked up at Katie who had a sympathetic look on her face and she broke.

With her head in her knees, Eliza cried.



Brian tried to call Eliza every night, and every night he couldn’t get through. He didn’t know Katie’s number so he couldn’t call her. Each time he tried to get someone else’s phone, they had to go do something.

Three weeks couldn’t pass fast enough, and finally they were back in Huntington.

He drove to her house, but when he knocked, no one answered. The house looked deserted. Not knowing where she could be, he drove around until he ended up at Johnny’s Bar.

He’d been there for an hour when someone slid into the bar stool next to him. He glanced and saw Amber sitting beside him.

“Hi Brian,” she said, meekly.

“Hi Amber.”

“Can we talk?”