All or Nothing

Zacky’s head was hanging back over the chair. Johnny was on his phone, Matt was propped up against the door, Jimmy was twirling his chair around in circles and Katie was pacing.

They’d had Brian and Eliza in the sound booth for over two hours, and once Brian was done pounding on the door, he’d moved to the opposite side of the room and sat down on the ground. Eliza had moved to the rolling chair and was now playing with the bottom of her shorts. Neither of them had spoken.

Brian watched as Eliza’s movements went from playing with her shorts to playing with the ankle bracelet around her leg. He watched as the muscles in her legs moved with the way she was sitting. One leg was pulled underneath her and the other was over that one so her chin could rest on her knee.

Her beautifully dyed hair was pulled into a ponytail with a black ribbon tied around it. She had on one of their t-shirts that had the sleeves and practically the sides ripped or cut away so Brian could see the black sports bra she had underneath along with her skin. He gulped almost audibly and stood up to pace.

Eliza was fuming, but at the same time, her heart was pounding with the thought of being so close to Brian. They hadn’t spoken, and she wasn’t sure why, but at the same time she wasn’t sure what she was supposed to say in this situation. Her eyes flickered to him as he stood up and began pacing the small space.

He continued to pace for a few more minutes, painfully aware of Eliza’s gaze on his. He stopped, though, when she finally said something. She couldn’t take him pacing anymore; it was driving her insane.

“What the fuck is wrong with you? Can’t you just sit down?”

“Are you sure you want to know what the fuck is wrong with me?” Brian came back with, his tone just as biting as hers.

“No, I just fucking said it because I want you to tell me what color the sky is.”

“You don’t fucking care,” he scoffed.

“You’re right, I don’t,” she said with a fake, cheery smile, and went back to looking at her ankle bracelet.

“You really want to know what the fuck is wrong with me?” Brian burst out and consumed the space between them so he was leaning down into her face, his hands on the arm rests of the chair.

Eliza tried to lean back away from him, but he was right there in her face and she couldn’t get away from him. She was torn between wanting to stare into his beautiful eyes and wanting to kiss him so bad.

“What’s wrong with me is the girl I love more than anything is sitting in front of me acting like she doesn’t even fucking know me. The girl I love is acting like this mondo-bitch because I made her act like that. I fucked up, Eliza, I understand that. What’s wrong with me is for the second time in my life I’ve fucked up my relationship with you even though I promised I wouldn’t. I ruined our happiness. What’s wrong with me is the fact that I can’t get you out of my fucking head!”

He screamed the last bit and pushed away from her, rubbing his hands over his face. He turned back to her and leaned against the wall behind him.

“What’s wrong with me is that even though I’ve had women fling themselves at me I can’t focus on anyone but you. My band mates are tired of me moping around and I can’t focus on my music anymore because without you by me, I can’t be fucking happy. I find myself hating concerts when at one point I couldn’t wait to perform for my fans. I can’t focus on music anymore because it feels like there’s a hole in my chest. What’s wrong with me is that every time I turn around I’m about to be raped by the new merch girl who thinks that because I thought she was you at Halloween and kissed her that I’m going to date her. She’s tried to sleep with me so many times that I’ve considered sleeping with Jimmy just to keep her away from me. That’s what’s wrong with me, Eliza, but like you said, I guess you don’t care.”

Suddenly, Eliza saw red.

She didn’t see Brian breathing extremely hard, she didn’t see the worried look on his face after his outburst, and she didn’t see the shocked expressions on the guys’ faces outside. She stood up with such a force that the chair she was sitting in went flying back into the cabinet and fell on its side. Breathing through her nose she moved to the door.

“James Owen Sullivan, you better open this goddamn door right fucking now,” she said in a low voice, but he heard her as clear as day.

She heard shuffling and the lock popped on the door. She turned the doorknob and stepped outside.

“Where the fuck is she?”

“At the house with Val going through the new stuff,” Matt immediately replied, seeing the fire in her eyes and knowing not to mess with her in this state of mind.

Eliza looked at Jimmy who tossed her his keys. She didn’t stop as she headed out of the building and to his SUV. She pulled the door shut as she started the engine.

Just as she was about to back out, Brian jumped into the passenger seat. She pressed the brakes and looked at him.

“Don’t look at me like that, Eliza, I’m coming with you,” he said at her expression.

She didn’t say anything but let off the brake and backed out of the space, gunning it toward the highway.

Brian’s hand gripped the handle on the door, not because he was scared of Eliza, but because he’d be a bit nervous with anyone going ninety down the highway. They were in Huntington in more than half the time it normally took, and Brian watched the scenery fly by until they were pulling into Matt and Val’s driveway.

He was going to try and talk to Eliza, but she was already out the door, slamming it in the process.

“Oh, shit,” he said and scrambled out of his side. He had to run to keep up with her.

The door slammed as it was pushed into the wall behind it, but Eliza still didn’t stop. She made her way down the hallway where she could hear voices coming from.

Val and Kaicey’s attention was on the clothes until they heard Eliza enter the room. Her eyes were on Kaicey who was smiling smugly, almost about to say something until her eyes found Brian who was a few steps behind Eliza looking worried. Kaicey’s eyes snapped to Eliza just as she stalked toward her.

Eliza moved toward Kaicey as a predator stalked its prey. Kaicey realized a bit too late that maybe she should be scared, and she almost tripped over boxes as Eliza’s hand came up toward her. Eliza’s fingers wrapped around Kaicey’s neck and slammed her into the wall behind her, making Kaicey wince. Her hands immediately went to Eliza’s, trying to pry the tightening fingers from her neck. Eliza let go slightly and Kaicey attempted to move, but Eliza was ruthless. She tightened her grip again and slammed her back into the wall, making Kaicey look into the fiery hazel eyes staring into hers.

“Let go,” she managed to gasp out.

“I fucking told you not to touch him!” Eliza screamed.

Kaicey’s eyes flicked to Brian and Val behind Eliza’s shoulder. Val was staring at the two of them with a hand over her mouth. Brian’s eyes were glued to Eliza, wondering what she was really going to do.

“I told you not to speak to him, I told you not to touch him, but you couldn’t fucking listen, could you? You had to take matters into your own hands. Well let me tell you something, you little fucking slut,” Eliza said, bringing Kaicey’s attention back to her. “Just because the goal is huge, doesn’t mean the goalie is fucking weak.”

Kaicey’s eyes grew round at the realization that Eliza knew about the conversation she’d had with Amy in Vegas. Suddenly, she was extremely scared. Her eyes went back to Val and Brian, but they just stood there doing nothing. The grip got tighter and Kaicey felt her airway being constricted. She clawed as much as she could at Eliza’s fingers, but to no avail.

Out of nowhere, Eliza’s grasp left her neck and Kaicey almost dropped to her knees. She coughed a bit and watched as Eliza looked at her for a minute and then turned away.

Val was about to say something when all of a sudden, Eliza whirled around fist raised, and punched Kaicey in the nose. Immediately, blood spurted out of Kaicey’s nose and she fell to her knees. Val was silently thankful they were on hardwood floor and not carpet, but when Eliza bent down to continue hitting Kaicey, she completely forgot about the floor and focused on the girl getting her nose smashed in. Katie had warned her something bad would happen and she wished she had listened, but she didn’t.

Brian immediately moved forward when he realized Kaicey wasn’t moving anymore. He grabbed Eliza’s arm as she raised it again, and pulled her away from Kaicey. Eliza was breathing heavy and her eyes were wide and wild as Brian held her back. He could see blood covering her knuckles and pieces of skin, making it impossible to discern exactly whose blood was covering her hands. His hand rested over her chest and he could feel the pulse hammering inside of her ribs. She pulled away from him and leaned back over Kaicey.

“I told you not to touch him, but you didn’t fucking listen. It doesn’t matter that he and I are not together; you should’ve fucking listened when I said that shit to you. Those weren’t suggestions, bitch; those were promises that if you broke there would be consequences. Consider yourself lucky that there were people here or else I would’ve fucking killed you.”

Kaicey’s eyes dragged themselves back to Eliza’s face but closed in a small attempt at blocking herself when Eliza bucked forward. All she heard was the sound of saliva being spat from Eliza's mouth and she felt it fall on her neck and front.

“You fucking disgust me you piece of trash,” Eliza said and whirled away from the girl at last to look at Val. “You either fire her bitchass now, or you lose a friend. It’s your call.”

Eliza pressed passed both Val and Brian and headed for the door. She brought her arm up to wipe her nose but noticed how bad it shook and how covered in blood it was and she put it back down.

“Eliza, wait!”

She whirled around and saw Brian running toward her.

“What the fuck do you want?”

“Wait, why are you mad at me?”

“Brian, you kissed her,” Eliza said as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.

“You can’t be serious, Eliza!” he said, throwing his hands up in disbelief.

“Actually, I am, Brian. What happened in there doesn’t change the fact that you still fucking kissed her. I understand that you thought she was me; fine, that’s awesome, but you still kissed her! I’m so mad right now, Brian, that I need to leave before I decide to hit you.”

He watched her shrug her shoulders and then turn away from him. She got into Jimmy’s SUV and drove off, not once looking back at him. He made his way back inside so he could at least help Val clean up.

He walked into the living room to hear the conversation between Val and Kaicey.

“If I were you, I wouldn’t think about pressing charges,” Val said as she looked at Kaicey. “If you call the cops, I will explain how you’ve been stealing money from us as well. I’ve been waiting for the right time to fire you, but I guess I should’ve done it before. Just remember all of this is your fault because you tried to get something you knew you couldn’t have. Get out of my house.”