You Are Exactly My Brand of Heroin

We all sat around the living room, doing a number of things. Zack, Matt, and I were playing a random Need for Speed video game on the PS2 while Johnny and Jimmy sat on the couch, watching and criticizing us on how we were playing. The girls, on the other hand, were in the kitchen making dinner, and after dinner, Val was taking Michelle to the airport so she could catch her flight to Los Angeles.

"Brian! What the fuck are you doing?! You keep driving into me!" Matt shouted at me. I was lost in thought at the moment, so I'd completely forgotten about the game.

"Oh! Sorry, bro. Didn't mean to," I replied with a smile and continued racing alongside Zack and Matt but consciously this time.

"I'm sure you didn't," Matt said with a sarcastic smile. Jimmy, Johnny, and Zacky laughed.

"Whatever," was all I said. Ever since yesterday, I'd been lost in so much thought that the simplest things were becoming difficult for me to do. Abby and I were so close that seeing her was eating away at me every second that went by. I wanted to see what she looked like in person, how she'd changed as far as her personality was concerned. Even though everyone was overjoyed to be seeing Abby after eight years, I was still having second thoughts. I mean, I knew for a fact that I wanted to see Abby more than most of these guys and girls, but I also knew that there was a large chance of rejection - something that the others were aware of but not expecting. I was both aware and expecting it. We'd left her broken-hearted. How could we expect to get a warm welcoming from someone we'd betrayed? How could we expect to be let back into her life even though we'd broken the only promise we'd ever made to her?

---

Valary stood at the island counter in her kitchen, chopping up lettuce while Lacey, Leana, and Michelle all chopped up an assortment of carrots, tomatoes, and cucumbers for a salad beside her. She sighed as she glanced down the counter at her sister. Michelle looked up at her and smiled. Val simply returned the favor and continued what she had begun.

"Val," Michelle suddenly spoke up, breaking the silence. "Don't be like this. I thought we already discussed this."

Val sighed and said, "We have, Michelle, and it's fine with me as long as Jessica doesn't end up getting you addicted to drugs or raped. She's not the most moral person in the world, you know. I don't have a problem with you moving out. I just wish you would live with someone else or on your own. I know you have better friends then her."

"You don't know the real Jessica, Val. At least not the one that I see. She's not always about sex, drugs, and alcohol. Yes, she has a problem with those things, but it's not like she's addicted to any of them. It's perfectly safe for me to be living with her. Now, can we please just have a nice dinner before I leave? That's all I'm asking," Michelle finished.

Leana spoke for Val. "Yes, we can," she said, directing the comment at Val. Val glared at her. Leana sighed, laid her knife on the counter next to her, and leaned closer to Val so that the only person that could hear them was Lacey, who was on the other side of Val. "Honey, she's going to do what she wants to do. She's reckless - just like we used to be and still are. You can't stop her. Like Jimmy said, she's going to have look at this as a learning experience. Once Jessica does something to her that she doesn't like, she'll leave and go somewhere else. You think that Michelle's naive and that she makes immature decisions, but she knows damn-well how to take care of herself. I know you're going to worry about her, Val. That's something that all sisters do. I mean, we aren't sisters and we live in the same city not even ten minutes away from each other but I still worry about you girls," Leana said as she hugged Lacey and Val.

"We worry about you too, Lee," Lacey replied with a smile. "Val, you know that we love you and that we care about Michelle just as much as you do. We'll worry about her too after she's gone. She's an amazing person with a bubbly personality but she also likes to take risks. This just so happens to be one of them, so why not let her take it?"

Val finished chopping the lettuce and placed it in a bowl along with the other ingredients the girls had chopped up. "Thanks girls, but that's not going to help me. I'll still constantly be worrying about her no matter what."

"We understand that, sweetheart. Just don't let that take over your life, okay?" Leana said.

"Yeah. Don't worry about her constantly. Do something less agonizing with your life," Lacey added.

Val smiled and nodded. "You have my word, girls." Michelle appeared from the living room where she'd disappeared to before the girls began talking.

"Hey, girls. Is the food ready yet? The guys want to know," she said.

"Figures," Lacey said, folding her arms over her chest and rolling her eyes.

"Yeah. It's ready," Val replied with a small laugh. Without a moment's notice, five guys piled into the kitchen, shoving past the girls to get to the food. Other than the salad, the girls had also grilled a few steaks so the guys wouldn't be very hungry later, but when they were, it was like feeding a herd of wild bull.

"They've obviously never heard of ladies first," Michelle muttered. They all ignored her, pretending as if the girls weren't even there. Once they'd all gotten their food and the girls were making their selves something to eat, they all attempted to head back into the living room.

"Where do you think you boys are going?" Val asked them. They all stopped and looked back at her.

"We have a race to finish," Zacky said, gesturing to Matt, Brian, and himself.

"Yeah, and we have to watch and criticize them on there shitty virtual driving. All the while hoping to God that they'll never get behind the wheel of a real vehicle and drive like that," Jimmy muttered. The others laughed.

"I don't think so. Why don't you head out to the deck so we can have a family dinner. You know, before Michelle leaves," Leana ordered more than suggested. The guys moaned and groaned but did as they were asked.

We all sat around the large glass table in Matt's backyard, happily munching on the the food that the girls had made. Well, everyone but me. I was forced to sit across from Michelle who was shooting me dirty glances every two seconds so I opted to not even look up from what I was eating. Still yet, I carried on a conversation with the guys.

"So when are we flying to Vegas?" Johnny suddenly asked. Everyone stopped to stare at him. After a moment, everyone but Johnny burst into a fit of laughter. "What?! What did I say? What's so goddamn funny?" he questioned.

"Johnny, in order to meet Abby on Monday, we have to leave tonight!" Matt laughed. Johnny's mouth fell open.

"That's not what you told me, asshole!" Johnny shouted at Jimmy. Jimmy simply laughed along with the rest of us.

"I didn't tell you a damn thing!" he protested with a sly smile.

"Whatever. I'm not even going to fuck with you guys," Johnny replied.

"What the hell did you tell him?" I asked Jimmy as I took a drink of my beer.

"I told him that we weren't leaving until he got naked and did some stand-up comedy,and he was drunk when I told him that, so he did it..." Not a moment too soon, the entire table was on the deck rolling with laughter. All but Johnny. This wasn't the first time that he'd embarrassed the hell out of himself doing stand-up comedy naked. He'd done it plenty of times the last time we were on tour for stupid reasons. We always fucked with Johnny, but we love him. To say the least, without him, we wouldn't be Avenged Sevenfold. I glanced up to find Johnny still sitting in his chair between Lacey and Jimmy who were both laughing. His face had turned from a pale shade of apricot to blood red in a matter of seconds. He was very easily tricked into doing so many things when he was drunk that it was almost ridiculous.

"I hope you've packed your shit, Johnny," Zack said after he was through laughing.

"At least I did that much!" he replied.

"Alright, you guys!" Val spoke up, still laughing a bit. "We're finished eating, so we're going to drive Michelle to the airport. Make sure you've got all of your shit packed when I get back. Matt and Jason are coming over to take us all to the airport," she said. "We'll be back soon, honey," she said as she kissed Matt. Leana did the same to Jimmy and Lacey to Johnny before leaving.

"Where's my kiss?" I asked Michelle just to piss her off.

"I'll give you a kiss, asshole!" she said as she began striding toward me, prepared to punch me directly in the face but Leana stopped her.

"Brian, fuck off. Michelle, ignore him. Let's go," she said ushering her in the opposite direction, into the house. Once Michelle was out of sight, Leana punched my arm.

"OW! What the fuck was that for?!" I asked as I profusely rubbed my arm. I glanced at Jimmy for a bit of help. He shrugged.

"Why did you do that? We want things to be peaceful not turning into World War 3! Now, be good until we get back. Don't break anything," she said as she walked into the house.

The girls were back now and they'd been screaming at us to hurry up and that they were leaving without us if we weren't downstairs in ten minutes. I packed everything that I owned. Mostly, though, it was to save me time, because since Michelle and I weren't together anymore, I figured that I could move back into my house again. Most of the things that I didn't need every day were still inside my house. What I had packed was just what I needed that I would be taking back with me to my house. Michelle never liked living in my house for some odd reason. She always preferred to be ten steps away from her sister, and that's what she got, so I've been living with Matt for almost six months now. I was beginning to wonder if my enormous house was worth sitting there with no one occupying it. Before our fight, I was thinking of selling it but returning to it sounds much better than that. I hadn't told anyone that I was moving back into my house after we returned from Vegas yet. I thought that it should be a surprise rather than something that they should know immediately.

"Brian! Hurry the fuck up! We have shit to do today, if you must know!" Matt Berry shouted at me from the bottom of the stairs. Matt and Jason Berry were brothers who had been with us for a while. They were our current roadies, but we treated them as if they were part of the band. They'd been there for us when no one else was, and we can only repay them for that.

"I'm coming!" I replied as I grabbed both of my bags. They were pretty heavy. I mean, I have muscles and those bags were about to be the death of me. When I reached the bottom of the stairs, Jason took one of my bags as Matt ushered him out of the house.

"Goddamn, dude! What did you put in here? Fucking bricks?" he asked as he lugged the bag into the trunk of Val's silver Range Rover.

"Most likely. Yes," I answered playfully. Once we had loaded all of our luggage and a few of us into one vehicle, the remainder of us piled into Jason's red Corvette. Everyone around me was acting like this was the experience of a lifetime. They seemed to feel like it to. I, on the other hand, played a charade, pretending like I felt overjoyed to be seeing a long, lost friend. Well, she wasn't lost. Just out of place. I felt as if I were riding in a vehicle and about to get on a plane to my death. I didn't understand why I felt this way. I knew for damn sure that I didn't want to feel like this but this emotion was overriding all others. It was hard to diminish. What was wrong with me? Was I crazy for thinking like this? Was it because of my previous relationship with Abby that I was feeling like a crazed stalker that was tracking her down? Was this all a horrible nightmare? Or a dream come true? No one would know the reality of it all until Monday.