A Beautiful Mess

Twelve missed calls. Twenty text messages. Five voicemails. Fifteen Twitter DMs. And they were all deleted.

"Spence, I need some help over here!" Dru hollered. That didn't sound like a good yell. It sounded like a frantic yell. I handed Finn the bottle of Jameson and crawled over the counter and ran up to my booth. "What? What's wrong?"

"My laptop just took a shit on me," he fumed. "And now I don't have anything to DJ with for the next few weeks while you're recording your album. What am I supposed to do?"

If this wasn't a sign I shouldn't be leaving Envy, I don't know what was. I may not have been permanently leaving, but I was going to be gone for at least a month. I wasn't ready to leave Envy for a month, even if it meant making my very first album. Envy was my baby. My first ever professional job.

"I'll call my Dad and have him bring over my old laptop." With that said, I took his phone and dialed my dad. "'Ello?" He answered.

"Dad, are you at home?"

"Yeah, why?"

"Well, I need you to go in my room and get my old laptop that I used for mixing and bring it to Envy. Dru's laptop bit the dust today and he needs a laptop for DJing while I'm in the studio."

"Yeah sure. Does he need it right now?"

"Yes, he needs it right now," I answered. "Danke Daddy. Love you, bye."

When I was stressed or when I was really angry, I tended to slip in a German word every now and then. Right now, I was stressed. Hanging up the phone and giving it back to him, I looked up at Dru with a pinched face. "My Dad will be here in a bit. It's an old Mac Book that I never got rid of, so all my DJing stuff is still on there. None of my mixes are, so you can't take anything and say it's your own." The look on his face made me chuckle. "I love yeh, kid, but you can never be too careful."

With that said, I left my booth and made my way back to the bar. "Can you hand me my purse, Finny?" He handed me my suitcase of a purse and gave me a look. "Your phones been ringing."

There was nothing to hold back my sigh. "Thanks. I'll see you lot later, yeah?"

"Of course," Kale answered. "Drinks and Nandos will be in order."




Over a hundred missed calls, texts, voicemails, and DMs. And again, they were all deleted.

"Spence!"

"Jerry!"

"Your album is officially finished!"

"JerBear say what?!"

"JerBear says your album is finished!"

I had never been so ecstatic in my entire life. My album was finished. My very first album. And my day was made as those five words left his mouth. I wrapped my tiny arms around his large frame as I let out a tiny squeal of happiness. His chuckle rumbled in his chest and shook my body.

"Jerry, thank you so much," I gushed. "You have no idea how much this means to me."

And here come the tears. I wasn't much of a crier, but it seems as of late I was. Jerry didn't seem to know how to take the big bad Spencer Faust crying. And I wasn't just crying, I was a blubbering mess. It was quite embarrassing to be honest. But there was nothing I could do to stop the tears. I was officially acting like a stereotypical teenage girl.

"Oh dear god. I'm sorry," I apologized, hastily wiping at my face. "Scheiße. Sorry. I've just been really emotional these last few weeks. I'm sorry."

Jerry was this big, burly man that was covered in tattoos. His hair was long, but not long enough to pull into a manbun. He has this god awful beard that bugged the shit out of me. His response every time I told him to cut it was that he was a manly man and manly men needed beards. There might've been one time when I brought a set of clippers in and tried to sneak attack him. That was the time that he locked me in a booth for the whole day and only let me come out when I needed to use the loo. He was quite bossy and rude when he wanted to be. So when he wrapped me in a hug and gave me a tight squeeze, I almost burst into another set of tears.

Over the last month, we had become very close. He was like a brother to me. He reminded me of Kale and Finn in so many ways. His sarcasm. His attitude. The way he carried himself. He had in a sense, taken me under his wing. At twenty five, he was a music producer and he was damn good at it. He made music in his free time and when I was stuck on my music, he helped me. He was the main reason my album was finished as soon as it was. If it wasn't for him, I would have never been able to get this album done. And he didn't just help me with the album, he helped me with my issues. And for that, I owed him everything. Jerry Grover was my savior and I would forever be in his debt.

"It'll be okay, love," he soothed. My brain kept telling me that it was, but my heart told me it wasn't. I listened to my brain and moved away from him. "I know, and thank you," I croaked.

I pushed back any and all tears, pretending as if the previous few minutes hadn't happened. My makeup was ruined so I quickly redid it and turned to Jerry with a grin. "Let's go to a pub, yeah? We could both use a drink."

"Hell yeah!" He exclaimed. The atmosphere went from depressing to cheerful in the matter of seconds it took me to say those few words. "I'll buy. You gonna drive or am I?"

My purse was tossed over my shoulders. "I will."


"Well if it isn't Miss DJ!"

Oh god. Not today. Please, I don't need this right now. And how in the hell was he here the same time I was? Shit. My fake grin was plastered on my face as I turned around on the barstool. "Mick, hey!"

He came over and pulled me up, giving me a big hug. Jerry cleared his throat making Mick release me. He held out his tattooed hand, to which Mick grabbed and shook. "I'm Jerry. S'nice to meet you," Jerry spoke. Mick gave him a nod. "Mick. Nice to meet you Jerry."

I sat back down and chugged the rest of my pint. My hand flew up and flagged down the bartender. He came over with a white cloth tossed over his left shoulder. "Need a refill?"

"God, yes."

"Put all their drinks on my tab, Kris," Mick stated. "They're some of my good mates. Give them anything they want." The Kris character nodded as he refilled my glass and said, "You got it boss."

My eyes shot up to Mick. "You own this pub too?"

He nodded. "Yep. I own this one and the one downtown." Jesus Christ. This was not what I needed right now. And by the look on Jerry's face, I knew that he knew that something was wrong. He had taken on the role of a big brother and could tell when my mood change the second it did. I'm positive that he knew more about me then I did.

"Spence, we should get going," Jerry spoke up. "We got album stuff to do." I said sorry to Mick and gathered my things, getting ready to go. As I slipped my coat on, the door on the far left of the building opened. Loud laughing and joking around, sounded over the already buzzing pub. Mick took one look over his shoulder and shouted a greeting across the room.

"Niall, mate! You alright?"

"Get me out of here," I whispered to Jerry. "Please."

Mick had other ideas though. "Niall, mate, look whose here. It's Spence!"

Jerry didn't ask any questions, he just slipped on his jacket and put his hand on the small of my back to guide me to the door. But it seemed as if someone else had other plans. And by someone else, I mean the five lads that made up the ever popular One Direction. Any girl on the planet would kill to be within a three meter radius of them, but me, I'd much rather be living in Iceland. I wasn't like the others girls. Any girl that had slept with two fifths of One Direction would be jumping for joy and telling anyone they saw. I was ashamed. I was ashamed of what I had done with Harry and Niall and I didn't plan on telling anyone.

"Spencer?"

God hated me. He legitimately had it out for me. All of the sins I had committed; he was smiting me. This was karma. What goes around, comes around. And boy, was that bitch coming back around. Full force.

"I was just on my way out," I mumbled, not making eye contact. Zayn and Liam stopped in front of us, blocking our path. "Spence, hey! What're you doing here?" Liam asked, moving in to hug me. Without thinking, I shrunk back into Jerry and they took notice to that. All five of them moved their eyes from me, to Jerry, and then to his hand that had moved to my hip. Liam stepped back with a hurt look on his face.

"Hi," I mumbled, giving a soft wave. "We were just having some pints after leaving the studio."

Why was I telling them this? I didn't even want to be here right now. Or even speak to them for that matter. But more importantly, I didn't want to speak to Niall. I had slept with him and ruined everything. You can't go back on that. What happens is forever. And I didn't want to deal with it right now. Or ever.

"Can I talk to you for a—" Niall started. Jerry cut him off. "Spence, love, we gotta get goin'."

I gave them a small smile. "Nice to see you lot." And with that, we left. Jerry didn't ask questions. He just asked where I wanted to be dropped off and I told him Finn's. The whole ride to Finn's flat, the only thing heard was the radio. He arrived and I bid him goodbye before heading inside the building. I used the spare key he had given me a while back and let myself in.

"Finny?"

"Loo!"

"Okay!" I hollered, tossing my purse on the coffee table and dropping down on his couch. "I'm just gonna suffocate myself with your throw pillow because I just ran into five people I've been avoiding for the last month and I feel like I'm going to have a breakdown! It was nice knowing yeh!"

A thud and thundering footsteps sounded down the hall. I had rolled over into the crook of his couch and shoved my head into the leather surface, hoping it would somehow smother me and I'd die a quick death. But alas, I wasn't that lucky. My so called friend forced me to roll over, to which I glared at him. "If you were any kind of friend, you would've let me suffocate myself."

His eyes rolled. "Come off it. Now, you ran into Niall and his band mates?" I nodded. "How did that go?"

"I got all awkward and Jerry saved me," I explained. "He lied and said we had album stuff to do. It was awful." I didn't let him get a word in. I started having a mini breakdown of sorts.

"I'm such a slag. I can't even have a good mate without mucking it up. I don't even know why I bother anymore. I mean, I might as well just go get all gussied up and go walk the streets at night. Not like it would be any different then how I am now. I'm a walking travesty. Everything goes wrong when I'm around. I can never do anything right. I'm just a bloody fucking mess." By now, I was crying. "And I don't know what to do about it! Or how to fix it! I can't change who I am! I'm a fucking mess! My whole existence is nothing but a big mess."

Finn took it upon himself to pull me up into a sitting position and wrap his arms around me. "You'll be fine, love," he soothed, rubbing my back. "It's okay. Just calm down, yeah?" When I didn't make any move to calm down, he started speaking.

"I warned him, yeh know?" I didn't bother looking up at him. Tears were clouding my vision and seemed to be in never ending supply, so there was no point. "I told him you were nothing but a beautiful mess and you weren't his type. But he didn't listen. You know, when you call me, your ringtone is A Beautiful Mess by Jason Mraz. It describes you to a fucking T. I mean, look at the lyrics." He pulled up the lyrics on his phone and rid my face of any tears. My puffy eyes scanned over the screen as he kept talking. "The song is basically about his feelings for a girl and how through all her flaws he still believes she is the most wonderful person in the world. In any good relationship that feeling should be felt. The chorus is suggesting the way the girls words makes the guy feel like crap. 'Picking up trash in dresses' is symbolizing taking out the bad in something that is truly beautiful deep down. When he says 'it's nice that we played in the dirt', he means that it's nice that we got through the fights and rough times in the relationship. Throughout the song when he says 'we're here' he is meaning that they are still finding their love for each other. And finally when he says 'oh, the wait was so worth it' he is saying they have each found love in each other and that if they ever had given up trying to find this love, they never would have found it in each other and they would've missed out."

"So what are you trying to say?"

"You like him, but you don't know it." What is he smoking? "That's why you ran after you slept with him."

My head furiously shook from side to side. "No I don't. I don't like him."

Finn shot me a small grin. "Yes you do. I see the way you get when you talk about him or when you text him. You have hearts in you eyes, love. There's no denying it."