A New Beginning

“You said what?” Lexi asked again into the phone.

I groaned out loud again at this question. The pain of it’s memory never let me get used to answering it.

“Thank you.” I sighed as I smashed my face into my pillow.

“The poor man spills his heart out and all you can say is thank you?” she roared.

I was growing tired of Lexi’s rants and tried to shut her up.

“Lexi, do you think that you could have responded sensibly if your favorite musician said he had feelings for you? I was a loss of words and you would have been to.”

“Well when Brian-.”

She immediately stopped what she was saying. Obviously she let out a little more then what she wanted to. I screamed with uncontrolled giggles into the phone. I love how I didn’t have to ask, she just told me.

“Shit! Oh fuck it all; I might as well just say it now. Brian and I are kinda sorta an item. I’m not real sure though.” Lexi revealed.

“Wait, how can you partially be together?”

She laughed at this before she continued. “He said that he likes me a lot and that he can’t see himself with anyone else. So I think he might be committing pretty soon. What did Jimmy do when you said thank you?”

“He just left. Not just the room, but he drove off and I have no idea where he went. I’m all alone right now because Johnny was gone when we came back from breakfast.” I complained.

Soon after I said that I heard the distant sound of a car door slamming. Making my way to the window I saw Johnny’s car in the driveway telling me that I had company now.

“Hey Lexi, my brother just got home. Can I call you back sometime?” I asked.

She agreed and the call was ended. I met Johnny in the kitchen to see that he had done some shopping. Twenty grocery bags filled the counter tops and Johnny started unloading them.

“Where have you been all day?” I asked a little angrily.

“Well, first off, I had a couple of interviews for some bass magazines and then I had to go shopping because we have you in the house now. Where’s the Rev?”

On the inside I started to panic, but I quickly covered myself.

“I’m not sure. He left when we got back from eating.”

I felt bad because I know that it was a partial lie, but how do you tell your brother about liking his best friend? Trying not to step on random items of food, I help Johnny put away all of the things that he had purchased. I laughed when I found three bags dedicated to frozen pizza. No one should have this much frozen pizza at one time. All the food had been put away and we entered the living room to just chill. I shrieked from fright when the door slammed open and people’s voices came from the doorway. Johnny gave me a weird look and seemed unfazed at the people currently storming the house. I recognized the voices of Zacky and Brian a second later. Situating myself back on the couch, I watched as they sat themselves on chairs next to us. They kept on shooting me quick glances but other than that seemed normal.

“Well, do we have a story for you guys!” Brian announced.

“Yeah, we actually wanted to tell Johnny but I guess it’s ok if you’re here Layla.” Zacky mentioned to me.

“So there we were, just minding our business, when Matt comes over and starts chilling with us.” Brian started out. “We’re just shooting the shit, but then he changes the subject to Layla and what we thought about her. Out of nowhere Jimmy barges in but seems upset that Matt is there. He sits down anyway and Matt continues talking about your sister Johnny. Then Matt just goes overboard.” Brian started laughing so Zacky took over.

“Not to be the bearer of bad news Johnny, but Matt let it slip that he wanted to see how far he could go with Layla. He even talked about how she agreed to go out with him sometime.” Zacky said.

Shock was the only feeling I had right then. How could Matt do that? I trusted him and this is how he treats me? I never agreed to go out on a date him, just spend time with him. Why would he twist my words? I had to stop my thoughts from running wild because Zacky still had more to say.

“That’s not even half of it. Matt was still going on about how he was going to ‘break in’ Layla to the rock star lifestyle, when Jimmy runs up to him and sends him a very hard right fist. This knocks Matt off his chair and almost unconscious. Jimmy screams something about how no one should speak about Layla like that and got up and left. We haven’t heard from him since. What about you guys, have you seen him?”

Johnny and I both shook our head. Knowing that Jimmy was out wandering by himself worried me. I definitely hoped he was ok. Zacky and Brian said that they couldn’t stay for long and had to leave in order to tend to the ailing Matt. The door closed with a click and I looked at Johnny who had been silent this whole time. His face was a little pink and he really seemed pissed off. I felt like I had to smooth things over.

“Johnny, I only said I would hang out with him. Matt never said it would be a date and I would never do that with him at all. This whole thing has really changed my opinion of Matt. Don’t be mad at me Johnny.” I whispered.

“My thoughts on Matt have changed as well. I won’t be so eager to have him around you anymore. Also, I’m not angry with you. How could I be? It’s not like you did anything wrong. I really want to talk to Jimmy right now. Enough of all the fucking drama, lets pop in a movie that I actually want to watch.” He laughed.

We had the majority of the day to ourselves, so we watched movies and had brother-sister time. Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, Death at a Funeral, and Hot Fuzz were all thrown into the DVD player. At one point we had a crazing for sugar and roasted marshmallows over the stove. Being the boring people we were, both of us hit the sack around 11:00 pm. I crawled into my nest of sheets in a pair of polka dot boy shorts and a black tank top. As my head hit the pillow I was gone.

I’m not sure what time it was, but someone in the house had woken me up from my sleep. Blinking at my clock, the glowing numbers told me I had only been asleep for three hours. I heard Jimmy’s door close, but I wasn’t sure if it was Jimmy or Johnny just checking the room. I tiptoed to my door and peered out into the hallway. Snores were coming from Johnny’s room, which made my heart flutter. That meant that Jimmy was finally home. Not knowing what I was doing, I opened Jimmy door and saw that his back was toward me. His head was slumped in his hands and he looked stressed. His muscles tensed as he sensed my presence. I slowly crawled on his bed so that I was right behind him. My hands worked themselves into the knotted muscles of Jimmy’s back. This seemed to calm him somewhat. He leaned back into me and let out a long sigh. Jimmy’s head found its way to the crook of my neck and stayed there. I started to run my fingers through his hair, moving it from his eyes. His blue orbs stared at me intently as all of the day’s emotions filled them. I could look into Jimmy’s eyes forever.

“Layla, I-.”

I stopped his words by lightly placing my lips over his. Pulling away I looked back into his eyes to see passion burning in them. Without breaking contact, he moved back on the bed so that he was lying down on one side. I moved across the bed and sidled up next to Jimmy. Wrapping his arms around me, he brought his body closer to mine. Resting my head on his shoulder, I draped an arm across his chest and ran my fingernails back and forth lightly over his skin causing his skin to erupt in goosebumps. He placed a light kiss on my head and pulled the sheets over our bodies.

“I think this was worth the wait.” He murmured into my hair.

“I agree Jimmy, I agree.”

I soon fell back asleep in Jimmy’s arms while listening to his heartbeat.