FRIENDS

11

When Michael woke me up the next morning, I knew instantly that he didn't remember what had happened the night before. He was grumpy in the way you expect a person to be after drinking as much as he had, but he was looking at me like things were still exactly the same as they had been twenty fours ago, when they weren't not at all. And I knew Michael well enough to know that if he was aware of what had happened, he'd know things were different. You don't kiss the person who has been your best friend since you wore diapers and pass it off as nothing.

Nothing at all was said about it and so I left it alone as well, not really sure how I'd bring it up, and I knew I'd end up feeling slightly embarrassed about the whole thing if we talked about it. I had no reason to be embarrassed, honestly, because he'd told me to kiss him, and then he'd been the one to initiate it. I wasn't at fault for what had happened. I had gone ahead and kissed back the boy I liked like any girl would.

The guys all had to go to the studio today, I had known that yesterday from when I'd talked to Ashton, before everything had happened with him. I didn't really know what I wanted to do with my day today. Part of me wanted to curl up in a ball and try and hide from everything that had happened recently. The past week had been an absolute shit show, all around. Michael talked to me like he thought everything was absolutely perfect here when really, things were anything but. I had hurt Ashton beyond fixing and I had no fucking clue what was going on with Michael.

But instead of getting to curl up under the covers and pretend everything was alright, Michael and Luke came into my room and told me they wanted me to go to the studio with them and Calum wanted me to bring Lacey.

"I don't know if that's a good idea." I said quietly, looking down at the blanket. I focused on a thread that had come loose, avoiding eye contact completely. I knew that Luke knew why I didn't think that was a good idea; why would Ashton want to be around me or Lacey? They were awkward around each other after they'd hooked up and I was a heartbreaking bitch.

"Come on, Ivy. We have a surprise for you." Michael pleaded, and of course every single person in this world knew I wouldn't be able to say no to him, not when he was begging. I sighed and told him I'd call Lacey so that we could pick her up on the way. I was pretty sure she had today off, so everything would unfortunately go according to their plan.

 

When we got into the studio a while later, Ashton practically begged to go into the booth first. He played it off as he wanted to get his drum tracking done for this song so he could hear it progress as everyone tracked their instruments, but I knew he just wanted away from me. He just wanted a bit more time to himself before he was forced to socialize with me.

I knew there was a chance that I was being too negative, but I knew Ashton. He didn't do well with heartache. He was forgiving, but he wasn't as forgiving as me.

Lacey sat down next to Calum and they were instantly bantering back and forth, their level of flirtation almost sickening. I found it to be kind of fucked up how willing Calum seemed to jump right into things with Lacey when he knew that his best friend had already slept with her, but it was none of my business. I was going to let everyone else do what they wanted. I wasn't going to get in the way of anything.

Michael and Luke sat on either side of me, talking around me, and I knew that being with everyone right now was a bad idea when I was in this perpetual bad mood. I had never been the person to scream and yell and get angry when I was down, I was the kind of person who would just start crying when everything became too much. I needed a chance to get away from everything and just let it out, or I needed a distraction.

"State Champs are supposed to be playing a show the night before you leave." Michael said, elbowing me in the side to get my attention. I looked back and forth between him and Luke, who both looked at me expectantly. They knew I loved State Champs and they very obviously assumed I'd want to go.