A Match Into Water

It didn’t take us very long to find where Mike had run off to, and once we had caught up to him, he shouted out, “Dudes, seriously, what took you so long? I thought we were leaving!”

“We were, but we had to go find you once you ran off,” Vic pointed out, a bit breathless as he slowed to a stop.

“Yeah,” I butt in, slowing to a stop next to him. “Besides, you’re like freakishly tall and have long legs. I, for one, am short with super tiny legs. Therefore, fuck you Mike for making me run so much.”

Both Mike and Vic bust up into loud fits of laughter while Mike stood there shrugging innocently. “Sorry Dean,” he says with a kind smile. Then, that smile slowly shifts into a mischievous smirk. “But maybe next time I’ll give you a ride-”

“Nope,” I cut him off quickly, taking a slow step back. “Sorry, I don’t do rides. I’ll just stick to walking, thank you very much.”

Mike let out a soft chuckle and shook his head at me. “Whatever you say, Dean,” he said with a wink.

I shook my head as well at Mike and Vic let out a bit of soft cough to break the silence. “Anyways,” Vic says, dragging out the last syllable for emphasis, “what’s the plan now? I mean, why were you even running this way Mike?”

Mike looked over at his brother and just simply shrugged. “I don’t know,” he said. “I just kind of ran...though food sounds fucking great right now.”

Vic laughed a bit at his brother and smiled. “It does,” he agreed. He looked over at me and raised his eyebrow a bit. “What about you Dean?”

As soon as he asked, my immediate response was to gladly accept invitation to get food, but some part of me reminded me that it hadn’t been that long since I’d eaten the muffin, so I probably should just skip eating. “Um, I mean I’m not all that hungry,” I try telling the boys, but at that moment my stomach decided to betray me and let out a very loud and audible gurgle that both the boys heard. Mike broke out into an enormous fit of giggles and Vic just softly chuckled and shook his head.

“Yeah, well your stomach says otherwise,” he teases, smiling at me as he added, “C’mon guys, let’s grab some pizzas and then we can head back to my place and just hang out or something.”

“Dude, we should totally invite the guys over!" Mike added. "This way Dean can find out that I’m not the crazy one.”

My eyes widened slightly and it suddenly felt like my stomach was tied in knots. “Wait,” I try saying, “what do you mean-”

Vic was laughing and nodded in agreement. “Totally!” he chimed in. “Though I’m sure you’re still the crazy one.”

“Nuh-uh,” Mike sassed, shaking his head at his brother. “Not even close. I mean, you’ve met Jaime, right?”

“Yeah, but to say that you’re not the crazy one-”

“Hey, um, guys, just a quick question here,” I interject with a small cough. Both boys looked towards me and I swallowed the slowly forming lump in my throat before continuing. “How many people are you guys having over? And are you sure you want me crashing? Because I could just go home-”

“You’re not crashing anything,” Vic says with a grin. “We invited you over to hang out and we’re inviting two of our other friends. No big deal.”

“It could be three though,” Mike pipes in. “Jaime might bring along Jess if she’s not working or anything.”

“Oh yeah, didn’t think about that,” Vic adds thoughtfully.

Mike just nodded a response at his brother and then looked back at me. “But what’s the big deal, Dean? You don’t want to hang out with the cool kids?”

I had to stifle a laugh at Mike’s last remark and I almost made a snide, sarcastic remark about them being cool kids, but I decided to save it. “Nah, it’s just I don’t handle crowds well,” I admit, shrugging a bit. “That, and I mean, we all just met and everything-”

“Dean, if we didn’t want you hanging out with us we wouldn’t have invited you,” Vic points out, giving me a reassuring smile.

“Yeah!” Mike cheers, grinning like an idiot. “I mean, I technically wasn’t involved with inviting you- that was all Vic’s doing -but if we didn’t want you we wouldn’t invite you over. Besides, don’t you live right across the hall or something?”

“Well, yeah-”

“Right, so if at some point we want to kick you out or if you want to bail, all you gotta do is walk across the hall,” Mike finishes with a final nod.

I couldn’t help but laugh a little at that. “I guess you have a point there, Mike-”

“Well I usually do, Dean,” he says.

“Yeah, but you know what I mean.” I rolled my eyes a bit before continuing. “So you guys really want me to come over?”

“Well duh!” both Vic and Mike cheer in unison. “Unless you’re uncomfortable with coming over,” Vic adds, shrugging a bit.

I stood there for a moment to think the whole thing over before I finally smiled and nodded at the two boys, who immediately broke out into loud cheers and wide grins.

“This night just got a hell of a lot better!” Mike cheered, throwing his hands up into the air yet again.

I let out a laugh and said, “Woah, calm down there Mike, we haven’t even gotten the pizza yet-”

Mike let out a gasp, almost as if he had completely forgotten about how this entire ruse was to get me to come along to get pizzas with the boys. “Then why the hell are we still standing here then? We have pizzas to get!” Both Vic and I were laughing at Mike’s behavior, and as the three of us walked off towards the pizza place Vic had in mind, Mike took the opportunity to loosely wrap his arm around my shoulder, but I quickly swatted his hand away and scooted further away from the taller sibling. Vic chuckled at that, muttering something along the lines of ‘rejection’.

After walking a few blocks, we ended up at a Mountain Mike’s, which the boys explained was a chain pizza place that had some pretty good food and was relatively close to where Vic lived, so they ended up coming here rather often. That was soon made apparent as several workers gave the Fuentes brothers warm welcomes when we walked in. There weren’t that many people in the pizzeria when we walked in, so that just made the employees all the more willing to talk to the brothers, and eventually me. They introduced me as Vic’s new neighbor and almost immediately, one of the hostesses, a tall middle age lady with greying Auburn hair, embraced me in a tight hug. She then started to fuss over me and ask if the boys were treating me alright, getting a groan out of both Vic and Mike while I started laughing. I assured the hostess, who I soon learned was named Rosie, that the boys were fine and that everything was alright. She nodded happily at me before smiling apologetically at the the three of us as she had to turn to help a group of people who just walked in the door.

Both Vic and Mike took this as a cue to go order pizza, and Mike agreed to call up their two friends Jaime and Tony while Vic and I ordered the pizzas. It didn’t take us long to get the orders placed, and as we went off to the side to wait for both Mike to return and for our orders, a girl that looked to be a few years younger than I was approached us with a nervous smile.
“Hi, uh, you wouldn’t happen to be Vic Fuentes, would you?” the girl asked, having a hard time not tripping over her words and blushing a bright red.

Vic smiled brightly at the girl and nodded. “The one and only,” he joked, causing the girl to giggle a bit excitedly.

“Oh my God, I’m such a big fan and this is like- wow, I mean, I’m so sorry to be bugging you in public like this, but can I, um, take a picture with you?” she asked, her eyes lighting up once Vic had confirmed that he was indeed the guy she was looking for.

Vic laughed a bit at the girl, but it wasn’t at all in a mean way. It was very kind and almost as if he was finding this rather adorable. “Of course, Darling,” he told her, causing a small squeal to come out of the the girl. She pulled out her phone and Vic looked at me with slight pleading eyes. “Do you mind, Dean?” he asked, referring to taking a picture of the two of them together.

“Not at all,” I say with a bit of a shrug, smiling and taking the phone from the girl. Vic wrapped an arm around the girl while they both smiled and I couldn’t stop myself from saying, “Alright girls, make sure I see those pretty smiles of yours. Now pose!”

This earned a laugh from both Vic and the girl who asked for the picture. I took a few pictures of them, some serious and some of the two goofing off. Vic gave the girl a hug and also signed her phone case when I gave her the phone back. “Thank you so much!” she cheered, still smiling rather big and bright. “And sorry again for bugging you-

“It’s no big deal, we love it when our fans come up and say hi,” Vic reassured the girl with a smile. “It’s always great to see that you guys care and all, you know?”

The girl couldn’t stop smiling as she nodded her response. “Yeah, well thanks again!" she exclaimed. "You and your girlfriend look really cute together by the way- she’s really pretty."

I immediately turned a bright red and I looked down to the floor out of sheer awkwardness. I almost said something to the girl but Vic beat me to it. “Oh, oh no, we’re not dating, she’s just a friend,” Vic corrected, who when I looked over at him appeared to be blushing a bit as well.

The girl turned just about as red as I was and I could tell she was deeply embarrassed. “Oh God, I’m so sorry, I just naturally assumed-”

“It’s alright,” Vic cut in. “No harm done.”

The girl nodded a bit awkwardly and scratched the back of her neck nervously. “Well, you’re still very pretty,” the girl admitted, looking over at me with mixture of both embarrassment and an apology written over her face.

“Thanks,” I say, genuinely touched by the fact that she thought I was pretty, even though I clearly wasn’t. “You’re pretty good looking yourself,” I tell her, winking playfully at her even though I meant it when I said she was pretty, because she was absolutely drop dead gorgeous.

The girl blushed even more and her eyes flickered to the floor. She opened her mouth to say something, and even before the first syllable got out, I knew she was going to protest again my compliment, but right at that moment, Mike bounded in, practically yelling, “Woah, what’s this I hear about my big bro getting a girlfriend? And why wasn’t I notified?”

The girl’s mouth fell open, obviously flabbergasted by all of this, as Vic started laughing at his brother. “Calm down Mike, nobody’s got a girlfriend right now- unless you do,” Vic quickly added, looking over at both myself and the girl he just took a picture with for confirmation. Both she and I burst out laughing and denied having girlfriends, which Mike didn’t seem to believe for a second. Then he went on to introduce himself to the girl and did the same picture routine with her. It was at that moment though that something finally dawned on me and I turned to Vic with a questioning.

“You and your brother have fans?” I asked.

Vic gave me an innocent look and shrugged. “Well, yeah,” he told me.

“What for exactly?” I continued, cross my arms and looking at Vic skeptically.

“Hope to see you at the next show, sweetheart!” Mike called out, waving to the girl who now had to run to catch up with her family that was leaving the pizzeria. He turned to Vic and I, and it was obvious he overheard our small conversation because he piped in with, “Well Dean, just to bring you up to speed on a few things, especially since this could happen a lot since we’re all pretty well known around here, but we’re in a kick-ass band.”

It was now my turn for my mouth to fall open as I stared at the two boys in shock. “No way,” I say, looking from one smirking Fuentes to the other. “Seriously?!”

“Yep,” Mike proudly states, popping the last ‘p’ syllable and then running to retrieve all the pizzas we had ordered as they were called out.

I looked from Mike’s retreating figure to Vic, still unable to believe what I just heard. “Are you two being serious? Or are you just messing with me?”

Vic let out a laugh and said, “Dean, if we weren’t being serious, do you think that girl would have come up and asked for pictures?”

I mentally slapped myself for being so stupid and just shrugged. “I mean, I guess,” I say, trailing off a bit before snapping out of it and smacking Vic on the arm, who recoiled and looked at me with a mock-hurt expression.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” I said, giggling a bit as I started to smile at Vic. “And what’s the name of your guys’ band?”

“Well, telling people you’re in a band once you first meet them is kind of shallow, don’t you think?” he jokes. He then shrugged and said, “I don’t know, I thought about saying something, but I think Mike just wanted to you figure it out on your own.”

I laughed a bit at the thought of that and shook my head. “Asshole,” I muttered. “But seriously, what’s the name of your guys’ band?”

“Pierce The Veil!” Mike answered for his brother as he came back with the pizzas. “We’re like the best band ever and you should totally listen to us and buy all of our shit.”

“Wow, conceited much?” I teased, causing both the brothers to laugh and for Mike to shrug. I shook my head and said, “C’mon guys, the pizzas are going to get cold. Let’s go!”

I didn’t need to tell the brothers twice, for they quickly pulled me out of the store with the numerous pizzas in hand. We walked back to the store joking around and talking like we had been before we entered the pizzeria, but I wasn’t totally in the conversation. Pierce The Veil? Why did that name sound so familiar? Maybe I’d heard of them before, but there wasn’t any way for me to be sure.

We were back at the apartment building already and things were already starting to become very familiar for me. Granted, parts of it were unfamiliar and I hadn’t even known where the elevator was until now, but when we reached Vic’s floor, I immediately recognized everything from last night and earlier today- including my apartment door. I looked over at it absentmindedly as Vic let us into his apartment building, but I was quickly distracted by the interior Vic’s living space. It was very modern yet had a bit a of a retro feel to it as well. The living room and kitchen themselves were a tad messy, but that was probably just from the party last night. I saw several vinyls stacked next to a record player and directly next to it was a massive collection of both CDs and DVDs. The sound system was next to all of that and hanging on the wall was a decent sized flat screen. Between all of this and the various guitars and other musical instruments scattered around the room, it was truly a sight to behold and it took my breath away.

“Like what you see Dean?” I heard Vic teasing me from the kitchen, where he set down the pizzas he was carrying and went to the fridge to grab what I presumed to be drinks.

“Dude, it’s freaking amazing in here!” I cried, spinning around and smiling at Vic. He let out a bit of a chuckle and shook his head at me, pulling out a beer for Mike, for himself and then pulling one out and handing it towards me. “Thanks. Want one?” he asked.

I nodded and gladly accepted the beer, grabbing my shirt and twisting off the cap with ease. As I threw the cap on the counter and took a drink from my beer, I heard Mike laughing from behind me and I turned to give him a look that said ‘What’s your problem?’

“Damn girl, you do this often?” he joked.

I shrugged at Mike, saying, “Back in my hometown, we had this music venue that I worked at. We never really invested into a bottle opener, so I was sort of stuck with twisting off the caps by hand.”

“Well from now on, I’m naming your our official decapitator,” Mike mused, smiling and taking a sip from his beer. He looked up from his beer and pulled it away from him when he noticed the weird look he was getting from both me and Vic. “What?” he asked.

“Nothing,” I say, shaking my head at Mike and taking another sip from my beer. “Just choose your words more carefully next time.” Vic nodded in agreement, and at first, Mike seemed confused by our request, but then he started thinking over what he just said before his eyes widened in realization and he started laughing at himself. To be honest, I couldn’t help myself from laughing along with him and apparently, neither could Vic. We sat there and laughed at each other and shared a few more bits of conversation with each other before there was a knock at the door, interrupting the natural flow of conversation.

“I’ll get it!” Mike shouted, jumping up from the bar stool he had seated himself at and running towards the front door. I couldn’t help but start to feel nervous about all this. I was about to meet two more people in this town, and they were really close with the Fuentes brothers. I was already breaking my set of rules by allowing myself to get close to those two, something my subscious highly disapproved of, and now I was adding two more people to that list. A new level of anxiety and panic rose up in me and Vic must have noticed, because suddenly, he was by my side and giving me a rather worried look.

“You alright Dean?” he asked with true concern in his voice.

“Yeah,” I lied, giving him a weak smile and brushing some of my hair out of my face. “I just don’t like crowds, remember?”

Vic let out a soft chuckle and shook his head. “Dean, it’s just two more people, you’ll be fine,” he reassured. “Jaime and Tony are pretty harmless, especially Tony, and if you’re worried about them not liking you, then they’d be fools not to- and believe me, they’re already a giant pair of idiots.” I couldn’t help but laugh a bit at that and Vic smiled at me in response. “Besides, you have Mike and myself if you need anything. Also, if worse comes to worse, you live right across the hall so all you’d have to do is run out that door and then escape into yours.”

I nodded a bit at Vic and immediately felt myself calm down a bit. He was right, I guess I was just overreacting a bit. Even with my subscious screaming at me to leave, I wanted to stay. I may have just gotten here, but not having friends was a stupid rule anyway. Maybe having a few friends wouldn’t be a bad idea anyway.

I stood up from my chair and Vic looked me over a bit in concern. “You alright now?” he asked. I nodded at him and hugged him, muttering a soft ‘thank you’ into his chest. He returned my hug and nodded. “Anytime Dean,” he murmured. He then pulled away from me and a wide grin spread across his face when he looked down at me. “Now c’mon, let’s go say hi to the rest of the idiots I call my friends.”

Notes

Ugh, sorry for taking so long to get this chapter up. Hopefully the little extra length and the fact that's it a bit more interesting now will make up for the lateness.

UPDATE: (some-what) edited as of 11/14/15