It was another sleepless night.

For the past 7 years it seemed every night was a sleepless night.

I tossed and turned, and anytime I got lucky enough to drift off to sleep it was interrupted by nightmares.

I laid in my bed, staring out the window at the morning LA sky. My thoughts were disrupted by the sound of my phone ringing. I turned over to grab it off of the night stand, groaning at the name and picture that appeared on my screen.

"Hmmmmmm what?" I asked as I answered the phone.

"Well someone's sassy this morning!" The voice on the other end answered, chuckling a little.

"It's 9 am Austin," I responded sleepily.

"It's not like you were sleeping anyway, Lyla. You don't fool me," he replied. Damn he knew me too well.

"Well did you need something? Cuz if not I'm going to go back to not sleeping," I responded.

"What? Can't a guy call his best friend just to say hey?" He asked, mocking a hurt tone.

"Of course, sweetie, just not at 9 am." I said, laughing a little.

"Okay fine. I just wanted to make sure you were all ready for tonight. We are going to leave at about 8 because we have a long drive ahead of us to get to the venue tomorrow." I smiled big through the phone.

"Yes I am so ready! I can't wait! Thanks again, boo, for this opportunity. You have no idea how much this means to me!" I said, excitement clearly showing through my voice.

"Of course, Lyla! You deserve this. Everyone needs to see how talented and amazing you are. Plus it'll give me a chance to give you a little music education." He said, laughing heartily.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah. We can't all be rockstars!" I said back, laughing loudly. We talked for a few more minutes before saying goodbye. Well there was no going back to sleep now; I was too excited.

Before I go on I should probably tell you a little about myself.

My name is Lyla James. I'm 26 years old. I'm 5'3" and I have long black hair, a nose piercing, and tons of tattoos.

I moved to Los Angeles 6 years ago to pursue my passion of photography. Over the years I have also done some print modeling for a little extra cash in between photo sessions, which were sometimes few and far between. I still did a little modeling here and there, but my true love was photography.

I hadn't quite hit it big yet, but I was on my way. That's not to say I haven't had some great opportunities; I have. Which leads to the story of how I met my best friend.

You may know him as Austin Carlile, the screamer for the band Of Mice & Men. We met a year ago when I had the honor of photographing the band. I had never heard of them before but Austin and I became best friends and we were soon inseperable.

Strangely enough I was kind of....music illiterate, at least to Austin. I was mainly into indie music, and I had never heard of most of the bands the guys toured with or hung out with.

Austin always talked about how one day he was going to give me a "music education." I guess now he would get to.

Austin had invited me to go on Warped Tour with the band and photograph them along the way, which was an incredible opportunity for me to show other people my talent. Besides that it gave me the chance to spend 3 months with my best friend, hear some good music, and hopefully make some new friends along the way.

Austin was always trying to help me pursue photography, getting me gigs whenever he could. With every step I made in my career I was one step closer to putting the past behind me and starting anew. Austin was always there for me. He was the only person I had met in LA that I could really trust. He had told me all about his past; his ex-wife, the cheating, his mom's death, and he knew all about mine; the pain I had gone through, the things I had done to myself, and the boy who broke my heart into pieces that never got put back together, though I had never told him who he was. It wasn't important. I hadn't seen or heard from him or of him in 7 years, though I thought about him everyday. It had been 7 years and for some reason I still couldn't shake him.

I got up and turned on my iPod, the sounds of "When You Can't Sleep at Night" by OM&M filling the air. This song was my favorite song in the entire world because Austin had written it for me.

The day after I spilled my guts to him about everything he played this song for me, and told me he would always be there.

It was that day that I knew he was my best friend, and would be forever. It was also that day that I felt like things would evenutally be okay.

I was on my way to fixing myself, to being me again, a better version of me.

Little did I know that something, more like someone, would throw a wrench into that plan.

Notes

Hi everyone! Hope you enjoy this first chapter! It's just a little introduction into the current friendship between Lyla and Austin. But don't fear!! Victor will be making his appearance sooner rather than later!! :)