“How guilt once harbour'd in the conscious breast, Intimidates the brave, degrades the great.” ~Samuel Johnson

Aiden’s POV

“Finally we’re done!” Rhyder sighed, dropping into a chair and letting his head fall back so his brown hair lifted off of his forehead. “I didn’t think we’d ever get so much work done. I say we celebrate.”

“Celebrate getting one track done? You really think we should?” Dayton asked as he raised his eyebrow. Rhyder sat up and nodded his head enthusiastically. Dayton sighed and rolled his eyes. Rhyder tried to find a way to celebrate anything, only because he wanted to get his hands on some beer.

“You can go ahead and celebrate if you want, Rhy,” I told him as I put my guitar back into its case. “Don’t let us stop you.” I clasped it and moved it over to where the other guitars in the room where sitting. I winced slightly at the pain in my fingertips. They were calloused over from playing guitar for so long, but it was only once in a blue moon when my fingers would hurt all over again as if I had picked up my guitar for the first time.

“I don’t want to celebrate on my own,” Rhyder whined. I swear he acted like such a baby sometimes I’m surprised he hadn’t been slapped and shaken until he started acting like an adult again. I guess his cheerful demeanor was what made people like him.

“Well, we don’t want to celebrate right now,” Jace said leaving the room. A few seconds later we could hear the TV on. He was watching either a football game or a soccer game depending on the cheering that was being heard. That’s all he ever watches nowadays and it’s starting to get on our nerves. He’d practically attack us if we got anywhere near the remote.

I looked down at my watch. 3:47. I was going to be late. “Guys, I gotta split,” I called to them as I rushed towards the front door to grab my shoes. I quickly pulled them onto my feet, getting a mini burn when I quickly tied them. The last thing I wanted was an intervention from them. “I’ll be back later.”

“Wait–”

I quickly closed the door behind me and ran to my car. I jumped inside and peeled out of the driveway and down the street. Only when I drove down the street and the studio was out of my sight did I slow down and take a deep breath. I didn’t really have to pay close attention to my surroundings to get to where I was going.

I pulled into a driveway and jumped out of the car. I looked over my shoulder to make sure no one had followed me as I knocked on the door. I couldn’t help feeling paranoid whenever I came into this neighborhood.

“Hey, I was wondering when you’d get here.”

I smiled. “Sorry to keep you waiting, babe.”

----

I flinched when I heard my phone ring. Why is it that people call whenever you’re about to fall asleep or when you’re in deep sleep? Sighing, I stuck my arm out to grab my phone off of the bedside table and answered it quickly to stop the ringing.

“Hello?” I mumbled.

“Aiden? It’s Mack.” I swallowed hard and tried to think of anything to say. She didn’t sound mad, but that only made me even more suspicious. I figured she’d be foaming at the mouth since I hadn’t called her in a while. It wasn’t my fault, though. I had a lot of band stuff to worry about. “Are you there?”

“Yeah,” I responded. “I’m here. It’s, uh, it’s good to hear from you.”

“Yeah, well, I finally decided to stop waiting around for you to call me when I can call you on my own,” she replied. “Anyway, to get to the point we have to talk about us.”

Wow, she was never one to beat around the bush. “Ok, what’s up?”

“There is no us,” she responded. “Not anymore, I mean. I feel like this long distance thing isn’t working. You don’t put any effort into our relationship. And, technically, we’re not even together since we never made it officially official.”

“So…you want to break up…kinda, sorta?” I questioned.

“Yeah,” she replied with a sigh. “Yeah, I guess I do.”

“Oh, um. Ok. We’re broken up then.” I paused, waiting for her to say something. The other end was strangely quiet. I waited a few more seconds. “You still there?” I questioned.

“Mhm,” she responded. “I was just thinking.”

“About?”

“Well, to be perfectly honest I’m not as upset as I thought I would be.”

“Me either,” I admitted with a sigh. “Maybe we weren’t meant to be together. Maybe everything we’ve been through was to just show us that we’d be there for each other but we shouldn’t be with each other. You know what I mean?”

“Yes, and it’s a great relief that you said that. I was hoping that you wouldn’t get mad at me or something.”

“To be honest, I’ve been thinking about this for a while too.” I ignored the hand that rested on my shoulder. “I’m just glad that you understand. We’re cool, right?”

“Right. I’ll call you later, I guess.”

“Ok, bye.”

I hung up the phone and replaced it on the dresser before looking at the owner of the hand.

“Who was that, baby?” Kandy asked sleepily as she rubbed her eyes.

“Eh, someone I had a fight with,” I responded before leaning forward and kissing her lips lightly. She smiled and ran a hand through my hair. “Everything’s cool now, though.” I glanced over at the digital clock on the bedside table. “Aw, babe, I’m going to have to go if I’m going to make it back in time for ‘Band Dinner Night’.” I moved to get out of bed but Kandy grabbed my arm.

“Are you sure you don’t have any time to spare, baby?” She asked with a sweet smile. I grinned before leaning over to kiss her. She locked her arms around my neck and pulled me closer, shoving her tongue into my mouth. I rolled over so I was on top of her, giving myself better access to her. I pulled my lips away from hers and bit and sucked on her neck, causing her to giggle. Her giggle quickly turned into a gasp when I moved within her. She wrapped her legs around my waist and moved with me, breathing heavily into my ear, biting it lightly every now and then. I stifled a groan of pain when her fingernails raked my back as she let out a stifled scream of pleasure.

“I really have to go now, babe,” I panted slightly, pecking her lips. “I’m surprised the guys didn’t call me thinking that I fell off the face of the Earth.”

“As long as you come back again tonight,” she said with a soft smile as she tapped my nose.

“I promise.” I slid out of bed and quickly pulled my clothes on. I grabbed my cell phone and waved at Kandy as I made my way out of the room. I jumped down the stairs and ran out to my car. As I pulled out of my driveway I checked my messages. I only had one text.

Hey, we’re going to CiCi’s. See you in a few.

~Dayton

I flipped my phone shut and focused on the road. My stomach felt like stone when I read Dayton’s text. I didn’t understand why, it wasn’t as if Dayton had told the rest of the guys a secret about me or something. I hated to admit it, but I was afraid of Dayton in some cases. He could seem so innocent in one minute and the next he could be your worst enemy. That’s happened to me a couple of times and I didn’t want to go back to being on his bad side. I had to make sure I didn’t do anything to upset him tonight or ever for that matter.

“AIDEN! OVER HERE!” Rhyder yelled from across the room as he waved his arms back and forth as if he was someone direction airport traffic. Jace and Dayton were slumped in their chairs, pretending as if they didn’t know Rhyder.

“Did you have to yell across the whole restaurant?” I demanded as I moved to their table quickly.

“Dayton wouldn’t let me get any food without you being here. So, now that you’re here…” he jumped out of his chair and ran over to the buffet part of the restaurant. Jace quickly followed him as I dropped down in the only empty chair.

“Did you tell her yet?” Dayton questioned so suddenly that I jumped. He had his hands folded across the table and he was giving me a hard stare. You know that one that you father gives you when you disrespected him and the only thing you want to do is pee your pants? Yeah, he had that look on his face.

“Well, I didn’t really have to,” I responded slowly. Dayton raised his eyebrow. “She kind of broke up with me before I could tell her.”

“Wow.” Dayton leaned back in his seat and clicked his tongue as he drummed his fingers on the table. He only did that when he was very deep in thought, trying to find the perfect way to either insult you or to compliment you. I knew which type of comment I would get. “You have to be the most insensitive, egotistical, guilt-free, idiotic, ignorant, piece of musical shit I’ve ever met,” he finally said as he looked at me. I stared at him. “I threw a compliment in there, you should be happy,” he added.

“Insensitive? Egotistical? Guilt-free? Idiotic? Ignorant? Piece of shit? Run that by me,” I ordered, even though I knew I would end up regretting it.

“Insensitive because you were fucking Kandy behind Mack’s back and you never grew a pair of balls to come up front about it,” Dayton said as he started to count off on his fingers. “Egotistical because you bragged a couple of times about it. Guilt-free because you walk around as if you know that you aren’t ever going to get found out. Idiotic because you actually think you can get away with this. Ignorant because you don’t heed the saying ‘what goes around comes around’ and a piece of shit because you’re the worst ‘friend’ ever if you think that what you’re doing to Mack is fair!”

“Thanks for the speech, Dad, but my problems are now over,” I said with an eye roll. “She broke up with me; I don’t have to worry about anything anymore.”

“Have you ever heard of the word pregnancy? Or STD? Kandy must be full of them with her reputation. Or did you forget all about that when you started smoking that cancer stick again?” he questioned as he stared at the cigarette that I had halfway up to my mouth. “There’s no smoking in here,” he added.

“What’re you trying to do? Make me feel guilty so you can feel better?” I questioned, breaking the cigarette in half.

“No, I’m just trying to get my old friend back, but if I have to deal with this Aiden just to get to the real you, then I’m going to abuse you as much as I can,” he responded. “Just until I knock you back into your senses at least. If that takes years, so be it. I have the time and the patience.”