Between The Books-Michael Clifford

Thirteen

"Star, let me introduce you guys. What's your name, Darling?" Scutter says to Laney.

"Laney."

Laney, seriously can barely contain herself with this drummer. I reach out and grab her hand to calm her down. She's a walking hormone all the time, but this....I've never seen her like this.

"Well, Laney, my name's Jayce Scutter, call me Scutter. These ugly boys here, are Lickit!" Scutter says, smiling.

Seriously wow. Synna, who I haven't seen yet to night, is a lucky girl.

"We've got, Toby on bass, Marcus on drums..."

Both Toby and Marcus give us a wave. Laney is squeezing my hand into numbness.

"...Michael on guitar, and of course myself." Scutter looks at his band. "Boys, after the show, let's all do shots with Jaxs' crew."

Marcus walks over. Green eyes. Beautiful.

"Hey Star, Laney. Glad you guys came out to see us play. We're actually amazing, if you wanna know the truth. I'll buy all your drinks tonight, so drink up." Marcus is looking down at us from the stage, eyes focused entirely on Laney, and smiles.

Perfect teeth too, of course.

Laney's just broken every bone in my hand, and with good reason. This Marcus guy, is drop dead sex.

Really.

"Enjoy the show!" He smiles again, looking briefly at me, then looking over at Laney. "I'll see YOU, when we're done." He says this directly to Laney, and then walks back to his drums.

I hear Laney's breath catch in her throat. Yeah, so much for Wade, Max, and Nate! Marcus just pulled out his best move, and shot Laney straight in the heart.

"So guys, we've been sounding really good this whole week, you picked a good night to come out. Marcus got some new equipment, and it's seriously sick." Toby says.

Toby's cute too. Blonde short messy hair, blue eyes. Not as tall as Marcus or Scutter, but still tall.

Ok, Michael's coming over. The moment I have been absolutely dreading has arrived and now it's my turn to squeeze Laney's hand. Of course I have to show zero emotion on my face because I can't let Jax see that I'm flipping out on the inside...over a flannel wearing, black and blue haired guitar player. Michael walks over, jumps down off the stage and stands directly in front of me. He smiles and nods at Laney and Jax.

"Thanks for coming tonight." He says to us all. Then he looks at me....directly into my soul I swear to God. "Hey, Star. Listen, we're obviously going to be together all the time, or so it seems..." He smirks. "I'm sorry about the other day, at your dorm, and about last night. I've had a fucking shitty couple weeks, probably took it out on you and plenty of others. Start over?" He reaches out and touches my arm lightly.

Um....what's happening?

Laney squeezes my hand, jolting me out of my Michael bubble.

"Oh, sure. It's no problem, Michael." I say.

He smiles. SMILES at me. That's the smile from the first night I met him, at the library.

"You guys know each other?" Scutter asks.

"Yeah man. She's in my history of Civ class, and works at the main library." Michael says to Scutter, then looks at Jax. "You must be Jax? Thanks for coming out. Sorry I didn't get to meet you before. My girl and I been moving into our own place. Scutter says you play?"

He has a girlfriend.

"Guitar, piano." Jax says, putting his arm around my shoulder.

I have a boyfriend.

"Cool, jam with us anytime." He smiles at Jax, then hops back up on stage.

We turn around and walk back to our table.

I know I shouldn't, but I feel like someone just punched me in the stomach.

"That's the guy who dropped off your notebook the other night isn't it?" Jax asks, taking a drink.

"Yeah," I clear my throat and take a long pull off my beer, trying to look indifferent. "He was an asshole that night. Was going to throw my notebook away, but decided not to since we had a test the next day." I say.

Take another drink. Steady yourself.

I'm fine, I have Jax, he has a girlfriend.

I quickly bring the bottle back up to my lips and drink the rest of my beer.

"It's ok, Star. At least he made the effort to talk to you. Girlfriends can easily be gotten rid of." Laney whispers in my ear, at the same time Jax is talking.

Oh, Laney, don't even put that thought in my head.

"Ah, well, he seems cool enough. Good he apologized, otherwise I'd have to beat his ass!" Jax is saying, as he laughs.

I think I was doing ok, until he jumped off the stage....and touched me.

Jax sees my empty bottle that I'm holding onto for dear life. "Wow you finished that quick! I'll get you another one. Be right back."

Yeah. So great he apologized. It was a lot easier to hate him when he was an asshole.

Now....well, I think this is going to be harder then I thought.