My One & Only

Ch 4: Beauty and the Beastly

TW: Off-screen physical abuse

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Four months.

That's how long it took for Jay to agree to meet her friends, more specifically Ricky. It's also close to how long Nini has been dating him.

She knew that meeting the others would be a breeze since they were a welcoming crowd, but Ricky had already been suspicious of this guy ever since he came into the picture. It didn't help that Jay had no desire to meet him either, but she needed for them to get along if she really wanted this relationship to work.

Getting Ricky to agree to meet Jay was easy since he'd been wanting to for a while now, just not for any pleasant reasons. Jay on the other hand was the polar opposite. She begged him almost every day the day after she kicked Ricky out since that was her wakeup call that she could lose her best friend because of her love for Jay.

Jay was hesitant and progressively got more agitated when she spoke about him, but he finally agreed two days ago. They all decided to sit together for lunch so that they could meet. If Nini was being completely honest with herself, she was a little nervous. Jay was very blunt and never hid what he was feeling. Even when he did keep his mouth shut (which was rarely), his facial expression always snitched on him.

Nini and Jay were currently sitting at an empty lunch table as they waited for Ricky to arrive. Nini was anxiously shaking her leg, and her palms were sweating like crazy. She didn't realize how nerve racking this meetup would be, and it hasn't even started yet.

Not much later, Ricky barged through the lunchroom doors with a blank expression. When he found Nini, she waved at him to come over. She didn't miss the unpleasant look on his face as he walked over, but she chose to ignore it. He sat across from Nini and gave her a faux smile.

"Hey Neens." He glances over at Jay and frowns slightly but quickly replaces it with a curt grin. "Jay."

She tapped his foot with her own under the table as her way of saying hello. She usually greets him with a gentle hand squeeze when he joins her for lunch, but she wasn't sure if Jay was going to be upset about that or not.

"Babe, I'd like to formally introduce you to my best friend, Ricky."

Jay scanned him with a stern look on his face and huffed. "Hmph."

Nini nudged him and gave him a pointed look, making Jay groan before reaching his hand out to Ricky. "Hey man."

Ricky reluctantly shook Jay's hand, not missing the tight grip he made when he shook.

"Hey..."

The two teens had a stare down as they continued to shake one another's hands. Jay's grip seemed to get tighter the longer they stayed put, and Ricky knew that it was Jay's own way of telling him he was less than thrilled Ricky was there.

Ricky broke the handshake and secretly wiped his hand off on his jeans. "So, you're the famous Jay I've heard so much about."

Jay smirks as he wrapped his arm around Nini's shoulder. "Awe, you talk about me?"

She blushes. "Maybe a little bit."

"That's adorable. Hopefully nothing bad, right?" He says it jokingly, but something in his tone indicated he wasn't.

Nini nervously chuckled and shook her head. "No, of course not."

"Good...good." Jay sighed from what Ricky assumes is relief.

There was an awkward silence that fell between them before Nini cleared her throat.

"So, Ricky, how about you tell us about theater? I know you have a show coming up soon. Which musical was it again?"