Long Weekend In Miami (It Can Turn Your World Around)

Hit Me With Your Best Shot

Ted's Hideaway was a true "locals" bar. The dark and smoky hangout had the word "dive" written all over it, but the locals didn't complain. The place was unpretentious, the drinks were cheap and the atmosphere was friendly; a night there was like spending a weekend with your favorite people.

The crowd seemed to like Youth Interrupted, too. They'd just completed a 90 minute set where once again Shayne had sang and bounced her way through a collection of their best songs and when it was over the crowd showed their appreciation by grabbing her off the stage and crowd surfing her.

Ten minutes later she was at the end of the bar and Chris was handing her an ice cold beer. "Thought you might need this," he said with a grin. Her face was flushed and her brow was pinpricked with beads of sweat.

"You're a lifesaver," she said accepting the bottle and enjoying a long chug.

It amused Chris to watch her down the beer. Most of the women he knew were into cocktails or those ridiculously sugary pink drinks, so to see a woman enjoy a beer straight from the bottle was kind of refreshing. She was definitely Ami's kind of girl.

His first impression of Shayne hadn't changed. She wasn't the usual type of girl he was attracted to. Yeah, she was hot and she dressed sexy; but she was clearly comfortable in herself and didn't feel the need to have all her merchandise on show just to get attention. Her attitude did that for her. Another thing he liked was the influence she had over Ami. He'd never witnessed another woman have any sort of power over him and get away with it. Although plenty had tried they'd always been given their walking papers. Chris wondered what made this one so different to the countless others. His buddy might not want to admit it, but this girl was his Achilles heel.

Shayne had gulped down almost half the beer. As she lowered the bottle she caught Chris's faint smirk. "What?" she asked licking her bottom lip.

"It's kinda cool to see a hot woman enjoy a cold beer."

She gave him a smile. "Double entendre noted."

Chris laughed. And then there was that. Her directness. There was nothing arrogant about it, though. She was upfront and there was plenty to like about that. He didn't know her that well but he was starting to recognize with Shayne it was most definitely a case of "what you see is what you get". He liked that about women in general. If Ami wasn't so wound up over this girl he'd have enjoyed spending some quality time with her. But there was a bro code to adhere to.

Shayne set the bottle down and took the opportunity to look around the bar for a sign of Ami. She hadn't seen him all night. In fact, she hadn't seen him since breakfast; although he had called to ask her how the meeting had gone.

"He had a few walk-ins at the shop, there was nobody else available," explained Chris. "He's gonna try and get here as soon as."

"That's cool."

"Although he missed all the good stuff. Show was great."

"Thanks." Shayne swung herself down onto a stool next to him. "We've been doing these bar crawl gigs all over the country but Miami's been the sickest by far."

Chris smiled. "Yeah, we know how to party down here in South Beach." He touched the neck of his beer to hers. "Cheers."

Yoji appeared and threw himself down on a stool, motioning to the bartender for another round of drinks. "Your bass player keeps asking me to jam with him. I think he's drunk," he said to Shayne.

Shayne looked over at Jamie, Josh and Adam who were sitting at a nearby table surrounded by about a dozen young women. It was unusual for Jamie to even get buzzed let alone drunk - he was by far the most sensible in the band - but sure enough her bass player was knocking back the Jägerbombs. She grinned. He was going to regret that in the morning.