Record Me Saying I Miss You

Chapter 2: Reunited

I sighed and leaned against the seat of Tessie's car.

"Was it a tough day?" she said, driving off. The sky was dark and the city was bustling with people and traffic. The street lights flickered from red to yellow to green and Tessie navigated through the tangle of cars.

"You have no idea," I said. I kicked off my shoes and slid my feet into a criss-cross position on the seat.

"But you're just reading lines. How hard can that seriously be?"

"You have to read them using the character's 'speech mannerisms and emotions' and you have to repeat them until they're perfect," I said, quoting Carl," And this is just practice."

"Oh my god, that sounds painful."

"I'm just going to... take a small nap," I press my cheek against the window and close my eyes. It was only my third day at the studio but I was already getting completely stressed out. As I begin to drift off into dreamland, Tessie punches my arm.

"No sleeping. We're going to dinner with the boys."

The boys... only two specific ones came to mind.

I smiled, "Is Andrew going?"

"Yep. Finally reunited," Tessie giggled, "You excited to see him again?"

"I missed him so much," I said. "And FaceTime's been a huge help." I mumble sarcastically. If it didn't lag so much maybe I could at least see his face instead of a collection of pixels.

Tessie drove into the parking lot of a restaurant and we walked in. The layout of the restaurant was similar to an old family-styled restaurant, tapestry hung on the walls and oil paintings filled the blank spaces. The lights were dim and tables housed candles, making the entire place romantic and vanilla scented.

At the corner of the room, Will and Andrew were sitting and playing on their phones, their heads ducked down. We made our way over and Tessie immediately threw her arms around Will's neck, giving him a tight hug. He lifted his head and met my eyes, giving me a wide grin. Will had jet black hair that he darkened compared to his natural brown color and wide brown eyes. His ears were adorned with several black stud piercings and at his lip was a purple ring. On his forearm was a tattoo of thick, angry black lines that made up the roman numerals of his birthday. Before I met Will, I never expected someone like him to be with Tessie and her curly blonde hair and innocent blue eyes. And when I met Will, I was still scared he was planning to murder us in the darkest spots of the forest.

Andrew looked up next and flashed me a smile. His dirty blonde hair was in soft curls around his face and he wore a thin white shirt that displayed the line of tattoos on his chest and right shoulder. I was able to pick out the line of flowers and trailed to my favorite, the shark biting the surfboard.

"Hazel," he said, wrapping me in a long overdue hug. It felt so much better than holding my laptop up to find a few bars of signal.

"I missed you," I mumbled.

"Yea," Andrew said, letting me go, "I was so excited when Tessie told me you were coming to Cali for a while." I nodded and then took my seat next to him. His arm was slung around my shoulders in a casual position.

"Alright, what's good here?" I asked, grabbing a menu. The foods had unique names: things like Turn Up Tornado and Squishy Squash. We all ordered; I chose chef's recommendation dish called Bacon Bazooka, and as soon as the food arrived, Tessie and Will slipped into their own conversation. Though their voices were low, I caught a few phrases such as vampires and demons or something.

"How's work?" Andrew asked, breaking the silence, "Heard about that position you got."

"Stressful," I said, sipping my lemonade, the Lunatic Lemon Juice. His hand found mine and squeezed it.