I Will Buy You a New Life
Chapter 7
~*"If I had a flower for everytime you made me smile, I'd be walking in an endless garden."- Unknown*~
Brian rolled over and landed with a thud on the floor of Nick's living room floor. He lifted his head and looked around with one eye open. He groaned when the pain of falling on a tile floor kicked in. He pushed himself up until he was standing completely straight. He staggered a little bit, then walked into the kitchen. Nick was already up and sitting at the counter enjoying a bowl of Corn Pops with a side of toast with strawberry jelly and a full glass of orange juice. His personal breakfast ritual. Brian yawned, stretching his arms above his head and groggily walked over to the refrigerator, grabbing the bottle of milk out of it.
"So...how'd it go?" asked Nick.
"How'd what go?" asked Brian, pouring a glass of milk for himself. He walked over and sat next to Nick at the counter, sipping it periodically.
"You were out until like 2 o'clock in the morning, retard. How'd it go with Angela or whatever the hell her name is?"
"Angelina."
"Yeah, whatever. How'd it go?"
"Fine," said Brian, resting his head on the counter top. "I'm so friggen tired. You need a wider couch so people don't roll off the side." Nick almost choked on his toast.
"That's what that loud thud was?" he asked, laughing hysterically.
"Yeah ha ha ha, laugh it up," said Brian sarcastically. "Anyway, back to Angelina...it went really well." Nick calmed himself down a little, then continued on with the conversation.
"Oh yeah? You screw her?" Brian lifted his head off the counter and looked at Nick like he was from another planet.
"Did I screw her? Nick are you insane?" he asked. Nick shrugged his shoulders.
"Hey, you were over there all night, it's a reasonable question," Nick answered. Brian rolled his eyes at him.
"Nick, sometimes you amaze me with your stupidity." Brian stood up and walked towards the living room. "I'm gonna take a shower and I'm borrowing some of your clothes."
"Do whatever you want, ass," said Nick taking the last bite of his toast. Brian just responded by flicking him off. "Yeah, at least I can stay on the couch." Brian ignored him as he walked back to Nick's bedroom to pick out some clothes. He decided on a white Chap's T-shirt and a pair of his own khaki cargo pants that Nick had obviously stolen from him. Brian walked into Nick's bathroom and locked the door after him, really not wanting any unwanted visitors in there. Especially since Nick's shower doors were clear glass. Brian removed his clothes and stepped under the spray of the water, basking in the feeling of the warm water running over his body. He was so tense, he really needed that.
"Stupid ass couch," he said to himself. A while later, he emerged from the shower completely awake and ready to see Angelina. He wrapped a clean towel around his waist and walked to the mirror. He looked at his reflection. He could see the difference having Angelina in his life had made. He used to look in the mirror and be disgusted at what he saw but not now. Now, he saw someone else. He saw his old self. Not the detached, lying, pretending-to-be-happy Brian he saw before. He quickly got dressed and walked out of the bathroom.
"Hey, dork, why don't you take a few more years next time," said Nick from his closet. He walked out and looked at Brian's pants. "I see you found them," he said smiling. Brian nodded his head. "You can have them, I guess."
"Well, they are mine after all. Thank you Nick, for your permission to have what is mine. That's very thoughtful of you," he said rolling his eyes.
"You know me. Always putting other people's needs before my own." He smiled sarcastically as he walked past Brian towards the bathroom. "I'm taking a shower...entertain yourself for a few minutes." Brian watched Nick walk in and close the door behind him. He was slowly remembering why he never really hung out with the rest of the guys during off times. He rolled his eyes and walked into the living room and flopped down on the couch grabbing the remote from beneath him and channel surfing for a while until he stopped on some cooking show. He sat staring at the TV, not really paying attention to it, just thinking. He thought over the events of the proceeding night and smiled. He felt like he had just had a break through in some kind of psychiatric group. It made him happy to know he had helped her...even if it was just a little bit. He smiled lost deep in his thoughts. He couldn't wait to talk to her again. She made him feel so good for some reason. He began thinking about Leighanne and suddenly he felt that emptiness inside him creep back slowly. What if Angelina ended up hurting him like Leighanne had...or worse. What if she was just leading him on? Making him think he had finally gotten to her when in reality she was laughing at him for being such a fool. He shook his head. He knew that wasn't true. He knew she wasn't like that. He could feel it. He knew she was for real. His mind slowly drifted back to Leighanne. 'God I miss her,' he thought quietly. He felt a tear roll down his face, but he wiped it away quickly. 'Get over it, Brian,' he told himself. No matter how many times he told himself that, every single time it just made him feel worse.
"Earth to Brian." Brian looked next to him and saw Nick right in his face. He jumped a little.
"Dammit, you trying to give me a heart attack?"
"Who told you my plan?" Nick asked sarcastically.
"What do you want you sarcastic bastard?" Brian asked smiling. Nick looked disappointedly at Brian and shook his head. "What?" he asked.
"Brian, Brian, Brian," he said still shaking his head. "What kind of language is that? You sound like a truck driver."
"And you sound like my mother. What do you want?" he asked, getting more and more annoyed by the second. He decided that night he was going to drive back home and get away from Nick for a few days.
"Well, I was going to tell you that you have a phone call, but since I'm such a bastard, I'll just tell this lovely young lady that she'll have to call you back some other time because you don't want to talk," he said waving the phone in front of Brian's face. Brian smiled sweetly at him and batted his eyelashes. "Here ya ass," he said handing him the phone and standing up and walking into the kitchen. Brian grabbed it and scrambled to put it to his ear.
"Hello?" he asked eagerly, praying that it would be Angelina.
"Hi," she said meekly.
"Angel?" he asked. He couldn't really tell for sure if it was her with how quietly she was talking, but it sounded a lot like her.
"Yeah. Hi Brian," she said, a little louder.
"Hey sweetie, how are you today?" he asked slouching down on the couch. His insides were jumping.
"I'm doing okay." She paused for a second and took a deep breath. "Brian, I'm not going to work today because I didn't sleep much last night, so I was wondering if you...I mean, you don't have to...but I kind of thought that maybe...don't feel like I'm forcing you to...if you have other plans it's okay...but I thought we could...well I was going to...and you could too...if you want." Brian smiled into the phone.
"Well, I'll be Angelina, I do believe you're asking me on a date."
"Don't flatter yourself," she said laughing a little. "I just thought maybe you'd want to come over and talk some more. I mean, you know just about everything there is to know about me, and I don't know hardly anything about you. So, I mean you're welcome to come...if you're not busy."
"No, I'm not busy. I'll be there in like a half an hour, okay?"
"Yeah, that'll be great. I'll see you then," she said and hung up the phone quickly. Brian hung up his phone and jumped up off the couch.
"WOO-HOO!" he yelled jumping to his feet and throwing his arms up in the air. Nick walked into the room just in time to see the end of Brian's little dance he was doing.
"I take it something good happened..." said Nick walking in and walking over towards Brian.
"She invited me over...aww yeah..." he said singing. Nick looked at him shaking his head and his finger at Brian. "What's wrong with you now?" he asked.
"Do you recall about a month ago when Kevin and Kristin were married and they said that they would be having a get together sometime this month?" Brian nodded his head, not catching Nick's drift. "Do you also recall when Kevin called everyone to invite us?" Brian nodded again. "Maybe you recall then that TODAY IS THE DAY WE'RE SUPPOSED TO GO," he yelled. Brian jumped back.
"Dude, calm down. Kev will get over it. I had to sit through his wedding and see how happy Kristin was as she walked down the aisle and see what she looked like as she did and that tore me apart inside, and now that I've found someone who makes me happy, I'm going to go to her. Kev and Kris will understand....when you tell them that I'm sick," Brian said smiling. Nick shook his head.
"Oh no! I'm not covering for you this time, Brian. Remember the last time he threw a party and I didn't want to go but you wouldn't cover for me? Well, payback time is now."
"Nick, first of all, I'm not going to tell my cousin that you can't go to his wedding reception because you came down with some weird case of the chicken pox so you could go hook up with Mandy and ruin your life again. Especially when you were at his wedding earlier that day and he'd seen you in perfect health, smart guy. I didn't cover for you because A) Mandy would have screwed you over again and you'd be a wreck for months again and B) it was his wedding reception! You can't skip out on that to screw some hoe!" Nick sighed giving in.
"God you suck, Brian," he said looking down. "OK, what if he feels bad and he wants to come over and make you soup or some of that nasty ass Kentucky chili? Then what?" Brian thought about it for a second.
"Tell him that you're going to stay with me and take care of me...that way you can get out of it too and do something cool."
"Sweet...it's a deal." Brian smiled as they did their handshake to seal the deal.
"You kick ass Nick. Thanks," said Brian jogging towards the door.
"Yeah, yeah, yeah I know. Have fun," he said smiling. Brian just nodded his head as he shut the door behind him. He looked around noticing a lot of people and decided it would be safer to drive over then to walk. Especially since he wasn't incognito at all. He pulled his keys out of his pocket and unlocked the door, sinking into the seat. The smile that formed on his face when he heard Angelina's meek 'hello' earlier hadn't faded a bit. He pulled up in front of Angelina's house and got out, locking the doors. He walked to the door and took a deep breath before ringing the bell.
"Hey Brian, I'll buzz you in," she said, followed by a high-pitched buzzing noise. Brian opened the door and climbed the stairs before him up to her apartment. When he got there, the door was open so he stuck his head in and looked around "Do you always go snooping around people's apartments?" Brian jumped about four feet in the air then spun around to see her standing there smiling.
"You almost gave me a heart attack," he said clutching his chest. She smiled a little and walked into her apartment. He followed her lead and shut the door behind him. Killer ran up to him and started yelping and jumping on him again. Brian leaned down and took the small dog in his arms. "Hey Killer," he said talking to him like he was a baby. He looked up to see Angelina looking at him.
"It's a dog, Brian. Not a baby." He smiled and set the dog back down. He ran over to the couch where Angelina was seated and climbed onto her lap. Brian smiled and walked over to the couch, also taking a seat.
"So, how's it been?" he asked, smoothing out his jeans. She shrugged and pushed her hair behind her shoulders.
"It's been," she sighed. "I didn't sleep much...or really at all last night, that's why I didn't go to work today."
"You should have called me," he said resting his head on the back of the couch and looking over at her. She shrugged again.
"I thought about it, but I didn't want to disturb you or your friend," she said looking down. Truth was she hadn't had the courage to do it. In fact it had taken her forever to get up the nerve to call him at all.
"It would have been okay," he said, softly. She looked at him and nodded. He cleared his throat and sat up a little bit. "So what do you want to do today?"
"I don't know...Oh! I have something for you," she said hopping off the couch and grabbing a small box off the dining room table. She brought it back over and handed it to him. He opened the box and looked inside. A dark blue guitar pick laid inside. He looked up at her questioningly.
"You didn't have to do this," he said, looking at her.
"No, I wanted to. I noticed the other day that you had chapped finger tips. Michael always did too and he played the guitar all the time, that's how I knew you did," she paused and studied his face. "Do you like it?"
"Like it? I love it! But you really didn't have to."
"Well, I didn't really. It used to be Mike's. See," she said taking it out of the box and turning it over so he could see 'M. J.' on the back in black permanent marker. "He played all the time."
""Cool, like Michael Jordan!"" said Brian, trying to make conversation.
"I never noticed that. Those were his initials. Michael Jacobson. See, I had your name put on there in silver," she said flipping it over in his hands. He saw 'Brian' written in tiny silver letters across the wide part of the pick. They both looked down at it for a few seconds before she talked again. "You remind me a lot of him. I guess that's probably why I warmed up to you rather quickly...well for me at least."
"Thank you so much. You have no idea how much this means to me," he said holding it in his hand like he would if he were to play. "I wish I had my guitar with me."
"Yeah, me too. You'll have to bring it some time." He nodded his head in agreement. There was a silence between the two for what seemed like forever. "I wasn't completely honest with you last night," she said quietly. Brian looked over at her. She sighed. "Well...when I said that Michael's mother told me never to come by anymore and that I wasn't allowed to speak to Mike anymore, that was true, but he still came and saw me. He'd come to me every night and bandage my wounds from Dominick and he'd bring me food and clothes and stuff." She paused and looked down at her hands. "To tell you the truth, I wouldn't have been able to have survived without him. It was his idea for me to come here. He stole my parents car keys and when I got in the car on the passenger seat there was a map of Florida and a route from Tampa to Winter Park highlighted in yellow and a little white box. Inside the box was that pick and this ring," she said holding up her left hand and pointing to her ring finger. "I haven't taken it off since then." Brian didn't know what to say, or if he should say anything at all.
"This pick means a lot to me, Angel. Thank you so much," he said smiling softly at her. She smiled back and nodded her head.
"No problem. Like I said, you remind me a lot of him." There was another strange silence. "So...what's your story Brian? Everyone has some big story to tell...what's yours?" she asked turning to face him. He shrugged and put the pick in his pocket then looked over at her.
"Mine's not really that big of a deal."
"Come on tell me anyway." Brian sighed. He really didn't want to bring it up because he knew it would lead to him crying all night.
"Well...my fiancee never showed up at our wedding and I haven't talked to her since then," he said looking down at his hands.
"Oh, I'm sorry," she said putting her hand over his and squeezing it a little. He shrugged a little, choking back his tears.
"It's not a big deal."
"Yes it is." He shook his head trying his hardest to stop the tears. One escaped his eye and he quickly brushed it away. She moved closer to him and wrapped her arms around his shoulders. Brian felt like crying even harder when she did that, but he held it all in. "You don't have to talk about it..." Brian shook his head.
"There's really not much to talk about. Everything was beautiful and right, she just never showed up," he sighed and looked at her. Her head resting on his arm. "The part that really gets me the worst is that I don't even know if she's alive anymore. I mean, we were together for 3 years, I would at least like to be friends," he paused and sniffled back a few more tears. "I loved her with everything. She could have told me she needed some time. I would have given her anything. I would have waited for 3 more years if I had to as long as I was with her." He looked back down at his hands and Angelina's arm draped over his chest.
"What was her name? I mean...if you don't mind me asking."
"No, of course I don't mind. Her name was Leighanne." He paused and took a deep breath. "I really thought she was 'the one' ya know? My soulmate. I guess she didn't feel the same way."
"Brian, you don't know that. I'm sure she did...she was just scared. She probably realized that her life was all about you. That every breath she took, you took with her and it probably just scared her. She didn't think she'd be able to live without you and that scared her even more, so she had to prove it to herself that she could. I'm sure you did nothing wrong, and I'm sure she'll come back eventually." Brian looked up at Angelina. For the first time since it had happened, someone actually helped. They didn't just give him a tissue and tell him that everything would be okay. It was obviously not okay. He wasn't okay. Finally someone had helped him to analyze things from Leighanne's perspective. Not just call her a bitch and continue about their day. "What Brian? Why are you looking at me like that? I didn't mean to--"
"No. You're right. You're absolutely right. That has to be what happened." Angelina looked at him a little strange. He laughed a little and smiled. She was relieved to see him smile. "No one really ever helped me try to understand this whole thing. They just wanted to make me feel better, which is nice, don't get me wrong, but I mean...no one really made me look at it from her angle, and I think you're right."
"Well, I am a genius after all," she said smiling. "So what do you want to do today?"
"Wow, I don't know. Whatever you want to do is fine with me."
"I say we go rent 'Sleepless in Seattle' and buy 2 big pints of ice cream and just eat and cry our miseries away." Brian smiled at her.
"That's such a chick thing to do," he said laughing. She laughed along with him.
"I know, but I've never done it, and I'm sure you being a guy hasn't either. It'd be fun. What do you say?" Brian sighed, surrendering. "Great!" she said jumping off the couch to put her shoes on.
"As long as you promise to paint my nails passionate purple when we get back," said Brian in a mock girl voice. Angelina held onto her stomach as she laughed.
"Well, I don't think I have passionate purple, but I might have radiant red if that's okay with you."
"Red is totally not my color," he said laughing as the two walked out of her apartment and downstairs. He showed her to his car and the two drove down to the local Blockbuster laughing and joking the whole time. Every second he spent with Angelina slowly cancelled out every second he had stayed up all night thinking of Leighanne. Wondering where she was, how she was doing. Brian was happy with himself again. He felt like he could smile forever.
-=Chapter Eight=-
-=I Will Buy Chapter Index=-
-=Story Index=-
-=Back to BoNe RoKin' KaoS=-