I was ravaged on the couch.
It was like Valerie Lira knew every one of my weak spots, disarming me over and over again with each touch. We were so eager, so turned on, that we didn’t bother taking things slowly. Honestly we didn’t even bother to fully take our clothes off. My jeans and panties were still halfway down my legs, and Val was still wearing her jeans, though unbuttoned, when the moment came and I felt myself orgasm to the touch of Val’s fingers inside me.
A minute later, after much panting, I began to come back to reality. Valerie had the sweetest smile on her lips. She’d heard me moan. Oh, god, I hated when I moaned like that. I covered my face with my arms to hide my embarrassment.
I felt Val lay down on the couch next to me, her body touching mine like we were magnets, helplessly attracted to each other.
“What’s wrong?” she asked, with a hint of concern in her voice.
“I made noises,” I admitted.
Val snorted, and then began to giggle uncontrollably.
“What?!” I asked, uncovering my eyes to look at her.
She clasped her mouth to stifle the laugh.
“You’re just too cute,” is what she told me.
I felt warmth spread inside me, irradiating from my chest to the rest of my body. If there was such a thing as heaven in this world, I’m pretty sure this could be it.
“I think you’re cute, though,” I told her. “Always did.”
“Really?” she was beaming at me. “Even when I… you know… kissed you back at the arena that day?”
I nodded slowly, a smile plastered on my lips. “Even then.”
She snuggled closer to me, and that gave me the opportunity to give her a peck on her forehead. For what felt like eternity, we just stood together like that, holding each other for warmth, and at some point we must have fallen asleep.
—
I awoke to the sound of my front door swinging open, and a familiar voice calling me.
“Giu, you’re not gonna bel—”
I opened my eyes all of a sudden, and the sunlight hitting them hurt since I was hungover. But I knew that voice. And I knew at once that I was lying down on my couch half-naked next to a sleeping Valerie Lira. And that’s when I knew I had fucked up.
Val woke up too. She sat down on the couch and rubbed her eyes.
“Hm… hello?” she told the stranger. Then looking at me, she asked: “What time is it?”
I sat down on the couch too, but I couldn’t answer her. My eyes were locked in Beatrice’s death glare. She looked at me as if she had no idea why on Earth she was seeing that.
“Is this a joke?” she asked, finally, wrinkling her forehead and crossing her arms in front of her chest. “Some sort of prank? Surely this can’t be happening, can it, Giulia?”
Her voice stung like a sharp knife to my chest.
A chest which was still bare naked. I realized that fact in a sudden and took my blouse from where it had fallen on the coffee table to put it on, quickly. Valerie did the same thing with her own blouse, but doing it more slowly since she wasn’t nearly half as shocked with that situation as I was.
“What’s happening, Gigi?” she asked me.
Beatrice scoffed.
“Gigi?!” she exclaimed, barely believing her ears. “She calls you Gigi?!”
I decided that I had some explaining to do, before things took a turn for the worse.
“Valerie…” I called her, “this is, um, Beatrice, my best friend.”
“Ex-best-friend, Giulia!” said Bea. “Because there’s no way a best friend would do what you just did. This is… this is backstabbing! My god, I feel so embarrassed now. Do you know how pathetic I must have looked when I was all hyped up about meeting the guy who did the lighting for Empty Memories’ concerts, when you were literally banging their drummer behind my back?! You know what? Fuck it, Giulia! We’re through!”
I saw Beatrice turn around and slam my front door behind her as she went.
That moment, there… I was at a loss. Some part of my mind told me I had to go after Beatrice, to try and explain the inexplicable to her. Wasn’t what she said the exact truth? And then, there was another part of my mind that did not want to let go of Val, who wanted to stay with her in that room without a care in the world.
I leaned back against the couch, and sighed. On top of it all, there was the mild headache from the hangover.
“Um…” Valerie started talking, trying to break the ice on that awkward situation. “Is that… was she the friend you told me about, before? The one you were trying to cheer up with Zacky’s autograph?”
I nodded, slowly, letting Bea’s words sink in. Why did I ever think it was a good idea to give her my apartment keys? No, strike that, why did I even go behind her back in the first place? Couldn’t I have just come clean? Sure, it would be messy, but then, it had already become messy anyway now that she found out, and the damage from this situation just might be a bit beyond repair.
We stood in silence for a while.
“Sorry…” Valerie whispered to me.
I attempted to smile, but it faltered. “It’s my fault, since I didn’t tell her,” I said. “She doesn’t even know what happened in the arena, last week. I messed up.”
“Can you two… work it out, somehow?”
I shrugged. “I don’t know… Maybe?” My face must have looked grim. I felt grim. My entire soul had turned grim, watching Beatrice leave me behind, furious as she was, knowing it was very much my fault that she acted like that.
We spent another minute in silence. Val took her phone from the coffee table, looked at the time on the screen, then sighed, before getting up from the couch.
“I need to go,” she told me, all the while picking up her belongings and throwing it all haphazardly inside her purse. “We’re hitting the road for those gigs I told you about. The guys are set on leaving in a couple of hours. I don’t even know if I’ll make it in time. Maybe I should already start calling for a ride in the app.”
I got up from the couch as well, and kissed her forehead, to distract her from the cellphone screen. “I’ll take you,” I said, and flashed her the keys to my motorcycle.
She smiled gratefully. “Thank you.”
Minutes later, Valerie was sitting behind me on my Honda, wrapping her arms around my waist, and I was pulling out of the garage and onto the driveway. Val’s meeting spot with her bandmates was on the other end of the city. Traffic was always terrible around these parts, and despite it being Sunday, there was still a reasonable chance that she’d run late if she tried to get a ride from the app. That’s one particular advantage that the two-wheeler had over the more conventional vehicles: I could dodge traffic if I had to. I knew I had to get her there in time no matter what.
Val’s friends were waiting by a minibus that was parked on the side of the road. They were absolutely surprised when a motorcycle drove up to them, and their drummer hopped off of it.
“Hey, guys!” she said. We both took off our helmets.
There were three men with her. One of which was ZAK. The others were probably her bandmates. I’m sure I must have seen a picture of them at some point, and either one must have been the guy I saw at the arena the second time I was there, last week… but I honestly couldn’t remember. Nor could I remember their names. I could never get as hyped up about their music as Bea did.
Oh, crap. I was trying not to remember what had just happened between Beatrice and me. Of course, I’d have to face it sometime soon, but I didn’t want to ruin what little time I had left with Val by being moody and depressive about Beatrice.
ZAK looked at me. “Oh hey! It’s the wild one!”
I chuckled, trying to take my mind off Bea. “I’m Giulia.”
He approached me with a smile, and offered me his hand for me to shake, which I did. “I’m Zack,” he said. “But you probably already know that.”
I nodded casually. “I’ve heard of you.”
He raised his eyebrows at me, surprised. I bet he was probably expecting me to go all hyped up about meeting them, and that was because he obviously assumed I was one of their fans. Sorry to disappoint you, Zacky.
“Giulia’s not a fan of ours, you know?” said Valerie, putting into words what was in the subtext. “But I’ll bend her someday,” she smirked at me. I had to laugh at that interaction.
“Guys,” said one of the other two. “I’m sorry to interrupt you and all, but we really need to go through the checklist one more time before we leave. Val, you need to check if we got all your stuff, ‘cause we’re running short on time to go back there in case we forgot something.”
“Alright!” she shouted. “Just give me a minute.”
ZAK — or Zack, which was his real name anyway — and the others went back to the minibus, while Valerie walked up to me.
“Thanks for yesterday,” she said, smiling. “I really loved all of it.”
I blushed, and found myself unable to speak, so I just nodded in agreement. I too had loved all of it, and that fact was pretty damn well written on my face.
“Also, sorry for the—”
“Don’t worry about that,” I interrupted her. “It’ll work itself out somehow.” That’s what I wanted her to believe anyway, even if I had next to no hope of that happening, myself.
“Right. Um, so I guess I’ll… see you around?”
“Text me when you’re back in town,” I pleaded, before I realized what I was doing. I almost sounded like a lover saying goodbye. “Err… that is, if you want to go out again sometime. I know some other good spots for hanging out.”
She nodded. “Of course.” Then she leaned closer to me, and whispered into my ear: “Next time it’ll be you doing me, deal?”
I blushed furiously at that, which made Valerie giggle.
“See ya, Gigi!” she said, before turning around and walking toward her bandmates.
I remained in a daze for a few seconds, barely believing the words I had just heard her say. Then I broke from the trance, shook the thoughts away and put my helmet back on, in order to make my way home.
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