"Uh... Melissa?"

As I absorbed her familiar face, all my nerves ignited. While I had a lot of fanatical and frankly homocidal promises during the Noodle Incident, once the fury had drained from my body I decided to take the option of Avoidance At All Costs. I'd been pretty successful too, since I'd essentially James Bond getaway'd any time we were within hearing distance.

And now she was here, and I cursed the alcohol for interfering with my fabulous avoidance skills. Damn you, vodka!

Melissa didn't look like she was searching for a fight, though. Her dark eyes darted between the two of us and a sheepish smile curved on her face. "Yeah," she cleared her throat. "Can I talk to you for a second? Stella, I mean."

I blinked, gazing up at the girl who was almost swallowed by the soft turquoise windbreaker she wore. Her chestnut brown hair was still pulled into a loose braid that hung almost to her bellybutton, but was a little less murderous this time.

Although looks could be deceiving. There was proof enough in that some people actually thought Reese was human.

Tyler rose to his feet, and I had to restrain myself from pulling him back down and mashing my face against his (a very tempting thought indeed). Instead, I watched with a futile pout and wide, longing eyes as he was off with a wave and a smile, taking along with him all my dashed dreams of hot, drunk make out sessions.

As the door swung closed, my thoughts turned from romance to every Jackie Chan movie I'd ever seen. An intense realization washed over me that Tyler had left me very alone with the girl who only weeks before tried to murder me via sweet and sour sauce drowning.

Melissa took a tentative step forward, and immediately my arms darted out in front of my in an x-formation. "Hands! Show me your hands!" I demanded, warily eyeing the girl.

She lifted her hands in innocence, and with a distrustful eye I watched as she sat down where Tyler had been moments before. Inside I was still grieving the loss of my future husband, and really, I still wasn't convinced she wasn't hiding more noodle in her jacket pockets.

"What?" I asked slowly, eyes narrowed. "I just got the smell of noodle out of my hair, and honestly, I would like to keep it that way."

Melissa chuckled lightly under her breath, nodding her head. "Okay, yes, I admit, I might have overreacted before-"

"Might isn't the word you're looking for, it's definitely. Definitely overreacted."

"And I'm sorry, okay?" she continued, looking up at me through her thick lashes. "I mean it, I'm sorry. I was crazy angry over something else and you were just an easy target."

I fixed her with a dubious look. "Okay," I murmured reluctantly, "I'll take it. But there's a part of me that thinks that you didn't come find me out right here, right now to apologize. Call me crazy."

When I cocked a brow in question, her face betrayed that I wasn't exactly wrong.

Melissa's eyes were dark and large, set in her heart-shaped face and shining underneath the weak, yellow tinge of porch light. I didn't exactly find it surprising that Reese had given her the title of girlfriend before, she was really pretty in that understated, girl-next-door sort of way. When she didn't want to kill you, that is.

She nodded again, sniffing and rubbing her fist underneath her nose. "That's true, actually," she admitted, a half-smile touching her lips. "I just, I saw you with Reese and I-"

I groaned instinctively, finding myself sounding broken-record-like. "Reese and I are not a thing! Opposite of a thing! We don't- okay, I know it looks bad since he drove me here, but trust me, we're not even an inkling of a thing. I don't even think he's okay as a human being, let alone a friend or god, a boyfriend," I insisted with a grimace and a shudder, waving my hands as if to dismiss any other clouds of thought falling in that direction. "Trust me. Exhibit A, I haven't seen him in like an hour or something."

"I know you say that, but, just... hear me out, okay?"

I shrugged with a sigh, already accepting my inevitable spinster future and finding that I really didn't have much else to do, anyway. And so my shoulders loosened and I relaxed in my spot, looking at the girl. "Hit me. Might as well kill the time, anyway."

Melissa smiled softly, her eyes melded with something that startlingly looked like sympathy. "I was you, once, you know. I thought Reese was just some stupid guy, and that yeah, he was hot, but also not my type, like, at all. He was such a flirt, God. Sometimes I wondered if he even really believed the shit he said?"

I barked out a laugh as she recalled, watching as her eyes fell from the ceiling and back to me from the outburst. It softened me up a bit, to know that someone else too realized how ridiculous Reese was.

"I know, really, but I just... we always think we can change them, don't we? I thought, you know, maybe I was the girl? The one that would, well, as cheesy as it sounds, make him change his ways and all. I mean, Reese is a great guy, and the way that he makes you feel when you're with him is... it's amazing. When it's just you two, it's like, you're the only girl he's ever looked at that way, you know?" she sighed, her eyes dazed and clouded with distant memories.

I shifted uncomfortably, almost feeling as if she was allowing me to dip into her hidden, personal memories for a moment, but said nothing. A confused mixture of emotions brewed in my stomach, and I didn't want to even begin to acknowledge them just yet.

"But- and there's always a but, he will make you feel great. That's not a question. And he'll do this, until he doesn't. Until he's ignoring your text messages, avoiding you, doing everything he can to procrastinate telling you. He's pretty tough, and despite the fact that he always fucking does it, he weirdly just... he'll cheat on you, and eventually the guilt will eat away at him and he'll tell you- he always does. But the way his face looks when he tells you, it looks as if you were the one cheating! I don't get how he looks so hurt, but he does," she said, sniffing once again.

A cool breeze whistled by, causing both of us to shiver.

I was enraptured by her voice, finding my body leaning in and hanging off from her every word. I couldn't even explain why I was so interested, it was Reese for damn sake's, what did I care about him? She was clearly misreading our situation. But still, the way she looked, it seemed to demand that type of attention.

"And it's like, both of us are disappointed. Because both of us thought I was the one who could... change him, not even change him, but make him want to change himself. Be the one that makes him forget about looking around, you know?" She looked up at me, a soft, watery smile on her face. "But I'm not, and Stella... you're not either. I know how that sounds, but trust me. None of us are, and it hurts but, well, that's just it. We can't make him change, and I know it sounds like I'm just trying to drive you away, but I'm really only looking out for you. Noodles might have not been the best way to do that, admittedly," she chuckled lightly, a little muffled from the weight in her voice, and scratched the back of her head with a look of guilt drawn across her face.

I blinked, opening my mouth and finding no words to say "I- er, Melissa, really, thanks for, um, sharing this with me," I stammered out, all the right words seemingly evaporating on my tongue. "Really, I appreciate it. Girls looking out for girls, all that jazz, I dig it. Really."

She smiled at me.

"But," I continued, desperately searching for the right words. "When I say that there's nothing between us, I really mean it! I know what you're thinking, but it's hard to explain. It's complicated, but it's very much business complicated."

She did not look wholly convinced.

With a hopeful grin on my face, I shot her a cheesy thumbs up. "But I will definitely keep everything you said in mind!"

Which was true, because despite my words, her voice seemed to resonate in places that I never thought existed before, and definitely would never exist now. And that really made me want to pour more vodka down my throat, like, five minutes ago.

"Okay," she yielded with a nod of her head. "Thanks for listening to me, I really hope everything, well, works out, I guess." She shrugged, her face reading that she really didn't think so.

I shot her a reassuring grin. "Yes, it will!"

Really the only obstacle was getting Tyler on the right page- Reese was now the least of my problems.

We both awkwardly stood up at the same time, and shuffled a little as we both headed towards the door simultaneously. There were a lot of awkward chuckles and mumbles of apology as I racked my brain for something appropriate to say, and again, finding nothing. Thankfully she stepped in front and pushed open the door, releasing all the familiar pop melodies into the night air.

"Thanks," I chimed, waving my hand.

She shot me another soft smile. "No problem." And with that she was gone, and I was able to take a calming breath again.

Speaking of Reese, I really had to find him and tell him what a disaster the Tyler thing had gone down like. Despite everything, I still had a spark of determination in my lungs. Reese would probably have some half-assed remedy, at least, and therefore not all hope was lost for the night. He always thought of something, at least enough to get some poor, weak attempt. We were still very drunk teenagers in a cramped house with many hours until dawn broke- the possibilities were still alive and intoxicated.

As I meandered through my fellow lingering peers, catching a few vaguely familiar faces but mostly met with unrecognizable blank stares, I cursed Reese again. Melissa was right about one thing, he sure was an undependable dumbass.

I felt a sense of hope swell within me as I stumbled upon the back of Tyler's head, my hands shooting out to grab the shoulders that fell below it. "Tyler!" I cried, a grin finding my face as he turned to look.

"Hey, everything okay?" he asked, and I had to physically restrain myself from melting into a puddle.

"No, no, everything's good," I said, brushing off his concern and feeling an irrational sense of smugness. "But anyway- as we were talking about before-"

"Yeah?"

I looked into his crystalline eyes and felt myself stumble, but the boldness of vodka pushed the words out. "I just- that was... nice, we should do that again," I mumbled, feeling an undeniable heat creep up my neck and scour my cheeks.

While a part of me was immediately wishing I could pull those words from the air and bring them back behind my teeth where they rightfully belonged, in my fantasies, a very small part of me was fist pumping at what Reese would probably call a step in the right direction. I was very desevering of at least a high-five later. Or maybe some more vodka- whatever untied the horrendous knot my stomach was twisting itself into.

He smiled at me, that easy grin of his. My breath hitched in my throat as I hung off his every syllable. "We sh-"

"Stella!"

I felt myself huff in frustration as we were interrupted again- heads were definitely going to roll soon, and turned with a frown on my face towards the voice. Instead of Melissa, this time it was a girl with short, wavy blonde hair and an over-sized beer can in hand, a girl I recognized as Britta. My irritation transitioned to confusion when I noticed the rather large huddle of people crowding around her, and the fact that she even knew my name.

I paused. "Um, yeah?"

The grin that split her face was devilish, and her eyes twinkled with something that only served to bewilder me more. "Wow," she drew out the word, sarcastic tones dripping from her voice. "First Reese and now Tyler, you're really getting around tonight, aren't you?"

I merely blinked at her, unsure of where she was directing this weird shouting-across-the-room conversation. "I don't get it, but... okay. Can I help you?" I scratched my forehead in confusion.

She threw her head back in an exaggerated laugh, and I was keen to notice that despite the thumping bass from the speakers, most of the conversation had died down to an idle buzz. An anxious knot formed in my stomach as I realized that meant even more people were thinking there was a thing between Reese and I because of Britta's stupid words.

This was the worst. The absolute worst.

Could a girl not just occasionally stand next to a boy without people forcing a non-existant relationship down their throats? Damn, Avril Lavigne, it was not that obvious.

"I just, I don't remember inviting you? Did anyone? Sorry, who invited this girl?" she asked, raising her voice as if she was actually interested in asking the crowd. They simply burst out in laughter as a response.

"Reese," I grumbled reluctantly. "But if it's such a problem, I'll just grab him and we'll go. And it's not a thing!" I turned to pointedly look at Tyler. "We're splitting cab money!"

Britta's grin inexplicably widened at my words as she crossed the room, only a few breaths in front of me. "It doesn't really look that way when you're hanging off him like a pathetic whore, hmm?" she suggested, and just as I was about to retaliate with a really, everyone in this room, please go tell everyone you know that Stella Sandavol thinks that Reese Powers is the literal devil, please, even your cousins, Britta lifted her hand and poured her entire king-can of beer all over me.

I gasped, taking a step back but finding it too late. Beer was now trickling down my back and in my mouth, drenching my dark hair and wool cardigan. Forcing out a steady breath, I felt the familiar sensation amplify in my lungs and ignite in my veins, the edges of my vision blending into the darkness.

I swallowed.

"Hey Britta," I gritted through my teeth, my voice painfully steady.

The girl cocked a mocking brow, holding the can with a contemptuous grin on her face. "Hmm?"

"Fuck you."

And then I punched her in the face.

***

WOOT WOOT ROUND OF APPLAUSE FOR THESE QUICK ASS UPDATES?

I feel like I've been taunting you guys with Stella punching someone in the face for a while, and I was like WELL MIGHT AS WELL MAKE IT NOW. PUT YOUR MONEY WHERE YOUR MOUTH IS.

Now you can also understand why I split it into two chapters, haha. And guys- I am so excited for the next two chapters, trust me. TRUST ME. You're gonna like 'em.

Thanks for reading, votes and comments and all that jazz make for a very happy Gabby.