Diana had to remind herself that this was her job, and she was 'required' to be polite - no matter how much it hurt her. And it did hurt her. From the amusement playing in Alex's facial features, Diana concluded that it was clear that she was long since over apologizing for her comment the last time they had interacted with each other.

"What would you all like?" Diana asked, bringing out her notepad and clicking on her pen. She found herself wishing that she was back to serving the first group of boys. It had been slightly unnerving feeling their stares on her.

The people at the table began giving their orders and Diana wrote them all down until it was only Alex's she had left.

"What would you like?" Diana looked her in the eyes as she spoke. She hoped her eyes made it clear that she wasn't in the mood for any of Alex's games.

Luckily, it seemed Alex got the message. "I'll take whatever she's having," she said, motioning to the girl that she had her arm around.

Diana simply nodded as she jotted her order down. Now all that was left was the last table. Diana found herself dreading this more as it also happened to be the table that Julia was seated on. Hopefully, they'd all be too drunk to even notice her existence.

However, Diana's hopes had not come to pass as she instantly saw the slight shift in Julia's body language the second that she appeared into view. From the way that she behaved around her, one would think that Julia was the one with the trauma. Diana almost scoffed despite herself, Julia wasn't the one that had to deal with the bullying and the ostracization due to betrayal by her best friend.

"Hey, aren't you that chick?"

It was Stefan that had spoken. He was seated next to Julia.

"What would you like to order?" Diana asked instead, completely ignoring the question.

"Did you follow us here??" It was Gia that had spoken. Oh, Gia.

"Why would I follow you here?" Diana asked even though she knew that she should have just ignored their dumb questions.

"Um, probably because you're like, obsessed with Julia," Gia replied, and the other cheerleaders on the table started to giggle. Diana rolled her eyes, all she wanted was a fucking break.

"You need to stop," Stefan said, speaking up. "Julia's my girlfriend, so you need to back up!"

It honestly was shocking to Diana just how obtuse they all were. "I'm not following your girlfriend. I work here you shit-heads, I'm simply taking your orders. But, since you're not interested..."

"I'll have a chocolate milkshake!" Gia piped up just before Diana walked away. She hesitated for a moment, not at all liking the glint in Gia's eyes before nodding her head and making her way back to the counter.

So many things were going through Diana's head as she put the order together. She did not like the fact that people from her school now knew where she worked, not in the slightest. In a strange way, this had become a sort of sane place to her these past few weeks, the last thing she wanted was them infiltrating it. She hoped desperately that showing up to cafes after parties was not something that they did often.

"Here's your drink," Diana said as she dropped the chocolate milkshake in front of Gia.

Before she could even fully process what was happening, Gia's arm had flown out so the drink was now spilt all over the front of Diana's pants.

"Oops, you should have been a bit more careful," Gia cooed mockingly, "maybe if you hadn't been so busy daydreaming about Julia none of this would have happened."

"Gia, is it the alcohol making you dumber than usual or have the last few remaining brain cells in that head of yours finally stopped working?"

Diana was just as surprised as everyone else on the table to see Alex at her side. She was glaring at Gia. Diana was close enough to see the storm silently brewing in her eyes.

"W-what?" Gia asked, confusion apparent in her voice. But Alex was done talking to her. She had turned to Diana and had grabbed a couple of paper towels from the table and began cleaning the spill all down her pants.

"I can do it myself," Diana quickly said, catching Alex's wrist in the process. She didn't like the fact that Alex had stood up for her. It was out of place, wrong. Alex looked at her for a moment before nodding her head and standing back. The others were giving occasional glances their way, no doubt they were all a bit baffled by the fact Alex had just defended her.

Without another word, Diana made her way back to the counter. She grabbed a couple of paper towels before heading to the back room. The back room was really just a cramped-up closet. Diana heaved deeply as she sunk onto the bench and began cleaning up the remainder of the chocolate milkshake that was on her pants.

She had barely been in there for a couple of minutes when there was a knock on the door. Without waiting for an answer, the door opened revealing none other than Alex.

For a moment, the two girls just stared at each other.

"Hey," Alex said, awkwardly scratching her head, "I brought more paper towels in case you needed them."

Diana stared at her suspiciously. Nevertheless, she took the paper towels from her hands, mumbling a quick 'thanks'. She expected Alex to just leave after that. Instead, Alex fully entered the cramped room, positioning herself on the other edge of the bench.

"Do you need anything?" Diana asked, she had tried to not make her voice sound as harsh as it did. But the reality was that she couldn't understand for the life of her why Alex was helping her.

"Do you always work the overnight shift?" Alex asked, completely disregarding her question.

"Yes. Why?"

"Isn't that like...dangerous?"

Diana let out a laugh then. But it was hollow and didn't come from her stomach. "Don't pretend like you care about me or my well-being all of a sudden."

And Diana meant every word of it too. She couldn't understand why Alex had stuck up for her tonight, nor could she understand why the hell she was in the backroom with her right then.

Alex sighed. "I'm just trying to be friendly. I'm actually not the demon you make me out to be."

"You're not?"

More moments of silence lay between the two girls.

"Look Diana," Alex said, finally speaking up, "I'm sorry about my comment the other day, I shouldn't have said that. I'm not going to act like I don't know what goes on in this school. You know, with the whole thing with you and Julia..."

Diana couldn't believe that Alex was apologizing. It was a very strange and bizarre thing. She looked at the girl suspiciously for a while before finally sighing herself and nodding her head slightly. "It's fine, it doesn't really matter."

For a moment Alex looked like she was about to object but decided against it, thinking that it was better to just leave things as it was. Diana was thankful for this as she didn't want to have to talk about Julia with Alex.

There was more silence between them now. Diana was very aware of how hot the back room had begun to feel all of a sudden.

"Um, don't you need to go hang out with your friends or something?"

"They all left already. I stayed behind, I want to drive you home after your shift."

Diana blinked. "What about the girl you came here with?"

"Amy would be fine," Alex responded instantly.

The suspicion coursing through Diana had not subsided for a moment. "What are you playing at, Alex?"

Alex laughed quietly before turning slightly to look directly at Diana. Diana felt herself squirm slightly from suddenly having Alex's full attention on herself.

"Just think of it as me trying to make it up to you. You're really talented and I want you to be the one to paint me. I was pretty bummed out when you didn't show up last Thursday."

Diana felt as if her head was spinning, hearing the words being spoken out of Alex's mouth. It seemed so bizarre, so out of place. She couldn't fully believe that they were having this conversation.

"Okay..." she finally said, but only because she didn't know what else to say to this. She was still pretty much having a difficult time processing the whole thing. "I have to clean up first which might take some time."

Alex seemed satisfied with this answer. "That's cool, I'll help."

Diana thought that she must be dreaming.

The girls ended up cleaning up in a strange sort of comfortable silence. Diana found herself being grateful for Alex's help as the kids from school had left behind quite a mess. Especially on Gia's table. Diana found her thinking that the mess left on that particular table had a purposeful dimension to it.

It wasn't long before Diana was seated in the passenger seat of Alex's car. She found herself noticing that the interior of the car smelt just like Alex, then a small panic seemed to seep through her as she realized that she didn't even know that she knew what Alex smelled like.

Diana provided Alex with the directions to her house and it wasn't long before they were cruising along the dark road. The car windows were rolled down slightly and the soft breeze of the summer night caressed their faces. Diana found herself relaxing into this, after all, summer was going to be over pretty soon.

"So um, do you all usually hang out at cafes after parties?" Diana asked after a few moments.

"Sometimes," Alex replied. Diana found that she didn't like this answer at all, she didn't quite fancy the idea of knowing that they could show up at Tracey's at any time. She for one knew that she was not in the mood to have a repeat of the night.

"Why do you work the overnight shift? Why not take a shift during the day?" Alex looked away briefly from the road to look at her.

"You didn't seem drunk at all tonight, you don't drink?" Diana asked, purposely ignoring Alex's question. She didn't feel bad doing so either, Alex did it to her all the time. There was also the fact that she simply did not want to get into details of her life with Alex. Sure, she was being nice tonight, but who knew how long that would last.

"No, I don't. I make it a habit not to, so I can stay at optimal fitness."

Diana didn't have a clue what the fuck Alex meant by that, but she nodded her head as if she understood.

The remainder of the drive was done in silence. Diana could tell that Alex appeared to be deep in thought.

"You can just drop me off here," Diana said once they had arrived a little distance from her house.

"Why?" Alex asked, disregarding her request and still driving. "I don't mind dropping you off at home."

"Yeah I know, but here is alright, I'll walk."

"Diana, the whole point of me driving you is to ensure that you get home safely. What's the point of all that if you're gonna trek the rest of the way?"

"Okay Alex, it's not that big of a deal," Diana said, feeling the usual irritation that Alex brought out of her coming round, "can you please just drop me off here."

Alex pushed her hair out of her face but brought the car to a halt, not at all pleased to be doing so. The truth was, besides Diana not wanting to risk the sound and light from Alex's car waking up her mom, she also didn't want Alex knowing where she lived. It would be weird. But obviously, she wasn't going to tell Alex that.

"Wait," Alex said, stopping Diana right before she left the car, "would we be having our painting sessions at the usual time?"

Diana hesitated for a moment. She knew that this was Alex's way of asking her if she was going to continue painting her portraits. Ultimately, the truth was that Diana didn't have much choice. But even knowing that, she didn't completely detest the idea, not in that particular moment at least. Even before she answered, Diana knew she would most likely come to regret it.

"Thursdays after school. Don't be late."