"WHO IS HE AND WHY IS HE WITH HER?" Damiano mumbled as he was spun around in the hair styling chair. The force from the hairdresser's spin almost sent his phone flying into Thomas' lap.

Thomas grinned as he tossed Damiano's phone back into his lap. Damiano glared as he continued to scroll through his ex-girlfriend's instagram page. "Beats me. But it looks like someone's already a little jealous..." Thomas replied as he got up from his position on the couch and walked towards an empty seat in the room, it was time for him to apply his makeup.

Damiano shook his head and jammed his phone back into his pocket. "Whatever, I'm not jealous..."

And right on cue, Victoria entered the room a smug smile across her lips as she crossed over first to Thomas and then back around to Damiano. "So, you saw the pictures, huh..."

Victoria teased her bandmate. Damiano rolled his eyes and got up after his hair was styled.

"Shut up, Vic."

"He definitely saw the pictures, I mean how could he not have seen them? They're everywhere!" Ethan shouted as he too entered the hair and makeup room grinning widely as he turned on the television. Low and behold there was even a news segment about Altheya and Luke. Damiano felt like he was going to vomit.

"Fuck it. I'm out of here." Damiano grumbled as he grabbed his packet of cigarettes and headed for the door.

"Hey! Where are you going? We have to perform in 5 minutes!" Ethan yelled but it was too late. Damiano was already out the door and dialing the number he still had memorized from the day that she had finally given it to him, despite a lot of coaxing on his part.

"Fuck. Please answer. Please.." Damiano whispered as he took a drag from his cigarette and waited with baited breath as he heard her voice on the other line. But unfortunately it was just Altheya's voice mail.

"You reached "Beayuhtrice" leave a message!" BEEP.

Damiano took a deep breath and began to "talk" as calmly as he could, running his free hand through his long locks, biting down on the cigarette hard.

"Hey, Bea.. (a pause, he remembered that Altheya didn't want him to call her that anymore) Altheya what the fuck gives you the right to have a boyfriend, especially one as ugly as him? Fuck I can't believe you would do this. Fuck you." BEEP.

With one final look at her picture in his contacts he hung up the phone.

As he shoved his phone back into his pant pockets, Charlotte appeared to be standing a few feet away from him.

"Babe? You okay?" She said softly, walking towards him, and once she reached him she put her arms around his neck, kissing his cheek softly.

Damiano sighed and kissed her lips. "Si. I'll be fine, amore." He smiled and walked back into the building hand in hand with the one he loved.

At least, Charlotte was the one he was supposed to love.

⊱ ──────{⋅. ✯ .⋅} ────── ⊰

"JAIL AGAIN? YOU SUCK LUKE!" Altheya giggled as she threw her go to jail card towards him. The two of them were  playing Monopoly with Giulia, Alessio, Kari and Francesca, Marie and Alberto and Gaia and Tatum, Michael and Calum.

The group had the house to themselves tonight since it was Alexandria's and Ashton's turn to visit Mr and Mrs Areola. Altheya and her siblings had been taking turns dropping off food and other necessities to the household since it was hard for her parents to get out of the "house" because of the pandemic.

"Well what can I say? I'm the king of Monopoly! And you're just jealous!" Luke laughed before kissing Altheya on the cheek.

Giulia smiled at the couple as she took a sip of her wine and placed the glass back onto the table before resting her head against Alessio's.

"Why don't you ever kiss me like that?" Giulia mumbled as she stared at Altheya and Luke on the floor across from them.

Alessio shook his head and laughed. "Well I can kiss you a lot harder than that..." He said smirking, pulling her up with his hand.

"We'd better get going... this one wants me to kiss her..." Alessio said raising a brow. Altheya kissed Luke and got up to let the two of them out of the house.

"Well thanks for coming, it was great to see you both! I missed hanging out!! Have a safe flight back, okay?" Altheya said hugging Giulia tightly.

"When am I ever safe with this one?" Alessio chuckled watching as the two friends said goodbye.
Giulia shoved him playfully out the door.
"You're always safe with me, Ale. Now shut up so you can kiss me when we get back to the hotel."
Altheya giggled and waved goodbye as she shut the door after them.

It wasn't long before Gaia excused herself from the living room floor with the rest of the party following suit.

"Tonight was super fun!" Gaia said hugging Altheya tightly as she put on her sweater and waved goodbye to Calum who was on the phone with his sister.

Kari hugged Altheya next followed by a kiss on the cheek from Luke as they did the same with Francesca.

"Hey, everything's gonna be fine, okay? I promise." Kari whispered into her friends ear.

Altheya nodded and released the grip she had on her dearest friend. "
Have a safe drive home! Love you!" Altheya smiled.

Francesca waved goodbye as she wrapped an arm around Kari's waist and guided her out of the door.

Marie and Alberto were already out the door.

"Hey, you call us if you need anything, yeah?" Marie suggested as Alberto guided her out to the driveway.

"And honestly, you guys should get a dog, Milo would love a friend." Marie said smiling. Altheya nodded.
"You bet. And we'll definitely think about getting a dog, won't we babe?"

Luke squeezed Altheya's hand gently giving the other couple a hopeful grin.

"Yes, we will, love."

Altheya waved at her friends one last time.

"Get home safe, guys."

Tatum, Michael and Calum had stayed behind to help clean up the small party and once everything was put away and the house looked presentable once again, the three quietly let themselves out of the house as Altheya and Luke waved to them through the window.

Tatum gave Altheya a thumbs up. And Altheya had given her friend one back. But before Tatum left she had given her a note from Victoria who said Damiano wanted her to habe it.

Altheya didn't want Luke to see it so she stuffed the note into her pocket and pretended to forget about it.

Unknowest to Altheya though, she was staring very hard out the window. She was in deep thought about the recent voicemail from her boyfriend, no wait— ex-boyfriend and she really didn't know how to feel about it.

"Babe?" Luke mumbled as he took her by the hand and led her over away from the window and back into the living room.

"Yeah, Luke?" Altheya responded quietly, holding his hand as he sat with her on the couch and turned on the television, making sure the volume was low enough just so they could have some background noise.

"You okay? You seemed pretty quiet tonight..." Luke chuckled as he tucked a piece of hair that had fallen in front of Altheya's face, behind her ear.

Altheya nodded. "Yeah, I'm fine." Altheya said absentmindedly as she closed her eyes for a brief moment, imagining that she was back in Rome with Damiano and they had just gotten home from their university classes.

They were about to eat dinner when Damiano noticed the state of Altheya's hair and tucked the strand behind her ear. Altheya leaned over to kiss him, but soon reality took over and she was back in her apartment a block away from her brother's and parents houses and her lips were locked with Luke's and that's when she realized she had to do something.

⊱ ────── {⋅. ✯ .⋅} ────── ⊰

After Måneskin's television performance, Damiano took off his inner ears and ran off stage and back towards the dressing room when Charlotte caught up with him after watching him from backstage.

"Hey! That performance was so amazing!" Charlotte said giggling as she wrapped her arms around him but Damiano shrugged her off as he began walking faster towards his dressing room door, but Charlotte was too quick for him and entered the room just seconds after he decided he wanted to be alone.

Damiano just shook his head and began to riffle through his various bags that littered the floor for a new packet of cigarettes.

"Sorry, amore." Damiano mumbled once he had found a new pack and lit up a smoke. He took one drag of his cigarette and pulled Charlotte close to him. Ever since he had found out about her he had been on edge.

"You thought the performance was that good, huh?" He said smiling. All of his former rage immediately disappearing. But once he looked at Charlotte he was imagining that she was someone else.

Charlotte nodded. "Yes, I did." She kissed his nose gently and replied "just be quick okay?" Before sauntering out of the room.

Once Charlotte was out of sight, Damiano sat down on the couch and sighed.  He pulled out his phone and began scrolling. In his photo album app, inside his hidden photo album he had saved mostly all of his photos with Altheya, even just the ones without him in them. It didn't matter if he was with Charlotte now, he couldn't deny it, but his heart still longed for Altheya.

And he knew that there was no way of winning her back. Altheya had made that very clear.

"Did she, though?"

Or was he missing something?
Damiano thought as he finished scrolling through the old photos and then began to do some research on his ex-girlfriend's new beau.

"What made him better than me?"

Damiano thought as he madly tapped away on his cellphone keyboard. He was angry. Angry at Altheya for finding a new man that quickly, but more angry at himself for having lost her in the first place. If he hadn't been so stupid, then maybe they would still be together.