This World's An Ugly Place

I stomped into Sebastian's house, doing well not to slam the door behind me. I left Alex to sleep off his hang over while I finally dragged myself out of bed around noon. I was unaware at how far we had really gone last night, but I was having a hard time controlling the nausea feeling that was engulfing my stomach.

"Well, well, look who showed up," Lexus said with a bright smile at me. I could tell she was containing a giggle inside her due to my outrageous appearance. Since I was really not in the mood to even be here, I had lazily put my long, blond hair into a bun and was wearing a tank with sweat pants. I really wasn't dressed for company.

I pushed my shades closer against my skull, not caring I was inside now. I still needed to block out all of this light. "Shut up," I muttered, forcing myself over towards her. She was sitting on one of the counter stools and I sat down next to her, laying my head down on the counter in front of me and covering my head up with my arms.

"You're such a ray of sunshine today," Lexus singed gently. "This is all your fault, you know. I should've been keeping an eye on you guys, I knew Jack was going to end up swiping something, but I didn't think an entire bottle of whiskey."

I let out a small groan.

"You guys nearly had the entire thing consumed before I found you." She chuckled now. "I knew your hangovers would be bad."

"How was Jack's?" I murmured from underneath my arms.

"Probably the worst he's ever had. I had to check on him this morning to check if he was still breathing because he hasn't moved from his bed since when you guys left."

I lifted my head up when I heard someone new walk into the kitchen, and not to my surprise it was Case. I shifted my gaze back towards Lexus. "Did the rest of the boys sleep over?"

She nodded her head. "Oh, yeah. Drummer boy seems pretty okay; he's been drinking tons of water in between his naps. The other guy, on the other hand, has been glued to the bathroom."

I cringed. "Throwing up?"

"A ton," Lexus said, wrinkling her nose.

"Poor dude," I said quietly, thankful I hadn't had to throw up. But, now that I thought about it, I wondered if I should've stayed at the Home to make sure Alex was okay with his first hang over. Then again, I did leave him a note on how to drink tons of water...

"Yeah, you're lucky Sebastian and I didn't find that bottle," Case said, leaning on the island in front of us. His eyes looked tired, but other than that, he seemed pretty okay. "We would've polished that thing off, clean."

I rolled my eyes, not that he could see it underneath my shades. "We had it almost gone," I said proudly, a smirk hinting on my face.

He shrugged. "Wouldn't have stopped us."

"Don't talk about drinking with my little sister," Sebastian muttered, walking into the kitchen and joining us all and letting his gaze settle on me.

I sat lower in my chair now, suddenly growing nervous. Sebastian had told me before about how much he disapproved of me drinking underage - which is why I had to sneak it around him in the first place - and I had a feeling the reason he told me to come over today was for that very reason. Instead of avoiding the situation like I usually would, I decided to face it head on.

"You know why I called you here?" my brother asked, going on the other side of the island next to Case so he could face me. His hair was mashed in every which direction, suggesting he had just gotten out of bed himself.

I shrugged my shoulders, biting down on my lip.

Lexus and Case shifted awkwardly, both gazing down at their own phones to busy themselves. They could feel the incoming heat that was going to be coming from Sebastian and they stayed out of it when he scolded me.

"I heard about that little bottle you guys had last night," he said quietly, staring at me dead on.

Again, I shrugged my shoulders. "So, what?" I challenged, which wasn't something wise of me to do with Sebastian. Although I was head strong, so was he.

"So, I told you I don't approve of that," he said, his tone growing more harsh.

"And I told you I didn't care," I spoke, knowing that that was an immature thing of me to say, but I could careless at the moment.

He frowned, crossing his arms across his chest. "Excuse me?"

I shook my head. "That's...not what I meant." I took a deep breath. "I know you don't approve of it, but, I mean, I'm young! I was just screwing around and having fun; plus, I was in one of the safest environments for me to drink."

"Being surrounded by four boys is what you call safe?" he asked, disbelief leaking into his voice.

"Yeah, Sebastian, because Alex or Jack is going to let something bad happen to me," I spoke sarcastically. Trying to contain my attitude was sometimes one of the hardest things for me to do, especially when I was in an argument.

He let out a deep sigh, letting his arms fall from his sides. "You're really pushing it, you know that?"

I chuckled at that, shaking my head. "And what is that supposed to mean?"

"I said exactly what I mean. Not only did you get yourself into this, but you also got Alex involved. You know what could happen if the authorities find out about this? They'd probably take Jack away from Lexus and then prohibit us from even seeing each other," he spoke, more emotion going through his voice.

I felt a shiver run down my spine at the thought of Jack being taken away, but quickly pushed it away. Sebastian was just worrying too much; there was no way anyone would find out about this. We were fine, we always were. I pressed my lips into a hard line and looked away.

"Well? Anything else to say?" Sebastian asked, knowing he had won this argument, even though I hadn't admitted it.

"There's nothing else to say," I said through a clenched jaw.

"You're not going to say 'I'm sorry, Sebastian! I'll never do it again'?" he asked, but now I could tell he was trying to make the mood lighter by his teasing tone.

"There's nothing to apologize for," I said, looking back towards my brother. "You're stuck on the fence, but I'm over it."

He narrowed his eyes now but before he could continue to scold me, Case let a hand fall onto Sebastian's shoulder. "Hey, hey, now this got a lot less fun than it was originally supposed to be. Now, Sebastian, why don't you tell Angel the real news?"

I blinked, looking between both my brother and Case as confusion dawned upon me. Hadn't we just discussed the very reason why I was brought here? What else did Sebastian have to yell at me for?

Sebastian sighed, reluctant to change the topic, but obeyed his friend's instructions. "We actually had a very different reason we wanted you here for," he spoke, looking over towards me.

I perked up now, suddenly curious. "Oh, yeah? Tell me, tell me," I urged him, liking the sudden vibe change in the room.

"A record company got in contact with me last night about The Star Gazers, and they want to sign us," Sebastian explained, a huge smile spreading across his face.

I felt myself deflate and I hunched my shoulders forward, suddenly very annoyed that they had built my expectations so high. "That's the big news?"

Case furrowed his brow. "Well, don't say it like that."

"Aren't you excited?" Lexus asked, frowning.

"I mean, if I was graduated, sure, but what good is this for us if we can't even sign it yet?" I asked, looking at all my friends in front of me. Unfortunately, we had already discussed this topic numerous times as a band. One of the biggest rules Sebastian had for us was that I needed to finish school before we could even consider beginning our music career with writing music.

Case rolled his eyes. "We're not saying that we're going to begin writing music yet, but it's really, really good for our band," he explained. "The fact that they went and contacted us shows that our band name is getting out there finally, and that people are beginning to like us. Hell, that means that once you're graduated we'll probably get a contract!"

I felt a few butterflies begin to tingle in my stomach. I knew this was always the plan, that we were going to make it big in the industry, but to see it actually happening in front of my eyes was thrilling. As much as I believed it would happen, there was always that sliver of doubt in me, but now I knew that we were meant to make it big.

"This is...amazing," I spoke quietly, looking down in front of me in slight disbelief.

"Can you believe it?" Lexus asked, cupping my hand and giving a bright smile for me.

I smirked at her, nodding my head. "Of course I believe it; I always believed it.."

Notes

<3