The clock on the bedside table reads 2:16 and Charlotte can’t sleep. She rolls onto her back and stares up at the ceiling, the spackle design fuzzy in the darkness. Her head falls to the side and she can see the moon peeking in through the curtains, throwing a thin shaft of light across the end of the bed. She sighs, sitting up finally. Her mind is alert and focused, no hint of sleepiness anywhere. A lot of it has to do with the fact that she hadn’t been able to pull herself out of bed before noon that day, her head threatening to split in half if she even dared move. When she finally did drag herself downstairs, she found Justin and Amelia sitting at the kitchen table, Amelia picking disinterestedly at a turkey sandwich while Justin looked like death warmed over, nursing a glass of soda water.

Charlotte rolls over, burying her face in her pillow, trying to banish Justin from her thoughts but she is perilous to stop the hazy memory of his chest beneath her fingertips, his palm warm against the back of her hand. And his eyes...god his eyes glowing dark navy blue even in the pitch black living room, even in the dimness of her drunken brain.

She groans into the pillow, punching the sides of it violently. Why couldn’t she just sleep? Why did she have to be here in this house, spending Christmas with his family? Why did she have to be in his bed, sleeping on sheets that he’s probably slept in a million times with her face shoved in a pillow that’s probably held his head-

“Alright,” Charlotte growls to herself, sitting up and swinging her legs over the side of the bed.

She sighs heavily, letting her head hang back as she listens to the stillness of the room, broken only by the wind gusting every now and then, rattling the window pane. She stands, tugging her thermal shirt straight around her waist, shaking out the legs of her flannel sleep pants. She looks around blearily wondering what to do now. It was – she glances at the clock – 2:23. What was there to do at 2:23 in the morning?

Charlotte runs her hands over her face, padding carefully to the door even though she knows the floor is clear but the unfamiliar room has her cautious. She pulls the door open, peeking down the hallway cast in a soft yellow glow from the dimmed lights. Her head snaps the other direction when she hears a noise, a soft tinkling sound and she squints, trying to see as far down the hall as possible but everything fades into darkness at the start of the banister.

She takes a cautious step out of her room, taking small strides towards the balcony overlooking the foyer and the tinkling gets just slightly louder, allowing her to discern a familiar melody. She can see a soft glowing light coming from the living room and she’s perilous to stop herself as she hears a voice, his voice, just a dull hum muffled by the walls separating them. Charlotte isn’t the only one who couldn’t sleep tonight.

As her foot hits the bottom step, her stomach turns over itself in anticipation her socked feet padding quietly towards the entryway to the living room. Justin is sitting behind the piano, his eyes watching his hands as they dance over the keys, a glass of deep red wine sitting on the top of the instrument. The Christmas tree is lit up behind him, the colored lights twinkling merrily, making the room glow hazily. His body moves with the music, his head nodding every time he switches chords, his plush bottom lip tugged between his teeth. His hair is a wild muss of curls, a day’s growth of beard covering his handsome face. Charlotte has to cover her mouth with her hand to conceal her gasp as he opens his mouth to sing.

“Have yourself a merry little Christmas / Let your heart be liiiiiight / From now on our troubles will be out of siiiiiight…”  

Charlotte’s hands press to her chest, trying to suppress the lump in her throat as she listens, her eyes never leaving him as he sways slowly. She tenses when he lifts his head but his eyes are closed, lost in the beauty of the song and the feeling of his voice as it leaves him.

“Have yourself a merry little Christmas / Make the Yule-tide gaaaaay / From now on our troubles will be miles awaaaaaay…”  

She watches him and she marvels at his talent, how he can make even the easiest song sound like it was a masterpiece, making it his own with little trills of the piano and slight inflections in his voice, his soft tenor ebbing and flowing over the notes in a way that Charlotte has never heard before. She is captivated, hanging on every note her eyes never leaving his face and marveling at the pure joy that radiates off of him.

“Here we are as in olden daaaaays / Happy golden daaaaays gone byyyyyy / Faithful friends who are dear to us gather near to us-”  

His voice cuts off as his eyes open, his fingers stuttering over the keys when he sees Charlotte standing in the doorway. She jumps, looking as if she’s about to turn tail and run, her green eyes wide. He ducks his head, a nervous laugh pulling from his throat and he can feel his cheeks burn. He thought he was alone, the only one awake. After all it was almost three in the morning. In fact there was no reason that he himself shouldn’t have been asleep. Amelia had forced him to get up at seven-thirty despite the bone crushing hangover he was sporting. He couldn’t help but feel that she relished in his suffering, saw it as punishment for going against her wishes. But he was probably just being overly sensitive. He shakes his head, clearing his throat as his fingers resume their work, raising one hand to wave Charlotte over as he continues.  

“-once more.”  

Charlotte bites her lip, stepping cautiously into the room, sidestepping the overstuffed chairs to stand awkwardly next to the piano. Her long dark hair cascades over her shoulders and she looks downright adorable in an oversized thermal shirt and flannel sleep pants that pool around the tops of her socked feet. He smiles, his fingers coaxing flourished notes out of the piano as he slides over a little on the bench, nodding his head down at the empty space next to him. She hesitates for a moment before settling next to him and he’s assailed with the sent of oranges, maybe mangos. She reaches up to tuck her hair nervously behind her ear and he wonders what kind of shampoo she uses. He shakes his head.  

“Through the years we all will be together / If the Fates allooooow” he sings and then he lets his eyes fall closed, forgetting about everything as the piano crescendos and the only thing there is is the music. “Hang a shining star upon the highest booooooouuuuugh.” His hands reach down the keys, playing a chord and then a higher one and then a higher one still, his arm pressing against Charlotte’s before coming back to the middle again, pausing just briefly. “And have yourself… a merry little Christmas…” He pauses, waiting and when Charlotte takes her eyes off his hands to look at his face, her eyes meeting his he grins at her, “…noooow.” 

His fingers ripple down the keys in a flourish before ending on a tinkling note and a low cord, the silence around them electric with the sound that had just ended. Charlotte’s heart is thudding in her chest, excitement racing through her veins. She now understands why all those girls used to tremble and cry at his concerts. He is awe inspiring.

“That was amazing,” she says softly and he scrunches his nose, shrugging as he plucks out another melody, one she doesn’t recognize.

“Can’t sleep?” he asks after a moment and she nods, shifting slightly on the bench and her hip presses to his and for the first time she doesn’t cringe or shy away. “Yeah me either.”

“It’s what I get for sleeping till noon today,” Charlotte replies with a sigh, reaching up to rub her eye. “Your family must think I’m horrible.”

Justin snorts waving one hand. “My family loves you.”

Charlotte feels her ears redden, her stomach tightening and she tries to fight it, to fight the swell of pride. She’s playing a dangerous game and she should be ashamed of herself. He’s engaged. She shakes her head, her hands moving instinctively to the keys, poised and ready to press down and she catches herself in time to stop the action but not before Justin notices.

“Do you play?” he asks, his voice laced with pleasant surprise and Charlotte shakes her head adamantly.

“No…no no I just…I had lessons when I was younger…but I…I don’t-”

“Come on,” he says, scooting further away from her on the bench, giving her more room. “Come on play something.”

“Oh…Justin,” Charlotte says holding up a hand and he grins at the way her cheeks flame. “No…I…no…it’s been…jeez it’s been forever since I played.”

“Yeah yeah me too,” he says grinning as he nudges her with his elbow. “Come on please?”

She bites her lip, eyeing him hesitantly and he nudges her again, his boney elbow digging into her ribs. She arches her body, trying to avoid his prodding and slaps at his arm, scoffing annoyed but she can’t suppress the laugh that pulls from her throat.

“Fine, fine FINE!!!” she exclaims holding her hands up and he quits his jabbing at her, waiting with an amused smile gracing his lips.

He watches her roll her shoulders, clearing her throat as she tucks her hair behind her ears nervously. She’s wearing a pair of tiny silver studs and he likes the way they glint in the soft light of the room. They’re so subtle, so her. He shakes his head as she poises her hands over the keys, her fingertips resting against the cool ivory. She frowns, curling her fingers back against her palms.

“I can’t think of a song,” she says turning to Justin slightly her hands resting back against her thighs and he squints in thought.

“Do you knoooooooow…” he draws out the word before pausing, scrunching his mouth to the side as he ponders and it takes everything Charlotte has not to giggle at how utterly adorable he is. “White Christmas?”

Charlotte thinks for a second before placing her hands hesitantly over the keys. “I think so yeah.”

Her fingers press down, drawing out lazy notes that seem so dim in comparison to what he’d coaxed out of the instrument just moments before. She bites her lip, almost embarrassed by it, her fingers slowing and Justin begins to hum, forcing her to continue.

“Not bad,” he says nodding his head because it’s true, she wasn’t bad. She wasn’t going to win a Grammy but she wasn’t bad. Maybe with a little guidance she could get better. She needed to loosen up a little, show a little more confidence. “When’d you learn to play?”

“My mom got me lessons when I was nine,” she replies shrugging, counting the rhythm in her head as her fingers pluck the keys methodically. “You?”

“Oh I taught myself,” Justin replies with a shrug, reaching past her for his wine glass and Charlotte stops looking at him perplexed.

“You taught yourself?” she asks and he nods, taking a sip of his wine and she shakes her head. “Figures.”

“What’s that mean?” he asks with a chuckle his eyes not leaving her as she nods her head with the slow count she’s plucking out. She doesn’t look at him, just shakes her head and he knows she’s just keeping her mouth shut. “No really Charlie,” he coaxes, wanting to know what she thought. What she thought of him.

Trace’s little confession last night had been a pretty heavy blow. To know that not only had he let his best friend down but that the one person in the world that truly got him, didn’t get why he was marrying Amelia, didn’t get why he loved her. He wishes he’d been drunk enough to just forget it, forget the accusation and hurt in his best friend’s eyes, to forget the way Charlotte had refused to look at him. He felt like an asshole. He was an asshole.

“You’re…you’re kind of good at everything,” she replies hesitantly and he chuckles, breathing a sigh of slight relief.

“I used to be,” he replies with a sigh, throwing his head back and draining the rest of the glass. He used to be a lot of things.

“What’s that mean?” Charlotte prods gently, her fingers stopping and the silence is deafening.

“Its means…” Justin says after a moment, his fingers beginning to coax out another beautiful melody but the tone is more somber than the ones before, “I don’t know what it means.”

Charlotte nods slightly in concession, her eyes roaming over his handsome face, hard lines drawn across his forehead, his mouth tight in the way that she has come to associate with his displeasure. His eyes are dark, not looking at her and she knows he has something on his mind. She wants him to know that he can confide in her if he needs to, that he can talk to her, that she won’t go blabbing it to Us Weekly. She sighs bracing herself.

“No really,” she prods softly and his hands stutter on the keys, his eyes flicking to her.

He tenses, bristling slightly as he continues his melody again, fully prepared to ignore her prodding. He doesn’t have to answer to her. Who was she to pry into his life anyway? Everyone always wanted to know everything. All the sordid details, all the juicy bits. No one really cared what he thought or how he felt unless they were using it for something. His eyes flick to her and she looks away, her bottom lip pulled between her teeth and he instantly regrets his frosty brush off. Everyone wanted to know everything but Charlotte, Charlotte never asked for anything. She just wasn’t like that. Charlotte never wanted anything from him, so if she was asking just this once, he figured he could at least try to answer.

“I guess…” he starts slowly, concentrating on his fingers working smoothly over the keys. “I guess it’s just not really the same anymore.”

He chances a glance at Charlotte and finds her peering up at him interestedly but not in the way he was used to. Her green eyes show curiosity but they lack that hunger he was so used to seeing when he was prodded about his life. She genuinely wants to know what he thinks, what he feels and he wonders what that says about him and his life that it surprises him. In any case, now she’s got him curious.

“I see,” she says nodding when he doesn’t continue and he can tell she wants to ask him more but she doesn’t and he smiles. It’s not everyday someone just dropped a subject because he didn’t want to talk about it.

“You know when I was a kid…” he trails, his fingers finding a familiar melody and Charlotte smiles recognizing it instantly as her favorite song. He’d played it for her before, the first time she’d ever heard him play. God, that seemed so long ago. “I used to race home from school just to play this thing. Couldn’t wait to get outta that stuffy classroom and in here where I could breathe.”

Charlotte watches him take a deep breath and then let it out in a sigh as his fingers continued to work over the keys coaxing the haunting melody from the instrument. She could sit here forever and watch him do this, listen to the beautiful music he’s capable of making. She wonders why he stopped. She barely knew him and she could see that this was what he lived for. She wonders what possible force could snuff this part of him out.

“You know when I was a kid,” Charlotte says and Justin turns his head to her grinning. “I would race home from school so I could get in the fort my brothers made in the back yard before they could.” Justin smiles. “They’d never let me in otherwise. We’d spend the entire afternoon fighting.” She pauses her face crumpling. “Your way seems more productive.” She adds and he laughs.

“Fort huh?” he asks, cutting his eyes at her and she nods, her head tilted to the side as she watches his hands move slowly over the keys. “Trace and I had a tree house.”

“Really?” she asks and he nods, grinning at the memories of running though the woods, racing to see who could get there first.

“Yeah, it’s still out there,” he says, nodding towards the window and Charlotte turns her head to look as if she could see it but the only thing she can see is their reflection against the black night.

“That’s cool,” she says and he nods silence descending on them. “I’d like to see it sometime,” she adds and then mentally kicks herself for how retarded she sounds.

“Really?” he asks turning to her and the music stops. “You wanna go now?”

Charlotte blinks at him slowly and responds the only way one can when they are caught so completely off guard. “Sure.”

***

“Careful,” Justin says, his hands reaching around Charlotte to catch her by the elbows as she stumbles over a fallen tree limb.

Even with the full moon and the Maglite in Justin’s hand Charlotte can still barely keep upright. She envies Justin’s lithe grace as he takes purposeful strides, charging through the woods like he lives here. Which he does, she guesses but that was beside the point. She looks over her shoulder and she can no longer see the porch light through the trees, nothing but pitch blackness in their wake. She wonders if this was a good idea. What if someone were to wake up and find them gone? What would they think?

Something catches on her pajama pants tugging and her heart rate goes through the roof, a small squealing sound pulling from the back of her throat as she reaches out to grab the back of Justin’s jacket, quickening her pace. He turns, shining the beam of light at her feet and she sees a thorny bramble caught on the hem of her sleep pants and he chuckles, reaching down to pull it away.

“You okay there Al?” he asks, examining the piece of foliage before tossing it aside and she scowls at him, putting a hand up in front of her face when he shines the light in her eyes.

“Yes,” she spats, reaching out to force the beam of light towards the ground and he chuckles.

“Who knew you were such a girly girl,” Justin responds and Charlotte’s scowl deepens, the ten year old that was constantly tormented by all her brother’s friends for being a “sissy girl” rising to the surface.

“I’m not,” she replies, snatching the flash light from him and charging ahead.

“Where are you going?” he asks and she turns, the light finding him and he’s standing in the same place with his arms crossed over his chest, smiling smugly, every breath coming out in white puffs.

“To find your tree house,” she says, pushing a piece of hair out of her face her finger clumsy and weak from the cold and he chuckles, pointing.

“Well it’s right there but if you wanna go trompin’ around the woods for awhile we can do that too.” He grins at her and she scowls in a way that he can’t help but find truly adorable.

Charlotte turns, finding an old wooden ladder leaning against a tall oak. She lets her light travel up it, finding a tiny ramshackle hut held by two of the thickest branches of the tree, the ladder disappearing up into a crudely cut square hole. She hears the rustling of leaves behind her and turns in time to see Justin standing next to her, peering up at the tree house, his breath coming out in curling clouds.

“So are we going up?” she asks after a moment and he turns to her slightly bewildered.

“You wanna go up?” he asks and he seems genuinely perplexed. Charlotte laughs.

“Well yeah,” she says, elbowing him. “What did you think I was just gonna have you drag me out here at three in the morning to look at the damn thing?”

Justin chuckles shaking his head as he steps forward to grip the ladder, applying his foot hesitantly to a rung making sure it’s secure before tugging himself upward. He crouches low as he takes a cautious step into the tree house, the boards creaking loudly under his weight. He wonders briefly if this thing can take their weight, then he remembers all crazy things he and his friends had gotten up to in here over the years and decides not to worry about it. Charlotte’s head and shoulders appear through the hole in the floor, her breath coming in white puffs as she swings the flashlight around, throwing light on the walls. He grins, taking the flashlight from her and holding out his hand as he helps her the rest of the way inside.

Charlotte grasps his hand, his fingers warm around hers and she plants her foot cautiously on the floor of the tree house, listening to it groan under her weight. She tenses as she crouches next to him, opening her eyes wide, trying to see in the near darkness. He waddles backwards into the open space of the tiny room before letting his body tumble back and the old boards whine in protest both of them tensing, waiting and when nothing happens they chuckle at each other. Charlotte crawls closer to him, making sure she’s clear of the opening in the floor before folding her legs and settling down, watching as Justin moves the flashlight around the walls. Light splashes on old posters of Michael Jackson, Boys II Men and Michael Jordan, newspaper clippings of concert reviews and sports scores, and old flyers announcing performances at school assemblies and pep rallies. There are ticket stubs from concerts long past and old notes yellowed and worn from years long gone.

“This is really cool,” Charlotte says, reaching out to touch a faded ticket stub from a Beach Boys concert. “You’ve just always loved music huh?”

Justin chuckles. “Yeah,” he says with a sigh. “It’s just a part of me, I dunno.”

“Why’d you quit?” she asks lightly, trying to mask the real curiosity in her voice, glancing at him and an uncomfortable look comes across his face.

He chuckles shaking his head at her and pressing his lips together, not wanting to say. Charlotte nods in silent concession.

Justin sighs, glancing around and memories fill him. Spring days and summer nights just hanging out with friends talking about basketball and girls and music and whatever else was on their minds. He hadn’t seen some of those guys in years. Last he heard Kyle owned the machine shop in town and Nick had moved to Nashville for some girl. They’d all just drifted away from each other somehow.

“Me and my friends used to chill up here on the weekends when we were ten,” he sighs, shaking away the unpleasant thoughts, reaching back to lean on his hands

His fingers brush against something cold and metallic, the sound of aluminum bouncing off each other echoing in the silence. He frowns, pulling out an empty Coors Light can and chuckles tossing it into the darkness, listening to it clatter along the floor.

“And Trace and I drank up here when we were sixteen.”

Charlotte laughs. “You and Trace have known each other a long time huh?” she asks and he nods, that tight feeling coming into his chest again when he thinks about his best friend. “How’d you meet?”

“Oh our moms are good friends,” he says dismissively and he looks out the little window into the darkness. “He just gets me you know? Or he used to.”

He tenses. Why’d he say that? Justin’s eyes find hers in the darkness and he can see her pretty clearly even in the darkness, the light from the moon giving her an almost ethereal glow. Her cheeks are pink from the cold, her lips full and red and her green eyes pierce the darkness in a way that makes his heart beat faster. She’s looking at him hesitantly as if she has a million questions but she’s holding them all back. One thing he really likes about Charlotte is that, in a world where everyone wears a mask to hide their intentions, he can read her like a book.

“He gets you,” Charlotte says delicately and Justin shakes his head, shifting uncomfortably.

“I dunno,” he says, shifting again and he can feel his foot tingle, falling asleep from his odd sitting position.

He grunts, shifting to so he can fold his legs in front of him and when he does his knees press against Charlotte’s, feeling her tense from the contact. He expects her to pull back like she usually does but this time she doesn’t, relaxing after a few seconds and it’s comfortable. He feels comfortable with her. He knows she’s not going to freak out on him for reasons he doesn’t completely understand. He’s not entirely sure but he thinks he trusts her.

“He does, Justin,” she says softly and he glances up to find her looking at him steadily. “Maybe he just needs a little help in this instance. Even best friends can’t read your mind.”

A smile pulls at his lips. “I just…I feel like he’s…” he trails and Charlotte’s knee nudges his encouragingly.

“What?” she asks softly and he sighs.

“I feel like we’re not as close as we used to be. I mean I don’t have any friends aside from him really. Not anymore…” he trails, shifting uncomfortably at his confession and he chances a look up at her, finding her looking at him, a mix of empathy and understanding painting her face. He never really realized how pretty she was until right now. She wasn’t Amelia and in the back of his mind he knew that was a good thing.

“Why is that?” she asks gently and he blinks slowly, trying to remember what they were talking about.

“I dunno,” he says, shifting again but he thinks he may have an inkling. “I just…Trace…” he says by way of shifting the subject and he tenses realizing he didn’t exactly want the subject shifted there either.

“…is your best friend,” Charlotte replies and he looks up at her in time to see her nod authoritatively. “Guys like you two don’t just drift away from each other Justin. He’s like your brother. I barely know you two and that’s obvious.”

Justin smiles but there’s a bitterness to it. “I missed his grandad’s funeral,” he says softly and his breath is pulled from his lungs at the unexpected pain this statement brings. “Ben was like his dad. I’m his best friend. I should have been there.”

He sighs, fisting his hands on his knees, frustrated with himself. How could he have done something like that? At the time it hadn’t seemed like that big of a deal. He was a thousand miles away and in a sense New York was an entire world away from their sleepy little town in Tennessee. He’d sent flowers. He’d called. Why was it now that he was home that he could see how glaringly wrong he’d been? He jumps as Charlotte’s cold hand wraps around his fist and the gesture comforts him even though he doesn’t deserve it.

“You screwed up,” she says and his head hangs lower ready for the onslaught. “But you can’t keep beating yourself up over it. You can’t go back. The only thing you can do is tell him you’re sorry and never let anything like it happen again.”

Justin lifts his head, blinking slowly back at her. Well that was unexpected. So often when he’d fucked up he had to listen to a forty minute diatribe on how he could have done differently or why he had screwed up so egregiously. It was always his fault, he should have known better, he should have done something differently. But not this time. Not with Charlotte. She was so different from Amelia.

“Why are you looking at me like that?” Charlotte asks, a nervous chuckle escaping her lips, her hand tugging back from him slowly and he smiles, shaking his head.

“I…just…” he sighs and then finally just lets himself be honest for once. “You’re so different from her.”

“Amelia?” Charlotte asks and then she chuckles, an uncomfortable look coming over her face before she looks at him for a moment and decides to say whatever it is she’s holding back. “Is that a compliment or…”

“No!” Justin exclaims chuckling and shaking his head so that he misses the look of disappointment on her face. “No it was just an observation.”

“You two seem so…” she trails and he can tell she wants to say more but she’s holding back.

“Different?” he provides for her and she nods, smiling sheepishly. “We didn’t use to be.”

“Yeah so I’ve heard,” Charlotte says and then sighs her words coming out in a rush. “What happened?”

“You’ve wanted to ask that for awhile huh?” Justin asks with a chuckle and she blushes, ducking her head.

“You don’t have to-”

He holds up a hand. “No it’s fine.” He takes a deep breath, screwing up his face in thought. How to explain this… “Okay have you ever met Amelia’s dad?”

Charlotte looks back at him puzzled. “No I don’t think so…”

Justin chuckles. “Preston…Preston is… intense.” He pauses. “Er…wait…” he pauses thinking and then takes a deep breath, starting again. “Okay Amelia and I met at this industry party,” he says. “Thrown by her father,” he adds as if to try and tie it in to his former statement. “I was there because I had done some production on a song with Jackson Raymes and I was kissing ass trying to get them to let him put it on the damn record,” he rolls his eyes and Charlotte smiles, “And I was standing there talking to…somebody…and,” A slow smile pulls at his lips as he remembers. “And I look over and there is this…stunning woman. I mean trust me Charlie I’ve seen a lot of beautiful women but she, god she stole my breath you know?” He peers at her through the darkness and she smiles at him but he’s so caught up in the memory he doesn’t notice how tense it is. “So I kinda milled around the party, slipping in questions about her and when I finally got up the courage to talk to her she turned me down flat, completely ignored me.”

He chuckles shaking his head.

“Now that was something I wasn’t really used to at that point in my life,” he confides, blushing slightly and Charlotte giggles. “So I sent her flowers the next day, saying it was a pleasure to have met her and that I hoped we’d run into each other again. And we did in the studio the next day. It turns out that she found out from her father that I was working with one of their artists and she had agreed to listen to the tracks and help choose which ones should go on the album, which made me nervous because I liked her and didn’t want to have to tell her that she didn’t know anything about music.”

He laughs again and so does Charlotte. He’s so cocky sometimes.

“But luckily for me she did know what she was talking about, which made me want her even more,” he sighs, shaking his head. “So we argue for a couple hours about the tracks and finally settle on an agreement and I’m just about to ask her if maybe she wants to go to dinner and she tells me she has to be at some benefit and asks if I’d join her. I agreed and I get all dressed up and I’m nervous as hell because I’m sure its this big debutante thing and here I am some musician from the boonies in a monkey suit pretending I know how to waltz-”

“You didn’t know how to waltz?” Charlotte asks perplexed and he shifts.

“Well actually yeah I did but that’s beside the point,” he replies and she giggles at him, nudging him with her knee again and he smiles.

“Anyway we go to this party and its so fucking boring and awkward as hell because every time we would start to talk or dance, some colleague of her dad’s or friend of her mother’s would whisk us off into this asinine conversation about show ponies and art auctions,” he rolls his eyes again, “And just when I think the night is doomed, Amelia leans into me and whispers in my ear, ‘you wanna get the fuck outta here?’”

Charlotte’s jaw drops, her eyes widening. “You’re lying.”

“Sweat to God,” Justin says holding up his right hand and Charlotte giggles.

“No way I don’t believe you.”

“Wait, wait lemme finish,” Justin says and they shift excitedly. “It gets better trust me. So we go outside, get in her limo and she takes me to this club in Brooklyn. I’m talking a seedy run down little place and here we are in evening wear…” He shakes his head, grinning wildly at the memory. “We danced on the bar and did body shots and heard this amazing band that you may know today as The Kill-”

Charlotte’s eyes widen. “No way!”

“Yeah I know,” he says nodding. “Amelia had known them for years and she got them gigs at various places using her father’s name. I told her after we’d gotten together that she should pitch them to her dad. She finally did and they just blew up. It was insane.”

“Wow,” Charlotte says breathlessly, watching him and marveling at how his face lights up at the memory.

“Yeah,” Justin says and his face darkens and it’s as if someone has turned out the lights. “After that her dad used her more and more for A&R because she was in the scene and she had a good ear. She still does she just doesn’t use it very often.” He sighs. “As she moved up in the company she wanted to succeed in the business end more than discover the bands and she struggled a lot with being taken seriously. You know the whole ‘oh she’s a party girl only here because her daddy got her the job’ thing. She kinda became a hardass.”

“Kinda?” Charlotte snorts before she can stop herself and she blushes. Justin chuckles.

“This business is hard Charlie,” he says somewhat chastising and Charlotte looks at her hands. “People take what they can get from you and you have to put up a strong front to keep the vultures away.” He shrugs pausing before adding. “I think it has a lot to do with living up to her father. Those are some pretty big shoes to fill you know?” He shrugs again, “And I mean it’s what she wants. And Amelia always gets what she wants.”

Charlotte chuckles nodding as she peers up at him and before she can stop herself she asks, “And what do you want?”

Justin jerks slightly, the smile falling from his face and he’s shocked by the question. What does he want? It’d been so long since someone even thought to ask him. So often he was told what he was doing, where he was going, what he was getting. His opinion never really mattered which is fine he guesses because so often it was stuff he didn’t really care about like flowers and paper samples. But now that someone was finally asking him the indignation over that fact finally hits him. When had he become such a damn doormat?

“Justin?” Charlotte asks softly, her hand reaching out to rest on his knee and he jerks in surprise causing her to snatch her hand back quickly. It’s then that he realizes he’d been frowning deeply.

“I…” he says and he looks up at her the words dying in his throat, his mind still working furiously towards an end.

Maybe Trace was right? Maybe he did let Amelia walk all over him. But no, that was just her personality. Why was he getting upset that she always got her way when she knew exactly what she wanted and he himself said he didn’t really have much of an opinion? She was strong willed and if he had to bend every once in awhile that was fine. But when was the last time Amelia bent for him? He shook his head, not wanting to think about these things now. He glances out the window and it’s lighter than it was before. Was the sun really coming up? Had they spent that much time out here?

“Justin?” Charlotte asks again, not touching him this time but her voice pulls his attention back. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah!” He exclaims plastering a smile on his face and Charlotte smiles back hesitantly and he ignores the fact that he can tell she doesn’t buy it. He shifts nervously. “You know what I want?” he asks, a hint of forced playfulness evident in his voice.

Charlotte looks up at him, her green eyes crashing into his and the laughter dies out of his question, the joke he’d planned on telling forgotten. He can feel his heart rate pick up and she can feel her stomach drop to her toes. Their knees are still touching and she is now suddenly very aware of this fact as is he and that sense of waiting is back. The feeling that something should be happening that wasn’t.

The silence around them is electric and Charlotte shifts uncomfortably, her knee moving from his and the incremental amount of space she put between them is enough to break whatever was holding them.

“What?” Charlotte asks avoiding his eyes and he’d forgotten what he’d asked his brain so turned around and confused, his heart twisted in knots between Amelia and Trace and his whole screwed up life.

“We should get back to the house,” he says and Charlotte nods silently.

“Yeah I can’t sleep till noon two days in a row,” Charlotte says hoping to lighten the mood for she is so unaccustomed to his pensivity. “Maybe I can tell your parents I have some rare sleeping disorder.”

Despite himself, Justin smiles, chuckling a little to himself. “Good plan,” he says maneuvering around Charlotte to get to the ladder. “But you can’t sleep in tomorrow…er…today anyway.”

Charlotte looks perplexed before turning over to crawl towards the ladder on her hands and knees watching as he begins his descent.

“Why’s that?” she asks and he looks up at her grinning.

“Because it’s Christmas Eve.”

And with that he disappears through the hole, leaving Charlotte to scramble after him.