(Author's Note: Very sorry for the delay on this chapter! I started two new jobs, and this chapter proved to be quite difficult for me to write. Quick disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters from My Candy Love. The only characters that I own are: Eva Ainsworth, Ravyn Anderson, Rhealyn Anderson, Aricka Anderson, and anyone else associated with that group. I also do not own any songs mentioned, or quoted in this chapter. Credits to these bands for making such awesome music (another note: I did credit the bands in text!): Carry on my Wayward Son by Kansas, What Have You Done by Within Temptation, and B.Y.O.B. by System of a Down. A special credit to Bullet for My Valentine for making the song "Bittersweet Memories", which is the title for this chapter! Let me know what you guys think! Also, I did not proof read this chapter, so do not be surprised if there are spelling, grammatical or content errors. I apologize in advance, if anyone does come across any of these errors. It took so long to write, that I wanted to get it posted as soon as possible, and proof reading/editing would have taken at least another 2-3 days. Enjoy!)

Carry On…#3: Bittersweet Memories

Alexy and I waited in the courtyard to tell Lysander about our "shopping date" when school finally ended. It was definitely a turbulent day, to say the least. I almost got into a fight with some girl, almost hurt Lysander, threatened to sue the school, saw Castiel half-naked, found out that Castiel would be more than happy to have sex with me, and had all but one class with Barbie Girl and each class with Castiel, Lysander, Rosalya and Alexy. Introducing myself in each class was a pain. The girl who pissed me off snickered each time I was made to stand in front of the class, and at one point had yelled "Go back to Whore Land where you belong", in which Castiel told her to choke on a dildo. Lysander laughed. Castiel got sent to the office for the rest of that class period. It was a pretty good time.

I really didn't understand why Lysander was taking so long. Thirty minutes after the last bell, he finally strode out of the school, his black and green Victorian-styled dress coat swayed behind him. Castiel followed behind wearing a slightly comical scowl. Alexy nudged me in the ribs with his elbow and giggled: "There's your bae!"

My eyebrow raised as I fixed an angry glare at him. The term "bae" wasn't one that I was fond of, ever since it became a thing.

Before I could scold Alexy for making that comment, Lysander approached us. He looked troubled. "Hello."

"I just wanted to tell you that Alexy and I were going to go clothes shopping. So you didn't have to worry. I would have said something earlier, but I wasn't expect you to stay at school for thirty minutes though." I said with a soft giggle.

"That's alright. I hope you don't mind if Castiel and I join. We need to talk to Leigh."

"About what?"

"Something."

"Something secret?"

"Yes." A small smile crept onto his face.

"Alexy, you're still here?" A voice asked from behind me. Everyone waved as I turned around to see who the voice belonged to. Immediately, I recognized him from my classes. Armin, I think was his name. His hair laid exactly like Alexy's, but was parted on the other side, and it was its' natural black color. The only thing about the two that wasn't identical was the color of their eyes: Alexy's were purple and Armin's were a very captivating sky blue color. He dressed much classier than Alexy, but something told me that his choice of clothing wasn't much of his decision.

"Yeah." Alexy said, smiling back at his twin. "We're going to the Clothes Shop. Wanna come with?"

"Not really." Armin replied, a wide grin spread across his narrow face, revealing pearly white teeth. "I have a date with my Sims."

Yet another another reminder of my friends. My heart ached to see, or at least hear them. Aricka loved The Sims, so much that she'd put over seven hundred hours into it. She would spend at least an hour on each Sim, just to make them as perfect as possible. I didn't know how she had the attention span for it. The one time that I played it, I made my characters and then got bored the moment night came and they had to go to bed.

Leigh's shop was in a wonderful spot, only a few blocks away from the school, and (according to Lysander) a very short walk back to the apartment. It was so amazing. I couldn't believe that Leigh had made all of the clothes by hand. They were flawless, and satisfied just about every different stereotype of fashion. Lysander and Castiel made a beeline for the register where Leigh stood looking as stoic and professional as possible. Alexy grabbed onto my wrist and drug me around the store, picking random articles of clothing off of the racks for both me and him to try on. By the time that we got to the changing room, Alexy had gone through each clothing rack, and both of our arms were filled to the point of not being able to see over them. Rosalya-who was M.I.A. during last hour, I can only assume that she skipped because she didn't look like she'd gotten sick-bounced up beside me, once she realized what we were doing. In the changing room, Alexy handed me a maid costume with a suggestive eyebrow wiggle. I scowled. "I'm sorry, but you don't have the figure for that."

He rolled his violet colored eyes, then thrust it in front of my body. "Try it! Just for fun! We'll show the boys!"

"Two are my cousins and I'm sure that they don't want to see that."

"Then we'll call Castiel over here!"

"I am not going to put a maid dress on and then show Castiel. That's a little too erotic-"

"Besides, Cas would have a brain aneurism just by seeing something like that." Rosalya giggled. "Eva's body is just too…much for him."

Alexy shoved another, less erotic dress up to my body. It looked like it had originally been a black, off the shoulder extra-large T-shirt at one point, cut up along the sides, tied back together. The second sleeve was cut off and replaced with soft, unobvious elastic. It had embellishments sewn on it: red lace decorated the bottom hem of the shirt, and the bottom of the sleeve, red ribbon made up a cute corset design that would run up my spine, and a big wink emoticon made of red sequins was placed on the chest. I didn't even need to try it on to know that I wanted it. Within a second, Rosalya stripped me down. I took the dress from Alexy, who kept his eyes averted. "Do you always strip people that you just meet?" I almost yelled as I slipped the little dress over my head.

Rosalya turned me around and around after I had the dress settled nicely over my body. Then, she giggled: "Of course I do! Besides, we all have the same anatomy."

"Uh…correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think Alexy has a vagina."

"A-plus to Miss Eva for knowing Biology!" Alexy howled with laughter. "On a more serious note, I didn't look. Even if I had, though, it wouldn't do anything. I have your preferences."

"No offense, but I already kind of guessed that. You're pretty much a replica of Ravyn! Mentally, not physically. Thank you for not looking, though."

"Go show Castiel!" Alexy gushed. "You look perf!"

A knock sounded, twice, on the door of the rather large dressing room. Alexy and I jumped from surprise. I was expecting Castiel's voice, from how loudly Alexy had been saying his name. When Leigh spoke, I breathed a sigh of relief. "Do you really need three of you in there?" he asked.

Rosalya threw the door open and jumped into her boyfriend's arms with an exclaimed: "Yes!"

Castiel and Lysander stood behind Leigh. Their arms were crossed, and wore an identical look that said this is annoying on their faces. Alexy grabbed the maid dress again and held it up. "Cas, tell Eva to put this on!"

"NO!" Lysander, Leigh and I yelled in perfect synchronization. From the corner of my eye, I saw Castiel turn his back to us shaking his head.

"You're just a bunch of buzz kills." Alexy pouted. He turned back to the pile of clothes and shut the door to the dressing room. The lock clicked, leaving Rosalya alone with the boys.

For the next hour, Alexy and I tried on different clothes. Most of them just didn't fit my style, but still looked cute-according to Alexy. The entire time, I couldn't get my mind off of the off-the-shoulder dress. It sucked that I didn't have money to buy it. "Guys!" Rosalya's voice excitedly yelled from the other side of the door, banging on it almost frantically. Before I could put a shirt back on, Alexy flung the door open. Just as Castiel walked by. Instantly, he palmed his face and quickened the speed of his walk to the front counter. Alexy and Rosa exploded in amused laughter. Then, I noticed the real reason why Rosa had banged on the door. She held up a beautiful, prom-styled dress that was strapless with a big, poufy skirt. Definitely NOT the type of dress that I fawned over. The top was a beautiful dark, blood red color with pretty, Victorian-styled designs made from aurora borealis crystals (my favorite semi-precious gem stone). The skirt was the same red color that gradually faded into black, with the crystals strategically placed throughout the fabric. "Try it!" Rosa was practically shaking from how excited this dress made her.

Alexy couldn't hold back his giggles from my expression. Not only did I have my arms crossed, to cover my mostly exposed double D sized breasts, but my eyebrow was raised and I looked disgusted by the dress, but still in love with it. I loved the color scheme, crystals, and the Victorian designs. But the skirt. And the lack of straps. "Sorry to let you down, but strapless and I don't get along. Like, at all."

"Take the bra off!" She shot back, as if expecting me to say that.

My cheeks reddened. As if it were THAT simple. "The boobs are the problem, not the bra." I giggled, nervously.

"It'd look perfect on you!" Alexy gushed.

I began scrambling through all of the clothes that we tried on, looking for my shirt. The last thing I wanted was for a customer to walk in and see me with just a bra and my black skinny jeans on. "You two obviously don't know the struggle."

"Boobies are only a struggle if you don't have Duct Tape." Rosalya handed the dress to Alexy, and with an awfully serious look, pulled a large roll of silver Duct Tape out of the bag that hung off of her shoulder and pulled it apart from the roll with the indescribable, signature sound that Duct Tape always makes.

"Are you really gonna-" Alexy began asking, only cutting himself off with a fit of uncontrollable laughter. Rosalya's golden eyes stared all the way to my soul. Yes. Rosalya was dead serious about Duct taping my boobs.

I finally located my red tank top and black leather jacket and threw them on with no resistance from the fabric of either. It was as if my clothes knew that I was in grave danger. Shaking my head, I ducked under her outstretched arms. "Nope. Not happening!" I called out as I ran to the counter. It only took a few seconds for my panic-stricken legs to take me behind the counter, hiding behind Leigh. Castiel glared, as if I had interrupted an important conversation.

"Eva! Come back! It won't hurt, I promise!" Rosa called as she and Alexy followed, dress in hand.

"That's exactly what my ballet teacher said!" I retorted, digging my sharp fingernails into Leigh's back, forcing him to become my human shield. "IT WAS HORRIBLE!"

"If you cover your nipples with cotton, it won't hurt at all!" She argued, letting the tape hang down from the roll. Rosa reached back into her bag and pulled out two balls of cotton.

Castiel, Leigh, Lysander and I all exchanged looks of pure mortification. Alexy raised an eyebrow and scratched at his chin. "You can't Duct Tape my boobs!" I growled.

"Yes I can! It'll look like you're flatter than Lys-baby!"

"No!"

"You'll look beautiful in the dress though! I can fix your boob problem!"
"I wouldn't call it a problem." Castiel chimed in with a devilish smirk. Leigh reached over the counter and flicked Castiel on the forehead. The thump that it made rang so loudly through the store that I barely noticed Lysander smack him on the back of the head.

"Duct Tape Castiel's boobs and put him in the dress! Surely he'd look much better!" I shot back, forcing myself to not laugh about my cousins' reaction to his remark.

Castiel frowned. "How about, no?"

"Lysaaaaaaaaaaander!" A shrill, young sounding voice chimed as she ran into the store. She looked like she had barely even touched puberty, aside from what little "boobage" that her obviously stuffed bra gave her. Her light blonde hair was dyed pink at the tips, I could tell that it was Kool-Aid, and not actual dye. Aricka would probably call her a pussy for doing such a half-assed job on her hair. She wore too much makeup for her age, and definitely fit the profile for the "Gothic-Lolita" stereotype. If I were her mother, I'd have beaten her ass black and blue. Before Lysander even had the chance to look in the girl's direction, she ran up to him and jumped, wrapping her legs around his waist as she "hugged" him.

"That's just gross." I scoffed. "Lys, I never took you for the pedophile-type."

"What?" he stuttered, cheeks reddening with-what it seemed like-embarrassment.

"Who the fuck are you to judge, bitch?" the girl shot back as she detached herself from my cousin's body. She glared at me from over the counter, her lilac-grey eyes seemed to shoot daggers at me. Daggers which just bounced off of my, I don't give a fuck barrier.

"Sorry, the big kids are talking, little one. Go find your mommy and daddy, I'm sure they've noticed that their cradle has been robbed." I said with an all too obvious eye roll, then raised an eyebrow at Lysander. "You do realize that I'm looking out for you, right? I've seen too many guys get put on the Sexual Offenders' list, just because of that crap."

"I'm not a little kid!" The girl yelled. "I'm twelve!"

I began laughing so hard that I nearly fell to my knees. "I remember saying that!"

Lysander was so mortified. His cheeks were red, and when she forced another hug onto him, he pushed her away. "Nina, you should go." He stated, as if breaking a kids' heart was something that he did on a normal basis. "I do not mind you hanging around, but I have told you-time and time again: do not do that. And this is why. I'll get in trouble, not you. I'm too old for you."

"This is no joke, Nina. If he gets in trouble and is put on the sex offender's list, Lys-baby won't be able to play on stage ever again, because sex offenders aren't allowed near anyone under seventeen. You don't want to do that to him, do you?" Rosalya was speaking so softly, as if she was trying to spare the girl's feelings as much as possible. I just rolled my eyes. I knew that there was no point in being gentle with her. There were too many girls, EXACTLY like her at my school. And they never backed off, until Rhealyn and I beat one girls' ass. After that, they all backed off. Girls like her were disgusting, and I couldn't understand why guys were even okay with letting them hang around.

Tears began welling up in the little girl's eyes, and she sniffled for effect. I saw right though her fake tears. As Lysander, Alexy and Rosalya began comforting her, I just rolled my eyes. How anyone could fall for that, shocked me. There was no way in hell that I would stand around, watching while Crazy-Nina played their heartstrings like a harpist. So I left the store, and began walking in whatever direction my feet took me. Which happened to be left. A hand grabbed onto my shoulder, and I raised a fist as I turned to the hands' source. My eyes widened with surprise when I my eyes connected with Castiel's stormy, grey eyes and discontented frown. Slowly, I lowered my fist. "What was with that?" he asked.

"What, am I supposed to stand and watch as that little baby sheds a few crocodile tears, and gets her way? I mean, if Lysander wants to be a pedophile, that's fine, but it's fucking disgusting." My voice was much louder than what I had intended it to be, but it was difficult to control the volume of my voice when I was angry. It's safe to assume that a lot of people have similar issues.

"Lysander isn't a pedophile, he just doesn't want to hurt her feelings." He said, a frown rested on his face. "He's tried telling her, time and time again. She just doesn't get the obvious hint. Nina is like my exes and Amber all mixed in one."

I began walking, arms crossed. Castiel didn't fall a single step behind. Honestly, the company was nice-seeing as I didn't know my way around-but I didn't want to talk. I just wanted to walk my anger away. Beside me, Castiel lit two cigarettes and handed one to me, as if he just knew that I really wanted one. "Where are you planning to go, anyway?" He asked after we had each taken a few drags.

"I don't know, I don't care. I just want to go home." I said after a long sigh.

"Well, Lysander's apartment is the other way, you know."

I scowled at him, and he smirked back after blowing a puff of smoke in my face. I blew smoke right back into his face. "No. Cali. That's my home. This is a cute town and all, but it isn't where I belong."

"You can't, though. How do you plan on getting there?"

"I have feet, don't I?"

"They won't get you all too far. You'll have to sleep eventually, and eat. And you don't exactly have money, do you?"

I quickened my pace, feeling my temper continuing to bubble up. "Then what do you suppose I do, huh? All of my stuff is over there, all of my friends are over there."

"You have friends here, too. And family."

"Family that I haven't seen since I was a little girl."

"Family who still cares about your safety and well-being, even though they haven't seen you since you were little. A lot of people wish that they had that."

"Why are you even so concerned about what I do?" I asked, coming to a complete halt. Castiel walked a few steps ahead of me before noticing that I had stopped. With a raised eyebrow, I took a long drag from the cigarette and blew it out before continuing. "I mean, we didn't get off on the right foot, obviously, and you really just regard me with a smart ass tone, like I do nothing but waste your time. I know that you only see me as a piece of ass, but-"

"I don't ONLY see you as a piece of ass, who told you that?"

"Alexy did! And frankly, it isn't that hard to tell."

Castiel rolled his stormy grey eyes, turned away from me, turned back like he wanted to say something, turned away again because he changed his mind then turned back to me and got his face so close to mine that I smelled the nicotine on his breath. "I don't just see you as a piece of ass." He said again, moving my bangs away from my gold eye with his free hand. "Yes, I told Alexy that I would like to have sex with you. He told me that you said the same, damn, thing. If you can't tell, that boy has issues keeping things to himself. That's why I told him that."

I smacked his hand away, much harder than intended, and smoothed my bangs back over it. My face heated up, I couldn't believe that Alexy had actually told him what I said. Then again, he did tell me. "If you don't see me as just a piece of ass, what do you see me as? Huh? Lysander's annoying little cousin?"

"No. I'm not going to go there, right now."

"What do you mean by that?"

He took a step back, opening up space between the two of us. "Don't worry about it." He smirked. "Come with me."

"No."

"Yes."

"On one condition."

"What might that be?"

"I get to play your guitar."

~Castiel's P.O.V.~

"You'll break it!" I almost yelled, taking a step away from her like she was a king cobra ready to strike. The idea of someone else playing my guitar was absolutely terrifying. What if she dropped it? Or WORSE: broke a string.

"I will not!" Eva retorted, her shriek seemed to echo off of the walls of the Clothes Shop.

"No one but me plays it." I crossed my arms over my chest.

"Five minutes. Or I start heading to Cali." She crossed her arms over her chest.

Stalemate. With a groan, I caved. Eva seemed like the stubborn type, and I really didn't feel like having a stare down for a few hours. Not to mention, Lysander and Leigh would both probably kill me if I let their cousin walk to California. "Fine. Follow me."

Eva stood behind me, looking up at my parents' house. It wasn't big, but it wasn't small, either. It was two floors, built out of dark red bricks with a black fence lining the sidewalk and a huge privacy fence lined the backyard. "You don't mind big dogs, do you?" I asked before opening the door. Over time, I've learned that some people needed to be warned about Demon. I heard his tail thumping against the wall beside the door. He already knew that I was home.

"I love big dogs! Who doesn't?" She responded with a cheerful, almost carefree smile. It amazed me to see how quickly her moods changed. With a smirk, I opened the door and Demon pushed past us and did his "business" right on the sidewalk. Then, he began sniffing at Eva's feet, and gradually moved up her legs before she pushed his nose away from her butt. Demon barked and pounced on her. It surprised me to see that he didn't knock her down. Eva patted my dog's head as he happily licked her face, I took the moment to clean up his mess.

"Go lay down." I barked the order, because that was the only tone that he would listen to me in. He dropped off of Eva's shoulders, back onto the ground and sat at my feet, occasionally whipping my leg with his muscular tail. I glared down at him, silently telling him to obey the command.

"He's such a sweetie." Eva seemed to gush. Demon sulked over to his pillow in the living room.

"He's usually more protective than that." I mumbled. Demon never acted like that, especially to a complete stranger. I led Eva into the living room-greeted by Demon's thumping tail-and I sat down on the brown, leather recliner that sat just a couple of feet to the left of the matching loveseat.

"Guitar." Eva mused, as she gently ran a hand through my hair.

"Pushy." I muttered, swatting her hand away from my hair. With a groan, I led her up the stairs and into my bedroom-which was pretty unkempt. "It's right here. If you break even a string on my guitar-"

"You'll break my fingers."

"Well…I wouldn't go that far, but I'd be pretty pissed."

"Well, you do realize that I play guitar, too. I wouldn't just break someone else's guitar." Without any hesitation, Eva picked up my guitar by the neck, sat on my bed and began an inspection of the strings. "You should think about getting new strings, soon. Your high E is weak." She strummed all of the strings once, testing its' tuning. Of course, it was perfect. Every morning I spent fifteen minutes making sure that it's in tune. Eva looked perfectly natural as she held my red and white electric guitar close to her chest-but not so close that it would interfere with her playing. She gathered her half black and half red hair in her hands and tossed it over her left shoulder. Eva even moved her bangs away from her eyes, which seemed to be a rare occurrence for her. "Can I plug it into the amp?" she asked as her fingers began playing warm-up scales.

"Be my guest." I chuckled. It was still difficult for me to believe that she played. Not many girls did, Iris was the only girl that I ever met who knew how to play somewhat decently. Anyone could hold a guitar and see if it's in tune. Anyone can even learn to play scales. "If you suck, I'm taking my guitar back."

A small, cocky smirk spread onto Eva's face. "I wouldn't expect any less." She plugged the amplifier cord into the respectable plug-ins then turned the amp on. When she strummed the strings, sound exploded from it, making her jump away from it. Apparently, I had forgotten to turn the volume down, the last time I had played it. Eva's backpack fell onto the floor. The contents spilled onto my floor.

I breathed a sigh of relief, that backpack could have easily been my guitar. "Careful!" I scolded Eva, as I turned the volume dial down from ten to four. "Your bag could have been my guitar!"

"What?" She yelled back, rubbing her right ear with a finger. "Sorry, I can't hear anymore!"

I couldn't help but chuckle at her dramatic reaction. Then, I noticed the notebook that had fallen out of Eva's backpack. It looked exactly like Lysander's. "Did Lysander let you borrow that?" I asked, pointing a finger at the emerald green cover.

Her blue and gold gaze turned to the notebook, and she smirked. "Nope."

I frowned. "Where did you find it?"

"It fell out of his coat pocket, on our way to school and I picked it up. He didn't even notice me fall behind as I grabbed it, so I decided to wait for him to ask for it back. And he hasn't. So I still have it." She strummed the strings of my guitar, then gently turned the amp's volume up to seven.

"That's because he didn't notice until school got out. He had me running around everywhere with him, looking for that damned thing."

"Huh." She mused. "You could have just asked if I knew anything about it."

"Because it was so obvious that you had it." I grumbled. Eva began playing a familiar song, her eyes were closed. She looked so peaceful. I struggled, trying to figure out what song she was playing. My phone vibrated in my pocket, breaking me away from the music. Lysander had texted asking what I did with his cousin. With a roll of my eyes, I picked the notebook up, held it out in front of me and snapped a picture that showed the notebook, and Eva playing my guitar. The text that I sent afterward read: both are safe and well. My attention immediately turned back to Eva, who was still immersed in the music. Her fingers jumped from chord to chord with sheer perfection. "What song?" I asked, finally becoming annoyed because I couldn't think of the song's title.

Eva dropped the guitar pick and opened her eyes, wide-silently asking: are you fucking kidding me? I just offered her a small shrug. "Think Kansas." She said, the shock slowly melting off of her face, and played the main melody. I was still at a loss, and offered another small shrug. "Just about any season finale for Supernatural." I shook my head. She strummed the strings in her frustration and threw her hands in the air. "Are you fucking kidding me, right now, Castiel?" She asked, her red eyebrows knitted themselves together, then she rolled her captivating eyes at me and began singing the lyrics: "Carry on my wayward son; There'll be peace when you are done; Lay your weary head to rest; Don't you cry no more…" She played the following solo with perfection, and continued playing the guitar as the piano's part. At this exact point, it would take an idiot to not recognize the song. Carry on my Wayward Son by Kansas was one of my mom's favorites. Eva's voice seemed to wrap me up in it. I haven't heard a female's voice so strong, pretty and pure all at the same time. And how she played…perfectly. I almost felt envious. "Once I rose above the noise and confusion; Just to get a glimpse beyond this illusion; I was soaring ever higher; But I flew too high; Though my eyes could see I still was a blind man; Though my mind could think I still was a mad man; I hear the voices when I'm dreaming; I can hear them say; Carry on my wayward son; There'll be peace when you are done; Lay your weary head to rest; Don't you cry no more;" Then she stopped. I opened my eyes to find her staring at me. She giggled as she covered her gold eye back up with her bangs. "Like what you hear, sir?"

"Yeah." I mumbled, still in my musical daze. Eva giggled, and my cheeks warmed up. "It seems that singing runs in your family."

"What do you mean?"

"Lysander sings in my band."

"Oh! Well that's great!" Her smile quickly faded to a soft frown. "I…had a band, back home. Night Reign. We were actually becoming pretty popular."

"Why did your group break up?"

Eva raised an eyebrow. "My parent's died." She stated with a strum of the guitar's strings. "Before we left, my parents deactivated my phone, and social media accounts, so I haven't been able to contact them since I left. For all they know, we took a vacation and just haven't come back. We're supposed to have our first big show this week. But…I'm not there. And it would take at least a month for even a talented guitarist to learn the solos that I wrote."

She began playing a solo that I've never heard before. I assumed that it was her original. It required some seriously quick finger-picking. I was beginning to feel jealous-I haven't even come close to mastering finger-picking. "How long have you played for?"

As she thought, she tapped her lower lip with a finger and hummed. "Since I was about four, I'd say. My dad taught me Carry on my Wayward Son, and since then, I was hooked. Like a tweeker on crystal meth. Someone is full of questions, now."

"Well, this is interesting." I said with a shrug. "Now that I think about it…you said that your band's name was Night Reign?" Eva nodded and gave my high E string a strum before going back to her ridiculously fast finger-picking. "I think I've heard of your band before."

"For real?" she exclaimed, excitement began dancing through her dark blue eye, and her fingers didn't miss a single note. "I didn't think our music got out of Cali. Let alone this far! How did you hear about us?"

I frowned. "My ex showed me your band. She always talked about how she 'personally knew the most bad ass cover bands of this century'. Honestly, I didn't believe that she knew you guys until she pointed each of you out in four different yearbooks. You looked goofy in seventh grade, by the way. I can't believe I didn't recognize you when we first met. Then again I listen to music, not look at people. Always wanted to hear an original, though."

"Not my fault I looked goofy, back then. My dentist made me have braces, because my teeth were apparently too crooked to live. And that was my…awkward time. If you catch my drift." Eva's cheeks reddened and she turned her face down to focus on her playing. "Did this ex have a name?"

"I don't say her name." I replied, drily. "I mean, she did say that she was one of your best friends so-"

Eva turned her face back up to mine, almost angrily. "None of my best friends moved away." She growled.

"Well…you can't just guess her name?" I shot back.

"Do you know how many crazy bitches go to my old school? A lot! Do you know how many moved? A lot more! Just tell me her name!"

"No!"
"I will give you a titty twister so hard that your nipples will bleed into next Friday!"

"I'll do it right back! It's been five minutes, by the way. I want my guitar back." I scowled and crossed my arms. Why Eva was becoming so infuriated about talking about my ex confused me. Then again, girls were confusing in every single way, shape and form.

Eva strummed the strings seven times, blue eye glaring right into my soul. Then, she slid her fingers up and down the frets, while plucking one string at a time. The sound that came out of the amp sounded like she had made my guitar sing "fuck you, Castiel". Her lips slowly spread into a cocky smile. "Just tell me who she is. I can make a guitar say just about anything. So, unless you want to be insulted by your baby, do what I fucking tell you!"

Her smile was so innocent, with perfectly straightened white teeth. It seemed wrong of her to threaten me with that smile. I crossed my arms over my chest, and for a few moments we glared at each other. "Candy." Just saying her name made me want to throw up.

The smile dropped to a frown in less than a second, her nostrils flared as she drew in multiple deep breaths. Eva gently placed my guitar on the bed and began angrily pacing. Her hands were shaking as she wrung them together, and rage seeped from each pore on her body. "You're saying that that…BITCH was claiming to be one of MY best friends?" she was yelling, not at me, but yelling in general. I did it a lot, myself, when I got worked up. One lone tear dropped from her blue eye, which was quickly wiped away.

In her anger, Eva took her leather jacket off and whipped it across the room. "Hey, no need for the violent stripping. We do sexy stripping in my room."

"You'd like to see that." Eva scowled, gathering her long, waist length hair up in both hands. "I can't wear that thing right now. It's too hot in here."

"You're just hot."

Her scowl turned into something much more menacing in the matter of a couple of seconds. "Are you trying to be funny? Okay, this isn't something that you should try being funny about, Castiel!" she yelled.

"I wasn't trying…" I sighed and defensively put my hands in front of me-with my limited knowledge of women, I knew that it did no good to argue, or make them laugh, while they were angry. "I didn't mean it like that, for one. And for two, I know nothing about what the something is, so don't bite my head off! That…unpleasant person only ever said good things about you, so I don't see what you're so damned worked up over."

"She's the one that MY ex cheated on me with! Not just once, either. Oh, no! From the very fucking beginning until I ended the relationship ten months ago! Every single break that he and I took, was because of HER! Every single fight that he and I had, that ended up with me bleeding was because of HER! And she told you that she was one of my best friends? She was NEVER my friend! And then she moved away, because I beat her ass in her front yard-right in front of her own mother, who just stood by watching, because she knew what was going on! Then they moved, apparently here! Where she met you, probably gave you nasty diseases because of how much of a slut she is! And because she moved, my ex decided to go crazy which led to-"

"STOP!" I yelled, as tears began to flood down her cheeks. I really couldn't stand watching her torment herself. "If it makes you feel any better, she played me for a fucking fool, too! She told me that she was a virgin-which was why we couldn't have sex-but cheated on me with this Austrialian beach boy named Dake. You wanna know what she said when Alexy found out and told me? You just aren't man enough, Castiel. Okay, this shit JUST happened a month before you got here. You don't see me bawling like a little baby over it! Get your shit together, Eva! You had plenty of opportunities to get out of that relationship, from what you've told me. But you kept going back! If that piece of shit hit you and cheated on you, why did you keep going back? Were you just stupid?"

The tears stopped flowing down her cheeks. She glared at me, as if she hated me, and I instantly regretted saying a single word. "You're a fucking asshole, you know that." She said as steadily as she could. Eva drew in a deep, long breath, then exhaled. "I guess you aren't wrong though. You know, you aren't the only person that's said something like that to me. I just loved him so much, and I couldn't just…not be with him. When he wasn't hurting me…he really was a great guy…and I couldn't have found anyone else…"

"He made you think that."

"It's true, though. Ten months later, I'm still single and crying like a baby."

I tried my best to raise an eyebrow at her, which I was rewarded with a miniscule chuckle from her. "So that's you and Lysander's thing. But honestly, you gained more than what you lost from walking away from that relationship."

"What could I have gained? I didn't gain anything."
"Well, for one, you aren't being beaten across the head with a glass bottle. Two, you aren't being cheated on. Three, you don't have some guy telling you that you aren't worth anything, and can't find anyone else. Do I need to keep going?"

"I got cheated on because I didn't give him my virginity, he hit me because I confronted him about cheating on me! And I'm not worth anything, and I can't find anyone else!"

"You're like a brick wall! I got cheated on because I took no for an answer. But any man who doesn't take no for an answer, and any man who hits his girlfriend for confronting him about something that he was doing doesn't deserve to call himself a man at all. Pull your head out of your ass and get over it Eva. You're a very attractive girl. Attractive is an understatement, actually. I for one would love to get my hands on you but-"

"But what?" She crossed her arms on her chest, underneath her breasts, which made the cleavage that much more noticeable.

"I'm not going there."

"I'm too damaged, right? I have too many problems, too many scars, too many mood swings, too much belly fat, too much-"

"It isn't that at all. I don't care about that stuff. You're my best friend's cousin, and frankly the fact that you're a virgin kinda freaks me out."

Eva narrowed her eyes. "Why is that a problem?"

"I…I don't know. I've never been with a virgin-I mean the only girl that I've ever fucked turned out to be a slut. And the idea of hurting someone, you especially, doesn't seem very fun."

"I wasn't meaning that." She said through gritted teeth. "Why does my being related to Lysander prove to be a problem to you?"

"If we did things, he would be pissed. If things with us didn't work, he would be pissed! It isn't anything against you, I just don't want to ruin a friendship with one of the best friends that I've ever had. And aside from that, when the two of you stand beside each other, the resemblance is uncanny…"

For a moment, it looked like she was considering saying something back. If she had anything else to say she changed her mind. Eva picked her jacket up off of the floor and cradled it in her arms, like she would a child. With a sigh, she moved her bangs back out of her face to show her golden colored eye. "My genetics aren't my fault, Cas. My last name isn't my fault either. If my mom had decided to stick to tradition and give me years of torment for having the last name: Hooker, would that have made you feel better about it?"

"Not one bit." I struggled to stifle a giggle that was absolutely desperate to escape.

"May I have my notebook, please?" Lysander's voice said from behind me. When I turned to him, Demon pushed past his legs to sit on Eva's feet. I couldn't tell if he was angry-from possibly over hearing me and Eva, or just in a normal state of Lysanderness. His eyebrow was raised, arms crossed, and he almost seemed to have an agitated aura emitting from him. As I handed the notebook to him, Eva put her jacket back on and sat on my bed.

"Did you know that Eva is in a band?" I asked, hoping to take my mind off of what he had possibly heard.

"No, I did not." He replied, still looking just as agitated.

"You remember the band that She-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named made us listen to, after she found out about us having a band, right?"

A small smile twitched on my best friend's face. "Oh, really? Your cover for What Have You Done, by Within Temptation was wonderful."

"Thanks! My personal favorite is B.Y.O.B. by System of a Down. A few months ago, the school's film club voted for us to be their project, and let us make an actual semi-professional music video for it. It was so much fun!"

Without a thought, I thrust my phone into Eva's small hands. "Find it. System of a Down is awesome. If it sucks though-"

"Did I suck at playing your guitar?" She asked, eyebrow raised curiously. She poked around on the screen for a few minutes before handing the phone back to me.

What I saw was exactly like the original video. Until the band was shown. Eva played lead guitar and sang Daron Malakian's vocals. A girl with waist length hair that started black at the roots for about half a foot until it hit platinum blonde for the tips sung Serj Tankian's lead vocals. When the camera did a side shot, it looked like the girl was at least seven months pregnant. There were two guys in the band: one had his light brown hair cut in the typical military crew cut, the other looked like an exact copy of John Dolmayan-his long, black hair pulled back in a ponytail, and his facial hair was groomed into a perfect goatee. When the video ended, I was completely floored. The music and vocals were flawless, and the video itself was pretty much an amazing tribute to the best band of the nineties. "I must say, I am impressed." Lysander stated. "How many performances have you guys done?"

Eva blushed, and Demon hopped up onto my bed and laid his head and paws across her legs. "I lost count after thirty." Eva giggled. My eyes widened-along with Lysander's-she'd played in more shows than her cousin. "We should get our bands together to play a show, someday!"

Lysander smiled down at his cousin. "That would be fantastic."

"Can I call them, right now?" she asked, running a hand through Demon's black fur. He offered a contented groan in response. Excitement began playing around in her blue eye again, it almost brought a smile to my face. Almost.

"Of course." Lysander said, happily handing his phone over to her.