Everything Changes
A/N: Thank you for all of the positive feedback and reviews! I am really excited to get this story off the ground and will hopefully be updating it weekly (if all goes well!) I am also going to start working on my other story, Something New, very soon so if you haven't read it, you still have time to get caught up!
Chapter 2
Gabriella opened her eyes, which were instantly blinded by the sunlight streaming through her balcony doors. She was not ready for another day of work, but thankfully all of her training sessions had been completed the day prior. Reaching over to her nightstand, Gabriella picked up her phone to check the time: 6:30am. She also had a text message from Danny, but refrained from opening it until she was at least semi-conscious and prepared for whatever he had to say. Swinging her legs over the side of her bed, Gabriella placed her feet firmly on the floor and took a deep breath. It was going to be another long day.
Thankfully, Gabriella had washed her hair the night before, which meant that all she had to do this morning was provide a little touch up her natural curls. She absent-mindedly trudged to the bathroom and began to heat up her curling wand. It was too early in the morning to do anything significant with her hair, which prompted Gabriella to stick with a simple look. She usually cared about how her hair looked, but she was just not feeling it today.
Now, a little bit more conscious than she was before, Gabriella walked back to her bed and started to fix her duvet and pillows, which had been tossed around her room in her efforts to get into bed the previous night. Suddenly, Gabriella remembered that she had a text message from Danny. Taking another deep breath, Gabriella opened the message. It read-
"Gab, come over after you get out of work. I want you to make me brownies."
"Phew," Gabriella sighed as she responded to Danny's message; it was not as bad as she thought it was going to be. All he wanted were brownies, he was not mad that she ignored him the night before; honestly, he probably didn't even remember that he had driven to her house and annoyed all of the neighbors as he laid his horn on.
Gabriella shifted her attention away from her phone and the agreement that she had made with Danny to come over after she finished with work for the day, and walked over to her closet to pick out an outfit for the work day. After looking through countless skirts, dresses, tops, and pants, she settled on a simple black skirt, a silky aqua button-up top, a silver statement necklace, and a pair of simple black flats. She tousled her hair around and pinned a small section to the back, making it look like she actually tried to put effort in getting dressed. Shutting her light off, Gabriella began to make her way downstairs. Walking into the irregularly quiet kitchen, Gabriella encountered another note written by her mother.
"Gabi,
I had to go into work early for a meeting, totally slipped my mind! Abuela says hello and that she wants to see you soon. I'll talk to you after you get home from work, we can make dinner together- I was thinking some type of pasta.
Love you,
Mama"
Putting the note down, Gabriella squeezed her eyes shut to hold in the tears that she could feel forming. She wanted to stay home and have dinner with her mom, she really wanted to. Danny was going to be expecting her, and she couldn't cancel on him. Gabriella scribbled a quick note to her mother, telling her that she promised Danny that she would make him brownies after work, which wouldn't make her mother very happy.
Maria Montez was not the biggest supporter of Gabriella and Danny's relationship. She thought that Danny was a slacker and wouldn't amount to anything in life, which essentially prompted Maria to conclude that Danny was not good enough for her little girl. At one moment in time, Maria was happy that Gabriella had finally found a boyfriend and seemed to truly be in love. Now things were different, but different in a way that Gabriella couldn't possibly discuss with her mother.
Clutching her purse a little bit tighter and straightening her posture, Gabriella walked through the elevator doors and out into the law offices of her internship. She had a little cubicle in the corner of the large office, which was situated with a few other cubicles reserved for the interns. She had joked with one of her fellow interns the day before about their being "castaways at intern island" because of how far they were from the heart of the office. They were right next to the bathrooms and the kitchen, which were always positive things.
There were four cubicles within "cubicle island", the three of which had already been filled by Gabriella, a young girl named Izzy, and a young man named Peter. Izzy and Peter had went to college together and were friends, which made Gabriella feel as if she was acting as the third wheel, even after one day of work. There was supposed to be another intern sitting next to Gabriella, but the desk was still empty. Gabriella hoped that the intern backed down at the last minute, which would have allowed her to have a little bit more office space.
Sitting down, Gabriella plugged in her earphones and began to get started on her tasks for the day. She had a list of names and addresses that were to be typed up in an excel document by 10:30am and wanted to get started right away. After picking a song to listen to, Gabriella was suddenly interrupted by a loud crash behind her desk. Ripping her earphones out, Gabriella swung around and was greeted by a young man who had dropped a box of desk supplies all over the floor. The young man had dirty blonde hair and was frantically trying to pick up everything that had spilled out from his box. Rushing out of her seat, Gabriella joined the young man on the ground and began helping him pick up some of the paper clips that were strewn across the small space of "cubicle island."
"You've got quite a lot of stuff here." Gabriella commented as she picked up a large stapler and placed it in his box.
"It's my first day, well, yesterday was supposed to be my first day but I caught some nasty virus, sorry, too much information," the young man babbled as he continued to throw his supplies into the brown cardboard box, "my name is Troy. I think i'm going to be sitting next to you, right here," he said, pointing to the cubicle next to Gabriella.
"Oh, cool!" Gabriella exclaimed, while actually sighing inside at the fact that her cubicle extension would not be happening. "I'm Gabriella. Let me know if you need help with anything."
Troy nodded, picked up the final paper clip on the ground, and darted over to his cubicle. Sitting down, Troy placed his head in his hands and chucked. He made an interesting first impression, that was for sure.
After what felt like days, Gabriella closed her laptop and started towards the kitchen for her lunch break. Troy was still working, which made Gabriella feel a little bit better. She didn't have anything against Troy, but she certainly did not feel like being forced into small talk with a fellow intern that had literally crashed into her life earlier in the morning. Pulling her salad out of the refrigerator, Gabriella took a seat at one of the tables set in the corner of the kitchen. Just as Gabriella began to take a bite of her lunch, she was suddenly interrupted by the ringtone that she knew all too well. Danny was calling her.
Contemplating on whether or not she should answer the phone call, Gabriella began to feel her face slowly turning red. Worst case scenario, Danny was drunk and was calling to ramble about some bullshit that she didn't care about. Taking a deep breath as she pressed the little green button on her phone, Gabriella mentally prepared herself for a conversation that she did not want to have.
"Where are you?!," Danny practically screamed into the phone.
"I'm at work, Dan. What's wrong?"
"You ignored me. Why do you always ignore me? What is wrong with you?"
Feeling her heart beginning to beat faster and faster, Gabriella pushed her salad into the center of the table and placed her clenched fist onto the table. Trying to whisper as she spoke into the phone, Gabriella took another deep breath and replied to Danny's questioning.
"I didn't ignore you Danny, I took a bath last night and must have missed your call. I didn't look at my phone until this morning. I'm sorry."
Practically screaming into the phone, Danny continued with his rant, which soon became almost deafening for Gabriella.
"I do everything for youuuuu- an you do nothing AT ALL."
"Danny, please listen to me. I'm going to come over after work and will make you those brownies like you asked? You sound like you've been drinking-."
"I can driiiinkkk if I WANT tooo," Danny continued, clearly stumbling over his words. It was only noon.
"Please Danny," Gabriella pleaded with her intoxicated boyfriend, "please don't drive anywhere. I'll even make you dinner later, how about spaghetti?" Her voice began to tremble as she forced the words out of her mouth that he expected her to say. "I love you, Dan. Go watch some TV or something until I get there."
"You better love me." Danny hung up the phone, leaving Gabriella hanging on the phone line.
Placing her phone on the table and her head in her hands, Gabriella tried her hardest to maintain her cool. She couldn't start crying here, right now, on her second day of her internship at one of the best law firms in New Mexico. The warm tears began to make their escape from Gabriella's dark brown eyes, but were suddenly interrupted by a new, but soothing voice.
"You alright?" Troy asked cautiously from the other side of the kitchen. He had been standing by the sink throughout the duration of Gabriella's phone call, but didn't really know what to do. By the sounds of it, whoever she was talking to had some issues.
Startled, Gabriella quickly wiped the tears from her cheeks and forced out a smile. "Yeah, i'm great, really fine."
Picking his sandwich up from the counter, Troy began to walk over to Gabriella's table in the corner and placed his water bottle down on the table. "Is it alright if I sit here?"
"Yeah, of course." Gabriella quickly replied as she retrieved her barely eaten salad and put the lid back on its container. She wasn't hungry anymore.
"So," Troy started as he finished chewing a bite from his sandwich, "this place is pretty nice! Do you want to be a lawyer?"
"Yeah," Gabriella said, nodding her head in agreement. "You want to be a lawyer too?"
"Actually, I'm not too sure. I double majored in political science and computer engineering. I'm trying to figure out what my destiny is."
Gabriella laughed as Troy continued to eat his sandwich. "Aren't we all?"
After what felt like five minutes, which had really been an hour, Gabriella and Troy cleaned up their table and began to walk back to their respective cubicles. During their lunch break, they talked about college, their favorite movies, and the best places to eat around town. Troy had just moved to Albuquerque and was still figuring everything out, which amused Gabriella. Their conversation felt so natural, which was something that Gabriella was not used to.
Sitting back down at her desk, Gabriella opened her laptop up and was about to begin working again when she was suddenly interrupted by her new cubicle buddy.
"You sure that you're alright?" Troy asked, peeking his head over the cubicle wall that separated their desks.
"Positive." Gabriella half-lied as she flashed a smile to Troy. She was feeling better after her jovial lunchtime chatter with Troy, but still felt as if she was going to collapse into a puddle of tears with the mere thought of having to go to Danny's apartment after work.
After stopping at the grocery store to pick up some supplies for dinner and for the brownies, Gabriella pulled into the all-too-familiar parking spot in front of Danny's apartment. She was probably the only visitor that he had at his dump of an apartment, considering that he didn't talk to his parents anymore and that his sister refused to bring her kids to spend time with their dopey uncle. Danny didn't have any friends besides the guys that he worked with, which left all the more time for Danny to spend with Gabriella. Composing herself before leaving the car, Gabriella slowly made her way up to the apartment door and knocked three times.
Danny, who looked as if he hadn't shaved in a couple of days, was wearing an old football t-shirt from high school and a pair of gym shorts. His breath smelled of doritos and beer, which was the last thing that Gabriella wanted to smell as she kissed him on the cheek before walking inside.
"So, what'd you get for me?" Danny chuckled as he leaned up against the door after closing it.
"Well," Gabriella started, forcing a smile on her face, "I got your favorite pasta-"
"Ziti." Danny interrupted.
"Yes, with your favorite red sauce. I picked up some ingredients for brownies and got some extra chocolate chips. I know you like those brownies when they're packed with chocolate."
Danny chuckled again, "Well, I guess you should know what I like by now. What, it's been seven years together?"
Nodding and taking a deep breath, Gabriella replied, "Yep, well, it will be seven years in a couple of weeks." How had it already been seven years?
Taking the shopping bags, Gabriella started into the kitchen. At least he seemed to be a little bit more sober than when he called her earlier. In the other room, Danny had turned football on and was probably drinking a beer of some sort. Gabriella didn't like to drink, especially because she saw how it turned people who she thought loved her into monsters with the potential to turn her life upside down.
After putting the brownies into the oven, Gabriella scooped up some of the finished pasta into two bowls and walked into the living room. Danny's apartment looked like a pig sty. There were empty bottles all over the room and dirty work clothes thrown all over the couches, which produced a pungent odor. Gabriella kept her thoughts about the state of Danny's apartment to herself- the last time she tried to urge Danny to clean the apartment up a little ended with a fight and memories that Gabriella wanted to erase.
Cutting the silence, Gabriella began to try and procure some type of small talk out of the nothingness that was present in the living room. "How was your day off, Dan? Did you do anything special."
Danny shook his head, his eyes glued to the TV screen.
As if with perfect timing the kitchen timer finally went off, allowing Gabriella to escape the loud noise of the football game that Danny had been glued to. She grabbed a towel and pulled the brownies out of the oven. Opening the freezer to see if he had any vanilla ice cream, Gabriella was shocked by the emptiness in front of her. Danny's freezer had nothing in it besides a half-empty bottle of vodka. She opened his refrigerator and and once again, was greeted by a startling emptiness, with the only exception to that emptiness being a twelve pack of beer and a few eggs.
"Hey Dan," Gabriella started with caution, "you don't have any food in here? Do you need me to buy you some stuff to eat?"
"Well," Danny sarcastically replied, "it's your fault that I don't have any food. You stopped making me dinner after you started interviewing for your stupid internship."
Fighting back tears, Gabriella shut the door to the refrigerator and turned to start slicing up the brownies. "I'm sorry, Dan."
With a plate of fudge brownies in hand, Gabriella slowly walked back into the living room. Danny turned towards Gabriella and patted the cushion next to him, signaling for Gabriella to come sit next to him. She placed the plate of brownies down on the coffee table and sat next to Danny, where she was immediately wrapped up in a tight, one-armed hug.
Gabriella placed her head on Danny's shoulder and closed her eyes. He was probably going to fall asleep soon, which meant that she would be able to go home soon after. After a couple of seconds, Danny let Gabriella out of the tight bear hug and dove into the brownies, which allowed Gabriella to breathe again. She leaned back on the couch and closed her eyes.
"Why are you so tired? Wake up!" Danny barked at Gabriella as he crammed another brownie into his mouth.
Slowly opening her eyes, Gabriella quietly replied. "I'm tired, Dan. I had a long day at work."
"Well, I had a long day of sitting around here waiting for you to get your ass here to make me these brownies!" Danny complained as he crammed yet another brownie into his mouth.
Gabriella nodded and began to get up, when Danny suddenly yanked her back down onto the couch. "I was going to do the dishes, Dan."
"That can wait." Danny said as he planted a kiss on Gabriella's neck.
"No, really Dan," Gabriella started as she shrugged, trying to stop Danny's actions, "I want to go do the dishes."
"Fine!" Danny yelled as he threw his hands up into the air. "That's fine. Fine. Fine!"
Gabriella stood up and slowly walked into the kitchen. Hopefully Danny would be asleep by the time that she finished cleaning up from their dinner. Taking the dirty bowl in her hands, Gabriella began to run water over the red sauce that covered the inside of the bowl. There weren't too many dishes to do, but Gabriella was prepared to make the dishwashing take as long as humanly possible.
After what was around half an hour, Gabriella put the final bowl back into its designated spot in the cabinet. Slowly walking back into the living room, Gabriella was greeted with the sight that she hoped that she would be seeing. Danny had sprawled out on the couch and was fast asleep. Knowing that she only had a limited amount of time before some loud commercial woke Danny up from his slumber, Gabriella ripped a piece of paper out from a notebook that was laying on the ground and began to write a little note for Danny. It read-
"Danny,
Thank you for such a wonderful night. I'm so lucky to have a boyfriend like you.
Love,
Gabriella"
Gritting her teeth as she signed her name, Gabriella placed the note next to the plate of devoured brownies that used to be on the coffee table, grabbed her purse, ran out the door, and slipped into her car. Before getting the chance to turn the car on Gabriella's heart began to race. She finally allowed the tears that she had been holding in since the morning to escape from her dark brown eyes. Pulling her knees up to her chest, Gabriella wrapped her arms around her legs and placed her head in her lap as she sobbed. How had she let things get like this?
So, how'd you guys like the chapter! What do you think of Danny? Are you excited for Gabriella and Troy to get to know each other? Let me know what you think may happen! Until next time,
~Meg