Disclaimer: I don't own Victorious. Or anything else you might recognize.
Chapter 12
You're doing something
underneath my skin
I never meant to
let you so far in
"You've been here for four days now," Andre told Jade, who looked up from her iPad screen to look at him. Tori looked up from the tests she was grading, curious to the interruption by Andre. They've been sitting around the living room for the past hour just involved in their own thing.
"Yeah, so?" Jade questioned.
"Well, I wanted to know when you were going to spend time with me?" Andre asked.
Jade groaned. Tori snickered as she placed down her red pen on the stack of papers. She knew this conversation would be very entertaining.
"I spend time with you," Jade informed Andre. "I'm spending time with you right now."
"No, you spend time with Tori and me," Andre stated. "You spend time with Tori but you don't spend time with just me. Why?"
"I've spent alone time with you in this apartment," Jade said.
"That's not what I meant," he told her. "You went out for dinner with Tori on Monday night, then yesterday you guys had dinner and you saw Wicked afterwards. Today you two didn't go out because she has a lot of papers to grade but I offered to take you out but you said no. Why?"
"Andre," Tori began but was interrupted by Jade. "Don't Tori," Jade warned her. "This is between Harris and me, you know why I don't want to go out with you? Because you are the main reason I'm even in this city. I'm here to spend time with her," she pointed at Tori, who froze as both set of eyes land on her. "I told you I was here for her."
"Yeah, I know we discussed this before but I'm still your friend. You can't just decide to spend all your time with her and not with me," he said.
Jade scoffed. "I can try," she told him. "I'm being a selective bitchy friend. Why are you so moody for? If you want to go out, go find your precious little Alana. Let her comfort you."
Andre stiffened at the mention of Alana's name. Tori looked between the two and sighed.
"Jade, you should spend some time with him," Tori encouraged walking over to sit down next to her friend. "I mean the night is still young and well I have a lot of papers to grade. I don't think you should spend a night in just because of little old me. Please go, it'll make me feel so much better if you went out to do something with him."
"Are you sure?" Jade asked, unsure of Tori's intentions. She narrowed her eyes at the brunette girl, trying to get a read on her.
"I'm really sure," Tori smiled, hoping that it would be convincing enough to get Jade out of the apartment. "Go."
"Fine," Jade said. "Give me twenty minutes to change into something decent," she told Andre before exiting the room.
Andre shook his head and smiled at Tori. "You're welcome," she told him before getting up to go back to her original seating spot.
"Thanks," he said. "She's a tough cookie to crack."
"Indeed she is," Tori agreed before she began to grade the tests once more. "Do you know where you are going to take her?"
"We haven't eaten dinner yet so I was thinking maybe Zio," Her eyes widened, Zio was one of her favorite spots to eat in the city. "Then maybe go uptown to the bar for drinks. To just talk."
"She'll like that," she responded. He didn't say anything after that and she just continued to grade her papers, trying to fight the urge to ask to come along. She would love to eat at Zio's again and plus she was actually really hungry.
"I don't mean to shut you out," Andre said, interrupting the silence. Tori looked up at him confused. "With asking for some alone time with her. I love spending time with you but I want to see if I can talk things out with her."
"And getting her inebriated would make things easier," she said. "I get it."
"I promise, tomorrow all three of us will go out to dinner," he told her and she nodded with a small smile playing at her lips.
Realizing she couldn't ignore her growling stomach, she got off the couch and walked towards the kitchen wanting to get something to eat. She could feel his eyes on her as she walked.
Although she was hungry, she knew her stomach wouldn't be able to handle anything too heavy so she decided on soda crackers. She grabbed a pack of crackers and a bottle of water from the fridge.
"Where is Alana tonight?" she questioned walking back out to living room.
"Yes, where is the wench?" Jade asked as she walked out of Tori's room back into the living room.
"Jade!" Tori scolded Jade as she took a seat on the couch. She tried to hide the proud smirk on her face but she knew it was futile.
"It's the truth," Jade explained. "She's a wench."
"You look good," Tori admired as Jade slipped on her leather jacket. Jade's outfit was simple but yet sexy enough for a night out. A black lace top, dark wash jeans, and a pair of knee-high black leather boots.
"Thanks," Jade said smiling at her friend then turning to face Andre. "So where's the wench tonight?"
He rolled his eyes. "Out with friends," he answered.
"Is that what you are eating?" Jade questioned Tori as she watched the girl take a cracker out the pack.
"Yeah," Tori took a bite of the cracker and smiled.
"I'll order you a pizza," Andre informed her as he took his phone out.
"No!" Tori protested, both Jade and Andre looked at her questioningly. "I'm fine."
"You are not," Jade narrowed her eyes as she stared at Tori. "Order that pizza Harris," Jade instructed as she walked over to Tori.
"Already doing so," he informed them as he continued to press randomly on the screen. "Pepperoni and green peppers, right?"
"No," Tori exclaimed. "I don't want that."
"That's good," Jade said, ignoring Tori's protesting and so did Andre as he continued ordering the pizza on the phone app.
"You two are annoying," Tori stated, she crossed her arms over chest and pouted as Jade neared her.
"It's just pizza Vega," Jade bent down a bit to be at her eye level. "Can you promise me you'll eat at least two of those slices when that pizza arrives?"
"It's being prepared," Andre stated looking up with a satisfied smile on his face.
"No," Tori grumbled.
"No?" Jade questioned, her eyes narrowing.
"No," Tori instinctively moved back in her seat, burrowing herself a bit further into the couch.
"Fine," Jade calmly stated surprising both Tori and Andre. "Harris and I will be leaving now. You eat if you want to or not, that could be my lunch tomorrow."
Tori stared at her wide-eyed. "Okay."
Jade smiled then look back Andre. "Let's go Harris, I'm hungry."
"Okay," Andre said standing up and grabbing his keys off the coffee table. "I ordered with your card Tor so the delivery guy will probably ask to see that."
"Okay," Tori said, as Jade straightened and took a step away from her. "Have fun."
"We will," Jade told her as she walked towards the apartment door. "Don't stay up too late."
"I won't," Tori informed her.
"Bye Tor," Andre said before he waved goodbye and followed Jade to the door.
"Good evening," The host greeted the pair as they entered the establishment. "Welcome to Zio. Do you have reservations?"
"Hi, yes table for Harris," Andre informed him. The host looked through the list on his iPad and smiled when he found what he was looking for.
"Yes, Andre Harris" The host looked over to his right. "Your table is ready, if you'll follow me."
"How did you get reservations?" Jade asked as they followed the guy to their table. "We just planned this less than an hour ago."
"Well I'm grateful for being able to make reservations online," Andre said.
"Me too, I'm starved," Jade smiled as they reached the table. The host pulled out Jade's chair before placing three menus on the table.
"Your other guest?" The host questioned.
"Not here yet," Andre informed and Jade looked over at him confused.
"Very well," The host smiled. "Your waiter will be with you shortly."
With that the host walked over and Andre looked over at Jade who openly glared at him. "Other guest?"
Andre cleared his throat. "Yeah."
"Didn't you say you wanted some alone time? And now you invited someone to join us?" Jade hissed.
"I know, I know what I said but I couldn't deny this person to come along," Andre informed Jade who just scowled at him before picking up her menu.
"Just tell me it's not Alana," she grunted.
He didn't respond and she looked up at him fuming. "You've got to be fucking kidding me," she yelled out, attracting the attention of the nearby patrons.
"Excuse her," Andre stated before glaring at Jade. "Keep your voice down."
"I told you I would only have dinner with her if and only when Tori agreed to do the same," Jade snapped at him, lowering her voice not wanting to cause too much of a scene.
Andre nodded. "I know, I'm sorry. She texted me after her plans fell through with her friends, she wanted to see if I wanted to go out and I told her I was going out with you to eat. So she asked if she could come along and eat with us. She got really excited knowing she has a chance to finally meet you for the first time that I couldn't deny her that."
"Why would she be excited to meet me?" Her eyebrows furrowed. "She should be terrified to meet me. I haven't met her and I already dislike her."
"Well," Andre drawled out.
"Oh!" Jade scowled at him. "You didn't tell her. You didn't tell her that Tori's my best friend and that I don't want to even meet her ever because she's the cause of my two best friends not getting together."
"Yup, pretty much," he said. "It didn't come up."
Jade scoffed. "Bastard."
"Just play nice," Andre pleaded. "Dinner tonight is my treat of course and I'll even lend you my card so you can go shopping with Tori this weekend so you can buy yourself something nice."
Jade's scowl turned to a pout, as she thought over his proposal. "No," she stated, he raised a brow. "This Saturday Tori and I will be going to spa, you'll pay for that and then we are going shopping you are paying for all the things we buy. Okay?"
He sighed. "Fine," he agreed, knowing there was no other way to get Jade to agree. "You have to be nice, don't make any snide comments about her or our relationship."
"Okay," she smirked. "Like I stated before I'm starved. Will we have to wait long for her?"
"She texted me saying she's on her way," he said.
"Good," she looked over her menu. "Next time I'm going to keep close tabs on you and your texting, you planned an unwanted meeting without me noticing."
He looked over his own menu but he knew what he wanted to get. "So many choices, I don't know what to get," Jade said, looking up at him.
"Tori likes a lot of dishes here but she usually likes ordering the Tagliolini," Andre informed her. "Try that, you'll like it."
"Wait, you and Tori come to this restaurant a lot?" Jade questioned closing her menu.
"Not often but this is one of her favorite spots," he replied, closing his own menu.
"You bastard," Jade sneered. "This is her restaurant and you have me meeting her enemy here."
"Alana is not her enemy," he informed her and she just rolled her eyes in response.
"Alana's not her enemy," she mimicked. "Ugh, why are you so dense? Who are you in a relationship with? Alana. Who loves you and wants you? Tori. So Alana is her enemy."
"It's not that serious," he said, wondering where the waiter was.
"It will be when I tell her that I basically slept with the enemy," Jade grumbled.
"What's so wrong with having dinner with your friends girlfriend?" he asked, confused.
"You know what's wrong with it," Jade exclaimed. "We talked about this. I should just leave, you two enjoy dinner. I'll go back and share that pizza with Tori."
"Jade don't," he grabbed her hand as she stood up.
"Hi," Alana said approaching the table, eyeing the situation before her. "Is everything alright?"
"Yes," Andre quickly let go of Jade's hand and stood up to greet Alana. He placed a kiss on her cheek and then pulled out her chair. "Glad you could make it."
Alana didn't take the seat and looked at Jade who didn't move, just stoically stared at the blonde. "You must be Jade," she held her hand out to Jade. "It's nice to finally meet you," Alana added, Jade looked down at her hand and reluctantly shook it.
"Yes, I'm sure," she answered before Andre sent her a warning look. "It's nice to meet you too," she added, trying to muster up some fake up kindness, trying to channel her inner Tori as best as she could.
Alana smiled as all three took their seats. "I've heard some great things about you," Alana told her. "I've seen a few of your movies too, some of them really spooked me."
"Good," Jade wickedly smirked at Alana. "That means I did my job."
"Yeah," Alana stated then looked over Andre. "Thanks for letting me join you guys."
"It's no problem," he said, his hand reaching out to grab hers across the table. "Jade was curious about you, so I'm glad you two get to finally sit down and have a chat."
Jade chuckled. "Yeah, curious," she said, eyeing the couples intertwined hands.
Alana looked down at the menu. "Did the waiter come to the table yet?" she asked.
"No," Jade said, looking around to see if she spotted someone. "I need a drink, he or she better get here soon."
"Me too," Alana stated. "Should we order a wine bottle for the table?"
"That sounds good to me," Andre looked over at Jade. "Good for you?"
"Yeah, sure, whatever," Jade said, Alana smiled at Jade before looking down at the menu.
Jade glared at Alana and Andre nudged her. "Stop it," he whispered.
"Fine," she took out her phone.
"What are you doing?" he asked, pulling his hand away from Alana's and drawing Alana's attention away from her menu to Jade.
"I'm going to text Tori," Jade informed him not looking up from her phone. "I want to see how she is and if she ate at least a slice of that pizza."
"She's not a little kid Jade," he said as Alana looked him questioningly. "If she wants to eat, she'll eat."
"Well I care for her well-being," Jade said, swyping at her screen. "She's been real picky about what she eats lately. Barely touching food, she keeps saying she's not really hungry. I practically had to force feed her meals the past few days. Not that you would know."
"What?" he asked, shocked by the revelation. But before he could question Jade further about this development, their waiter had finally arrived at their table.
"Hi guys, sorry for the wait," the waiter greeted them. "I'm Jace and I'll be your waiter this evening. Do you guys still need time to order or have you already decided?"
"We've decided," Alana said, looking around the table hoping she didn't overstep by speaking out. "I'll have the Filetto."
"How would you like that?" Jace questioned, as he jotted down the order on his notepad.
"Well done," Alana said, handing Jace her menu.
"For you miss?" Jace said looking over at Jade.
Jade handed Jace her menu. "I'll have the Tagliolini," she told him.
"Very well," Jace wrote down Jade's request. "For you sir?"
"I'll have the Agnello," he said handing Jace his menu. "Medium rare," he added.
"Alright and for drinks?" Jace questioned.
"We'll have a bottle for the table," Alana said. "Your Pinot Noir, Abaco."
"Good choice," Jace stated. "I'll go put your orders in and I'll be back with your bottle shortly. Anything else you'll like to request?"
Everyone shook their heads and Jace left with a nod.
Alana turned to face Jade. "Now, what were you saying earlier about Tori. About her not eating so much?" The blonde asked, concerned.
Jade was taken aback by Alana's caring tone. "She's just being really selective for some reason," Jade informed the duo. "If she'll eat it'll be something really light, like earlier she wanted to soda crackers for dinner. Last night, I shared my steak with her cause all she ordered was a salad and that just looked pitiful cause she barely touched it and drank lots of water, so I force-fed her a few pieces."
Alana looked towards Andre then back at Jade, worriedly biting on her bottom lip. "You don't think, she's not eating like before cause she's heartbroken right?" Alana curiously asked.
"Vega, isn't so stupid," Jade scoffed.
"Yeah, don't worry about Tori babe," Andre said, reaching out to grab hold of Alana's hand that rested on the table. "She's not that type of person."
"Well," Jade drawled out and Alana looked over at Jade. "Well what?" Alana questioned.
"You know when you think you know someone and then you learn something about them that surprises you," Jade said and Alana nodded. "Well who knows what Tori's capable of."
"Starving herself is not of those things," Andre stated, wanting to steer the conversation away from Tori.
"Well you don't know that," Alana said. "I mean Jade has a point. You have no idea what is going through her mind, what she is capable of doing."
"Did she respond back?" Andre asked Jade, who just shook her head. "I'll be right back," Jade said standing up. "I'm going to try calling her, if you don't mind."
"Not at all," Alana encouraged. "Go right ahead."
Jade tried to suppress the smile that tugged at the corner of her lips but Andre caught sight of it before her face became stoic once more.
They watched as Jade walked towards the front of the restaurant. "Aren't you worried?" Alana asked him.
He looked over at his girlfriend. "A bit," he admitted. "I mean I didn't notice the difference in Tori's behavior but she's been spending so much time with Jade so how could I?"
"Don't blame yourself," Alana gave him an encouraging smile. "It's probably just nothing, Tori's stomach might just be feeling funny because of everything. You'll see she'll be back to normal soon."
"I hope so," he smiled at Alana who mirrored his with her own smile.
"Do you think she likes me?" Alana asked.
"Who?" he questioned.
"Jade," she said nodding towards the direction of where Jade was.
"To be truthful, I don't think you'll get there yet," Andre responded.
"I knew it," Alana nodded. "Tori and you are her close friends so of course she wouldn't like me if you being with me kind of hurts Tori."
He nodded. "Tori hurts herself most of the time, so don't blame yourself too much okay?"
"Yeah," she said.
"Though I must say that as concerned as you are with Tori's well-being you scored some brownie points with Jade," he told her. "Tori is Jade's best friend, I mean we all are best friends but Tori holds a very special spot in Jade's heart like none of us can."
She beamed at that. "Well that's good," she said. "I mean I am worried about Tori and I hope I do get to meet her soon. I know we won't be best friends or anything like that but I want to get to know her. She's important to you and well I would love to know why."
"I knew you were amazing but wow babe, you just amazed me even more," he leaned forward and she smiled leaning forward as well. "I'm glad you are in my life."
"I'm glad to be in your life as well," she said before closing the space between them and kissed him.
"Well aren't you two a loving couple," Jade remarked as she took her seat. Andre and Alana jumped apart startled by Jade's appearance at the table.
"What did Tori say?" Alana asked before Andre could.
"She's fine," Jade answered dismissively. "She's eating right now."
"Good," Andre stated and Alana nodded, approvingly.
A server arrived with their bottle and poured the wine into the empty wine glasses on the table. He waited for the trio to taste their wine and after they hummed their approvals, he left the bottle on the table and left.
"So Jade before you leave on Tuesday, I wanted all of us to eat dinner together this weekend," Andre said, placing his glass on the table.
Jade looked at him than at her wine glass, rolling her eyes. She took a big gulp of her wine and chuckled. "Cause that won't be disastrous," she told him then looked up at Alana. "You seem cool but I hope you aren't naïve to this whole situation."
"I'm well-informed of Tori's feelings," Alana reported.
"Good," Jade said, placing her glass on the table. "So you are just stupid."
"Jade!" Andre admonished.
"Let her speak her mind Andre," Alana stated and Jade smirked at her.
Jade rolled her eyes. "I wouldn't listen to him anyway. Now you must be a fool to enter this knowing what he feels and what she feels."
"I'm not a fool," Alana smirked. "I know what's going, I know what happened and what didn't happened between the two. But you know what? There is a reason why he picked me over her."
Andre groaned then took a big gulp of his drink, regretting even thinking this dinner could be civilized. "What's the reason according to you?" Jade asked.
"I'm not her," Alana stated.
"So what's that suppose to mean?" Jade questioned. "You think you are better than her?"
"No!" Alana exclaimed. "That's not what I meant. I don't think that. I'm just a breath of fresh air for him. Different."
Jade glared at her. "What are you trying to say about Tori?"
"Nothing!" Alana nervously responded. "I didn't mean anything by it. I'm in a relationship with Andre because he likes me, I'm not stupid, I know he loves her but I really like him. I just want him to be happy. I want to make him happy and I think I'm doing that by being with him."
"You are," he said and Alana smiled at those words.
"Make him unhappy and I'll take a flight out here to beat your ass," Jade threatened an wide-eyed Alana.
Andre gave Jade a disapproving look. "She doesn't mean that," he said.
"No she definitely does," Alana chuckled. "I'm fine with it though, that just means she's that good of a friend. I know it'll take some time but I hope one day we can be friends."
Before Jade could respond Andre gave her a warning look, hoping it was enough that it could control Jade's mouth. He knew though she was being a bit rude to Alana, he knew she could be much worse than she was at the moment.
Alana eagerly awaited Jade's response, Andre just hoped Jade wouldn't be too harsh with the no he knew that would be her response. Jade rolled her eye before finishing off her glass of wine."Maybe," Jade conceded. Alana squealed but stopped herself after Jade glared at her.
Andre smiled at Jade, knowing that a maybe was a big deal in Jade's world. Alana had a lot to work on if she wanted to get into Jade's good graces but it could happen.
"So what do you do for a living Alana?" Jade questioned.
Alana smiled as she began to explain her job and that turned into a conversation about their favorite books over dinner. As much as Jade didn't want to he noticed that she smiled a lot throughout the dinner and Alana was the cause of that smile. As they ate their meals the two girls talked about books, movies, their favorite bands. The two woman had a lot in common and he could tell that Jade disliked that as much as she liked it.
After making sure that Alana got into her own cab, Andre and Jade got a cab of their own.
"So?" he asked as Jade looked out the window of the cab.
"So what?" she snapped, turning to face him.
The look in her eyes surprised him, anger and guilt. "Did you like her?" he asked, worried.
"I did," she sighed. "I wasn't suppose to like her."
"I know," he knew that feeling. "I wasn't suppose to like her either."
"But it just happened," Jade guiltily admitted. "As we continued talking she just kept the conversation going, she was just kind, inviting, we had so much in common and now I feel like crap."
"Because you liked spending time with her?" he inquired.
"Yeah, it'll hurt Tori to know that we ate at Zio's, that I met your girlfriend and that I actually liked her," Jade sighed. "I actually liked talking to her, I wasn't suppose to like her."
"I know," he repeated once more and neither of them said anything else for the rest of the ride home.
They arrived back at the apartment a quarter after ten. Tori's papers were scattered all over the coffee table, a mostly full pizza box sat on the couch but no Tori in sight.
"Tori!" Jade called out as she shrugged off her jacket, lazily tossing it onto the couch. "She can't be sleeping right now."
"Tomorrow is a school day," Andre said closing the apartment door.
"Yeah but we are talking about a girl who has to take prescription pills to fall asleep," she told him as she walked towards Tori's closed bedroom door.
She opened the door and saw Tori laying down on the bed, eyes open staring at the ceiling. "Didn't you hear me calling for you?" Jade asked.
"Yeah," Tori whispered before closing her eyes.
"What's going on?" Jade asked walking further into the room.
"Nothing," Tori responded. "Just tired."
"Hey," Andre said walking into the room. "She sleeping?"
"No, just tired though apparently," Jade said casting a worried glance towards Tori. "I'm going to change into my pajamas and go to sleep myself. We'll just see you in the morning."
"Yeah, that's good," Andre nodded, worriedly looking at Tori. "If you guys need anything don't hesitate."
He left the room, closing the door behind him.
"Do you need anything?" Jade asked, grabbing her pajamas off the bed.
"No," Tori opened her eyes once again. "I kind of just feel out of it. Sleep will do me some good."
"Okay, so let me brush my teeth and get changed so we can sleep," Jade said walking into the bathroom.
"Alright," Tori softly replied.
A few minutes later Jade walked out of the bathroom to find Tori sitting up in bed. She hugged her legs to close to her chest and her head rested on her knees, eyes close. "You okay there Vega?" she asked as she turned off the light and then moved around the bed to her side.
Tori turned to face her. "Yeah, how was dinner?" Tori asked. "Where did you go?"
"Zio," Jade responded, slipping under the bed cover. "I had the Tagliolini, heard it was one of your favorites."
"It is," Tori nodded, a small smile appearing on your face. "Did you like it?"
"Yeah I did," Jade reached over and placed a hand on Tori's shoulder.
"Good, I'm glad," Tori said.
Jade soothingly ran her hand up and down Tori's back. "About tonight, I wanted to tell you something," Jade began and paused as Tori's eyes fluttered close. "But it can wait for tomorrow, you need sleep."
Tori tried to suppress a yawn but she nodded in agreement. "Yeah, we can talk tomorrow," Tori said moving from her spot to get underneath the covers.
"Goodnight Jade," Tori said before pressing a kiss to her cheek. "Thank you for being such a good friend."
"Night Vega," Jade grunted as Tori pressed herself against her side, seeking the usual comfort Jade offered each night so Jade hugged her close.
A/N: Finally updated, I know took me long enough. So what did you guys think of this chapter? Let me know and leave a review. Take care til next time guys.