When Jude walked through her front door at 6:30 in the morning, she wasn't at all surprised to see her dad, Portia, and Sadie sitting on the couch waiting for her. Darius shot up at the sound of the door opening.
"Where the hell have you been?" He asked rushing over to her and pulling her into a hug.
"I went out. I need some time to think about things. I went over to the rehearsal space." So some of it was a lie, but she didn't think he needed to know the rest. She buried her face in his chest and wrapped her arms around him. In the back, Portia and Sadie quietly left the room. Darius could feel a dampness cover his chest.
"Hey, it's okay. Shh. I know. Everything's gonna be okay." He whispered.
"She's gone and it's all my fault." She whispered into his chest. Darius lifted her head up and wiped her tears away.
"It's not your fault and I don't ever want to hear you say that again, you understand me?" Jude nodded and wiped her remaining tears.
"We got into a fight the hour before and I basically told her I hated her."
"She knew you didn't mean it. You guys have been best friends since you were five, she knows you didn't mean it."
"You promise?" Jude whispered. Darius nodded kissed her forehead.
"Go get some sleep. I'll take care of everything." Jude nodded and walked upstairs to her room. Zeus quietly followed her and jumped on her bed as he entered the room. Jude shut the door and laid down on her bed next to her dog. He rested his head on her stomach over her blanket. Jude softly rand her fingers over his head.
"At least I still got you." She whispered before following into a restless slumber.
Jude spent most of the day sleeping. It was dinner time when she was woken up by the smell of something good. She opened her eyes to see and plate of food in front of her and Angelina sitting next to Zeus staring at her.
"I brought you dinner because you didn't come down and I didn't want you to be hungry." She said with a proud smile on her face. Jude smiled and looked down at her plate. There was broccoli, steak, and mash potatoes.
"Who helped you?" Jude whispered rubbing the sleep out of her eyes.
"Miss Liza. She said that you might be hungry so I asked her if I could bring you something. I wanted to bring you a piece of cake, but she said that daddy could get mad. I didn't want you to get in trouble." Jude smiled and kissed her head.
"Thanks Gigi." Jude whispered grabbing the fork and stabbed it into a piece of broccoli, stuffing it into her mouth. She looked over at Gigi, who was petting Zeus with a dreamy look in her eyes.
"He's nice isn't he?" She asked with a smile. Gigi smiled and nodded.
"When did you get him?" She asked looking at Jude. Jude put down her fork and scratched her head.
"It was my fifteenth birthday. Dad got him for me because I had been bugging him with me always saying I wanted a puppy."
"So he got him for you?" Gigi asked with a smile. Jude nodded and picked up her fork, stuffing a fork full of mash into her mouth."
"Jude, TomTom came over when daddy was at work." Jude tensed up and stopped eating.
"And what happened?"
"Sadie said that you didn't want to talk to him and that you were angry with him. Why are you angry with him, did he hurt your feelings?" Jude smiled at her and felt her eyes well up.
"Yeah, pretty bad." She whispered. Zeus, sensing her discomfort, started whining.
"What did he do?" Gigi asked crawling closer to her.
"He lied to me, used me, name it, he did it." Jude whispered harshly. Gigi crossed her chubby little arms across her chest and let out a dramatic sigh.
"Well then, I'm not gonna talk to him." She said sticking her chin out. Jude chuckled at her and sniffed.
"Why not?" She asked.
"Because he hurt your feelings. I don't think that is very nice."
"Gigi, just because I'm hurting doesn't mean you can't talk to him."
"But.."
"You like Tommy. Don't stop talking to him."
"Fine." Gigi said with a sigh.
The next day Jude walked into hospitality to see Tommy pouring himself a cup of coffee and Kwest sitting on a stool reading a magazine. She sighed and quietly made her way over to Kwest.
"Hey." She whispered low enough for him to hear. Kwest looked away from the magazine and smiled at her. She looked at his fat lip and winced.
"Sadie, told me what happened. Thanks for sticking up for me." She whispered. Kwest shrugged and kept the smile on his face.
"It's okay, he punches like a girl anyway." Jude chuckled softly drawing Tommy's attention to her. She ignored him and pulled out a bottle of pain killers, handing them to Kwest.
"Thought you might need these."
"Thanks."
"'Listen, I'm not coming to the memorial later. Scott and I are planning on going down to the beach later and we're gonna have our own memorial, just close friends. You want to come?" She asked. Kwest nodded and shrugged.
"Sure. What time?"
"Same time of the other memorial. Just don't let anyone else know about it okay? SME knows, Jamie knows, and Sadie knows, but other than that, don't mention it." Kwest nodded.
"Okay. Well, I got to go mix Shay's track. I'll see you later." He got up and walked into Studio C. Jude sighed and turned to see Tommy still standing there. He opened his mouth to say something, but was interrupted.
"Hey Jay Jay. It's tough what happened, huh?" T-Bone asked walking up next her. Jude smiled at him and nodded, completely ignoring Tommy as he walked away. Jude began whispering to T-Bone what she had just told Kwest. What they didn't realize was Darius, who had been watching her since she came in, was making his way over to Sadie.
"Sadie, what's going on between Jude and Tommy?" He asked causing Sadie to look up from her paper work. She looked over at Jude and then at Darius.
"Dad, you should really be talking to Jude about this." She whispered.
"Well I'm talking to you about this. Now tell me, what's going on?" Sadie sighed and bit her lip. She began giving him the short version of what happened, leaving out the part where Jude gave him 'everything'. By the time she was finished, Darius was already on his way over to Tommy'S office.
