A/N: Thank you Netflix for adding Victorious! I am finally able to add to this story since I was able to watch The Blonde Squad episode again. (I'm poor- no cable for me, and I only own the first season of Victorious.)

As always, a huge thank you to all those who read, follow, favorite, pm, and/or review this story of mine.

I have to send a shout out to my fanfiction bestie ABEDFAN for giving me much needed feedback on this chapter. I don't know what I would do without you My Matt!

Enjoy!

I Don't Know How

Part Four

"Shit, shit, shit!" I scream out as I notice what time it is. Beck's movie is scheduled to start at seven. It's 6:50 when I open the doors of Hollywood Arts. Everyone associated with the film went out to dinner before hand and arrived as a group together almost an hour ago.

Well, everyone except me.

I explained to Beck that I had band rehearsal, and I already had to beg the band to talk to the management at The Gorilla Club to push back our usual start time by an hour, so we can take the stage at nine instead of eight o'clock. Plus I was exhausted from the show last night at the Intersection, and I also drank a little bit too much, so I knew I needed to take some time to relax between rehearsal and the movie premiere and my show tonight.

I'm sure I imagined it, but I thought for a minute I saw something that almost looked like regret in Beck's eyes when I told him I wasn't going to make the dinner tonight, but before I could blink his usual blank mask was back in place.

Pretty sure it was just wishful thinking on my part anyway. Why the hell would Beck care if I'm at the stupid dinner or not?

What I didn't plan on was falling asleep after rehearsal and getting to school almost an hour after the rest of the people involved with Beck's project.

"Sorry I'm late," I say, walking into the green room backstage.

"Yay, Jadey's here!" Cat squeals, turning away from Robbie, giving me a bright smile. "I told you guys there's no way that she would miss this."

"Does anyone know where my bag of birdseed for Larry went?" Andre asks frantically, after crawling out from under a makeup desk. "I thought I left it in here, but now it's just gone!"

"Why don't I help you look for it?" Vega asks, and gently leads an unhinged Andre out of the green room. I swear, Andre can be such a drama queen. No wonder he and Vega are such good friends.

"So yeah, we are going to help look too," Cat says awkwardly, walking away with a bundle of something in her hands. "Come on Robbie," she says, and he sighs dejectedly, and follows her out. If I wasn't so focused on Beck at the moment, I would wonder what the hell those two were up to. Because I am 99% sure it doesn't have anything to do with finding a missing bag of birdseed.

I glance around the now empty (aside from me and Beck) green room, and take a big breath and force myself to look at him.. "Look, Beck, I'm sorry I'm so late. Rehearsal ran over and-"

"Whatever Jade. I know what's a priority to you now," he says, his eyes darting around at everything but me, while he twirls the ends of his long scarf absentmindedly between his fingers. I blink in confusion as I notice he's wearing our matching necklace. Why the hell is he wearing that right now?

"Or maybe I should say who," he says.

"Uh- I feel asleep Beck," I say, totally distracted by what him wearing the necklace could mean. I haven't seen it on him since we broke up. "You know how I have sleep issues-"

"Is that what you're calling it these days?" he asks, his voice dripping with sarcasm.

The tone of his voice makes all thoughts of the necklace vanish and the curiosity is replaced with indignation. "What the fuck is that supposed to mean?" I ask, narrowing my eyes at him.

"I don't have time for this right now," Beck says angrily, as he begins to walk towards the door.

"Beck?" I grab his arm and he spins around to face me, yanking his arm out of my grasp.

"I saw you guys Jade."

I look at him blankly. "Saw me and…..?"

"Last night."

"Oh." I say dumbly. I'm not exactly sure what he means. Is he talking about my show? Is he pissed I wrote a song about our breakup? He can't possibly know about what happened with Ryder and I after our show, I assure myself quickly.

Besides, even if he did know, I've got nothing to feel guilty for, right? He shouldn't care that I made out with Ryder. We broke up months ago.

"Beck- it's showtime!" Vega calls out from the open door. Beck just continues to stare at me for a beat.

"I'm not doing this right now," Beck says, and I see the tension and anger leave his face as he slides his mask back in place, before turning to look at Vega. "Thanks Tori- I'll go out and introduce the film. See you guys after the viewing," he says and strides out of the room without looking back at me.

I bite my lip, to keep from saying anything I'll regret. This is Beck's big film premiere. I'm so frustrated we ended up fighting right before he has to go onstage and introduce his film. How am I supposed to enjoy myself now?

"Uh, Jade?" Tori asks, pulling me from my thoughts. "You coming?"

I force myself to give her a small smile. "Yeah, of course."

Beck isn't the only one who's good at wearing a mask.

"Well, I guess we'll take a break from the film," Beck says, after watching the majority of the people get up and run out to see what all the commotion with the stupid bird was about.

I don't expect anything else from the majority of them, but to see Robbie and Vega run out on Beck was kind of surprising. Do they not realize how important this project is to him?

I watch Beck sigh and walk to the empty front row and sit down, bracing his elbows on his knees and putting his head in his hands.

I wonder if I should go up and talk to him, tell him how sorry I am. Say something. Anything.

"Beck, your film is sooo funny!" one of the three girls from Northridge says to him. "And this whole bird thing- how crazy is that?"

"Yeah, come with us to see what's happening!" another one of them says, tugging on his arm.

He looks up at them. "Nah, I'm good. But you girls should go check it out. Get some more popcorn while you are at it," he says.

After a few moments of the Northridge trio trying to convince Beck to come with them and him flat out refusing, they finally give up and leave.

Beck turns around in his seat and watches them go, and his eyes sweep the otherwise empty Black Box Theater. His eyes stop roaming around the room when he notices me sitting a few rows behind him.

I smile at him tentatively and stand up and walk towards him. "We really gotta stop clearing out rooms like this," I tell him, walking up to stand beside his seat. "Second time this hour it has happened. This keeps happening, I'm going to start taking it personally."

Beck forces a weak smile. "How come you aren't leading the charge? I figured you'd be right in the thick of things. Larry could try to peck someone's eyes out or something. Maybe he'll shit in Tori's hair. I know you wouldn't want to miss that."

I roll my eyes. "The things I give up for you," I gently kick his leg with mine.

"Go on. I'm good," Beck says, standing up.

I cross my arms and continue looking at him, arching my right eyebrow.

"Okay, fine," he says after a full minute of continuous eye contact and silence. "Maybe not totally fine," he finally tears his eyes away from mine and looks at the ceiling. "This kind of really sucks."

"I know. For what it's worth, I'm sorry," I said, unsure if my apology is for what just happened to interrupt the showing of his film or for our argument earlier. Maybe it was a little bit of both.

"I just….I worked really hard on this project," he says, beginning to pace across the stage. "I get that Andre needs to catch that damn bird. But did he really have to make such a scene in the middle of the premiere? I've spent months on this short film, writing the script, designing and building the sets, working on the lighting, filming, editing….."

"I know," I say gently. Because I do know. Out of all the juniors at Hollywood Arts, only Beck and I have successfully written, designed, and directed our own short films. Usually it's only seniors who are able to do it, but our advanced creative writing teacher broke the long standing rules and allowed us to each make our own film this year.

"Tonight was supposed to make it all worth it," he gestures to the empty room, "and it got upstaged by a fucking bird!" he yells, and turns to look at me, his eyes brimming with fire.

It's not often Beck drops his mask and let's people see him upset. I haven't seen the true Beck Oliver in awhile. Not since before we broke up.

I walk up to him without even realizing I'm doing it. Before I know it I am slowly putting my arms around him and lay my head on his shoulder. "It's okay to be upset about this." I tell him quietly.

After a couple beats I feel him wrap his arms around me and squeeze, bringing my body flush with his. "Thank you," he says after a minute, and he leans his head back so we can look at each other, while our bodies are still connected.

"Jade, I," he closes his eyes, and looks away, and I can see him struggle to regain his cool facade.

"Jesus Beck, let go of your fucking self control for once!" I say, shoving him away from me in frustration. I absolutely hate that he is putting his guard up around me. Me, of all people.

"You want me to let go?" he asks me, closing the small gap I had just tried to put between us.

We both turn our heads to the open doors of the Blackbox Theater as we hear a commotion and people running in the hallway.

"Larry! Larry, come here! I've got the wig full of birdseed!" Andre screams as he runs down the hallway, wearing the blonde wig.

I turn back and look at Beck and note that his face is a blank slate again.

"Forget it," I tell him with a sigh.

"No," Beck says, tucking a lock of hair behind my ear. His hand gently cups my cheek, and he slowly leans into me, until our lips are just centimeters apart. "This okay?" he asks me.

"I-"

"Jade!" Cat cries, looking like her normal self again, and runs into the Blackbox Theater, wiping her eyes. Beck and I quickly spring apart, and Cat throws her arms around me. "Evan just broke up with me!" she sobs into my shoulder.

A/N: I hope you all liked this chapter! I know I originally said that this was going to be a three part story, then a four part...Well I'm positive it is going to have at least one more chapter, if not two.

Please, please review and let me know what you thought!