Oh my god I am finally free of deadlines until September! And I have a brand new shiny computer that works! I can write things in bulk again! Anyway to celebrate here is a new chapter with the aftermath of last chapters and a lil fluffy bit in the middle, enjoy :D

The alcohol-induced amnesia is something only a lucky few are able to indulge in. I, unfortunately, am not one of those lucky few. When I woke up the next morning the events of the night before were still painfully clear as was the resulting hangover that was throbbing through my temple.

Tai and I had kissed. It wasn't even something we could pass off as an accidental lip bump either; there had been tongues and moaning and his hand up the back of my shirt and everything. Not only that it had effectively happened three times! (Well three separate kisses but it's not like I was counting or anything – no that would be weird.) If I closed my eyes I could still feel his lips against mine and it was like all my dreams had come true.

But I knew I couldn't get hung up on it. I mean Tai had apologised for being unprofessional and I had said not to worry about it because it was nothing more than a drunken accident. I still had to work with him after that and there was a chance that he wouldn't remember it depending on how drunk he had actually been. I decided, while still lying in a cocoon of blankets and hungover failure, that the next time I saw Tai at work I wasn't going to bring up the kiss unless he did.

When I finally managed to extract myself from my bed, taking my blankets with me, apparently as soon as you graduate, even though you're not even a year older, you lose your ability to deal with hangovers, and went to vegetate on the sofa with Davis. We watched a few crappy TV movies and he made bacon once we both had the mental capacity to move.

Every so often his phone would go off and he would look at it and grin like a loon. I wanted to ask (as I suspected it had something to do with Kari) but I knew that he would tell me when he wanted to. He asked me what had happened to me at the party but I decided not to tell him about Tai. If Tai and I weren't going to talk about it then I saw no reason for me to talk to anyone else about it.

When I went to work on Tuesday I saw Tai and greeted him as I would normally, trying to gage what kind of reaction I would get. He greeted me with his usual cheery (well cheery for him at work) reaction so I decided not to say anything about what happened at the party. Either he didn't remember it at all or he wasn't going to bring it up because he didn't want to make things uncomfortable. That was fair (and a very good idea) I mean we did still have to work together after all.

I must have not been checking where my eyes were wondering because I found myself staring at Tai a lot that day. Luckily he didn't seem to notice and the few times he caught me eye I could pass it off as looking for something in that general direction. Unfortunately someone else did.

"Earth to TK." Mimi giggle right behind me when I was caught in one of my stares, making me jump. "You alive in there?" she asked as I tried to get my breath back.

"Sorry." I panted. "I was off in my own little world."

"I could see that." she smirked. "Thinking about anything in particular?"

"Nope." I lied shaking my head and continuing with the date check I had been doing. Unfortunately Mimi was the persistent type and she had clued on to something (probably because I was being an unsubtle dumb-arse today) and she wasn't going to drop it until she had got the whole story.

"I just wondered," she shrugged, feigning nonchalance. "because you looked as if you were staring off in a particular direction. At a certain someone?" I sighed. It was time to face the music to at least one person who wasn't Davis and Mimi wasn't going to drop it.

"What are you getting at Mimi?" I asked. She grinned at me and leaned in close to my ear.

"I saw you and Tai kissing on Saturday night." she told me. My jaw practically hit the floor. I cleared my throat.

"What?" I asked. As far as I was aware she wasn't at the party and there was a slim chance that I could possibly convince her that she didn't actually see what she thought she did.

"On Saturday night," she said slowly as if I was having trouble understanding what she was saying. "when you guys were at his sister's I saw the two of you standing out on the balcony talking and then I saw you kissing." Ok there was no way that I could convince her that she hadn't seen that. That was a pretty accurate description of what had happened.

"How did you…?" I began tailing off as I realised that there was no way that I was going to get out of this one.

"I was at Joe's and he lives three doors down from Tai's sister." she grinned slyly at me.

"Ah…"

"So…" she pressed after a short awkward pause. "what's going on between you two?" And there was my little light of hope. I could still just about lie my way out of this if I was very convincing. I shrugged and shook my head.

"Nothing." I replied.

"Didn't look like nothing to me." she pressed.

"It was a drunken accident." I told her grinning in what I hoped was a convincing way. She eyed me shrewdly. Clearly she didn't believe me.

"A drunken accident is falling asleep next to the toilet or eating an entire wheel of cheese," she said. "not dry humping your Supervisor on his sister's balcony where anyone could see you."

"There was no dry humping!" I cried trying to keep my voice down.

"Like I said," she grinned. "looked pretty heated from where I was standing. So did you two get it on?" I rolled my and shook my head.

"If you continued to watch for the whole thing, which I suspect you didn't considering you're asking, you would have seen him go back inside before I did." I told her.

"Yeah I must admit I thought I should probably give you as much privacy as you were going to get considering you were going at it in a public place," she said. "and skipped out before it got too juicy."

"You're terrible." I told her.

"I know." she grinned. "So how did it happen?"

"It's a long story." I said.

"I've got time."

"Aren't you supposed to be working?"

"Probably." she grinned. "Now come on: spill!" I sighed.

"Fine. We were at his sister's party. I walked in on his sister and my flatmate getting off in the bathroom and after I made my escape from that awkward situation I bumped into him and he already knew about them despite my best efforts." I told her. "Then we went out to the balcony for some air, we both realised we were a lot drunker than we thought we were and we kissed. It's not big deal."

"No big deal?" she asked incredulously. "I've known Tai for a good few years now and I've never known him to drunkenly kiss anyone."

"And?" I asked. She sighed as if I was completely clueless.

"All I'm saying is the drunken mind acts out what the sober mind wants to." she stated.

"You're dreaming." I replied.

"Oh come on!" she exclaimed. "Don't tell me you haven't thought about it at all!"

"I…" I began but I stopped immediately when I saw Tai walking towards us over her shoulder.

"Mimi are you actually doing any work?" he asked when he reached us. She shrugged. "Or are you just bothering TK?"

"I'm just getting briefed on how far he's gotten." she replied. "You did tell me to take over from him so he can go home after all."

"Sure thing." Tai said shaking his head and rolling his eyes as he walked away. "Just hurry up about it I'm sure he wants to go home."

"I would actually." I said directing the statement at her.

"You are so clueless." she said as I handed her over the box of biscuits I had been putting out on the shelf.

"And you are reading way too much into this." I said.

"All I'm saying is for someone who is as protective of Kari as Tai is he's in an awfully good mood for someone who knows that she was snogging your flatmate all night." she said.

"And you think I have something to do with that?" I asked.

"Yes."

"You're insane." I told her, raising my hands to say that I was done with the whole conversation. "I'm going home."

"You know I'm right!" she called after me as I left.

"No you're not!" I called back. Thankfully she seemed to accept this and give up although that might have been because I was far enough away for her to be practically shouting at me if she was going to respond.

I tried to ignore what Mimi had said (I knew that she was wrong and there was no way that what she was implying was in anyway true) and this was made vastly easier by the fact that when I got back to my locker and checked my phone I had a text from Matt asking me to call him as soon as I got the message. As soon I was out of the building I dialled his number.

"Hello?" he said sleepily after the third ring.

"Were you asleep?" I asked.

"I was up very late recording." he said obviously knowing that it was me who he was talking to. "I needed a quick pick me up."

"It's three in the afternoon." I said reproachfully.

"I'm a musician; leave me alone." he said as if this justified everything. I just rolled my eyes.

"So what did you want to talk to me about?" I asked. "You sounded quite urgent in your text."

"Ah yeah that!" he exclaimed as if he had forgotten that he had even sent me the message. "How are you on the job front?" he asked.

"Still working my shitty retail job for very little pay if that's what you're asking." I replied.

"So you still hate your job?" he asked.

"Yes."

"Good."

"Um… if you say so." I replied. He seemed very happy that I was still stuck in a job I hated that paid me very little money. I mean I know Matt likes to play the part of the jaded rock star who hates the world but using me – his own brother – for his daily dose of schadenfreude seemed a bit like overkill.

"I wanted to see if you still hated your job because if you had one that you actually really liked then I'd try to find someone else." he explained.

"Someone else for what?" I asked.

"The band needs a new photographer." he said after what he would consider a dramatic pause.

"What happened to that American guy?" I asked. "Tim?" There was another pause.

"I may or may not have punched him in the face and then fired him." Matt admitted.

"Any particular reason why?" I asked.

"He kept hitting on Sora every single time she came in to say hi." he said. I got really sick of it and then one day I punched him because he tried to feel her up.

"Ok I can understand the punching then." I said. At least it hadn't been because he was turning into one of 'those' rock stars; the ones who punched people because they were bratty arse-holes (like Noel and Liam Gallagher). At least there was a reason for this.

"So the long and the short of it is we need a new photographer," Matt said. "and I want to recommend you for the job but I wanted to check you weren't doing something that you totally loved first."

"If I did get this job what would it mean?" I asked.

"You'd get to quit your shit one now." he replied.

"Ok but will I still be able to afford to pay my rent slash crippling student debt off with this one?" I asked. The question that I really wanted an answer to.

"You're my baby brother," Matt said. "I'm sure we can come to some kind of arrangement." I had two choices here: on the one hand stay in a shitty job that I hated but knew paid just about well enough for me to afford my rent and to be able to pay a little bit of the huge chunk of debt that I was in each month. On the other hand a job that I would absolutely love (and I'd get to boss Matt around if he wasn't co-operating on shot) and would get me some recognition for the next time I tried to apply for a photographing job.

"Ok. I'll do it." I said. "Recommend me."

"Awesome!" Matt whooped with delight. "I'll tell my manager tonight. He'll probably want you to send over a portfolio of your work and stuff and then have an interview with you."

"Ok just let me know when and where and I'll be there." I said.

"Great!" Matt replied. He sounded so happy and so relieved. He probably got a lot of shit from his manager for punching the photographer so it was probably partially wanting to get me a job in my field and not wanting to get fired for knocking out the other one at the same time. "Oh there was one more thing I wanted to tell you before you go."

"Yeah?"

"Sora's pregnant."

"What?"

"Ten weeks now." Matt said, happily. "I'm going to be a Daddy!"

"Congratulations, that's amazing!" I was so happy for him. He sounded so excited (and that may also have been another factor into his punching of the previous photographer).

"I know." he replied. "It's exciting and scary and I'm only just really processing it now since we had a scan this morning. I can email you the pictures if you want?"

"That would be amazing." I said pulling my flat keys out of my picket. "I'm so happy for you guys."

"Thanks." Matt replied and I could tell that he would be wearing the biggest goofiest grin in the world. "So how about you?" he asked after a short pause. "Any development on the love life front."

"Um…" I hedged. How much did I want to get into this whole story right now? Also considering that Matt knew Tai it might not be the best time to bring up that he was constantly on my mind when I wasn't at work and that we had kissed while drunk. Probably best not to mention that bit…