Chapter Five: Jealous From the Start

As Brian walked with Angela he slowly began to break down the wall that had been keeping them from being friends before. It wasn't that she was being mean or didn't want to talk to him, but Angela never really had a reason to.

Now, as they walked down the street together, sharing one tape player, Brian found himself brave enough to make comments and ask her questions that he would've otherwise left unsaid.

"I really like this song." Brian began unsurely as Angela nodded.

"Yeah, it's nice," She muttered as silence followed them soon after.

"So, how's life so far?"

"Life?" Angela repeated with a scoff of surprise. "Every day reminds me of stuff that happened last year even though I don't want it to."

"Do you think about Jordan a lot?" Brian asked boldly.

"Jordan Catalano is completely off limits here and … is it that obvious that I like think about him?" Angela wondered looking as vulnerable as Brian had seen her.

Jordan always seemed to have that effect on her, even when he wasn't around. Brian was just waiting for the opportunity to say what he had been wanting to say to Angela.

She looked so beautiful tonight that he was scared that if he said a word, it would scare her off. Her fading red hair flew in the wind beside her, as if wanting a life of her own as her glove-covered hand fiddled around for another tape.

"So are you going to like … answer or not?" She pressed once the tape had been successfully changed. Angela was so focused on Jordan that she did not even notice what was going on between her and Brian.

His hand, had previously been near hers and he had flirted with the idea of breaking the invisible line, was now touching hers, ever so slightly. "Ummm…" Brian took Angela's neutral response as a requiem for more, allowing his hand to drop and reaching for her face bravely.

Before he could consecrate his feelings for her, a car drove by and nearly ran him off the road.

"Watch out." Angela pulled him closer to the curb, bringing the two of them even closer. She continued walking nonchalantly, more focused on the music than on anything else.

"Thanks … for like saving me back there."

"No thanks needed." She looked at him for a moment and during that entire moment, Brian felt like he was human being, a person worth talking, a person who like mattered.

Brian wished that he could feel that way all the time and command her attention so forcefully, but the moment had passed. To kiss her now would be awkward, and would possibly threaten to make future moments like this obsolete.

"I think that like … umm … you're so caught up in Jordan Catalano, but you don't have to be. If you think he's the only guy that is like … into you then you're wrong. I-I mean … what I'm trying to say…"

As if being some cruel way to punish Brian for his cordiality and nervousness, the very person who was the topic of their conversation appeared, of course in his red car. This made the blow even worse.

"Red…" Jordan breathed, stopping the car by the duo.

"Jordan … like what are you doing here?" She wondered, nearly one hundred percent sure that it was over between them after she rejected him and then called like an idiot.

"Do you want to like go somewhere?" Jordan wondered, getting out of the car, leaving it and coming dangerously close to her.

"I'm already doing that." Angela turned him down without looking at him once. To do so would be to cave in, without a doubt.

"I have some things to … say … would you … Leave with me?" He managed to get out in a combination of frantic fragments. Lifting Angela's chin so that the two of them were face to face and kissing Angela ever so slightly sealed the deal.

The two walked off to his car, with Angela's waist now becoming the property of Mr. Catalano himself.

"Later Brain." Jordan bid farewell to his less formidable opponent. Brian tried to make a last ditch effort to get Angela to notice him, by referring to the tape player, but she shrugged it off. Jordan had her.

**

"You wanted to say something so say it." Angela demanded as Jordan's car pulled off leaving Brian behind. She barely noticed the change in Brian's face, rather she was trying to figure out Jordan's.

"Angela, it's really … like … I can't …"

"If you can't say it, let me say it for you…" Angela paused a moment.

"You act like nothing happened between us whenever I see you at school, but like you keep coming around and … you make it really difficult."

"I know but I can't … come back to my house." Jordan offered. "I can say it there. I wrote a song about you."

"I-I can't Jordan … I can't go back with you and hear your songs and … it's just too complicated. It confuses me into thinking that things are a certain way when they're not."

"What do you mean?" Jordan wondered genuinely confused.

"I mean …" Angela searched for the right words to say, but she couldn't find them. All she seemed to be able to think about was the fact that she could feel a smooth, warm object encircling her hand.

Jordan's hand was on her hand. "Fine." Angela gave in. "One song … and then you'll take me home."

"Sure." Jordan shrugged as Angela rested back into the passenger's seat thinking about how much safer it would have been to have continued walking down the street with Brian … or even to be doing some dorky mother-daughter trip with her mom … the options seemed endless now that she was in this situation.

**

"So before we go in … My parents are like … weird."

"All parents are weird. It's like a requirement or something."

"No. They're worse … so just don't like talk to them or anything."

"Fine. But you only have one song." Angela repeated as Jordan nodded, running his hands through his hair and reaching for her hand as the two walked into the house. He was actually nervous.

Jordan lead Angela through a house badly in need of repairs, with creaking floors, a sunken in roof and a complete water-damaged mess but Angela ignored it all. She just wanted to survive that one song.

"Here." Jordan tossed her a notebook where he had written lyrics or at least it looked like he had …

"I thought you couldn't--"

"I'm not stupid." He countered defensively. "I did write the words, every last one but … Brain wrote them down for me, him and Tino."

"Why are you giving them to me?" Angela crossed her legs under her body, realizing that she was in his room, Jordan Catalano's actual room. Her eyes darted to the walls that were filled with visions of rocks-stars, but oddly held no pictures of people in his life.

"I want you to like …"

Angela fiddled with the notebook in her hands. The room was definitely a lot cleaner than hers even if it was a little small. "Pick one." Jordan finished after an extended pause.

"What?"

"Whatever you want to hear, I'll play it." He promised, pulling the chair from his desk closer to the edge of his bed, where she was sitting.

"Oh … wow…" Angela giggled nervously. She could always pick Red again or … "Yellow. Can you play it for me?"

After he played the first chord Angela was struck again by it. His hand, the beautiful music he made, the way he looked … like everything was right in his world. It was beautiful. It was inspiring but it was the lyrics that made her in awe:

"Look at the stars,
Look how they shine for you,
And everything you do,
Yeah, they were all yellow.
I came along,
I wrote a song for you,
And all the things you do,
And it was called "Yellow".
So then I took my turn,
Oh what a thing to have done,
And it was all "Yellow"…

For you I'd bleed myself dry,
For you I'd bleed myself dry."

The silence that followed was more than deafening. Angela was scared to move or even to make a sound because it would completely destroy the moment and she wanted to keep it immortalized.

So it was Jordan who said something first. "I'm still working on it. I don't even have a chorus for it or anything." He started to explain.

"It was beautiful." Angela gushed. If she could have this Jordan, the one right here that was so complex and intelligent and vulnerable with her … if she could just have this then it would be worth it.

Even with her smile and absolutely genuine response, it felt wrong somehow to leave it that way, to leave with having said one thing but done something else. Angela closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and decided to go for it.

The sensation of her lips matching his, so perfectly like the last two pieces of a jig-saw puzzle made the moment complete. Jordan's guitar stumbled to the ground as the duo continued to allow their physical desires to take over. Jordan led her to his bed, she lost her denim jacket. He was shirtless. That was as far as they got.

"I-I have to take you home." Jordan whispered as Angela was brought back to reality. She was grateful for it. Something could have happened … something did happen, but it was nothing compared to what could have transpired.

The car ride home wasn't awkward like Angela would have guessed. Instead, she found herself asking Jordan all kinds of things about his music, which he gladly answered. This was like a chain reaction that spun out of control because nearly every day after the two of them met up and just … talked like this.

They clicked. It worked and it couldn't be manufactured because it was just so organic and natural. Which is why Angela allowed herself to be wrapped back into the world of Jordan Catalano. Their relationship wasn't anything like it was before.

She told him things about people in her life, about how she really felt about things and he slowly began to open up about his family … very slowly. Their newly-forming relationship wasn't by any means platonic but it was in between friendship and something so emotionally and physically intimate that there wasn't a word for it.

Yeah they were definitely moving somewhere between the two but closer to the latter every day. It was through their 'time' together that Angela really knew what it felt like to crave something or someone and to be counting the hours until she could see him again, listen to one of his songs, kiss him… That's why when Angela saw the site before her a few months later she was more than just a little confused…

(A/N: I'm checking to see if anyone is reading. I know this show is almost as old as I am but it's still great and I hope people are still going to this page to read MSCL fics. If you are, send me a review so I know! –NL)

Disclaimer: the lyrics to 'Yellow' belong to the group Coldplay and their record company, not to me.