Hey guys! Missed you! I'm taking a break from my Walking Dead posts and updating this little MSCL alter-reality story. Big thanks to all the readers who have stuck around and been so encouraging, and an equally big welcome to new readers! There isn't a ton of action in the MSCL fanfic world these days, and I so appreciate everyone's time and interest and feedback! (At some point I'll be updating the Tino & Angela in California storyline in the MSCL Vignettes for those of you who are also reading that epic story (I can't tell you how many unfinished chapters I still have unposted for that story!).)

She extricated herself, and took herself home. Angela walked down those grimy apartment stairs, fished her keys from her stylish clutch handbag and drove away from the night, from those choices, from that slip. The night had been an unforeseen time warp and she needed to get out, back to reality, back to her present. Out from under his influence and the desires of her past.

Driving home she rolled her windows all the way down, she kept her radio loud and ever-changing. Keeping herself from listening to a single track all the way through kept her mind from settling too long on the still vivid sensations from her night spent with him, arresting her as she drives. Once behind her own door she shed her clothes, the ones that had been peeled and tugged and shorn off her so fervently by those strong familiar hands. Leaving the pile abandoned on the hardwood of her narrow entranceway, Angela made directly for the bathroom. There, for an extended length of time, mindless and automatic, she showered, letting the past and the nostalgic-fueled illusion wash off her under the steady torrent of steaming hot water. The steam rose around her as habitually and without thought she scrubbed and lathered, suppressing the unwitting replay of the lapse in her two-year resolve.

After, having let the hot water run out over her head, she stood even longer staring at herself in the foggy bathroom mirror. Free from his influence and the trap of those wicked blue eyes and boyish grin, she tried rationally to deconstruct the past twelve hours or so with Jordan Catalano.

What was that? She could not answer. Why did she go home with him? Why had she allowed it to go that far? Why hadn't she walked away immediately? Because, in the moment, held fast within his gaze and his arms, it hadn't occurred to her. Truthfully, she'd been melded to him in that place, in that moment. There was no possibility of extraction.

She'd longed for him for so long, built so many of her ideas of love and sex and desire around him and the early years they'd spent together, yielding to him was near intrinsic. He'd left her — and though she's left him too — she'd unknowingly waited for him and his return. Waited for his change of heart, for things to shift just slightly enough so that they might be together, and work. It was bigger than her, bigger than her to walk away from.

Eight years from the start of it all, she's horrified to find the same central question still plagues her. Angela's eyes rolled in self-inflicted agony. What is it about him? Hasn't anything changed in all this time?

And the thought struck her, brutally … Is she not who she thought she'd grown to be?

In the absence of answers Angela pushed it all aside and resumed her life where she'd left it when she'd left her place for a low-key night out the evening before: stable, ordered, rational. Healthy. The day passed; she made herself breakfast and a cup of coffee. She went for a run; she took another shower. She read the paper. She answered emails. She called Rickie, but left no message when he didn't pick up. She watered her houseplants; she went to the market; she cleaned out her freezer. She did a lot of things. She did a lot of things she hadn't planned on for the day just to keep herself busy. But even so, in a flash, in a moment, in the middle of any mundane task, he'd come back to her. His touch, his scent, his heat, his mouth, his raspy voice, those eyes – they come back to her so that her breath hilts, and her chest tightens, and her face flushes. Jordan—

She'd walked right into it. After everything between them and all she'd gone through over him, she'd allowed him to pull her back in, and flood her with nostalgia and— Longing…

She knows better. Since fifteen she's known better. Jordan's always had a sort of indescribable power over her. Truthfully though, if she allows herself the honesty, it hasn't always been a bad thing… But she'd thought she'd gotten past it. How, after all this time, could she not have gotten over it?

All day she keeps her hands busy, but then it's a little past five and she's pulling a sweatshirt over her faded tee, grabbing her water canteen, and picking up her keys and heading to her car.

Angela shuts her brain off while she drives. If she's in, she's in, she isn't going to agonize over it; and for some reason, she seems to be in. Retracing the drive she'd made just the night before, she finds herself taking him up on the invite to catch some of his sound check. She doesn't know why. Angela has no interest in being the girl on the sidelines — it's too conspicuous for one. She can't be a groupie, she's too old, and has come too far. But she'll hang out, and guesses she's good for a beer or two. And, maybe this time, some actual conversation.

It's close to five when she walks into the empty club. She gives her name at the door — some part of her half surprised he even remembered to leave her name (she wouldn't go so far as to say thrilled, but undeniably it's an improvement upon being the afterthought he seemingly so effortlessly walked away from) — and walks down the narrow black hallway, her sandals gripping to the sticky painted concrete floor as she goes, and edges into the venue. She looks around, Jordan's at the soundboard with the engineer, and up on the three-foot high stage is the rest of the band. She recognizes Shane immediately; the other two, the bassist and the lead guitarist, she thinks she's met, or seen, but if she's ever known their names they're not coming to her now.

Alone, she looks around, and waits for something more to occur to her than waiting. It's less than twenty-four hours since she was last there, but without the people, and the drinks, and the music and the lighting, the place looks underwhelmingly different. The space is just a painted black room with a sticky floor, a small wrap-around balcony, a stage in front and a bar in back, and a band waiting to break through. She's been in countless of these clubs before. From band to band Jordan's had a fair number of sets in local bars and clubs, opening on Sundays, headlining on Wednesdays, never getting much traction beyond a small circle of like-minded local musicheads. Entering through all those back alley service doors with the musicians and their entourage used to give her a bit of a rush, but being on the sidelines wore thin, and the longer she hung around, being remembered to be included just didn't hold up to the promise of really being some place with him. But here she is again. Not as hopeful, not as rose-tinted, but maybe just as hopeless.

She would give a hello nod to Shane if he looked her way, but he's busy and she'd just as well postpone the moment of telling eye contact when she'll find just how much of their reunion had been shared. Undoubtedly, if Jordan resisted talking, Shane will fill in the blanks himself, which makes her even more loathe to re-up the acquaintance. She takes a seat at the abandoned bar, and tries to look as though she's completely at ease. As easy at it had been to slip into sync with Jordan, it's not as easy to slip into his larger life. Suddenly she's reminded of all the times she's been left to sit and wait and watch and not participate. Angela resists the temptation to pull out her phone for the easy out, knowing, if she pulls her phone out now as a crutch, she'll come back to it over and over again, and it will look like she chose the most absurd place ever to answer emails. She has no reason to be there but listen, and there's no pride in fronting like she has something other to do than that while she's there. Angela waits. On stage the band works with the crew to set up the cables and mics and their assortment of guitars. They tune, and test mics, and joke, and send signals about the levels up to Jordan and the soundboard guy.

The feeling of cold glass, almost wet, touches her arm. Angela looks behind her, "You made it."

She takes the beer. "Looks like."

Jordan's sense of irony sparks, "It kill you?" and his eyes glint when he asks her.

Angela swallows a smile. "Think I'll hold that call till you play."

A chuckle bursts out from him, low and delighted, "Fair e'nough." He clinks his bottle with hers then heads up to the stage.

Angela sips. Slow, spaced-out cold sips give her something to do as she sits, and listens. They're actually not bad. It's kind of a garage metal-rock sound, with a kind of alt-influence. Jordan sings one and a half songs but mostly he plays rhythm guitar and stands back from the front of the stage — part of it, but not of it all, refusing to be the center. Angela recognizes him up there, in a way she hasn't until now. It's him, Jordan Catalano, in his element. Unchanged, unfiltered, Jordan looks more like himself when he's got a guitar in his hands and only that to think about. Unguarded, he forgets himself and just is. The shit his father for years loaded him down with dissipates; all the crap he worries about and gets caught up in, he escapes without knowing. He isn't fronting anything, not trying to run any games, and he's likeable. Truly. Like in the odd moments she catches him in an honest laugh where he could be just twelve years old. Her eyes, when she lets herself look, stay on him.

They play through four songs in full, and rush through bits of two more. When the opening group switches out their gear for their sound check, Jordan's band gives up the stage and assembles at the bar. "Hey, Chase," Shane nods at her, dryly friendly as at best he ever is. "Heard'ya was back around."

"Shane," she smiles with reserve, "how's it going?"

"Not bad. J's not bad off either." There's that smarmy look of his.

"Good to hear," she nods a bit awkwardly, then smiles at the other two. "Hey. Angela," she extends her hand in poised introduction.

"Yeah," the bassist nods, "we've met."

"Chris," Jordan makes a quick nod in his direction and makes the briefest of re-introductions for Angela. "Anthony," he nods at the guitarist and singer.

"Nice to meet you." Again Angela smiles.

"'Again'," Chris adds.

Angela fights the compulsion to role her eyes. Why are all of his friends always such inaccessible jerks? She finds herself entertaining the thought if Jordan's always read as an equivalent jerk to her friends.

"Nice of you to help out with sound." Shane's mocking her, she knows it. Pointing out, in that singular fashion he has, that sitting there by herself, listening to sound check with nothing to do, and no business or pretense for being there, makes her a groupie of the lowest and most pathetic order. He turns from her to the others, forgetting Angela in full, "Food?"

From a small enclosed booth at the balcony level two girls and a couple of guys have descended and joined them at the bar. as part of the group, as people who have arrived with the band. It occurs to Angela, while the others work out timing, walking distance, and food options, that these people, like she, had have arrived with the band and that Jordan could have set her up with these others, only didn't. Instead he'd left her conspicuously on her own. Calculated or benign? She doesn't know if she's angry, or should be, or humiliated, or doesn't care at all when Jordan leans into her, his lips and warm breath hovering just beyond her ear, "You comin'?" This mixture of an invitation in the form of a proposition, and a command laced with indifference is textbook Catalano; she finds herself walking with them to a taco stand, ordering, and hanging out, happy that, uncharacteristic for her, in her pullover jeans and sandals she's managed to under-dress every other girl in their party.

With Styrofoam platefuls of small tacos and plenty of beers and messily poured cups of salsas, hot and multicolored, spilling onto the sticky veneer tabletops, the band and their guests shout and jostle and gorge themselves as they please. While the others talk and joke around them, Jordan surreptitiously leans into her from the side, his breath once again hot against her ear and neck, setting her skin aflame. "Hey," he gestures offhandedly with taco in hand, "you, uh, should, stick around for the show tonight." Angela says nothing, only glances at him over the beer she sips. "C'mon," he provokes, "we're not all that bad."

Soberly, vexingly unattainable, she lowers the bottle and looks at him, "What're ya called again?"

"Well," he grins dopily, "don't come cuzz'a the name." He eyes her as he takes the bottle from her, though his own is not yet empty. Drinking the appropriated lager he never breaks his eye contact from her, "You know you know what we're called."

She does. Angela nods, and gestures for the return of her beer. "'Behind the Picture'." She'll never know where all these band names come from.

"You should go," he says again, coolly, like the invitation does her more good than him, like he's looking out for her, which upon reflection is often a stance he takes with her.

How can someone so bad for a person, so successfully present himself as something necessary, and safe?

Though such impenetrable resistance may play poorly at this point, after his apartment last night, and showing up today, Angela for some reason refuses to allow herself to soften. She takes a large drink, swallows, and looks at him evenly. "Why?"

The grin comes cockily at her, "Because…"

It's… she doesn't know what … the way he never balks at her dispassion, just takes it in his resilient stride and leans in a little nearer.

"'Because—" her quick eyes take in the others; not one is listening "—I slept with you last night?'" Her conjecture is stoic, but not accusatory.

Mutely, Jordan shakes his head; not for the first time, she's got it wrong. "'Cuz…" he smiles that goofy boyish half-laugh that's been getting him out of tight spots since before puberty, "it's music." The pure simplicity makes her waiver. It's easy to forget that he isn't calculating; Jordan never was. He leans in to life and lets it happen. If he invites you to hear some music, it's because he wants you to listen, and to stick close around. For all that he is – both good and bad – he's not big on duplicity. Jordan shrugs, "Ya might like it." He's won her over. "An' 'cuz," he adds with a slanted wisp of a grin, "I might want to give you a chance to sleep with me again tonight." In spite of herself, she laughs. He's always had that kind of timing.

"You're a jerk," she smiles spitefully.

"If you say so." Jordan leans back.

Angela bites into a taco, glancing at him, just briefly, as she does. "What if I told you I have a boyfriend."

"Well," he says, "ya a'lready did say that." He drinks, and takes a large bite off his carnitas taco. Then he looks at her. "Do you want that to be true?" He doesn't know if she's giving him the truth or just pushing him away. Either wouldn't surprise him. He deserves to be pushed away some, and why shouldn't she have a boyfriend?

Angela does not answer.

They rejoin the conversations around them, interacting with the band mates and their guests, but he can't stop looking at her. She is the same. She is exactly the same. The same fullness of cheeks, the berry tint of her poised lips. And those eyes, those wise, all-seeing, remarkably wide eyes of hers. "Stop it." She mutters to him, bringing the long-necked bottle back to her lips to obscure any expression her face may be generating.

"Stop what?" Jordan drinks, blinking his would-be innocence at her, stifling a chuckle. It's so easy to rile her.

"Stop staring."

"I'm not." He smiles. She wonders if he knows that even at this age he can make himself sound fourteen – innocent and full of trouble. He's not going to stop looking. She looks incredible. So much like herself, the young girl he'd fallen for, but a woman now, beautiful, and confident, and so lovely — no, striking — beneath that honey warm blonde hair, dark at the roots, framing her face better than any halo would. And those captivating eyes… Angela.

"You are."

"You're looking at me." He grins at her.

At this point she has to swallow a smile, the bottle's not enough. "I don't know why." Her eyes avert his; too much of him is not good for her. She does nod though, in the end, consenting she will go. To another music show, to another night starting with Jordan Catalano.

That's it for now. (Not sure how much longer this story will go, maybe three more chapters?)Would love to hear from you!