Chapter 18

"Jason, will you relax?" Johnny asked, as the tailor walked away, muttering obscenities under his breath.

He cracked an eye open from where he was sitting in a leather chair, daring Johnny to continue nagging him. "He runs his hand up the inside of my leg one more time…"

"You want the tux to look good," he replied, rolling his eyes as he turned back to the mirror and looked himself over. "Or at least I do. I don't want you messing up my photos."

"Excuse me?" Jason asked, rubbing his forehead against his hand. He was slightly hungover from the night before and thought that perhaps he'd heard his best friend wrong.

Since when did O'Brien give a damn about pictures? He couldn't be sure, but the last time he remembered his friend having his photo taken was when he was booked on assault charges after a fight at Jake's.

"I'd never hear the end of it from Lulu," he muttered, covering himself though Jason couldn't rightly believe him.

Whether O'Brien wanted to admit it or not, he was caught up in all the fuss of the wedding, and while Jason knew he was excited to be marrying Lulu, it was starting to get under his skin. All the chatter about catering and vows and making his fiancé happy had given him a taste of what Elizabeth was receiving and he didn't envy her.

He frowned as he thought about her, mostly because he had been trying to not think about her all morning, but it was nearly impossible.

Knowing how Elizabeth was, how she craved being alone when she was upset despite the fact that she really wanted nothing more than to not be alone, he'd decided against calling her that morning.

Even thought it had nearly killed him.

Jason had kissed a lot of women, a whole hell of a lot, and never before had they ran away, and he just didn't know what to think about that. He knew how to wine and dine the best and the most complicated, and he imagined that was partly why Elizabeth chose him to put on a show. If she wanted to attempt to make Johnny jealous she could have brought any man he knew, like Ritchie, who would have been enough to piss anyone off on sheer principle alone. Instead she chose Jason, and that had to mean something, or maybe he just wanted it to.

Damn her.

She had him mixed up beyond reasoning, and he wasn't sure if he'd ever get back to the way he used to be.

Fuck.

There really shouldn't even be a way he used to be; a Jason Morgan before being kissed by Elizabeth Webber and a Jason Morgan after.

No, that most definitely shouldn't exist at all.

"What's got your panties in a twist this morning, Morgan?" Johnny smirked, brushing his fingers over his lapels as he continued to check himself out in the mirror.

Nothing.

Because in order for him to have his panties in a twist, he would have to have something, and he certainly had nothing.

"Too much whiskey," he muttered, slinking down in the chair and resting his head on the back of it.

And too much Elizabeth, or not enough – it all depended on how he looked at it.

Or didn't, seeing as he shouldn't be looking at it at all.

Fuck.

He draped his arm over his face, needing the darkness. "Long night."

Johnny grunted. "Yeah, me too. Lulu's a handful once she gets all fired up."

Jason rolled his eyes against his elbow, partly out of jealousybecause after a night of parading an attractive woman around in a dress and letting her dry hump him on the dance floor, he had a right to be.

Or not, considering the woman was his best friend.

"Son of a bitch," he muttered, sitting up and rubbing his face in his hands.

Johnny held his hand up to the tailor who was making his way back over, tiny measuring tape in hand. "Could you get my friend a bottle of water?" he asked politely. "He's feeling a little under the weather."

The tailor turned on his heels and hurried back across the room, muttering under his breath. Jason would have felt bad had the man not tried to cop a feel.

"What's going on?" Johnny asked, looking at him skeptically. "This is not just a hangover. Jason Morgan doesn't get hangovers."

"Just a long night," he muttered, letting out a deep breath as his phone rang from where it was sitting on the end table next to the leather chair. He perked up, hoping it was Elizabeth, but frowned when he saw Ritchie's name on the caller ID.

He had no idea why he was waiting on her to call because he knew she wouldn't. She would sit and seethe or do whatever the hell it was she was doing, and then show up like nothing had happened, or worse, she would admit that something had and it just wasn't supposed to.

Did he even want it to?

She was annoying and pesky, always getting into things she wasn't supposed, usually his things, and she always needed something. She slept in his clothes, ate his food, and left her shit everywhere.

But she also looked really good in a tight dress, and he imagined she looked even better underneath.

"You going to answer that?" Johnny asked, glaring at him as the tailor made it back over with the bottle of water.

"Jerk," he hissed, ignoring the call and leaning back in the chair. The tailor looked at him briefly as if Jason was calling him a name, but he didn't bother to correct the mistake.

His phone rang again, and he perked up briefly, even though he knew it was just Ritchie calling repeatedly, but it wasn't his fault.

Elizabeth was the one who had kissed him the way you kiss someone when you're taking them to bed, or you at least want to. She was the one who stormed out of the hotel restaurant leaving him with her credit card, and if he had enough guts he'd charge a bunch of porn or something to it. Instead, he was going to sit and seethe and think about what it all meant, mostly to her, because she was the one that mattered, the one with the control.

Oh, hell, what the fuck was he saying?

"Just give us a second," O'Brien muttered to the tailor, when he asked if he could finish sizing Jason up. The man happily obliged, shooting Jason a dirty look before he walked away. "Dude, what the hell is going on? Did you and Elizabeth have a fight or something? 'Cause you two seem to have more bad shit going-"

"It's nothing," he interrupted, getting up from the chair.

"Yeah, sure," he grunted, checking himself out in the mirror yet again, making Jason want to slap him. "Just fix it by tomorrow night."

"Tomorrow night?" he asked, wondering if Elizabeth had managed to schedule yet another unplanned date for their unplanned relationship.

Fuck.

It was not a date.

They were not in a relationship.

"What the hell is going on tomorrow?" he asked angrily, shaking his head.

"Lulu is throwing Elizabeth that surprise party," he reminded him, taking a deep breath. "I called and told you about this a week ago. She wants to thank her for being so great with the wedding stuff-"

"Great?" he interjected, nearly laughing.

"Okay, patient, and helpful or something," Johnny replied, clearly agreeing with Jason. "She wants to do something nice, especially since her art opening is in a few days. Get everyone together, pay homage to Elizabeth-"

"The person who hates her," he muttered, unable to help himself.

Johnny glared briefly, but bit his tongue. "It's at Jake's, seven o'clock. and I assume you'll be there."

He lifted his eyes to O'Brien's, snarling as the tailor approached him, his measuring tape in hand. "Yeah," he grunted, figuring that if he was going to face Elizabeth booze might as well be involved.

"So, what do you think?" Lulu asked happily, clasping her hands as her eyes swept over Elizabeth.

"It's…" Her voice trailed off and she jerked as the seamstress, some overpriced woman who worked for Kate Howard, jabbed a needle into her hip. "It's something."

"I figured since everything else is so low key wedding wise, you and I should pop," she exclaimed, reaching out to smooth her hand over one of the feather's on Elizabeth's shoulder.

Yes, feathers.

Like from a bird.

"Especially seeing as we have the best dates," she continued, looking very satisfied as she brushed her fingertips over various parts of the fabric.

Supposedly, Lulu had told Elizabeth about the fitting days ago, but she must have missed it amidst all her jealousy and resentment.

So when the blonde showed up on her doorstep at eight that morning, her seamstress in tow, Elizabeth was anything but pleased. She'd fallen asleep at her studio and woken up around four in the morning. Disgusted by her moment of nostalgia, she quickly shoved her memories back into the box and slid it under her couch, and hurried home.

She was embarrassed enough to have kept the mementos, and she would have been more embarrassed if anyone ever discovered them. In a way, Jason Quartermaine was her secret and always had been. That didn't need to change now.

"Are you alright?" Lulu asked, frowning heavily. "Is it the dress? Oh you just hate it, don't you?"

Elizabeth's lips twitched with the urgency to speak the truth, but she just timidly shook her head, trying to keep her eyes from lifting to the mirror across the room.

Sadly, her eyes won.

She bit her cheeks, sank her teeth into them so hard that she tasted blood and her eyes filled with tears.

What. The. Fuck.

Just when she thought her life couldn't get any worse; when she couldn't believe she kissed her best friend and liked it, or that her other best friend who she thought – no, that she loved came back to town with Princess Purity, she was now standing in her living room wearing the ugliest dress known to man.

What. The. Fuck.

"Um…" she muttered, still biting her cheeks because she knew the second she stopped something bad would come out.

Something like how this was the ugliest fucking dress she had ever seen, and there was no way in hell that Elizabeth Webber would be caught dead wearing a hot pink bridesmaid gown with a matching hat that had fish netting hanging from it. There was also fish netting, or at least that's what she was calling it, on the end of the dress, which Lulu and the seamstress said just looked so fantastic with the feathers.

There were just no words.

The material was tight in a really bad way. It didn't highlight curves or show off her very nice breasts, because if Elizabeth Webber had good anything, it was boobs. Not only had Johnny's fiancé taken him away from her, but she also took her boobs.

This was bad.

"Lulu…" she started, but hesitated, smoothing her hands over the front of her dress, looking for something good about it.

Kate, her ultra rich and glamorous godmother, not to mention fashion icon of the world had supposedly sent her five sketches for possible bridesmaid gowns. She'd also attached a note saying that she wouldn't make it to the wedding, but she wished her and her fiancé well, which Lulu felt she had to share with Elizabeth.

She found herself mildly curious as to why so few people in Lulu's life were coming to the wedding. She was leaving early next week to go to Europe and meet up with her mother to shop for the gown, and Elizabeth couldn't figure out why she wasn't really helping her daughter plan the big day. Not to mention that they were flying in a day before the ceremony and leaving a day after, leaving her to wonder just what the Spencers thought about Johnny O'Brien.

"Oh, if you hate it, we can try another," she said apprehensively, making it clear that for some ungodly reason she loved the dress.

It would be appropriate on a fashion runway in Europe, but never in the states, unless she was a fish or a bird with a soft spot for raging hot pink.

God, she fucking hated Lulu Spencer.

"What's wrong?" she pressed, tapping the seamstress on the shoulder and giving her a look that told her to get the hell out of the room.

Elizabeth would have been amused at seeing Lulu show the slight bit of annoyance or anger with anyone had she not hated her so much.

"I just had a long night," she said, watching the seamstress – she really needed to learn her name – disappear into her kitchen.

"Long night?" she asked, playfully arching an eyebrow. "Or another kind of long night?"

Elizabeth continued to stare at her reflection in the mirror, not wanting to really talk to Lulu of all people about what had happened.

She didn't even know what happened, except that aside from her minor breakdown last night, Jason had been the only thing on her mind. His mouth, his eyes, the way he smelled, and how heartbroken he'd looked when she walked away, but it was only because she had to. Technically, she had loved him once, and she wasn't about to do it all over again.

Love? Ha.

Elizabeth Webber had officially lost her mind if she ever thought it was possible to have feelings for Jason Morgan. Serious, real, life-changing, let's hop into bed and never look back kinds of feelings.

One, she didn't have feelings like that.

Two, he was her best friend.

And three, she was supposed to be breaking up Johnny's engagement or something.

"Oh, I just think I'm feeling a little sad is all," she managed, her cheeks sore from how hard she'd bit them. "The wedding, the boys, things changing."

Okay, so it wasn't technically a lie, but it was better than telling the truth.

"Elizabeth, one day you will have your own day just like this, and you'll get to stick me in a fabulous dress, and I'll watch you walk down the aisle," she grinned, her eyes lighting up at the idea.

Nothing about that was good, except the possibility of sticking Lulu Spencer in a horrifying gown, something off the clearance rack at David's Bridal, but thankfully she would never put her in her wedding party anyway.

Besides, it wasn't like she was ever going to get married.

"For a while, I worried about you," Lulu confessed dramatically, holding a hand to her chest. "John would talk about how you float from one man to the next, never really finding what you need or want, like you were lost and alone."

"You worried about me?" Elizabeth asked, gritting her teeth. "You're the one marrying the former man-whore of Port Charles?"

The blonde's face fell, just like she knew it would, and she didn't feel guilty. Not one single bit, especially when Lulu got quiet and sat down on the couch, wringing her hands.

"I didn't mean to offend you," she replied softly, smoothing her hands over her perfectly straight hair. "I just meant you seemed alone…Like you've been looking for something, and I was hoping, after seeing you with Jason – that maybe he was it."

Or she wanted to be assured that Elizabeth didn't want Johnny.

"You two seem to fit one another very well," she continued, praising Elizabeth's non-existent relationship. "And the way you look at one another…"

Glaring at her reflection, she hated herself more and more by the second. Instead of Johnny being jealous over her relationship, he seemed to enjoy it, maybe even thrived on it, probably getting some sick pleasure of seeing her pant the way she used to.

She was such an idiot, a very pissed off idiot.

"Well, I'm not alone, and I'm sure as hell not looking for anything. This is just how I like things to be," she replied seriously, tugging the stupid hat from the top of her head and tossing it onto the floor. "And this dress sucks."