(Now) Alex's Perspective: Bros Before Hos

1.  If you missed Saturday's post, you can find it here  You'll want to read that one first or this one won't make as much sense! 

2.  I've had a couple requests to add the celebrities that my characters look like to the character list, as some other awesome blogs have done.  However, this is the one request I probably won't grant.  I will continue to consider it, but I have left the descriptions fairly ambiguous for a reason.  I want readers to be able to imagine the characters in a way that makes sense to them.  What if my idea of what's attractive isn't yours, and I post the person that I imagine Brody as, and y'all are like "Dude, he's so not hot"?  Then you don't like him as much, and that would be sad, because Brody has jumped through a lot of hoops to win you all over (see what I did there?).  This way, you can imagine him as any tall, dark, and handsome man you choose.  

I do appreciate the feedback that the characters are hard to imagine, so I did go back into the character list and add physical descriptions to the main characters, so I hope that helps a little.  If the lack of celebrity comparisons is seriously impeding your enjoyment of the story I could probably be talked into adding it but I'd really rather not.  (That sounded rather sarcastic, but I promise that it's not.  I think you guys know that I love to give you what you want, so it's probably weird that I'm putting my foot down on something like this, but for some reason I feel strongly about it!)
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I dodged a bullet.

Okay, that's probably a little dramatic.  But all of Liv's back and forth shit with Brody was ridiculous, and it was really hard to watch my friend get jerked around like that.  What is up with girls, anyway?  Figure out what the hell you want.

Don't get me wrong.  I don't think Liv is a bad person.  I get why she started dating someone else.  She didn't know if Brody would be back.  But I do think that Brody is so in love with her that he doesn't know his head from his ass, and I'm not entirely convinced that Liv feels the same.  If she does, she sure has a weird way of showing it.  I just don't want him to get hurt.  I've never seen him like this.  He's put so much on the line for this and if she decides to change her mind again, he's going to be a mess. 

And I guess I can admit that I'm also a little irritated that I never get to see him now.  He's been so busy with work and now I'm sure he'll spend all his free time with her.  Since he got back from Miami, the only time I see him is when we all get together.   As much as I want to blame it on Liv, I know I can't.  They haven't been back together for that long.  And now that he filled me in on what's going on at work, I get it.  But it still sucks.

I feel bad about some of the things I said when we had it out at happy hour, but they were all true.  I am worried that she's going to break his heart.  I do think the way he caters to her is ridiculous.  But I know that most of my issue isn't actually with Liv, and I did promise Brody that I wouldn't be an asshole to her.  I don't want to be an asshole to her, so it wasn't really a hard promise to make.  I was just really pissed off that day.

He was furious at the things I said on Thursday.  I've only ever seen him mad a couple times.  He's usually pretty laid back, and his "mad" matches most people's "irritated."  But on Thursday?  I got the ass chewing of my life.  He was fired up, and I could barely separate one "fuck" from another.  He called me an asshole at least 3 times, and a motherfucker twice.  If I hadn't been so blown away by how angry he was, it might have been comical. 

Of course, after swearing at each other and getting it out in the open, we made plans to hang out and watch football.  (It's times like this when I'm awfully glad I'm a guy.  I don't do catty chick bullshit.  Isn't it better to bitch each other out, maybe throw a punch or two, and then go have a beer together?  Take note, ladies.)  This was the first time this entire football season that we've done this. When he got to my house, he rang the doorbell.  That was weird, he's always just walked in.

"Really, man?" I asked as I pulled open the door.  "Since when do you ring the doorbell?"

"Since the last time I was here was when I was leaving for Miami and the last time I saw you, you bitched me out," Brody replied, but he was smiling.  He held up a case of beer.  "Peace offering."

"You're going to have to do better than that," I grumbled.  "You can buy the pizza too."

Brody laughed.  "Planned on it.  Now get out of my way so I can actually come in."  I moved, and pushed the door shut behind him.

We ordered pizza and sat on the couch drinking beer and yelling at the terrible play calling and even worse officiating.  The commentating was pretty terrible too.  Ugly game.  At halftime, I asked casually, "So what the heck even happened with you Liv?  You weren't together, and then you were.  It was like it happened overnight."

"It did happen overnight," Brody responded.  He told me the story--the way she had shown up at his house at 1 in the morning, in the pouring rain.  Her confession, their talk the next morning.  I still wasn't convinced that her feelings were at the same level as his, but I guess she probably feels more strongly than I thought she did.  So that's good, I guess. 

"That's sort of crazy," I commented.  "I mean, in a good way."  I was trying to be neutral, but it wasn't going so well.

"It was crazy.  I almost didn't answer the door.  And I definitely wasn't expecting to see her standing there when I did." 

I nodded.  I couldn't think of anything else to say on the topic and I still had my doubts, but I didn't want to be all negative about it, since we were having a pretty good day.  Luckily, the game came back on and our attention turned back to that.

As the day went on, things began to feel normal again. Brody had to take a couple work calls which was surprising to me.  I mean, I know he said he was busy, but for some reason I hadn't realized that meant that he was working on Sundays.  It helped me understand just how busy he was.  I started to feel a little ridiculous for my little outburst on Thursday.

I blamed my overly competitive nature and always feeling like everything was a competition.  I had competed with Brody for Liv, and I'd lost, so now I was competing with Liv for Brody.

I also couldn't help but feel like my friendship with Lauren was changing too.  She and I had always gotten along effortlessly, our dry, sarcastic senses of humor blending seamlessly.  But lately, our friendship had seemed off, and I couldn't quite figure out why.  She seemed a little more on edge and for some reason I felt the need to fix that.  Of course, I had no idea how. 

I was interrupted from my own thoughts by Brody tossing his phone onto the couch next to me and heading in the direction of the bathroom.  While he was gone, his phone vibrated and the screen lit up.  I saw it was a text from Liv and rolled my eyes.  Couldn't she even leave him alone for one day?  Then I saw what it said: Hope you're having fun with Alex.  Don't worry about stopping over later if it gets too late.  Just have a good time there!

Okay, fine.  I was jumping to asshole conclusions again.  I felt guilty and knew I needed to make peace with Liv.  I knew she knew what I had said on Thursday and I really did feel bad about it.

Brody ended up staying until the end of the Sunday night game.  A full day of football.  What's better than that?  "Thanks for the beer and pizza," I said as he was putting his shoes on.

"No problem.  It was good to hang out, and we should probably do it again soon,"  Brody replied.  I agreed and we said goodbye.


On Thursday I pulled Liv aside when she got to happy hour.  "Can we talk for a second?" I asked her.  She nodded, looking confused.  "Look, I was a huge asshole last week, and I'm sorry for the things I said.  I really am glad you guys are back together, because he's really happy."

"Thanks," she replied.  "I guess I wasn't sure if I had done something else to piss you off..." she trailed off, raising her eyebrows questioningly.

"Not at all.  You haven't done anything to piss me off.  I was just being a jerk."  She seemed satisfied with that and smiled.

"We all have our moments," she said.  "So, we're cool?"

"We're cool," I confirmed.

"And if you're pissed at me, next time you'll just tell me instead of being an asshole?" Liv smirked as she said it, and I could help but laugh.

"Yes, mom, next time I'll tell you instead of being an asshole," I said.  She started to walk back towards the table but I stopped her with a hand on her arm.  "Hey, um, can I ask you a question?  In confidence?"

Now she really looked confused.  "Sure, I guess," she replied.

"It's about Lauren, and I know you guys are close, so can you promise not to tell her I asked you this?"  I was taking a risk even giving this much information, but I had to know what was up with her.

"Okay, I promise.  What's up?" she asked curiously.

"She's been...weird lately.  Has she seemed weird to you?  Is there something going on with her?  You don't have to tell me what, but I'm just a little worried."

Liv looked surprised.  "No, she hasn't seemed weird at all to me," she answered genuinely.  "I don't think there's anything going on.  She hasn't said anything.  What do you think is wrong?"  Now Liv looked concerned too.

"Nothing," I said quickly.  "I don't know.  She's just seemed a little off lately.  Maybe it's just me.  I've clearly been a little off lately."  I tried to joke it off.  "Seriously though, don't say anything, okay?"

"Okay," Liv agreed.  I wasn't completely sure if I could trust her, but therapists are supposed to be good at keeping secrets, right?  I let her return to the table and puzzled over why Liv didn't notice anything different with Lauren.  And why did I even care so much?