It was the day of midsummers.
The one day where the whole kook side of the island came together for a celebration. Most of the pogues came too, as workers.
I left Rafe's house in the afternoon to set up the event and collect my uniform. The boys working wore a suit, and the girls wore a black dress.
"Well hello princess." JJ says, walking in the room with a suit on.
We've both worked at every midsummers for about 3 years now and every time something bad happens, but at least we get payed.
"Finally, it took you long enough to get here."
"Well I gotta make sure I look good for my boy." he winks to the side of me.
"What boy-" I turn to the side seeing Pope blowing him a kiss.
"Oh okay!" I say in a sarcastic tone.
"Do you guys know where John B is?" Pope asks, walking closer to us.
"Nah he's probably with Sarah." JJ shook his head.
"What about Kie?" he asks.
"Probably with her mom getting ready." I say.
"I mean- our mom." I correct myself.
Suddenly, all of our attention was drawn to the loud noise of the opening doors, all of the kooks slowly coming in.
"Here we go again." JJ states.
"Don't pull any stupid shit like the last times." Pope says.
"I never pull stupid shit?" JJ shrugs, acting oblivious.
"Well thats a lie." I laugh.
"You two!" a worker shouts at me and Pope while JJ pretends he's preparing drinks.
"Get over here and do something." they shout again.
Pope instantly walks over to the man while I say bye to JJ.
"You two will be bringing the drinks over to the guests." the man says.
"Okay, tell us when to start!" Pope says enthusiastically.
The man rolls his eyes and walks away from us.
"Man, I hate kooks." Pope whispers.
"Right."
"No- I mean uh, some kooks I hate, not all of them." Pope corrects himself.
"What?" I laugh.
"Rafe." Pope says.
"Oh."
And I remember how Rafe treated Pope. I never even talked to Pope about his feelings towards us being together when Rafe hurt him the most out of the pogues.
"I never talked to you about how you felt, did I?" I ask, knowing the answer.
"No but I'm cool with it if you're happy." he shrugged.
"I'm sorry Pope." I say genuinely.
"It doesn't matter." he shrugs.
"You don't have to pretend to like him after everything he's done, but he's changed." I say.
Pope looks to the side and then looks at me and raises his eyebrows in disbelief.
"Has he?" he says.
"What?" I ask.
He points his head into another direction to show me what he was looking at. The Cameron family walk into the venue one by one as we watch.
Ward, Rose and Wheezie together, then Sarah and John B. And finally, Rafe and a random girl.
My heart instantly drops.
"Damn, that's gotta hurt." Pope comments.
I scoff in disbelief, still watching Rafe hand in hand with another girl.
"Hey, I can cover for you if you wanna talk to him or-"
"No, it's fine." I shake my head, going back to work as if nothing happened.
"Gia-"
"God, it's fine I just-" I cut myself off by looking around the room.
I grab the closest bottle of vodka and start downing it, my throat burning at the taste.
I finally put the bottle down, wiping my mouth.
"Much better." I laugh.
I sigh, seeing Pope's disappointed face.
A man walks in, putting down his notepad full of orders for drinks.
Me and Pope serve about five tables, and that's when the alcohol starts to kick in.
But I notice that Rafe hasn't even looked at me once. I look over to see what table he was sitting at, but he was too far away to tell.
I put a few random cocktails on a tray, walking out into the hall.
"What are you doing, those weren't on the lists?" Pope shouts from behind.
I go towards Rafe's table with his date, stumbling slightly as I walk.
"Hello, is this table 7?" I ask, slurring my words.
Rafe finally looks up to me, gulping at the sight.
"No, this is table 3, it says it right here?" his date points to the middle of the table.
"Oh I'm sorry, what's your name?" I ask her.
"Nicole." she says with attitude.
I pretend to trip, the drinks pouring down onto her.
Rafe's mouth drops open, biting his lips to contain his smirk from showing.
"Oh my god, I'm so sorry Nicole." I say with my hand to my heart.
"You bitch!" she stands up from her chair.
People start staring and whispering and Rafe notices.
She pushes me backwards as I laugh at her.
"Are the workers supposed to be drinking on the premises?" she yells to one of the workers.
"Someone's mad." I roll my eyes.
"Do you want to start shit or-" she gets cut off.
"Hey, I'll take care of it." he gets up, signalling Nicole to sit down as she scoffs.
He takes my arm, pulling me to a random hallway in the big venue.
"I can't believe you did that." he laughs.
I roll my eyes at him.
"What- oh yeah, shit." Rafe realises.
"I forgot to tell you, my dad said I had to bring a kook date so-"
"I don't fucking care what your dad says, oh my god!" I shout.
"Gia shh!"
He tries to cover my mouth with his hand as I pull it away from me, walking back a step.
"Oh c'mon, it's not like I'm with her?" he raises his hands in the air, clueless of what he's done wrong.
I sniff, looking away from him.
"Hey." he steps closer to me.
And immediately when we hear footsteps coming towards us, he steps backwards. Away from me.
I scoff, walking away from him.
"Rafe? Is that you?" I hear Kelce say from a distance.
"I'll come out in a second Kelce." he shouts to him.
"Gia wait." he whispers.
"Gia!" he shouts, walking the same way as me.
"I mean I already know you're embarrassed of me, but shit." I laugh.
"This is like a different level." I say, laughing even louder.
"Stop walking away from me!" he yells.
"It's not like you care anyways." I sniff.
I feel him pulling my arm backwards for me to face him again. He doesn't say anything, just stares at me.
"What do you want?" I say coldly.
"I-"
"You cant keep doing this shit, Rafe."
"I'm sorry, baby."
"Don't call me that."
"Gia- I just forgot to tell you."
"Tell me what? That you're going to midsummers with another girl?"
"Yes, exactly that."
"We literally talked about midsummers two days ago and you didn't say anything about it?"
He doesn't respond.
"You're a liar."
"Okay- I didn't want you to be upset." he corrects himself.
"Upset?" I yell.
"How would you feel if I went with JJ?" I ask.
"I didn't think of it like that." he sighs.
"Let's just forget this, alright?" he says.
"What, no." I shake my head.
"You don't wanna be seen with me and that's okay, maybe this won't work out-"
"No." he interrupts me.
"I'll go tell Topper about us, Kelce, fucking anyone if that's what it takes." he states.
"But you don't want to." I look down.
"That's the problem." I say.
He doesn't say anything, which is what I expected.
I look to the side, seeing more vodka bottles, grabbing another and downing more, this time feeling nothing.
"Gia stop." he tries taking the bottle away from me.
I step backwards, downing more.
"Stop!" he pulls it out of my hand.
He puts it on the table, looking back to me seeing tears drop down my face.
"C'mon I'm sorry." he walks closer to me,
He cups my face, wiping the tears off from my cheeks.
"No- I just." I sniff, my hands going through my hair.
"I'm gonna go." I say.
I take his hands off my cheeks gently, placing them down.
"Wait- just talk to me." he pleads.
"Where does this leave us?" he says before I walk away.
"I don't know." I say quietly, my voice croaking.
I walk into another corridor, finding the bathroom and looking in the mirror.
My eyes were shockingly red, mascara was dripping down my face, and my hair was all over the place. I looked like a mess. Over Rafe.
I tried to contain my cries, but he took over me, like he always did. I know I started the argument, but even that was low for him.
Suddenly, I hear a cubicle unlock even though I thought nobody was in here. I quickly breathe in and out, acting as if I wasn't crying and start washing my hands to act normal.
"Gia?" Sarah says.
"Oh hi Sarah." I try to avoid looking at her.
"Are you okay?" she sounded concerned.
"Yeah, I'm um-" I stop to take a breath.
I finally look at her, but her expression stays the same.
"If you want we can leave." she smiles at me.
"What?" I ask.
"John B went off with JJ to go smoke weed, and I don't really do that." she laughs to herself.
Sarah was sweet, she had a pure heart.
"You can come to my house, we can chill, watch a movie, maybe talk?" she asks.
"Yeah- no yeah." I nod.
"I'd love that, thank you." I try to smile.