You can wait for the perfect moment all your life, when something you have waited for, longed for, finally happens. It may never happen, but you anticipate it, imagine it happening over and over again in your mind. And then it finally happens.

I was in the middle of obsessing, yet again, about the stupid fall I'd taken during our Boxing Day concert. It was three in the morning, and everyone had left the party inside, and had moved it outside. The only people left in the living room were the members of the tour crew that we were closer to, and some personal friends and the few who were too drunk to make it outside. But out back, the party was still raging on, I could tell by the sounds of laughter and voices yelling "wassup" every few seconds. I was in the middle of describing how I'd tripped for the second time, to a very drunk Clark, the sound technician, when my cell phone rang.

"Hello?" I asked.

"Howie, get your fine self to where the real party is!" a voice yelled through the background noise.

"Belle?" I asked, recognising the voice, but I was unsure if it was her or not, because Belle wasn't much of a drinker, and the person on the phone was definitely drunk.

"Howie. Howie, why are you still talking? C'mon outside," she said and promptly hung up. Baffled, and concerned by behaviour completely out of character, I went outside. And saw Belle jumping on a trampoline with a bottle of champagne in her hands.

"Howie!" she cried when she saw me, and hurled herself off the trampoline. Miraculously, she landed on her feet, and then she made her way sluggishly over to me. I took a good look at her eyes, and I knew that there was something more to her behaviour then just some celebration.

"Belle, what's up?" I asked carefully.

"WASSUP!" she cried in return, prompting ten other people to yell in response. I led her away from the din of the party, and she was so gone, she barely noticed.

"Bella, where's Darren?" I asked, speaking of her boyfriend. She glared at me, and in response to my question, smashed the champagne bottle on the ground.

"I'm sick of everything being about him! My work, my life and now, even this bloody conversation! He broke up with me, the stupid asshole, so it doesn't matter where he is!" she yelled.

"This is a good thing, he treated you like crap."

"Don't you start on me about that. I don't want to hear any lectures from you," she warned. And her expression changed, and so did her tone of voice.

"You know, Howie, I've always found you attractive. Painfully so, but Darren, who will now be referred to as 'that asshole', was always in the way. But now that he's gone, we could always…" she trailed off, drawing closer to me. I could smell the alcohol on her breath and it was repugnant.

"Bella, you're drunk and you're on the rebound. Rethink that statement," I said, the words that she had spoken, this moment, had been too long in coming. But now that it had arrived, it wasn't as planned. It wasn't supposed to be like this.

"Fine," she yelled, pushing me away, "if you don't want me, then I'll find someone else that does."

"Belle, I think it's best if I call a cab for you, and you head home," I said.

"You're just trying to get rid of me, like everyone else. Well, screw you," she yelled, storming off. She was a few feet from where we were, when she tripped over a bench, and hit the pavement, head first.

* * * *

Belle is an absolute lighting genius. As the lighting director, she does everything, from planning out which lights to use where before the tour, to setting them up, to directing their usage during performances, to the dismantling and clean up at each and every single venue we play. Just everything. While we're touring, I don't think she sleeps. She's been with us for two years now, along with Darren, a light technician. Darren and Belle met while touring, and have been a couple ever since then.

While everyone loves Belle to death, you can't help it with her quiet demeaner and her random acts of kindness; not many people like Darren. He is rude, obnoxious and he treats everyone like they are below him. Including Belle. He would order her around like a dog, insult her and show up late for every date they ever made. There were many times when I've had to control my temper when he was around, watching helplessly as he hurt Belle again and again. The press would enjoy the story of a Backstreet Boy kicking the shit out of a lighting technician too much to follow through. But I've been tempted. Belle and I never really had much in common, until one day, we were both waiting for our dates to arrive, in the lobby of some obscure hotel, on the West Coast. We just started talking, and when they finally did show up, we said good bye and went our separate ways. I didn't even recognise her from the crew. The next day, however, I saw her with "her" headset on, doing whatever it is that she does, and yet another conversation had ensued. That was the range of our relationship. We talked. Of course, I was incredibly attracted to her, and loathed Darren, at first because he had Belle but later on because he was so horrid to her, but mostly we talked. I don't let it get to me at all, the fact that she stayed with Darren when he was such an ass, when the whole time, I've been right here, waiting for my chance. Belle is worth it, right?

Okay, so I'm lying. It got to me a lot. Whenever I saw the two of them together, or when I got the two a.m. calls asking to me meet her to talk, I would rack my brain trying to figure out why an asshole who couldn't care less about her, had managed to steal her heart. He treated her like dirt. I would treat her like a queen. It just doesn't make sense. The cruel irony of the world. I had been waiting two years for either him to get bored with her, or for Belle to break it off with him. Two years and my day finally came. And now she was drunk and injured. And low and behold, guess who comes running to the rescue.

"Belle!" a voice called, startling me out of my angered contemplation. For the past twenty minutes, I had been hovering around protectively while a doctor cleaned the gash on her head, and informed her of the symptoms of a concussion. I glared in the direction it was coming from. He ignored my hostility, and came running to her anyway. She was sitting on a stretcher in the emergency room, where I had insisted on driving her after she had fallen. A concussion and a pretty bad scrape of her head was the diagnosis.

"Darren, what are you doing here?" she asked coolly.

"I heard that you were hurt, so I came to see if you were alright, baby. How are you?" he cooed. She looked away, ashamed.

"I'll be fine, I guess. You shouldn't have come," she stated weakly. I knew exactly what she was thinking. Well, I knew exactly what I hoped she was thinking. Stupid bastard, couldn't wait to get rid of me, and now the one time I don't need you, you are here? Go to hell. But wishes don't always come true. She didn't say anything.

"Belle, are you alright? You know that I would just die if anything happened to you," Darren gushed.

"You cared enough to dump me four hours ago," she stated. I secretly applauded her.

"Baby, it was just a fight. You know, the kind we always have. I was waiting for you to come back, you always come back. But you didn't." Stupid prick had an explanation for everything. Don't do it Belle, don't listen to him this time, I was screaming inside.

"But you have never said it was over before. Never."

"I was mad. But I got over it, honey."

"Maybe I haven't," she said.

"But to go and do something so stupid, just because we've had a fight is not the way to solve our problems," Darren said, full of concern (my ass).

"What on earth are you talking about?" Belle demanded.

"I'm concerned about the way you handled your emotions tonight. But it's not just tonight, sweetie, it's every time that something happens between us, you run off and do something potentially dangerous to yourself. I think you need counselling," he said. Belle stared at him open mouthed for a few minutes.

"I'm drunk, my head is killing me, and we are not having this conversation right now." She stood up precariously on shaky legs, and looked over at me.

"Howie, could you drive me home?" she asked.

"Sure, Bella," I said, having chosen to remain silent until spoken to. We started to leave the room, and she put her arm on my shoulder for support, most likely because she was dizzy. I slid my arm around her waist and we walked away from Darren. I looked back at him, and a look of sheer vengeance passed between the two of us.

I had made a resolution, it seems. Darren was not going to sink his claws back into Belle, not with me around.