"What are we doing in my neighbourhood?" I finally managed to express my shock in the form of a question, as Dorian and I exited the car that brought us to Ridgeton.

   This night was already taking a weird turn. Throughout the day, Dorian remained tight-lipped about what he was planning for tonight. He'd left so much to the imagination that countless scenarios of how this night was going to go won't stop appearing in my head. Despite that, I couldn't have possibly guessed that I'd be standing in a familiar street of my very own neighbourhood.

   Taking Dorian's outstretched hand, I decided to try again, "May I ask what we're doing here?"

   I received a hand squeeze from him after he said, "You'll find out in a minute."

   So I let him lead the way. Although, I have to admit how strange it was that Dorian was leading me through the streets in which I was born and bred like he owned the place. Any passerby would think he'd been to Ridgeton a hundred times.

   After a brief walk past some stores and houses, we stopped in front of a large, brick-walled building I knew all too well.

"We're here," Dorian remarked.

   I made sure to shoot him my most confused look before staring at the building before us again. It was the ancient music store that was one of the most famous landmarks in our district. This was where I'd met Dorian when he first came over to my house so we could work on the drone we initially planned on using to infiltrate Zavlon. It was also when I got to know about Dorian's love for music and the piano.

   But... this was a music store. Who went on a date in a music store?

   When I looked up, Dorian was closer to the door, one of his hands hanging on the door handle.

"Are you coming?" he asked, his tone ever so casual.

   You know, my house wasn't too far from here. I could still make a run for it before I got arrested for trespassing. Clearly Dorian was doomed, but that didn't mean i had to go down with him–

"Beth." Dorian sighed, holding out his hand afterwards. "Trust me."

   Choosing optimism, I took his hand and emptied my mind of all the worst possible cases as we walked through the store.

   Somehow the messy arrangements of guitars, violins, keyboards and other instruments I couldn't name against the walls of the room we were in had an appealing effect. That could probably also be attributed to the old and fresh wood scent mixed with vanilla.

"Dorian!" The dark-skinned, grey-haired man wearing tiny glasses behind a counter peered at him with a big smile that appeared to be too familiar. "Welcome back!"

   Welcome back?

   Before I could inquire further however, Dorian replied with a grin of his own, "Hey Mr. Placca."

   I took the smile of Mr. Placca as an indication to speak, "I'm Beth Simmons. Nice to meet you."

"That name sounds familiar," he mused. "Aren't you the girl that goes to that fancy school?"

   I winced. After everything that had happened in the past few weeks, I'd forgotten the mild fame I'd received in Ridgeton due to my attendance at Zavlon Academia. The moments when I had shameless stares–some glares, let's be honest–thrown my way as I walked from the bus stop to my house wearing the Zavlon school uniform seemed like decades ago now.

"You must really be something," he added, without a trace of sarcasm or mockery in his tone. "Ridgeton is proud to have you."

   On any other day I would have begged to differ, but the genuineness behind what he said was unlike anything I'd ever seen. Even though it wasn't entirely true, I was glad to see that aside Mum and Tali, someone from Ridgeton didn't think I was a sellout.

"Thank you, Mr Placca."

   He gave a slight nod, before turning to Dorian, "Everything is ready. Have fun kids." he said, sealing his words with a smile.

   Dorian took my hand, leading us through a narrow hallway. We'd barely taken a few steps when he stopped in front of a bright blue door. I couldn't resist holding my breath as he twisted the door knob open.

   My heart lurched at the sight of the largest grand piano I'd ever seen that seemed to take up almost half of the room. The moonlight shone through the open window within the one room's walls unto the shiny black and white keys which formed a part of the glittering clear-coloured body of the piano. It was the most beautiful thing I'd ever seen. But this couldn't be what I came for... could it?

"So what do you think?" Dorian asked.

   Looking over to find a sparkle in both eyes, I noticed his gaze wasn't on where mine just was. That was when I stared down and saw what Dorian had actually asked my opinion on.

   On the large jute rug spread out on the floor was a low wooden picnic table with two covered plates facing each other, an ice bottle with two bottles of what looked like wine immersed in it and four scented candles at each pointed end of the table. Also on the rug were multiple pillows that had been stacked into what looked like two comfy seats that, like the plates, were opposite each other.

"This is incredible." I gaped, not bothering to hide how much I was in awe of everything before me.

"I hope you're hungry," he said, as we settled into our respective seats.

   The heavenly scent of steaming hot jollof rice went straight for my nostrils when I opened the cover placed over my plate.

"Wow." I swallowed. It was getting harder and harder to keep myself from drooling.

   While we ate, he admitted that Mr. Placca was to be given credit for the food. Or at least the restaurant from which he'd ordered the meal.

"Since we're on the topic of Mr. Placca," I said, the fork in my hand digging into the remains of food on my plate, "It's kind of impossible to ignore the familiarity between you which is confusing the hell out of me to be honest. We weren't in Ridgeton for a very long time and I'm pretty sure for that period, we never stepped foot here. Or did you know him already or something?"

"Do you recall,'' I noticed how his hands began to fumble with each other while giving the food in front of him a hard stare. "our argument about Landon when he first came around? About whether we could trust him?"

   My hand gripped the fork a little too much strength. How could I forget? I especially could not erase from my head the hurt expression on Dorian's face when I said some awful things to him. And how that expression switched to anger before he bolted and didn't return until at a much later time in the day.

"When I first left the motel, I wasn't really sure of where I wanted to go, after all, we'd just moved into the new motel. I didn't know the area well," he remarked. "But Ridgeton crossed my mind for some reason, and that was relatively familiar so I took the bus there even though I had no plan whatsoever. While walking through the streets, I came across this store and that came with the nostalgic memories I'd made playing my piano almost everyday after school."

"When everything was normal," I whispered.

"Exactly." He gave me a knowing wistful smile.

   Dorian went on to explain how he'd met Mr. Placca struggling to carry some instruments when he walked in and offered to help. In exchange for that, the old man allowed him to browse around the store even though Dorian confessed that he didn't intend to buy anything.

"Before I realised, I'd spent hours here just looking around." he laughed. "When I returned to the motel, the memories and the urge to play was stronger than ever and so I went there the next day, offering to help Mr Placca in any way if he allowed me to play any piano in exchange."

   This went on for the following days, according to Dorian; him arranging or cleaning the instruments in exchange for a few hours of feeling normal as he played the piano. Eventually that also led to the unlikely friendship between Dorian and Mr. Placca, hence the reason he was able to get access to everything for tonight.

"So," he said, while popping open one of the wine bottles and pouring its contents into our glasses. "Any more questions?"

   I couldn't stop my face from falling at that question. With the time Dorian and I had spent together in the past few days, I'd forgotten about the enigmatic part of Dorian that had caused problems between us in the past. My mind took me back to when we were in the basement and he revealed his parents' death at a tender age, the trauma he'd faced in a crazy institution and his adoption. I remembered being so happy that for the first time, Dorian had been this open to me. But I also recalled that in my fear of pushing him too hard, I'd never asked about how and why he wasn't affected by the Virtuo glasses at the dance, to why he lied about it, to why he acted in such a bizarre manner after the camera explosion and lied about that.

   Dorian seemed to notice the change in the atmosphere, but to my surprise, for the first time ever, he looked me square in the eye saying, "I can't tell you everything tonight. The answers to some questions would no doubt interfere with our much needed focus on the mission at hand. But after all this is over Beth, I promise you, you'll know everything."

"Everything?" I stared at his face, noticing how it remained poised and unflinching as it stayed on mine.

"Everything." he affirmed.

   The earnest look in his shiny green eyes urged me to believe him. I sighed, cursing myself for not looking away.

"Okay." I nodded.

"But that doesn't mean you can't ask me basic questions." Without meaning to, my sight followed Dorian's hand as it took hold of a glass full of wine and brought it to his lips. I found myself swallowing as he did the same to his wine, feeling my cheeks warm up when I realised what I just did. "So ask away."

A/N: Thanks for reading! Please don't forget to vote and comment!