In Another Life

Five

A/N: If anyone is confused I changed the name of the a cappella group Scott and Mitch are in. The thought of members of the real group finding this fic randomly popped into my head and I do not like that thought lmao so I went through and changed it to a fictional name. Everything else will be staying the same!! (Sorry for coming up with such a lame replacement by the way lol)

"What the hell do I even pack for Big Bear? I don't own outdoorsy clothes, Scott."

Scott laughed from where he was sat on the floor across the room. Just like Mitch, he was busy packing some of his clothes into a duffle bag.

Mitch was hardly as amused about the situation as Scott was.

"Just some shorts? And t-shirts? I don't know, it's not that complicated," Scott replied with a shrug.

Mitch narrowed his eyes at him. "That's easy for you to say, you dress like a frat boy," he grumbled. "The only shorts I own are basketball shorts, and I'm not about to wear those in front of a bunch of people I'm trying to impress."

Exactly one week had gone by since Mitch had been accepted into CalTones. That very morning before their classes Scott had informed Mitch that they would be going on a weekend trip to Big Bear with the rest of the group. According to him it was a tradition; they went every single year to initiate their new members.

Mitch wasn't a camping person, but he'd still been fairly excited at the news.

His excitement had faded significantly however when Scott preceded to inform Mitch that they were leaving for said trip that afternoon.

It wasn't like it was that much of an inconvenience; Mitch's weekend plans had consisted entirely of watching anime and eating shitty pizza from the campus cafeteria, so Big Bear was probably a pretty big improvement. But regardless, some prior notice certainly would've been nice so he could've been better prepared.

Scott snorted at Mitch's words. "You don't need to impress anyone, Mitch. You'll realize very quickly that the whole group are just a bunch of choir nerds like you and me," he promised.

Mitch struggled not to roll his eyes. Sure, he thought to himself. A bunch of ridiculously talented, popular, and attractive choir nerds.

"You can borrow some of my clothes, if you need to," Scott added, going back to the matter at hand.

Mitch made it a point to look up from the shirt he was examining so he could give Scott an incredulous stare. "You're a giant, Scott," he reminded him. "I'm not going to fit into your clothes."

"Well we're leaving in, like, thirty minutes. So you better figure out what you're packing soon," Scott replied simply.

Mitch watched as Scott shoved one last item into his bag and then zipped it up. He wished it could be that easy for him. His own bag was currently empty.

"You know, if you would've given me earlier notice then I could've bought appropriate clothes," he grumbled.

Scott stood up. "That would've been no fun. It's supposed to be a surprise," he replied cheerfully. He crossed the room and plopped down on Mitch's bed, examining a few of the random clothing articles Mitch had strewn about.

Mitch sighed exasperatedly. He snatched a shirt out of Scott's hand and folded it neatly, shoving it into the bottom of his bag. "Speaking of surprises..." he began slowly after a moment. The pointed tone to his voice had been replaced with a more casual, calm one. "Is there a reason why you didn't tell me about your ex boyfriend being in the group?"

He did his best to make it seem like the question had randomly popped into his head, even though that definitely wasn't the case.

Over the past week he'd thought about Lucas and his status as president of CalTones much more than he'd like to admit. Mitch was still extremely excited that he'd been accepted for sure, but he'd be lying if he said that being in the group with Lucas wasn't a cause of stress for him.