5SOS Imagines

Calum - Frat AU

Author: Rhine

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You don't recognize him anymore.

Taller than you remembered, broader – muscles defined and highlighted with black ink to add shadow to his lean arms, razor-sharp jawline with its pointed smirk and cliff-steep cheekbones; some gold in his hair, some mischief in his eyes.

He looks like a stranger of someone you used to know; you would've walked right past him on the streets and still have the sight of his broad-shouldered varsity jacket engrained in your memory for days as you tried to place the oddly unfamiliarly familiar face to a name that used to come easier off your lips.

"Calum?"

You haven't said his name out loud in so long, and it sounds a little different as it disappears in the air as opposed to echoing in your brain.

"Hey! You made it – wow, look at you – you're just on time for the party, c'mon over, yeah? God, it's been so long – what, like five years? Eight? Fuck it, I can barely even remember who was there last night, but I am glad I remembered you."

His voice is deeper, a bass that vibrates in your ears and it matches the lean boy with the confident smile in front of you, but not the one in your memory.

"Thought it was a bit of a long shot – boys and I were digging up some of our old stuff – gold, I tell you, Luke has got some of the most hilarious pictures with all that shit in his hair and Mikey with his god-awful love letters that he didn't have the balls to send out, you gotta see it – remind me later, yeah? Actually, remind me to introduce you to the boys first, promise they're not as big of losers as some of that shit from sixth grade makes them look out to be, but – wait, where was I again? Right. You. Pulled out a class picture of us ages ago – you know, the one where you were trying out that new thing with your hair – didn't know what the fuck it was but it's not coming back anytime soon. Still smiled like the sun though, god you were adorable – and anyways, had your old e-mail scrawled on the back, figured why the fuck not? Gave it a shot, and besides, could always use more bodies at a party like this. Didn't think you'd remember me, let alone check your old e-mail. Glad you did though."

His smile is too bright and his words are too fast; running into each other through his plump lips and frequently cut short with a hey man and a high-five to some passing bulky boy with a red cup in his hands and lingering eyes on you, the occasional greeting to girls who croon hi Calum with lowered eyelashes with sharp glares at you – his words are disjointed from the interruptions and he trips over the breaks of commas and question marks are periods and you're still trying to process the last sentence as he finishes the next.

It's all a little too much to try and take in – the large house with flashing lights from the windows, the three hour drive's tiredness mixed in with the blaring music's pounding headache; the exposed sides of Calum's tanned skin through the muscle tee and your baggy sweats, unknown eyes looking at you as they talked to him, unfamiliar eyes looking back at you while he talked to you.

When he had said let's hang out some time, are you free next Saturday, you figured it just meant driving down to his campus with a quick tour, grabbing some dinner and some movies at his place with photo albums and conversation about the years you missed with him by your side and the years without; trying to rediscover someone you thought you had lost in the past and rekindle it into something brighter than memories of playgrounds and science projects.

Not this.

Not this goddamn frat party with girls wearing less than what you were underneath your t-shirt and sweats, not red solo cups and kegs at every corner; not bad techno music remixes and boys who called you up to come because they wanted to see if the wide-smiling naïve girl in the picture is just as much of a mess now as she was then.