Beside You | Calum Hood

23

Please read the author's note at the end of the chapter

Skyler's POV

    "Liz?" I take a few steps closer towards them, "What are you doing here?" Michael comes up beside me, his expression almost the same as mine. Shocked. Liz spins around on her heel, her once tense face disappears into a warm smile.

    "Michael, my dear boy! Look at you, and your hair," She exclaims running a hand through his messy hair, "Now another color, I see? How many times have I told you that if you keep dying it, there'll be no hair left to dye?" Michael rubs the back of his neck and laughs nervously admitting,

    "A lot."

    "I'm just kidding, Michael," She laughs smacking his arm playfully before pulling him in to a hug.

"It's good to see you, Liz," He laughs, pulling away. Turning to me with open arms, Liz beams,

"Skyler, it's been too long, sweetheart," Liz hugs me tightly and I laugh.

    "It has! I've missed you, and your cooking," I joke.

    "Aw, I miss seeing you kids running around the neighborhood," She sighs, "Seems like just yesterday you five were running around my front yard."

When we were younger, we would always go to Luke's house to play and mess around. Whenever it rained though, Liz would always force us to come indoors so we wouldn't get sick but she would always have some sort of food for us to snack on. My favorite days were the ones when she would make us hot chocolate and grilled cheese.

We would all sit on the floor, cuddled up in blankets in pillows, watching stupid horror movies or comedies as we ate and joked with each other. By the end of the night, it had always seemed that I would find myself in Calum's arms as I hid my face in his arm at scenes that made me jump or just resting my head on his shoulder as my eyes begin to close. I know it sounds cliche, but those were the moments that I wished would last forever.

The ones where we would all end up falling asleep on top of each other as our bodies littered the living room floor or the times we would end up screwing around too much. One time, while playing rounds of truth or dare at the reckless age of fifteen, the boys pushed my dare a little too much.

"Truth or Dare?" Michael smirked. We were all sitting in a circle, eating grapes from a bowl in the center of the circle that Liz brought down for us.

"Uh, Mike, I don't know," Luke said hesitantly .

"Oh, come on, Lucas," Michael teased, "Live a little, yeah?"

"Fine," Luke caved, "But let's just be careful, alright? My mom will kill us if we do anything stupid."

"Yeah, yeah, mate we got you," Michael turned to us, "You three in?"

"You know I can never turn down a good game of truth or dare," I grinned, Michael returned the smile,

"That's my girl." Turning to Ash and Calum I asked,

"What about you two?"

"Sure, just please don't make me streak outside again, Mike," Calum said as he glared at Michael in a jokingly manner. Ashton agreed.

"Alright! Let's do this then." Michael placed an empty water bottle in the middle of our circle before spinning it. The bottle slowly halted to a stop, landing on Luke.

"Damn it," Luke mutters under his breath.

"Truth or Dare, Lucas?" Michael said as he wiggled his eyebrows.