Soundcheck•l.r.h.

find me at a quarter to three

"So, what are your names?" Calum questioned, slowing slightly to walk in the middle of us. 

"This is Ella, my sister, and I'm Aurora, but I go by Rory for short," I spoke softly, gesturing to Ella and then myself. 

I was surprised at how steady my voice was; it definitely did not reciprocate how I felt. 

Calum Hood was taking us to the VIP section personally. There was nothing that could beat this moment. It was way too surreal. 

"Cool names. I'm Calum, but for some reason, I think you might already know that," he joked, smiling brightly. 

I sighed in relief. Thank God he didn't mention our names.

So precious. 

"Where exactly are we going?" Ella asked, looking up at him. 

I was relatively tall for a girl, around 5'8, so I was almost level with Calum. But Ella, however, was only 5'5, so she had to glance way up at him. 

"Well, like she said, the soundcheck is over. But, since the Q&A is still going on, we're gonna go to the stage," he replied, shoving his hands in his pockets. 

"You mean you're going to go to the stage. We're gonna sit in the audience," Ella laughed, flashing him a smile. 

His eyes lit up suddenly. Oh no.

"Actually, I stand by what I said." 

<--------------------------->

"I'm not getting up there." 

I shook my head, gazing up at the Kiwi band member. 

No way in hell was I getting up onto the stage. No. 

"You wanna meet the rest of the lads, don't you?" He smirked, holding out his hand. 

"Yeah, but I don't want it to be unfair. Not every fan gets to do this," I whined. 

We were currently on the side of the stage, and the voices of the other members of 5 Seconds of Summer could be heard from where we were. A whole bunch of equipment was stacked around us, including guitars, speakers, amps, and several wires thrown everywhere. Calum was trying to convince Ella and I to get up on stage with him to go sit down next to the band for the Q&A, but I didn't want to anger any of the other fans. I also knew that a bunch of people would be staring at me, and that did not sound fun. 

"Won't your managers get mad if two random girls are up on stage with you?" Ella raised an eyebrow, crossing her arms beside me. 

Calum thought for a moment, raising a hand to his chin. After about four seconds of silence, he shrugged. 

"Probably, but who cares? I can do whatever I want, I'm in the band." 

Ella copied his action, shrugging before allowing him to take her hand, pulling her up and onto the slick, black stage. 

I sighed, my body feeling as if it was buzzing. As calm as I was acting, my brain had been screeching nonstop for thirty minutes. 

"C'mon, Aurora, this is what you've always wanted. Do not make me miss this opportunity," Ella begged. 

The funny part was, she wasn't even a huge fan of them. She only knew their songs because I'd been obsessed with them since 2012. She always did love Calum though; I was shocked that she hadn't jumped on him yet. 

But hey, we still have time. 

"Alright, whatever. But if I get in trouble I'm telling them Calum Hood told me I could," I warned, pointing a finger at the twenty-two year old as I let him pull me up. 

My legs felt like Jell-O as I walked across the stage, my left hand trembling as I unzipped my purse, stealthily popping two pills into my mouth to calm myself down. No need to have a panic attack in front of 5sos. 

"Okay, guys. Relax. It's gonna be fine. They're cool guys," Calum assured us. 

He was just how I imagined: sweet, funny, comforting. I hoped all of the boys were like this. 

I took a deep breath, Luke, Michael, and Ashton's faces coming into view. 

Oh God, here we go. 

I don't know how I feel about this story yet tbh. Not sure if I'm gonna continue it or not, but I guess we'll see. It's funny because the reason I was inspired to write this was because yesterday my sister and I went to a 5sos concert with soundcheck tickets and the same exact thing happened: they wouldn't let us in because ticketmaster didn't send out the itinerary email in time so we were like two hours late. So yeah we missed our entire VIP experience, which actually sucked a lot. Of course the concert was still amazing, even after seeing them twice before. But I would've liked to see them soundcheck and stuff. Still mad about it. Anyways, comment if you want more or just to let me know what you think. 

-joshuawdone