~Paige
"An acoustic show?" Michael repeats as if he hadn't heard me correctly.
"Yes, I think it's the perfect compromise for the bands situation!" I encourage my brilliant idea.
I had gathered all the boys—and Victoria for backup—into the dressing room to try and convince them into doing something they hadn't even considered, which was doing an acoustic show in a venue that fills ten thousand.
It sounds crazy and we only have three hours till show time, but I really think it could work.
"I don't know Paige, we don't really have enough time to prepare." Ashton shrugs his shoulders, still in the slump he'd been in since the accident.
I shake my head, pacing across the black leather couch that the four boys sit on together. "I disagree. I've seen you guys write a song in less than an hour before."
I stop my pacing and look back at them, "All I'm asking is that you at least try and take songs you already have and turn them into an acoustic setlist?"
The boys look to one another with all sorts of emotions flowing throughout the room. I understand that this was not the intention they had for performing their show today, but it's either this or nothing.
If there's one thing that never fails to bring the boys happiness, it's the music they play.
"I'm in." Calum is the first to speak up, making me sigh in relief.
The other boys look to Calum worried, but he stands his ground by giving me a small reassuring smile.
"Michael, what do you think?" I ask, starting to worry that this plan will not be followed through with.
Michael runs his fingers through his hair a few times, thinking everything through before giving me his answer.
"It could work." He shrugs, his lips turning into a nonchalant frown.
"Thank you Michael." I say, relief finally starting to overtake my stress.
Vanessa sat in a chair placed in front of one of the mirrors, spectating the entire conversation in case I needed a much stronger voice to help out.
She finally puts that overpowering voice to use when she takes notice that the youngest member of the band has yet to give me an answer, "Lucas Hemmings!" She speaks up, causing Luke to jump slightly in his seat and look up at her. "If you don't give Paige an answer right now, I'm sleeping in a different hotel room tonight."
Luke quickly turns to look at me, eyes widened in stress for a moment to think this through. "I just don't think Cal should be performing at all." He finally says, voice quiet as he realizes if he says one wrong word Vanessa's out of the hotel room.
Understanding where Luke's coming from, I still disagree. I wouldn't have suggested an idea knowing that Calum couldn't handle it.
"Calum can handle an acoustic show." I state simply.
My boy looks up at me with a smirk tugging at his lips as he mouths a "thank you" to me.
I smile back at him, hoping he knows just how much on his side I am. I would do anything for my perfect boy.
Luke turns to look at Calum with nothing but pure love and worry for his best friend in his intentions, "You sure you can do it Cal?"
The much more enthusiastic boy smiles back at his best friend, "My superhero nickname is Cal-Pal for fucks sake! I can handle anything."
All of us laugh at the memory of the boys filming the music video for Don't Stop and how Calum got the worst costume color combination out of all of them, lime green and yellow. If he could handle that, he really can handle anything.
Calum, Luke, and Michael lose themselves in a silly conversation over the memory, but I find myself distracted by an unusually quiet Ashton staring at the floor.
Ashton's not the type of person to check out of a conversation and it's been incredibly sad watching his bubbly personality diminish over the past week.
It's clear that he still feels entirely at fault for the situation the band has been put, when that shouldn't be the case at all.
I walk over to the side of the couch he sits on, careful not to draw too much attention this way. "What do you say Ash?" I ask softly, aware of the state of mind he's in right now.
His eyes stay focused on the floor, "I'm just worried something will go wrong halfway through the show."
I bend down beside the couch to be ear level with him, "Nothing will go wrong Ashton, I promise." My heart breaks as I speak to the boy I've looked up to for years. Seeing him so broken is so unfamiliar and hurts like a thousand knives stabbing into my heart at once. "We have so much backup and people prepared to take over if something does go wrong, but I can assure you that everything will be fine."
Ashton finally turns his head to look at me. His eyes are sad, but no tears seem to be on the brink of falling which is a good sign. "I trust you, Paige."
I give him a small yet sad smile, "What do you say Ash? Are you in?"
He nods his head and forces a small smile for me, "I'm in."
—
Vanessa and I were so excited for the boys first acoustic show in a while. So excited that we might have gone above and beyond to help prepare for the performance.
With three hours still show time, Vanessa and I ran to every supply store New York City had to offer in order to gather what we needed to make sure this performance was special.
The boys stayed in the dressing room with their instruments, determined on changing their rock setlist into an acoustic sit down show.
When Vanessa and I returned to the venue we had brought back three whole boxes of fairy lights, ten thousand newly designed wristbands to hand out to the fans as they entered the venue, and a cozy carpet for the boys to set their chairs on top of to give the stage a more comfortable feeling.
Everything was going perfectly so far and we still had an hour to spare.
"Hang it around the back of the stage and plug it into the cable!" I called over to Vanessa who was on the opposite side of the stage, trying to help me situate the fairy lights perfectly.
We had decided to hang some of the lights up behind the boys and put the rest around the entirety of the stage. The only problem is, Vanessa can't seem to find where the plug goes.
"I can't see it. It's too dark over here!" She calls back over to me.
"One sec!" I plug in my side of the fairy lights before running across the stage over to her, taking the other end and bending down to find the adapter. "Okay, got it!" I sigh in relief as I come back to a neutral position.
"We did it." Vanessa smiles as the two of us look over the new set up of the stage.
"We're not done quit yet." I smile at her as I stand up from the stage. The braids that I had done early are much messier than they were a few hours ago.
"What do you mean?" She asks getting up after me and dusting her hands off on the jeans she wears.
Feeling more excited than usual, I grab my best friends hands and practically run us to the back stage area. "Paige!" She giggles behind me. "Why are we going so fast?"
Bringing us into an empty dressing room, I finally let go of her hand and explain, "We're going to surprise our boyfriends." I smile slyly at her.
Vanessa places a hand on her hip, a look of confusion plastered on her features. "Haven't we surprised them enough today?"
I bite my lip to suppress my wide smile and shake my head, "I think we're due for one more thing."
"What is it?" She asks curiously as I turn around to grab the items.
"These!" I say, holding up two differently designed 5 Seconds of Summer shirts in my hand.
Vanessa laughs loudly, finally understanding what I want to do. It's been so long since the two of us wore the guys merchandise and it only makes sense that we wear some tonight. "I am so in." She says, taking her pick.
—
Unbeknownst to the guys, Vanessa and I put on our 5SOS shirts, styled them with cute bottoms, and finished off the look with the newly designed wristbands.
The show was a complete success so far. As the two of us greeted the fans with the wristbands, they had their fair share of utter shock that two of the band members girlfriends were greeting them before the show.
It was a complete turn around on my half. Especially because I had grown accustomed to the hate I received constantly from the fans, simply for being Calum's girlfriend.
It made me happy seeing how supportive they are of us and how grateful they are for the pictures and video diaries I put out for them.
Although the concert wasn't what the fans expected, the feedback that the guys were receiving was nothing short of positive making my chest feel light and a wave of relief rush through me.
As the guys finished off the set, Calum spoke into the mic, sharing a few words of gratitude before getting into their last song.
"This last song is a very special song to the band. We wrote it with the intention of it being an unanswered question," With his words I slowly remove the camera from my eye and let it rest around my neck, wanting to take in everything he's saying. "Personally as a band, we've been through a lot and we've learned that tomorrow isn't always a given."
As Calum continues sharing about the next song their about to play, I feel my eyes water with tears and suddenly my vision blurs. I'm reminded of how I almost lost him and how unbelievably grateful I am that he's still here and able to be on that stage.
He's the love of my life and it makes me feel horrible that I'm keeping something from him, something that will break us eventually in one way or another.
"On that note, I'd like you all to join us in singing Ghost of You."
As Michael begins strumming the opening notes of the song, the venue lights up with the flashlights on the fans phones. It's a beautiful sight that makes it almost impossible to not let my tears fall. So I let them.
This is the first time I've ever really taken in the lyrics. As I unfold and analyze them more than I ever have before, a pain arises in my chest worse than I've ever felt before.
I hadn't even realized that my tears were falling this hard until I felt Vanessa wrap an arm around me, pulling me closer to her. "You're okay, babe. I got you." She whispers close to my ear and holds me tighter. In this moment I am beyond thankful that at least one person knows what I've been struggling with.
"Cleaning up today, found that old Zeppelin shirt. You wore when you ran away, and no one could feel your hurt. We're too young, too dumb, to know things like love. But I know better now, better now."
Calum sings the lyrics that hit so close to our relationship. He sings the lyrics to words we've heard far too many times from people who thought they knew us better than we knew ourselves.
With every tear that falls down my cheeks comes another wipe, but it's no use. I haven't let myself break down in so long and here I am, watching the boys I grew up with perform to a crowd of thousands as I'm weeks away from never seeing it again.
The crowd cheers as the boys finish off the song and step forward to take their final bow together.
I quickly remove myself from Vanessa's grip and aggressively wipe at the tears, not wanting to worry any of them if they see how distraught I appear right now.
It takes an immense amount of effort, but I somehow find it in me to put a smile on my face and applaud for the boys as they say goodbye to the crowd and exit backstage.
"We should go see them now, don't you think?" Vanessa says to me as the house lights come back up, worry evident in her expression.
"Yeah," I say sniffling. "Is it obvious that I was just crying?" I ask, patting my face to fix my smudged makeup.
"Only a little bit," She says, using her thumbs to wipe under my eyes. "But the guys won't think anything of it. They just played literally every sad song they've written imaginable. How can they not expect one of us to cry?"
I laugh at my best friends realness, "You're right, and thank you."
"Of course Pae," Vanessa says, pulling me into a comforting hug. "I love you, okay?"
"I love you more." I sniffle before pulling away and doing my best to put a smile on my face before seeing the boys.
"Hey!" Vanessa says excitedly as we greet the boys in the backstage area.
They cheer excitedly once they see us, obviously very pleased with how the show went.
I make sure to hug each of the boys individually, telling them how proud I am, before I make it to Calum.
"What is this?" Calum says happily, eyeing my outfit.
"You like it?" I giggle. "I was going for a very much fangirl look tonight."
"I love it," He pulls me in, his smile as radiant as ever. "It's so sexy seeing you wear the bands name."
"Calum!" I squeal loudly as he buries his face into my neck, pressing loving kisses to the area.
He comes back up only to press a long kiss to my lips, "Thank you for everything. You do way too much for us and it certainly will never go unappreciated."
I have no doubt that Calum can read through my emotions right now, because no matter how hard I try to hide the pain it is evident in my eyes. Without responding, I simply press my lips against his once more, needing to feel him close.
"I love you Calum," I say truthfully as I speak with our lips millimeters apart, "Please don't ever forget that."
A/N
So as you can kind of tell...the fic is sort of coming to an end.
I heard Ghost of You live on Saturday and couldn't even sing most of the lyrics because I was crying so hard lol.
Anyways! I love you guys very very very much and thank you for reading :)