Julia's P.O.V.
When we got to the LA house that the guys rented out, Luke was as heated as ever. He stormed into the first room he walked into and called it his and ended up locking himself in it while the rest of us were still unloading the van with our things. If I really thought about it, his actions were for the better because nowadays when he was angry, there was nothing controlling him, not even me. We arrived in the states early afternoon, but it was already the next morning and Luke still had himself holed up in his room.
"Luke?" I knocked on his locked door to a seemingly empty space. "You gotta eat something, Hemmings," I sighed leaning my forehead against the door as he continued to ignore my words. "The boys and I are going out for breakfast before the studio, if you're not down in fifteen then we're leaving," I announced giving up my pointless attempts to get something, anything out of him.
When the time came, Luke still remained in his room so that's when we left. But leaving the house was a different story. We hadn't even been here for more than 24 hours but there were still already a few fans waiting outside. Before I would've been surprised at this, quite possibly impressed by their quick appearance, but because of how much time I spent with the guys, I became desensitized by their lifestyle. It was normal to have paps near me, it was normal to have complete strangers yell at me either to ask questions or to voice their opinion both positive and negative, it was normal to be followed and to be stopped on the street by fans of them.
"I don't know what to do about him," I sighed as we took our seat at the restaurant
"Maybe after today, he'll be good. Just let him come back to the music," Calum spoke
"I still can't believe what Josie did," Michael muttered scrolling down his phone to see even more information being written about the "marriage"
"I don't believe it all," I stated once again
"You don't know her," Calum claimed
"You just- you think you know a person and they end up being the complete opposite," Ashton explained as I scoffed
"You obviously should know from experience," I rolled my eyes shutting him up for a second
"Okay, we're going to talk," he said getting a firm grab on my arm as he pulled me up from the table and to one of the bathrooms
"I don't want to talk to you," I said about to open the door to get out until he slammed the door in front of me shut with his arm standing face to face with me. My back was against the door as his arm was placed next to my head to keep me from trying to leave again.
"Let me out," I demanded
"Then let me have a damn word, Julia," he retorted still keeping his stance right in front of me as I was forced to comply
"Are you going to be mad at me forever? I said I was sorry for fucks sake and I told you the truth, that's better than what the average guy would've done," he argued
"And what would the average guy do? Fuck their best friend like any other girl they take home? Because you were pretty close to doing that too," I reminded him
"I don't know what else you want me to do!" He said almost yelling, he backed away from me as if it would release the tension already established between us
"I just- what if we didn't stop at the kiss that night? Would you have still given me the same apology? Like you had every bit of remorse on your body just at the idea of doing it," I said
All I was wondering was whether or not he would've regretted his decisions if we had chosen to go farther. If he would've still taken back his words the night before, if he still would've said that he liked me more than a friend and actually meant it.
"You think I would've regretted having sex with you?" He questioned as if it was the most absurd thing he's ever heard
"Well you felt pretty bad about kissing me so who knows?" I mumbled
"Jules," he stepped closer to me as I lifted my hand to silently tell him not to come any closer
"You don't have to apologize again. I was just- I was just being dumb," I shook my head. He was about to speak up when I cut him off.
"We'll go back to how it was before, let's just forget about all of this alright?" I sighed
"I... Okay,"
Luke's P.O.V.
Just the thought of her brought back over a wave of emotion, anger and frustration. I was doing okay. I thought I was doing okay. I thought we'd land in America and I'd get some time for myself, but no, the second we fucking land, I'm already bombarded with all this bullshit. When Julia and the guys left for breakfast, I remained in my room trying not to punch the nearest thing to me. I don't even know how long I was in that position forcing myself to stay still for however long I could because I knew, I fucking knew that the second I moved would be the second that I have to face that fact that this is my reality. A reality that I never signed up for, that I never even thought would ever happen to me. Instead of standing up, I immersed myself into my thoughts. Every word, every sentence blowing up in my mind felt so bottled up and I was trying so hard not to release it until I just had to. I grabbed my notebook and put down every emotion I was every feeling at this moment down with my pen until it all made sense. The next step was pulling out my guitar to find a melody. Then it all began to mix together.
Julia's P.O.V.
By the time we made it to the studio, the familiar sound of Luke's voice was playing through the speakers singing a song that neither of us had heard before.
"Because you were nothing more than a fairy tale I wrote in my own head." He sang as we walked in
"New song?" Calum questioned with a hint of excitement laced with his words because it had been so long since Luke had written one, it has been so long since he had even touched a guitar actually
"Yeah, but just a demo for now," Luke let out a satisfied smile through the microphone as I took in a sight that I haven't witnessed in ages, a happy Luke.
"Let us hear it then, can you play that back please?" Michael questioned the producer working the sound booth as he nodded and pressed play. It wasn't even half way through the song and we already knew exactly who he was directing his lyrics to. The good thing was that it was a fucking amazing song and it wasn't shouting out hate as much as he secretly wanted to. I knew he wanted to spit out every cruel venomous word he held towards her, but he managed to transform that into a series of beautiful emotional lyrics that got me pretty good. It was relatable, but he still kept his personal experience intertwined in the mix which made it even more risky to release and that was why he decided not to. For now, he was completely satisfied just being able to write again and finally let out all the built up emotions he had pent up inside of him in the past few months, everything that he couldn't suppress with a simple sip of alcohol and forced smiles.
Days had passed and I could almost feel a new light coming over Luke, he didn't seem as miserable as he was before. Sure he had his moments where he'd act like a complete fucking douche, but he began going with the guys to meet fans and going in public without yelling at paps for spitting out everything they had at him regardless of whether it involved her in his life. In fact, we've all basically banned the use of her name within our group just to keep him from spiraling back down again, slowly but surely, we were getting the real Luke back.
"Shut up, you all know how uncoordinated I am already," I groaned as they laughed at me for tripping over my own foot as we were walking into the studio. "I was blinded by the flashing cameras what else do you expect?" I reasoned.
"We couldn't see either but we could still manage moving with one foot in front of the other correctly," Ashton teased me as I gave him a light punch in the shoulder
It was week 2 in the studio now and fortunately the guys were able to just exude new music right off the bat. Luke especially was making some massive break through a for some reason, he seemed to be writing a new song every single day and they all had their own special thing about them. He refrained from love though, his songs focused mainly on life and making memories which he started applying to his own world as well. It was like every day was a new beginning for him and trust me, that was progress. He no longer locked himself up in his room, he stopped snapping at everyone who bothered him, in fact, he hardly said anything even remotely negative nowadays.
"Don't worry, you look cute when you're embarrassed," Luke commented once I plopped down beside him on the couch while Cal was entering the recording booth
"Wow thanks Hemmings," I said sarcastically feeling his arm snake around my shoulder so I could lean against him
Ashton and I were relatively okay these days. When I told him to forget about everything that happened that night, I guess he really did just forget it. Neither of us brought it up so we just tried going about our daily routine to keep the guys from getting curious, but still, I could see the way he stared whenever Luke made a move. The way he'd always steal glances as if he was constantly watching everything that Luke and I did together, but what I didn't know was whether he was doing this because he was being protective over me or something completely different. I don't know. Maybe I'm just overthinking this like I always do.
"I'm gonna go to the restroom," I told them as I got up and out of their studio room and into the hallway of the building where the bathroom was located. The guys had different studios for recording both big and small, but this one was gigantic. It was essentially a huge office building and their producers bought one of the floors to transform it into multiple studios for musicians to write and record music so there were many different rooms and long hallways that led to different areas of the building. Once I reached the bathroom, I did my business and came out of the stall to wash my hands, but once I looked up at the mirror I completely froze at the sight right next to me.
Josie's P.O.V.
As the date of the wedding drew closer and closer, the stress began building upon me about finishing the album. I had plenty of songs written for it, but it was always a struggle for me to narrow it down to less than 15 tracks on my albums and the fans were waiting on me to release my next one.
"I know I know! I'm on my way there, it's your fault for giving me the wrong address," I spoke to Alex through the phone as I drove to the studio we would be writing at today
It had been a while since I had seen any of the members of All Time Low, and today's writing session would be the most special because I was finally meeting up with Alex before his wedding.
"Floor what? floor six?" I questioned as he answered "yes" once I reached the building, but the sight of paps outside gave me a bit of an unsettling feeling. I started a new method of tuning them out whenever I was forced to walked through a crowd of them that included blasting my music through my headphones on its loudest setting so I would avoid any questions and comments that they'd yell at me. And that was the method I used today.
It worked surprisingly well since I couldn't hear one word coming out of their mouths once I was entering the building, but physically being in the building was a whole different story. For one thing, it was fucking massive, by the time I made it to the sixth floor, I was already lost and repeatedly trying to call Alex for any source of direction, but for some reason he wasn't answering. The only familiar looking sign that I found on this god forsaken floor was the sign to the ladies restroom so I decided to wait there until Alex picks up his phone.
I stood in front of the mirror checking to see if my make up wasn't smudging until I heard the toilet from one of the stalls flush and see a girl walking out. I decided not to think much of it until I looked at her as she was washing her hands and noticed something so familiar about her.
"Hey, do I know you from somewhere?" I questioned her as she looked up somewhat hesitantly at me
"Uh- I don't think so," She said making eye contact with me as I saw a sort of nervousness set in her gaze
"Are you sure? We haven't met before even just once?" I asked wanting to know who she was. I didn't know why, but I knew for sure that I had seen her before.
"I think I would've remembered meeting Josie Castano," She told me
"Well, you're right. I think I would've remembered meeting someone with as nice a cheekbones as you do to be honest," I accidentally blurted out, but she let out a slight smile so it seemed like my comment broke the little sense of anxiousness that she held towards me
"It's nice to meet you..." I trailed off hoping she would give me her name
"Julia," She answered shaking my hand as I tried to back track in my mind to anything I could recognize about her name and her face, but I just couldn't figure it out.