POV: Jack

“For fuck sake, the concert starts in an hour… Where the hell is he?” Zack fretted, frantically pacing back and forth like a worried mother.

Me and Rian had taken on the role of the silent but worried children, whereas Robbie was acting more like the rational father of the group; he was lounging on the sofa of the backstage room the four of us were in as if he didn’t have a care in the world.

“Zack, stand still. You’re making me dizzy,” he grumbled. “This is Alex we’re talking about. He does this all the time… He’ll be here soon,” he stated confidently, but I don’t think any of us were reassured. We are the ones who have to play the show not him. All Time Low cant play without their fucking singer now can we?

I was on the same level as Zack; I was freaking out too, but I was doing so silently and motionlessly, just perched on the edge of the sofa, too tense with concern to relax.

But there’s good reason to be worried, seeing as the last time I saw Alex was several hours ago in Starbucks when we had an argument, and no one has heard from him since… We’ve been trying to call him for the past hour and he hasn’t been answering his phone. It always raises a panic alarm inside of me when Alex doesn’t pick up his phone… It usually means something bad has happened.

Maybe it’s my fault he’s acting this way… What if he is upset with me after our argument? We don’t know what we’re fighting for. But was it really something worth getting so upset over that he’s avoiding our calls…?

Rian seemed to climb into my brain and hear my thoughts loud and clear, because he was staring at me with piercing, narrowed eyes from across the room. He was leaning against the wall, seemingly calm but definitely suspicious of me, judging from the expression on his face.

“Yes? What is it, Rian?” I asked openly, pushing him to just say what I already knew he was thinking.

“You were the last one to see Alex… What happened between the two of you?” He demanded instantly, still wearing the same cynical expression.

“Nothing,” I retorted automatically, before realising that I should probably tell the truth. “Okay, well… Uh, we kind of had an argument…”

As soon as the words left my mouth Rian’s face fell and he groaned loudly, Zack stopped dead in his tracks, and Robbie just turned to look at me.

“But it was nothing major,” I added quickly, trying to dismiss the news as irrelevant, but no one seemed to hear me.

“Oh God,” Rian sighed, drowning out my dismissive comment.

“What about?” Robbie enquired, sitting up straight suddenly, looking as if he meant serious business.

“I, uh… I told him I was thinking of asking Jade to marry me, and he told me not to, and it kinda escalated from there,” I explained candidly, trying to be casual, despite knowing full well that the argument could definitely be the cause of Alex disappearing without a trace.

And the others knew it too.

“Oh, Jack… Why did you have to tell him that?” Rian whined, running his fingers through his short hair in a stressed way.

“Well, why should I hide it from him?” I frowned defensively.

I’m just trying to get us back to the friends we used to be, before it all changed… You messed things up. Friends shouldn't keep secrets that massive from eachother. I miss the honesty in our friendship, where we told eachother everything.

“Because you two clearly aren’t at the stage yet where you can talk about that kind of stuff!” Rian retorted frustratedly.

“Are you really going to ask Jade to marry you?” Zack suddenly asked in surprise, slowly processing what I had said.

Everyone else seemed to have bypassed that declaration.

“Uh, yes… In a few weeks…” I mumbled awkwardly, realising that it was the first time I was mentioning this massive news to the guys.

“Wow... You got over Alex fast,” Robbie commented, raising his eyebrows at me.

I averted my eyes to the floor and remained silent, because I didn’t want to let the truth slip that I am not totally over Alex yet... I’m only getting there. But I love Jade and I think marrying her will help me move on quicker. With progress, we forget…

“He’s not over Alex at all… I found the two of them asleep in eachother’s arms this morning!” Rian revealed openly, talking about me as if I wasn’t sat right in front of where he was standing. But then, suddenly, he turned to acknowledge me and found me glaring at him in annoyance.

“Dude, you’re not ready to marry Jade,” he told me abruptly, reminding me of Alex.

Here we go again…

I climbed to my feet so that I was on Rian’s level as I prepared to argue with him like I did with Alex earlier.

“Me and Alex are never going to be together, Rian. I’ve come to terms with that now and I’m moving on with my life,” I spoke in a flat tone of voice, standing with my arms folded. “I don’t care if you think I’m not ready, because I know I love Jade and this is for the best for all of us.”

It’s time to finally move on once and for all. Dearly departed, certain tragedy when we started off...

“I’m just worried about you, man. I don’t want you to make a rash decision that you’ll grow to regret,” Rian replied, sounding genuinely concerned and reaching out to give my shoulder a supportive squeeze with his hand.

I sighed in defeat, having to appreciate the fact that he was trying to look out for me, even if it does frustrate me when people try to tell me what to do.

“Thanks,” I mumbled gratefully. “But don’t worry about me, I’ll be fine.”

“Yeah, we’re not worried about you. We’re worried about Alex,” Robbie suddenly piped up again before Rian had a chance to reply. “You have a fucking missing band member!” He reminded us, getting to his feet and starting to pace the room, like Zack.

I raised an eyebrow at him for his sudden change of mood.

“Oh, look who’s finally freaking out!” I announced.

The simple fact that Robbie was getting worried about Alex worried me more… Robbie never frets about anything; he’s too laid-back all the time! And He’s basically our sound manager!!!

“Well, time is running out and my patience is wearing thin… Where is that fucker?” Robbie grunted in annoyance.

“Well, if we knew that there wouldn’t be a problem, would there?” I frowned, causing Robbie to stop and glare at me.

“But where do you think he’d be?” Zack asked, and suddenly there were three pairs of questioning eyes all on me, like I miraculously had the answer.

How the fuck should I know? I felt pretty useless, because I had no idea where he could be.

“I don’t know… Is there a music shop around here? Or a coffee and video game exhibition?” I suggested, turning to sarcasm because I couldn’t think of anything else. It’s just something I do.

“There’s probably a music shop…” Rian considered slowly, completely ignoring my other sarcastic suggestion. “Why don’t we all split up and go and look for him in different places?”

“And meet back here in about 45 minutes,” Zack added, nodding in agreement.

No one seemed to care that finding one person in a city as big as London is pretty much an impossible task when you have no clue where they could be. He could be anywhere…

Yeah, this is insane, but we’ve got to try. Something tells me that something bad has happened to Alex… He needs our help.

We didn’t waste any more time before departing from the backstage room and setting off down the corridors of the concert venue together at a quick pace. We rushed silently, all in our own little worlds as we thought of places to go and look.

I decided immediately to try the most obvious place first, only because Alex has always been shit at hiding…

Okay, so, to the hotel!

Time seemed to speed up with us; as we ran, it was quickly running out, counting down the minutes until the concert was due to begin: 58 minutes. 57 minutes. 56 minutes...

By the time we had even found our way out of the actual concert venue, five minutes had been and gone. Outside, the weather was miserable, pouring down with rain, but there were still hundreds of kids already queuing for our concert. The others were quick to disappear in different directions, but I just stood on the corner of the road, looking up and down it for a taxi.

I actually forgot who I was for a minute as I waited on the street corner, but all it took was several girls screaming my name to quickly bring me to my senses.

“Oh my God! It’s Jack!” One girl shouted excitedly, screaming and running towards me.

Oh, shit.

My presence rapidly spread down the queue and more and more people started screaming my name and leaving the queue to come over to me. I had no choice but to run in the opposite direction of the fans, frantically chasing after a taxi that conveniently drove past at that very moment.

I’m not totally sure why the taxi driver even pulled over once he saw that he was being tailed by what must have looked like an insane guy and his army of followers… But it’s a good job he did. I managed to jump in and escape just in time.

“Hilton Hotel, please,” I told the driver immediately, breathing heavily as I fought for my breath.
(I am so unfit it’s not even funny… Drinking doesn’t help the cause.)

I felt so guilty as the taxi sped off, away from dozens of disappointed fans, but then I reminded myself that I needed to find Alex, otherwise we would have to cancel the show, and then we would be left with many more disappointed fans…

Time was ticking away while I was sat in the back of the taxi and I was actually fucking twitching with anxiety. I tried to calm myself down and not worry about Alex or the concert or anything, but I couldn’t stop myself constantly checking my watch, and when I found that I only had 35 minutes left until I needed to meet the guys back at the venue, I realised with a pessimistic groan of defeat that I was screwed; there was no way I was going to be able to find Alex and get him to the venue on time.

When the taxi suddenly pulled up outside our hotel and I almost didn’t even want to get out. I had no plan or bright idea what to do, and I knew that if Alex wasn’t in the hotel, he could be anywhere… He could be lying in a ditch somewhere for all I knew.

I paid the taxi driver and then jumped out of the car to sprint inside hurriedly, opting to take the stairs because the lift would only slow me down in my mad race against time.

Finally, I reached the second floor and arrived at our hotel room. My fingers were fumbling and my hands were trembling with suspense as I unlocked the door with the spare key. I slowly pushed the door open, holding my breath and silently praying that this is where Alex would be.

And amazingly, he was. But the chilling sight I was met with stopped me from breathing a sigh of relief, because I could see quite clearly that my initial instinct was right: something bad had definitely happened. It’s such a certain tragedy...

Notes

Song: The Higher just a small update.. i have SUCH BAD WRITERS BLOCK!! WHAT DO YOU THINK ALEX IS DOING??!?!?!?? IT WONT BE FOR A WHILE SWEET HEART!!! i have horribe writers block, i have 3 ideas in my head and im trying to pick one,..... the only one what sounds right and would fit is REALLLY depressing and will cause problems later on.... BIG problems... the other two are less big but will end the story soon. so i have to pick between pain and distance. or less pain and the story ending in the near future....