When we came back it was already time for Jack to go to soundcheck. We had been gone for a couple of hours and decided to go get some food afterwards as well. Fortunately, though, their soundcheck was later than normal, so we didn’t have to cut things short. I counted this as our first official date. Maybe the dress shopping wasn’t really part of it, but the lunch/early dinner was. I actually had fun and Jack didn’t try to get me to like him by promising to buy me a boat. Well, that wasn’t completely true, because Jack totally made fun of it. But he was definitely a lot better than that Brian guy; anybody would be a lot better than Brian. Jack was just amazing.

We were now all in the All Time Low changing room. This venue actually had a good shower, so I decided to take advantage of it. I hadn’t had a good shower since I came here. The one in the bus could only be used for short periods of time and the ones at the venue were either pretty crappy or somebody else was using them. I had actually already brought a bag with a large and a small towel, soap, some clothes, and other stuff with me. This time I was not going to let someone else claim it before me. I was starting to learn the ropes of tour pretty quickly.

I stood up, “I’m going to take a shower. If anybody objects, they can go fuck themselves.”

“Well, have fun then,” Alex looked up from his phone, “I’d rather not fuck myself today, maybe tomorrow I will, though.”

I rolled my eyes and started making my way to the small bathroom, trying not to fall over any of the legs. Jack followed me, however, causing us to get some weird and suggestive looks. I, myself, also got confused.

“Yo, Jack, where you going?” Alex called out, the only one daring to hear the answer.

“With her?” Jack gestured with his hand as if it was blatantly obvious.

“Oh god, please don’t be too loud.”

“I will be as loud as I want to be,” I pointed at him accusingly.

With that Jack and I both went into bathroom, locking the door behind us. I put my bag in the sink, as there was no where else to place it, and got out my shampoo and body wash. Jack was watching me while I was doing everything.

“You know they think we’re going to have sex, right?” Jack told me.

“Are we?” I raised an eyebrow at him.

“I don’t know, are we?”

“No.”

“Ok.”

I took off my clothes and turned on the shower before taking off my underwear. Jack just stood there awkwardly. I knew exactly why he was here, though. He was still too afraid to leave me alone in the shower. Now that he knew I was comfortable being naked around him, he came in the shower, instead of staying outside the bathroom.

“You can take a shower with me while you’re at it,” I told him before stepping in the warm water.

“You want me to join?” Jack asked.

“Yeah, why not?”

“Ok,” he took off his own clothes and boxer briefs before stepping in the shower with me, “sorry in advance if I get a boner.”

“I’ve learned to ignore it,” I laughed and got my hair wet. Before I could even reach to grab the bottle of shampoo, Jack already lathered my hair.

“I can get used to this,” I smiled at him, “I won’t have to do much anymore. Will you shave my legs while you’re at it?”

“Strangely enough, I wouldn’t really mind,” Jack stared off at the distance and shook his head, “we are way too comfortable with each other.”

“I liked to think of it as a good thing. But I won’t shave your balls for you.”

“Dammit!” Jack picked up the bottle of body wash, “I guess you’ll just have to wash them with oatmeal and shea butter body wash… Who the fuck puts oatmeal in their soap!”

“I don’t know, but it smells good, so I like it,” I took it from his and put some in my hands, but I then noticed a dilemma, “if I want to put this stuff on my legs I’m either going to have my face in your dick or my but against your dick. This shower is way too small.”

“I could do it,” he scooped the soap out of my hands and into his.

“But then your face will be in my-”

“When will you realise that I don’t care?”

He continued to wash my legs while I rinsed the shampoo out of my hair. This was a lot more efficient than when I showered by myself. I would have expected us to keep getting distracted, especially since Jack often got distracted in everyday life.

“How did you get these bruises?” he trailed the purple and yellow blotches and stood up back to my eye height.

“When I kicked you in the balls and you dropped me on the floor. It doesn’t hurt too bad, I can still sleep on this side,” I shrugged as if it wasn’t anything big.

“Oh, ok. I’m sorry about that,” he grabbed my waist and carefully leaned forward until our lips touched.

Just when we both started to melt into it, I pulled away, “I still have to be loud for Alex.”

“And how are you planning on doing that?”

“You know, the normal thing most people do in the shower,” I shrugged and thought about what I would do. When I finally knew it, I smirked.

“Hey, Alex!” I shouted, knowing he should be able to hear me, “this is just for you!”

I proceeded to loudly sing the chorus to Guts. Cam and I would sometimes sing it together, so I knew the lyrics. Also, it seemed pretty fitting. The only problem was that Cam was the much better singer. There was a reason why he was the lead singer of a band and I wasn’t. I just simply didn’t sing; I could dance and do other sports, but you just can’t be talented at everything.

“Holy shit! That was amazing,” Jack gasped after I had finished.

“Yeah, right,” I got out and dried myself off, “do you want the small towel or the big towel?”

“No really, that was good. And I think my dick will look a lot bigger if I take the smaller towel. So…”

“Your dick’s good enough,” I patted him on his shoulder and gave him the small towel, knowing he only said it so I could have the big one.

“You don’t think it’s perfect!” Jack gasped, “how dare you?”

“I don’t have much to compare it to, do I?”

“Fair enough.”

I got out the clean clothes and put them on. They were all new, Cameron had gotten them for me, and I was actually surprised by how much I liked them. Sure, they were different to what I normally wore, Cam obviously had some influence on the choices, but they still looked cool. What I was going to wear today was just a simple white sports bra with a black muscle top and some black ripped jeans. I was also going to put on some of the bracelets Cam had hidden in my duffle bag, because I thought it was pretty sweet of him to do that. Also, I thought it would fit with what else I was going to do today.

“I’m going to watch your show today, if you’d like me to,” I turned around to see Jack just pulling his shirt over his head.

“Yes!” Jack eyes went wide with excitement, “and look at you all punky and rocker chick. I like it.”

“Well, you have Cam to thank for that,” I unlocked the bathroom and let all the steam roll out. The fresh air hit my face, and I realised it was really difficult to breathe in there. Before I could even take three steps out of the bathroom, though, Alex stumbled up to me and grabbed me by my arms.

I looked at his hands and frowned, “why are you touching me?”

“You have to sing with me!” He blurted out and tightened his grip, shaking me a bit.

“Please don’t touch me.”

He let go off me, raising his hands up, “please, please, please, please!”

“No,” I walked past him and put my bag back on the table I got it from.

“What! Why!”

“Because I don’t sing,” I rolled my eyes and fell back onto the couch, “obviously.”

“No, you’re good at it!” Alex glared at me, looking like he would attack me if I wasn’t going to say no again.

“My brother and my mom sing, my dad and I do not. I just can’t do music. So, no.”

“But-” Alex got cut off my Jack walking up to him and whispering in his ear. I couldn’t hear anything Jack was saying, but it caused Alex so frown before he smiled slightly.

“Ok, fine. I’ll just sing all by myself again,” Alex sighed dramatically.

“You have Zack,” I pointed out casually.

“Whatever.”

“Nice to know you’re grateful!” Zack exclaimed, looking up from his phone. Alex didn’t reply except for sitting on Zack’s lap and kissing his cheek. Zack pushed him off and Alex pouted before going over to Lisa and sitting with her.

Jack, feeling uncomfortable being the only one standing up, made his way to me and poked me, “move over, fatass.”

“No,” I stretched and sprawled all over the couch so there was no space left for him.

He grabbed my legs and started pulling me off, but I grabbed the backrest just in time. Sometimes Jack and I didn’t even act like a couple, but more like best friends. But that was only a good thing. Our relationship wasn’t just romantic and sexual, but also a great friendship. It was nice to sometimes go back to how we acted before we officially got together.

“Let go, woman!” he shrieked and kept tugging on me. I could slowly feel my jeans, only held up by my belt, being pulled down.

“I shall not let go!” I tried kicking him, “never!”

Jack let go of my legs and instead grabbed me by my waist and rolled me off the couch. I hit the floor chest first. His strength was too much for me to keep holding on, especially since I barely had any strength left myself.

I groaned and rolled onto my back, “ouch. Can’t breathe, feel like I’m going to be sick. Boobs, ouch.”

“Stop being such a pussy,” Alex joked.

“It actually really hurts, don’t make fun of her,” Lisa hit him on the back of the head, earning a scream out of him.

I faked my death very dramatically, making sure to drag it out. Jack shuffled around to see me better and awkwardly pointed at me before looking up at Brian, the tour manager who had just walked in, “I think she diededed.”

I grabbed his feet and pulled him down with me, “you will die with me, you asshole!”

He hit the floor loudly, just missing me (luckily), “but you died! No!”

“I swear, I will push you out of the bunk today.”

“Please don’t break Jack,” Rian glared at me with a smile, “we need him to make dick jokes on stage. The kids don’t like us unless we have dick jokes!”

----

Lisa and I were both side stage for the entire show. Everything was so amazing. The crowd was large, much larger than what my brother played for, and they were also dancing and singing along. It must feel great to stand on stage and see people screaming the lyrics back at you, but to me it also seemed terrifying. All these people were focused on you and staring at you. How could you deal with that!

Jack was always running around the place, while Zack was mainly staying in one place and singing his back up vocals. Poor Rian couldn’t talk back whenever Jack or Alex made fun of him; the poor guy didn’t have a microphone like the other three. But the weirdest thing was this thing Alex did. Sometimes when he played the song he would stroke a specific pose - bending his legs and pointing his feet inwards - all the girls in the crowd always went crazy when he did that. But I didn’t really get it. What was so hot about that? It just looked like he would break his knees if he went any further.

“So, for this next song I want to get some of you on stage so sing with me!” Alex hyped up the crowd. He started pointing out people and the security guards helped them to the stage. This was pretty cool, getting the fans to participate. Many bands didn’t want to see their fans get that close to them, but these guys actually were very involved.

Jack walked up to me and I knew immediately what he was going to do. While Alex was speaking, Jack grabbed my wrist and pulled me along with him. I tried to escape and run back, but he was holding on too tight and pulling me too hard. There was no way my method of trying to walk in the opposite direction was working.

“Oh look! It’s Jack’s girlfriend!” Alex shouted, making the crowd go crazy. I did not like this; not at all.

Jack let me go as soon as he was satisfied with where I was standing. But I looked at it like it was my time to break free. So, instead of standing there, like he had hoped, I ran like my life depended on it, back to where Lisa was standing all by herself. When I was about halfway, I felt a pair of arms grab me around the waist, pull me off the floor, and drag me back. I kicked and punched Jack’s arms, hoping to break free.

“Jack let me go,” I cried, tears forming in my eyes. But Jack just laughed, thinking this was all good fun.

“Jack,” my punches were getting weaker and I could feel my breathing becoming more rapid while the crowd was judging me. I really didn’t want to be up here and it was freaking me out.

When Jack finally realised how messed up my breathing was, he finally let me go. I ran; I ran offstage, past Lisa, past crew members, until I reached a wall and slid down it. This was nobody’s fault, but mine. Maybe my shyness hadn’t really come out yet, but now I had fully shown my social anxiety. I had embarrassed myself and everybody was judging me, looking at me. Normally I didn’t care about people judging me, but in situations like this, it was the only thing I could think about. I hadn’t had an attack like this in ages. Why it had to happen now, I did not know. There was another reason why I didn’t want to sing with Alex.

“Hey, you ok?” my hands were peeled away from my face to reveal Jack.

I nodded, still trying to catch my breath, “yes.”

“Are you sure? I’m so sorry, I shouldn’t have brought you up there without asking,” Jack’s eyes were warm and apologetic, with a hint of worry.

“It’s not your fault,” I shook my head and watched as Jack held my hands, “if I would have know I would have freaked out like that, I would have warned you before you even went out on stage.”

“It’s not your fault either. You mentioned you used to have social anxiety, I should have known better.”

“Well, I’m ok now. They’re waiting for you, you should go back,” I urged and let go of his hands.

“I want to know for sure that you are ok.”

“Yes, I am ok.”

Jack smiled at me and kissed my forehead before standing up and rushing back to stage, the crowd going crazy when he appeared. But all I could think about was the fact that I wasn’t ok. Not in the sense of the ‘almost-not-really panic attack’ I had, but just in general sense. The leukemia was starting to hit me; and it hit me hard. I was starting to feel sick and actually didn’t love food as much as I used to. The tiredness I felt constantly, was obviously because of it as well. But not only that was changing. I also started getting weird pains in my bones, especially when I was trying on the many dresses. Everything about me was dying.

I was not doing well, but I couldn’t tell Jack.

Notes

A longerish chapter. Still kind of a filler, but now you guys know Ireland will not sing on stage. And the fans really do know who Ireland is now.

Anyway, I realised many people reading this story are silent/invisible readers. I want to know what you guys think of this story! How will I know I'm doing something bad without you guys telling me? Maybe there's stuff you want me to write about, so you could mention that as well. I don't just want to write. I want you guys to get involved. This story isn't just for me, but for you guys as well. Together we will be able to make this story a lot better.