I already knew that being on an airplane sucked. I’d been to LA. That took around five hours. It wasn’t necessarily unpleasant, but it certainly wasn’t nice. I was always happy to finally get off. Now, getting to London took two hours longer than that. Turned out that five hours was my limit. Or actually, it seemed like one hour was my limit already this time. How I ever went on that holiday with my family and Jack seemed like a mystery to me.

Charlie and I were sitting together in a row of four with two strangers next to us. Originally he had taken the aisle seat on our side. It only made sense. He was the taller one out of us, so he liked having the illusion of extra leg space. Another factor that determined our seating plan was the fact that I walked in first so also had to sit down first.

But, you see, that changed a little bit. We were on an overnight flight. Well, sort of overnight. You had to consider the time difference. Charlie was hoping to sleep through most of it, but I kept tapping him on the shoulder asking to be let out. Eventually he got so fed up that he forced me to switch seats with him.

I couldn’t help it. I either had to pee, or I was becoming so fidgety. There was no way for me to get comfortable in my seat. I felt horrible. It wasn’t just for no reason, though. Or at least I thought so. I was taking new medication for my PTSD because of some insurance thing. The transition was messing with me a little. I didn’t really have nightmares or horrible fear during the day, but I was restless. It felt like I suddenly remembered I had forgotten to turn the oven off or that moment you can’t find your phone in its usual place out in public, but then that feeling consistently.

Being in that confined space definitely didn’t help. But there was nowhere to go. Both Charlie and I were glad when we got to go off the plane, but it didn’t help my nerves all too much. Carter, Colton, and John were just lucky not to be around it all because they were in different rows on the plane.

The worst part was that Charlie wouldn’t let me live it down.

We had an interview the day we arrived. It was around six in the morning when the plane landed and the interview was at one in the afternoon. We had more than enough time to get our stuff from baggage claim and then load everything into our bus. Well, more than enough time meant we could do it without being rushed. It didn’t mean that we had enough time to load everything and take some time to rest or take a nap. It was straight to the interview afterwards.

The interview was on BBC radio, which I thought was insane. I didn’t think we were important enough to go on. Our band wasn’t that big. But I guess going on tour with All Time Low had its perks. They had been on there many times before. It was one of their go-to’s whenever they were back in England. I guess we were the next best thing since they weren’t going to be in the UK this time.

We were let into the building and all the way up to the studio. The guys were amazed at everything around them while I was just trying to get myself to focus. This was a big thing. I couldn’t let myself get in the way of that. I would hate myself so much if I did. It was all I was focusing on as we were introduced to Scott Mills and sat down around two microphones. I was sharing with Charlie, once again because that was just the way we were standing.

And then it was time to start.

The song playing ended and Scott introduced as. “How are you guys?”

We all said our own version of ‘hello’ or ‘hi’. Even I managed to get something out. It probably helped that I was third to go and not first. If I had to go first, I would have frozen up. Now, I felt like I was ready to go. Yes, I was still on edge, but the nerves of being on the radio for the first time had fizzled down.

“So, you guys arrived this morning and now you’re here. Did I hear that correctly?” Scott started the conversation, looking over his microphone and equipment.

Charlie was quick to take this question. He felt very passionate about it. “Yep, we came here right after. I am running on no sleep.”

“I got like six hours,” Carter laughed loudly. “I was out like a light.”

“Hmm, yeah,” Charlie nodded, acting like he was taking in the other answer. “You see, I had this constant tapping on my shoulder.” He turned his voice to an audible whisper, “tap, tap, tap, ‘hey, Charlie, can you let me out, I need the bathroom.” He continued in his normal voice, “she comes back, I let her back in. Forty-five minutes later, I’m finally falling asleep again. Tap, tap, tap,” and the whisper came back, “‘hey, Charlie? My legs hurt, can I get out?’”

“You’re mean!” I pouted, but turned it into a joke. “I just need whatever Carter takes.”

“I got you, boo,” Carter winked at me, keeping the joke running. He already knew that he hated being on a plane for too long, he came prepared. I obviously hadn’t.

“All to give Charlie a chance to sleep,” Scott started to wrap the question up.

“Exactly.” Charlie nodded. “We sleep across from each other on the bus. I’ll just start feeling this poking in my side at like three in the morning.”

“Yeah, that’s right, you’re on tour now, right?” Scott took the chance to transition easily.

“Yep,” John finally contributed as well. He was more about serious questions. “Well, we’re playing two shows in London, and then we’re going to go to mainland Europe to support All Time Low.”

“They’re actually the reason we aren’t doing more UK shows, going to different cities or countries other than England,” Charlie commented, but wasn’t being serious. We never were going to do more shows than those two, it had never even been talked about.

“How so?” Scott urged us to continue.

“I’m not allowed to go to Ireland,” I said, making it more vague than before.

“I feel like there’s a story behind that.”

“Not really,” I shrugged, my thumbs twiddling above the table. “It’s just an inside joke… with my boyfriend and now also with these guys.”

“Speaking of which,” Scott managed to transition again, “I don’t know if you’re okay with me asking. You don’t have to. But I’ve been getting a lot of requests on twitter to ask this. So, Jack Barakat.”

“Yes,” I stated, waiting for the question to come. But it never did. What was I supposed to answer if I didn’t even know what was being asked?

“Snog, marry, and umm…” Carter hijacked the ‘question’.

“Avoid,” John entered the blank. We knew the version ‘fuck, marry, kill’, but we couldn’t exactly say that on radio. Also, people were British here, they always called it this.

“Snog, marry, avoid,” Carter restarted. “Well, I would definitely kill Jack. Then, this becomes quite a difficult choice. Probably marry Jack, because he just seems like a great guy. And then I’m left to snog… Jack, but I wouldn’t complain about that.”

“Hmm, I’m not sure about that,” Charlie joined in as well. “I’d switch out Jack for Jack.”

“Really?” Carter scoffed and shook his head. “No, definitely not, that would be strange.” He then switched his mood to mock seriousness. “But, anyway, yes I’m dating Jack. We are very much in love. We met like one…” He looked at me and I shook my head, holding up two fingers. “Two years ago. And our anniversary is coming up in De...cemb…”

“Feb…” I interrupted him to correct yet again. “...ruary.”

“Right, yeah, February,” Carter chuckled and brushed it off. “I’m just so bad at dates. Luckily I’ve got people to remind me.”

“I’d love to date Jack. I’d love to date all of All Time Low,” Charlie added on top. “They are some handsome boys.”

Scott was laughing. “You answered that question quickly, you were prepared. I’m guessing you get asked this a lot.”

“Not really,” I told him, but something told me that it was going to be a more regular occurrence during this tour.

“I just answer all of the sexist questions Ireland gets. It’s unfair to her,” Carter clarified and wiggled his eyebrows at me.

It was something he had done at other interviews before. Like, I would be asked how I would plan outfits for tour, and then Carter would answer, giving a detailed account of his own. There was a fine line between honestly wondering how we managed to take showers on tour and only asking me how I took showers while the guys were asked stuff about playing music.

“Oh, that was a little sexist, wasn’t it?” Scott scrunched up his nose, seemingly becoming uncomfortable with what he had said in the first place.

“You’re cool,” I excused him as I bounced my leg in addition to my fiddling hands. “You did say I didn’t have to answer.”

“Alright, but only if you’re sure about that.” Scott then changed the subject yet again. “So, on that note, let’s play a song of yours.”

He did as he said and we stayed silent until we got the sign that the microphones were now off. Being on the radio wasn’t too bad. And I knew Jack must have been laughing his ass off or feeling embarrassed, because he said he would be listening to us live. I should have known the inevitable Jack question would come up. Technically it wasn’t a question, but still.

“Can you stop?” Charlie groaned, back in his sleep deprivation mood that he had managed to hide for the most part. He slapped his hand over mine as I kept flicking my thumb nails together and nudged my leg so I would stop bouncing it.

“Ugh, I’m sorry.” I quickly stopped and he pulled his hand away again.

“Everything okay?” Scott asked us since we were now free to talk without having to pay attention to what we were saying.

“Yeah, it’s all good,” I told him and ran my fingers through my hair. “I’ve just been taking new medication, it’s messing with me a bit. I’m fine, though.”

“Oh, shit, I forgot about that!” Charlie sucked in a breath and looked at me with wide eyes. “I’m so sorry.” He leaned forward to hug me.

“No, it’s alright.” I pat his arm lightly until he let me go again. I mean, he couldn’t know that these meds didn’t seem to work as well as my previous ones. “I know I’m being annoying, but I can’t stop. So, if you catch me doing something, snap me out of it. Do you think I enjoyed waking you up every half hour on the plane?”

“Now I feel bad.”

“Don’t worry about it,” I urged. I’m sure I would have gotten annoyed at him if the roles had been reversed.

“You are getting a lot from us today, aren’t you?” Scott also still seemed to feel a little guilty.

“I’m good, you guys didn’t do anything wrong!” I said once more time, trying to convince them of what I believed to be the truth at the time.

But was I really good? I mean, I definitely thought so. I was used to the questions, so that didn’t matter much. As for my medication making me have these nervous ticks and nervous feeling, I didn’t think too much of it either. First of all, it was new medication. My body had to get used to it. I still remembered when I hit my lowest point on my previous meds just before they started working. Second of all, thinking about it only made me more nervous. I was sure it was going to disappear in a matter of time.

Notes

I'm back yet again, and nobody is here to read yet again. Oh well. Words are happening!