Best Years // Alex Gaskarth

Chapter 17 - Misery Business

Stella's POV
Alex and I killed it in the studio. We were both absolutely exhausted by the time we got back to his house.
"You'd think after too expresso shots I'd be awake." I said and threw myself onto the bed.
"I feel you, babe." Alex slumped beside me and rested his head on mine.
"Alex, can we post it now?" I was so giddy I wanted everyone to hear our work. Plus the lyrics meant the world to me.
"You don't want to wait and get everyone hyped up?" He asked pulling me to his side and running his hands through my hair.
"Nope, I wanna be spontaneous!" I grinned and he chuckled.
"Fine, get me my laptop though, I'm broken." He groaned.
I got up and brought it to him, dancing around the room as he posted it.
"Where's all this energy from? My god." He laughed before closing his laptop and falling back into bed. "It's up, my love."
I climbed into bed with him and snuggled up as close as I could get. "I can't wait."
The next morning I woke up way earlier than I normally ever did. I had a turning in my stomach and could hear it grumbling. It was a classic anxiety stomach ache. I knew that people had heard the song by now and I had no idea what they were saying.
I took my phone off of the bedside table. Looking over my shoulder I saw that Alex had his eyes still closed and soft snores were coming out of his partly opened mouth.
I gave him a gentle kiss on the head and opened up Twitter. The notification section was already overflowing.
Most were from We Are The In Crowd Fans which was understandable as the song was clearly dissing her. She used him to grow her own career and I wanted to shout that in everyone's face.

"Can't believe @StellaHemmings thinks she could ever top Tay how embarrassing 💀"

"Alex and Tay supremacy, I don't listen to home wrecker music lmao."

Other's just general hate

"@StellaHemmings music be sounding straight out of a kohls commercial"

"Alex's taste is music > his taste in women"

I stared blankly at the screen. My stomach turned even more as they started trying to involve Jack.

"Imagine dissing your boyfriend's ex as if you're not all over his best friend."

"Someone on Tik Tok said she saw Stella and Jack holding hands. Yikes, @StellaHemmings care to make a statement?" 

I was taken aback by just how much hate there was aimed at me. I expected at least some but not this much. People in the comments were getting into arguments with each other. I was turning fans against each other and it felt terrible. I even passed by a few death threats and people telling me to off myself. I didn't think I was THAT terrible? I knew that I made Alex happy and we did the right thing but it's so hard to not doubt myself when thousands of people wanted me dead. 

"Sweetheart, please close that." Alex said and I looked up, not realizing he was awake and reading over my shoulder this whole time. 

His strong arms turned my body so that I was laying on his chest, making direct eye contact with him. I bit my lip trying to hold back a waterfall of tears. He placed a lingering kiss on my forehead and I buried my head into his neck. I found a sense of comfort just by being close to him. Alex never failed to make me feel like I was worth something. 

"Believe it or not we get that stuff all the time. People on the internet have no life." He ran his fingers through my hair yet again and picked up my phone from me. "You also passed by all of the good ones." 

He scrolled down my feed picking all the positive tweets. 

"So happy to hear a strong female voice singing Pop Punk. Stella rocks!" Alex read aloud. "Yes, she does." He confirmed and ruffled my hair, making me laugh and try to fix it. "So glad that if any girl gets to live my dreams of dating Alex Gaskarth it's Stella." Alex read another tweet out loud. "Well, I'm flattered." 

"Do you have to add commentary to every one?" I giggled and kept scrolling for him. I finally felt at ease again as I tried to rework my brain to filter out the negative comments. I was so used to looking directly for them, reading hate comments was disgustingly addicting. 

"BESTIE JACKO: The song didn't have to go that hard. I'm gonna lose me job!" A text from Jack appeared at the top of the screen, making Alex snort at the contact name. 

"Have you even checked your messages? I'm sure it's full of love." Alex blushed and kissed the top of my head a few times. "I love you so much. I'm going to take a shower. If you read any more hate I will..." he tried to think of a way to playfully threaten me.

"Any 'threat' you make about you in the shower does the opposite of scare me." I shot back and he rolled his eyes and picked clothes out of the dresser. 

"You're a nut." He tried to play it off but I saw his cheeks heating up to a rosy red. 

My phone started buzzing with a call from Sierra. I picked it up and blew Alex a kiss as he walked out the door. 

"What's up?" I answered, pressing the phone to my ear. 

"How do people know about you and Jack?" She immediately asked, not even bothering to say hello.

"Sierra no they can't. It's just a rumor because Tay Jardine fans want to get under my skin." I sighed, trying not to let the tweets replay in my head.

"O-oh, well are you alone?" She asked.

"Yeah?" I understood why she was so freaked out but I reassured myself that it didn't matter.

"Okay well, it's just kind of convenient that they said that after what happened on tour." Sierra reminded me of the time Jack and I locked lips in the hotel room. She was the only other person who knew and Jack and I swore we'd never tell a soul. 

"No, it's because nobody thinks guys can have girl best friends. It's just a very convenient rumor. Jack swore to never say anything." I tried to keep my breathing steady. 

"Yeah, no.. you're right." She got quieter and I could hear what sounded like Luke in the background.

"Sierra! I shouted. Why's Luke there? Luke fucking knows?" I was getting irritated but kept quiet so Alex wouldn't hear me. 

"Stella, I didn't until this morning." Luke's voice started coming through the line. "Jack must've not called bullshit as fast as you and-"

"Oh fucking shit, Luke. What?" My heart sank. 

"He called me asking what to do and I didn't know what to say so I told him to talk to Alex." Luke admitted and I looked over at Alex's phone sitting on the nightstand. 

"Alex?! Why not me? Are you stupid?" I bit my lip and closed my eyes. 

"It's going to ruin their friendship before you and Jacks. Plus, I figured you would've already-" Luke began trying to defend himself but I hung up on him.

I bolted over and picked up his phone. I felt dishonest and disgusting but it was a mistake and telling him would do no good, only hurt us. 

Barakat Boy: Hey Alex, I'm really sorry you had to find out this way. That night was....

I could only see the start of the message preview but I was able to guess what the rest said. I tried guessing his password. His mom's birthday? no. Mine? no. Our anniversary? no. 

Before I knew it I was locked out. 

"What are you doing?" Alex said from behind me as I clutched his phone in my hands. His blonde hair soaking wet and draped over his face as he had his bottom half wrapped in a towel. 

I died inside. I was fucked.