Close As Strangers // Calum Hood

Chapter 16 - Calum's visit

Calum's Point of View
-One month later-

We had just dropped off Luke at his house and the next in line was mine. Our two bodyguards were nice enough to drive us from Sydney's arena and home. Me and the boys were all very jet lagged and tired after this crazy and extremely fun tour.

It was very late, around 1 or 1.30 am and just a couple of hours ago, we had finished our last concert on this tour. We could have slept at the arena and gone home in the morning but I think all of us just wanted to sleep in our own beds.

"I can't believe it's over." I said to no one in particular.

"Yeah, it's been crazy." Michael answered me.

"I'm very lucky who gets to do this with you guys." Ashton said and Michael put one of his arms around Ash and hugged him.

"Me too bro." He said.

I sat in the seat in front of them so I turned around and did a brofist with them both. "Couldn't have said it better myself."

A few minutes later, the minibus we sat in stopped outside my house. I said goodbye to Ash and Michael and told the bodyguards thanks for the ride. Then I made my way out of the minibus, took my big suitcase and slowly walked up to my house. I heard the minibus drive away when I stopped on the porch to my house. I took a deep breath and looked to my left, to Ivy's house. Not a single light was on in her house, which wasn't so strange since it was the middle of the night. I swallowed hard. I would do almost anything to be able to run up to her room and that everything would be as it once were. I haven't talked to Leah since that night one month ago when she was so worried about Ivy and I don't know what Ivy have been doing the last couple of weeks, if she's really taking drugs or if she still hang out with that Theo guy. It feels weird to know so little about what's going in in Ivy's life.

I turned back towards my own front door and to my surprise it was open. I stepped inside and quietly closed the door behind me. I had the time to register that the lights in the kitchen were on, before a girl ran into me and hugged me tight.

I took a little step back to regain my balance and hugged her back. "Mali, what are you doing here?"

My lovely sister let go of me and smiled. "I went to the concert and thought that I would stay here and wait for you to come home. You know, I haven't seen you in almost five months."

I smiled big. "It's good to see you too. But how did you get a ticket, I thought it was sold out."

Mali-Koa nodded slightly. "It was, but I bought one on the internet for a cheap price like two months ago."

"So what did you think about it?" I asked.

"You guys were awesome as usual." She ran her hand through my blonde streak of my otherwise black hair and I ducked away while laughing. Good that both my parents are heavy sleepers, or I would have woken them up with my laughing.

When my laugh had faded Mali-Koa suddenly looked sad. "How's it going with you and Ivy?" She asked.

I sighed. "You've probably heard, it's not going so good..." I told her all about how Ivy and I had slipped away from each other and Leah's call when she told me about Theo and how weird Ivy was acting. I also told her about the tour, how fun it had been and all the stuff we had done. Our conversation ended very late which made me sleep until 2.30 in the afternoon the next day. And later me, Mali-Koa, my mum and dad went out and had a 'welcome home' dinner. I hadn't seen Ivy yet which made me feel both sad and relieved.

The next day, I was very determined to go to Ivy's art exhibition. I still wanted to see it.

I parked my dad's car outside of Ivy's school. School had probably ended because it was a Monday around 10.30 am and the school grounds were totally empty. I climbed out of the car and slowly started walking, even though I didn't know where Ivy's exhibition was being held.

I ended up by the school's main entrance, at least I think it was, and tried to open the big door but it was locked. I continued my search after Ivy's art exhibition. Maybe it was closed now when it was school holiday. But I kept on walking anyway.

After turning around a corner, I found a smaller building to my right and saw an open door with a sign indicating Ivy's art exhibition. I walked inside and followed the signs to a room were photos and drawings were put up on the walls.

A guy, maybe a student at the school, sat by the entrance and read a book. He looked up at me and nodded a greeting. "Just go inside, it's free."

I murmured "Thanks." and slowly walked past the guy with my hands deep down in my pockets. I was the only one there at the moment so I could take all the time in the world to walk around and look at Ivy's works.

Her works were amazing. It was so long ago since I had last seen her drawings and I didn't even know that she took photos too. I had forgotten how talented she was. There was a drawing of a bird playing in a puddle, a picture of a lighting bolt, a picture of Leah, drawings of different flowers and much more.

Even though Ivy would probably never care or know that I had visited her art exhibition, I didn't regret coming to it. I couldn't stop loving Ivy even though I hadn't seen or talked to her in months and even though she had hurt me so badly.

Just when I turned on the car engine about to go home, Michael called me and asked if I wanted to come over, maybe play some fifa or start writing new songs. We already had a few songs for our second album but we still needed more.

I had driven halfway to Michael from the school when I had to stop at a red light and a red Audi I very well recognized pulled up beside me. I was in the lane that was going to the right and she was in the lane that was going straight forward. She stared up at the red light and tapped her fingers against the steering wheel like she was in a hurry.

I sucked in a breath. Ivy. She was just as beautiful as the last time I'd seen her which was over four months ago. I felt like screaming her name.

Suddenly, someone obliquely behind me honked its car horn and Ivy turned her head and looked straight at me. I looked away from her car which made me notice that the stop light had turned green and I quickly drove away while my heart suddenly was beating like crazy.

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Author's note:

Sorry for jumping so much in time these last two chapters, I just really didn't have any more ideas with Calum being on tour, I had to get him home lol.

THANK YOU ALL SO MUCH FOR READING, YOU ARE BEAUTIFUL AND AWESOME! Don't forget to vote or comment something nice if you like what I'm writing! xoxo