Foreign Exchange // Punk Luke Hemmings

Promo

<Luke's POV>

My hands ached from playing guitar all day, but it was an ache that I missed dearly. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to bring a guitar over from Australia, and I was beginning to sorely regret it. I was considering having management ship one of them to me just so I wouldn't lose my skills along with the callouses I had built up over the years... Shouldn't be too difficult, right?

Sitting in Danny's room, we stared intently at the screen of his TV, fingers flying over his PS4 controllers as we played Fallout 4. The silence between us was tangible as the game showed before us. I was perched on his bed, while he was on the floor leaned against the frame of the bed. Just before I was about to reach the target, my phone went off, shaking my concentration and causing me to unfortunately get blown to bits. With a groan, I slipped the device out of my back pocket, but instantly smiled as I saw who was calling.

"Mikey!!" I answered loudly. "You just got me killed mate, I hope you're happy..."

"Like you would've gotten very far in whatever game you're playing anyway," he laughed.

"For your information, I was about to reach the target, so fight me," I retorted.

"Sure you were," he sighed, and I could tell he was shaking his head. "Just wanted to call and check in on ya. We miss you over here. The album promo is weird without you," he whined.

"Who's that?" Danny whispered as he paused the game.

"It's one of my best mates," I answered before returning to the call. "Yeah, everything's great here," I replied and ran a hand through my hair. "Starting to miss you guys, but we've always got Twitter and all that, am I right?"

"Yeah, but that's not really the same..." Michael agreed.

"How are things back home? How's my mum?"

"Everything's alright. Liz wanted me to tell you she misses you and that she says hi."

I chuckled, standing up and moving to Danny's desk chair. "Tell her I say hi and I miss her for me, will ya? Are the other guys there too?"

"Yeah, they're all here. I can put you on speaker if you want," he confirmed.

"Sure, that would be great," I nodded to myself. From the corner of my eye, I saw Danny watching me closely.

"Hey mate!" came the sound of two other boys, Calum and Ashton. Their voices were almost unbearably loud, and I flinched away from my phone for a moment, which made Danny chuckle.

"Hi guys," I responded, though not as loud as they just were.

"We miss you Lukey," Ashton called.

"Miss you too, Ash."

"The fans keep asking about you at all the signings," Calum sighed. "We haven't told them where exactly you are, just that you're in America."

"Yeah, well knowing them I think they've figured out where I am now. Just look at the tags on Twitter," I laughed, a bit nervously though.

"Yeah, I think they do better research than the CIA," he laughed.

"Management said if you want to do some acoustic gigs over there you can," Michael yelled, sounding farther away now. There was a clatter followed by some yells from the guys before he returned. "And we still need a demo for this so-called band you wanna sign."

"I need Haylee to give me one, then I'll send it right over. And I can't do any acoustic gigs-or plugged in ones for that matter- because I don't have a guitar with me, remember?"

"Why don't you have management ship one over?"

"I was going to call them later today to ask," I explained.

"I'm sure Feldy could hook you up," Calum said matter-of-factly.

"Yeah, except for the fact that he's in LA and I'm in Cleveland. It's not that close, in case you didn't remember," I shook my head and picked at the seam of my jeans.

"True, true..." He sounded like he was nodding in agreement. "So you wanna have them ship one over or what?"

"I'll probably do that. I'm not sure what I was thinking not arranging a guitar to be sent over before I left, but it was really dumb of me," I chuckled.

"I mean, the whole trip is pretty dumb, but I guess we can't complain right? If you wanna finish an education, why hold you back?" Mikey piped in, before sarcastically adding, "Being world-famous can wait, am I right?"

Nodding, I thought for a moment. "Yeah, I guess you're right..." There was a beat of silence before I spoke again. "If I do any gigs, I shouldn't play the new stuff right? That would be kinda bad to do..."

"Uh, yes. Definitely don't get in trouble for that. Otherwise management will have your head," Ashton confirmed.

"W-what if I only show one or two people a few songs? I need to practice them anywa-"

"No, Luke. You know we're not allowed. Plus, it's not like there's that much longer until it comes out."

"Fine. I guess you're right," I huffed.

"Hey man. We gotta go. There's a signing in a few and we gotta head out. Call you whenever, okay?" Calum cut in, sounding rather dejected.

"Yeah. Tell the fans I miss them and I love them all okay?" I smiled a bit.

"You got it! Talk to you soon!" There was a chorus of goodbyes before the call was ended. There were a few moments of silence between Danny and I before he spoke up.

"So I take it that was your band?" He asked curiously.

"Y-yeah. They were just calling to check in. I miss them loads of I'm being honest," I laughed. Standing, I put my phone back in my pocket, then I flopped back on Danny's bed, grabbing the controller once again. "They had some promo to do for our album that's coming out next month though, so hence why they had to go so soon," I shrugged.

"That's still so cool that you're like... A real musician. Has anyone here recognized you yet? I haven't seen any crazy fangirls around yet..." He chuckled as we resumed the game.

"I think a few people have, but no one has really come to talk yet," I nodded. "I mean, it's still pretty early, and the only thing we released to the public about this whole foreign immersion thing is that I'm in the US. It's only a matter of time though before they pin point my location," I muttered.

"If that were me," he started after taking down a few of the enemy. "I would love the attention. Especially if it were mainly girls..."

"Yeah, I guess it's nice sometimes. It can be annoying too though."

"I don't see how, but whatever you say," he said a bit defensively.

"Oh, you've got no idea Danny. No idea..."

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A/N

So hi there. I am updating really late again and you all probably hate me and I don't blame you for that. I hate me too. I just had really bad writer's block on this chapter for some reason, so it took forever to write.

I want to thank you all so much for all the heaps of support lately. Honestly, you guys are amazing. I feel so bad because in terms of the number of reads, the last time I updated there were around 15,000. Now there are around 25,000. I just can't apologize enough. I have also been pretty busy lately and I haven't had much time to write.

Well, thanks again for all the reads and voted and comments lately, and I love you all. Hopefully I will get the next chapter up very soon.

~CC