What The People Don't See

Bloodsport

It was a four hour journey from London to Liverpool. Four hours crammed into a tour bus with four rowdy and hyperactive Irish boys, five overly tired and grouchy roadies and a manager, who just so conveniently happened to be Evan's dad too. He'd travelled over from Dublin the night before. My head hurt. There wasn't enough room for all of us to rest at once so we had to take turns, squishing on to one of the fold out beds with three others or squeezing into the corner of the leather couch surrounding the back window.

I didn't feel comfortable enough laying on one of the beds with anyone (plus my head pounded even more whenever I lay down flat) so I stayed on the couch, watching reruns of Malcolm in the Middle on Josh's laptop with Pete and one of the roadies Mattie. Another of their roadies (Kyle, I think) was curled up on the floor between our legs, his own legs supporting a snoozing Evan. I couldn't even move a single muscle without knocking against someone else, that's how tight of a squeeze it was.

My eyes were beginning to burn when Ross appeared from his spot at the front of the bus, struggling out of the passenger seat, stretching his arms and yawning loudly. Evan kicked him in protest as he passed and I giggled sleepily. Ross snuggled against me once he reached my side, lying down until he was resting his head in my lap. I let out a little whimper when I felt his warm breath against the small gap between my jumper and my jeans.

"Happy Christmas Eve Eve" he mumbled, smiling up at me dopily. I grinned back, hoping against hope that he couldn't feel my heart racing rapidly, sending every drop of blood in my body to my cheeks. I silently thanked God that I hadn't been born a boy; my blood would have been rushing in the opposite direction if that had been the case.

"You feeling better?" he whispered, making sure that no one overheard us. I nodded, and began to play with his hair, tugging at the loose strands from his fringe. I felt sick to my stomach. The withdrawal symptoms from my meds were finally kicking in. Exhaustion was clouding my vision and I'd barely spoke since my conversation with Ross in the coffee shop. I felt dumb; when I spoke I had to say everything extra slow because it was taking immense effort to gather my thoughts into coherent words. Not to mention, I was starving. I kept grabbing more food from the buses mini fridge, stuffing myself like a turkey but still feeling impossibly ravenous.

"I feel great" I smiled.

•

I decided to go straight to bed as soon as we reached the hotel shortly after 2 am. The lads all wanted to get proper bar food and hoped that with a bit of bribing they'd at least get served burgers or something half decent. Evan's dad, Niall, gave me the key card for his room, saying that he could share with Ev. I could barely mouth the words 'thank you' and I ended up staring at him dumbly instead.

As I curled up on the double bed, I fought the urge to cry again. The bed felt too empty so I grabbed the two spare pillows and cocooned myself around them, wishing that Eloise was with me. I let out a harsh sob when I realised that it was my mum I wanted more than anyone else. When I'd first been slowly weaned off Adderall, she had stayed up with me on the sleepless nights, rubbing my back in soothing circles and telling me all the funny stories she knew. God, I'd made things so difficult for her but she'd always been there. At the end of every day, she was waiting for me with a warm smile and open arms. After losing more friends or getting so distracted I'd miss the bus to school or coming home hours late because I was trying to avoid every crack on the pavement because I really, really didn't want to break my mother's back. None of it mattered because she was always there.

I rolled over until I was on my stomach, scooting down to the foot of the bed to grab my phone from my bag. 130 missed calls, 45 texts, none of them from Mum. Dad had called me 36 times since I'd left the house with no explanation to where I was going. I deleted his voice mails without listening to them, feeling a pang of guilt when I realised how worried he must be. Toby had called 29 times. 7 missed calls from El. 5 from Adam. I gulped when I glanced at the last number of missed calls: 53 from Calum. I didn't know whether to laugh or cry.