Let Me Keep You Safe - 5SOS boyxboy

Chapter Six

 It's the weekend after their five month anniversary. Nothing else has happened at school since the locker incident except for some teasing and a bit of name calling here and there. Michael is worried about Calum, though. The familiar sparkle that usually accompanies his eyes has dulled, and his bouncing step has turned into a slow trudge. He still smiles and tries to act happy, but Michael can tell that the bullying has started getting to him.

Michael confronted Jake once right after the locker thing. Michael had the asshole shoved up against a locker as they screamed profanities into each other's faces. Mike was one more scream away from punching Jake straight between the eyes, when he heard a familiar voice say his name from the crowd surrounding them.

Michael looked over and had seen Calum standing there with tears glistening in his eyes. For a split second, Michael saw what he thought was fear in the small boy's eyes so he immediately dropped his hold on Jake and walked over to wrap his boyfriend in a hug.

Jake was scared, although he would never admit it, and he ran away as fast as he could. Jake was bitter that Michael'd nearly made him look like a fool in front of the whole school, and he vowed to take out his aggression on Calum. After all, in Jake's eyes, Calum was the cause of all of this.

Now it's Saturday, though, and Cal is laying in his bed, twirling the ring that Mikey'd got him the month before in his fingers. It was past noon, and Michael had already called a few times, but he didn't pick up. He just doesn't feel like doing anything. It's like all of the energy has just been sucked out of him, and he doesn't want to drag Mikey down into his hole of self-pity that he's buried himself in.

There's a knock at his door, but instead of getting up to answer it, Cal buries himself further under his comforter. He hasn't even gotten out of bed to eat or shower today, but he doesn't really care. It's a good day to mope around.

Calum's mother's voice comes through the door. "Cal, honey? Are you up?"

When she doesn't receive an answer, she opens the door a tad bit. She sighs sadly when she sees her son tangled up in his blankets, her mind immediately flashing back to last year when he all but refused to come out of his room for months.

Joy doesn't want to seem overbearing, but she also can't stand to see her son like this. She knows the one thing that'll always cheer him up, though. She closes his door and walks downstairs before pulling out her phone and dialing Michael's number.

He answers after only two rings.

"Hello? Joy? Is everything okay?"

Joy smiles. She loves how much Michael cares about Calum. "Yes, honey. Everything's fine," she pauses for a brief moment. "Well, actually I'm not sure that it is. Calum hasn't gotten out of bed today, not even to eat. I'm worried about him, and I was wondering if you might come over and see if you can't get him to get up and do something."

Michael is already grabbing his jacket and heading for the door. "Absolutely, I'll be over in five minutes."

Joy thanks him and hangs up before going into the kitchen to make sandwiches. Calum is a teenage boy and he needs to eat. Maybe Michael can get him to at least eat a sandwich.

As promised, it's only five minutes later when there's a knock at the front door. Joy opens it and Michael walks in. He has a smile on his face, but his eyes are laced with concern.

"Thank you so much for coming," she smiles, giving the tall boy a light hug.

He nods. "Of course. Is he still in his room?"

She nods and then walks into the kitchen and picks up the plate with the sandwiches. She passes it to Michael. "In case he's hungry," she says.

Michael takes the plate from her and walks quickly up the stairs. He stops in front of Calum's door and takes a deep breath before opening the door and walking in. All of the lights are off, and the room is almost pitch black except for the tiny bit of light that's seeping in between the blinds on the window.

Michael quietly walks over to the lump on Calum's bed which he assumes is his boyfriend. He sets the plate down on his nightstand and sits down. He pulls back the blankets a few inches and Calum's face appears, his eyes blinded momentarily by the small bit of light.

"M-Mikey?" He mumbles. "What are you doing here?"

Michael reaches out and begins running his fingers through the boy's hair. "Your mom called," he says. "She's worried. She says you haven't gotten out of bed all day."

"I'm just tired," Calum lies, sitting up and wrapping his arms around the larger boy.

"Well here," Michael says, picking up the plate from his nightstand. "Your mom made you some lunch."

Calum doesn't reach to take it. "I'm not hungry," he murmurs against Michael's chest.

Michael sighs. "Cal, you've barely eaten anything at lunch all week."

"I'm fine," he insists, getting slightly irritated.

He's beginning to hate how everybody in his life thinks he's some helpless child that can't take care of himself.

Michael knows that something is really, really wrong with Calum, but he doesn't know how to fix it and it's killing him. He goes to set the plate back on Cal's nightstand when he accidentally bumps a box that's sitting there. It falls to the ground, and a whole mess of papers spills out.

Calum immediately jumps up to clean up the mess, but Michael stops him, his eyes wandering the disturbing contents of the box.

Michael slowly leans down and begins looking through all of the small pieces of paper that are stuffed in there. There are at least fifty or so little notes written in various handwritings. None of them are nice. Some of them go as far as telling Calum to kill himself or telling him that nobody loves him.

Michael is about to say something when he lifts up a particular note, and underneath it is a razor blade. Michael isn't naive. He knows what these are used for.

A breath catches in his throat as tears form in his eyes. He looks back at Calum who's sitting there with a guilty look on his face.

"What have you done?" He asks.