room // malum au [in progress]

april 21st, 2021: part one

"you ready?"

"no." calum mumbled, tugging on his tie for the eleventh time in the past three minutes. mali sighed and walked into the room. she pulled the tie from calum's hand and readjusted it to look neat.

"it's gonna be tough couple of days." she said softly placing her hand on calum's shoulder and giving it a little squeeze.

"you don't think i know that?" calum retorted.

"i didn't say you didn't." she replied.

"i know." calum muttered. "i'm sorry."

"it's okay cal."

"i'm just glad tucker doesn't have to testify today."

"yeah do you think he'll be okay when he has to?" mali asked.

calum shrugged, "i guess we'll just have to wait to find out."

mali nodded. "alright. let's get going then. we don't want to be late."

"yeah okay."

the two siblings fell into a comfortable silence as they made their way downstairs together. calum's gaze immediately fell on tucker who was standing in the small foyer by the front door letting joy tie his shoes.

"hi daddy!" tucker called out to calum.

"hi baby boy what's up?" calum knelt down in front of tucker and brushed his hair out of his face.

"i missed you." tucker declared.

"missed me?" calum laughed. "you saw me ten minutes ago."

tucker whined as calum straighten out his shirt, "that's too long."

"i'll take note of that. you ready to go?"

"do we have to?" tucker whispered.

calum nodded, "sorry bud. i don't wanna go either but it has to happen."

"what's going to happen?"

"john's gonna get locked up for good." calum explained. "we just gotta answer some questions and stuff like that."

"and then he goes bye bye?" tucker asked. "he won't be able to get us again?"

"yep." calum answered. "he won't be able to hurt us anymore."

"good." tucker stated. "i didn't like it when he hurt you."

"i know baby." calum mumbled. "c'mere. i'll carry you to the car."

tucker didn't hesitate to climb into calum's open arms and cling to his torso. calum stood back up and turned to face his family. calum sent a curt nod their way and everyone made their way outside to the car.

"so michael and ashton are meeting us at the courthouse right?"

"yeah ma." calum sighed.

"okay good. i'll make sure they sit with us." joy exclaimed. "and are you sure tucker can't sit with us? he isn't testifying today."

"mom we've been over this already." calum groaned.

"sorry."

"everyone relax." mali said. "the next week or so is going to be really stressful so we need to take every chance we can to just calm ourselves down and destress."

"i agree." david chirped.

"yeah yeah." calum muttered.

"daddy? can we listen to some music?"