difficult | calum hood

41

Luke

Calum was taking this badly, I hadn't seen him this upset and hurt ever. He hadn't left our bed in almost a week now, and it was up to me or Michael to bring him food - otherwise he wouldn't eat.

Zoe seems to be much further on in the process of getting over someone, as every morning I can hear her getting up extremely early and leaving for a run. I was up when she got home the other day, and she's had a haircut, and appears to have a new best friend that she meets up with for breakfast most mornings on her run. I just hope, for Calum's sake, that her new friend isn't a guy.

And Ashton, well, that's a whole other story. I don't think Ashton's been in bed since the day it all happened. I find him passed out somewhere in the house when I wake up, and he's always gone again by lunchtime. I've had all of two conversations with him, and both included shouting and me trying to stop him from drinking.

So me and Michael are stuck somewhere in between the three of them, not knowing how to explain to Anne Marie that her two oldest children won't speak, and that one is adopting a major drinking habit.

We spend most of our days just the two of us, me and Mikey that is, by the pool, watching TV, playing FIFA, or trying to write songs. We avoid talking about the fact that Ashton has supposedly 'quit' the band, and the fact that Calum won't be nearly ready to perform again when we go back on tour in 3 weeks.

***

It's 5am, and like every day recently, I'm woken by the sound of Zoe getting up and getting dressed, tripping over in the early morning.

Some nights, I still hear her crying.

Calum is asleep on the other side of my bed, is arms closed around a pillow and his cheeks stained with dried tears.

I hear Zoe's bedroom door open and close, and she runs down the stairs noisily. Beside me, Cal stirs but stays asleep, tightening his arms around the pillow. After the front door has slammed shut, I lie back down and close my eyes, beginning to fall back asleep almost instantly.

"Luke?" The croaky voice is barely audible, and muffled from bed sheets. Turning to face Calum, I'm met with his brown eyes wide open and tears brimming inside of them.

"Yeah? Why are you awake?" I ask, smiling weakly.

"She just left again didn't she? How come she can get up and run every morning but I can barely manage to sit up?" He mumbles, propping his head up and sighing.

I pause and think, having to be careful with what I say. "People grieve differently. Just because she's up and doing things at -" I check the time. "- 5:13 am, doesn't mean she's hurting any less." He looks at me sadly and I realise that no matter what I say, it isn't gonna make him feel any better. "Calum, we're both up. Lets go do something, come on, we don't have to run. We could walk down the beach, catch an overnight bus into the city, anything."

He blinks and looks down. "I just wanna sleep."

"No, I'm not allowing you to do that anymore. You need to focus your energy into something else, come on." He looks at me and nods. We're both much slower getting up and ready than Zoe is and it's past 6 by the time we're ready to leave. I've forced us both to have some coffee and drag him out the door. 

The white's of his eyes are red as we slowly head down to the beach, making small talk and avoiding the obvious topics. 

I pull him quickly past the rock on which I know him and Zoe shared their first kiss, and we wander across the sand.  

"So, Calum? What's next?" I say. He looks at me and shrugs. 

"Sleeping hopefully." He chuckles sadly, it barely sounding like laughter. 

"Calum." 

"Luke, its quarter to six in the morning and its only been a week since we broke up. Not everyone can move on like she has." Calum sounds mad, but it's the first time he's been out since they broke up, so I don't mind. Baby steps, after all.

"Dude, you need to get laid." I say, knowing it will annoy him. I think, if I can annoy him enough, he'll burst and let everything out, and then it will help him move on. "I mean, I think the best thing for you to do is to forget about her. Lets go out, get drunk, and you can hook up with someone."

"Luke-"

"Calum. When was the last time you had sex?" I ask, nudging him. I can feel his temper rising, and I want him to get madder. 

"If you must know, my birthday." He snaps, looking me in the eye. "She left in the morning and that was it. By that afternoon, we weren't... we weren't, we weren't together anymore. And I really fûcking miss her. I miss her, Luke. I miss her so much." He's sobbing now, shaking. "We shouldn't have told Ashton, or I should've been a man and just asked Ashton for permission before I fell in love with his sister." 

I stay quiet and Calum turns around and walks away, heading home. 

"This was a stupid idea Luke. I'm clearly not as strong as her. I'm going back to bed!" He calls over his shoulder, trudging grumpily across the sand. So, that wasn't the outburst I was expecting, but hopefully it did some good. 

"How did she make you feel?" I shout after him.

"Like someone replaced my heart with a ball of the actual fücking sun and every time she smiled it grew a little bit, every time we touched, the energy expanded. Now, It's burnt out. No, someone is preventing it from growing anymore." He shouts, groaning in frustration. 

I watch him leave sadly, just as it starts to rain, setting the scene in a horribly cliche yet perfect way.