Adolescent

1.

The average American fifteen-year-old had school, friends and boyfriends or girlfriends to worry about. Me? Not so much. At fifteen, I'd had a book published, had been asked to tour with One Direction as one of their openers and been given a record deal with the American branch of their label. At fifteen, I was an author who was in the process of making her first album and also happened to be touring the world with her favorite boy-band of all time. Not to even mention being fluent in Spanish, French, Russian, American Sign Language and Latin -if one didn't count English as well - and having skipped two grades in school.

Instead of desks, books and classmates, I had video-chats with tutors and worksheets that were e-mailed to me. Instead of hanging out with friends, it resorted to video-chatting too. Instead of a house, I had to live in a tour bus and various hotels.

Oh god, my life was crazy.

****

I finally had an off day, so I was nestled up in the tour bus, alone, doing my old cheer stretches after reading for about two hours straight. No one else was in the tour bus, not even our driver, Andy, and that was the way I liked it. I liked the serenity of being totally and completely alone, which is why I was on the tour bus instead of in the hotel with the guys.

The guys weren't in the hotel, though. They were out doing a photo-shoot with some big-shot magazine. They should've been back at the hotel any minute.

I was partially glad that I hadn't had one of those photo-shoots yet because I hated dressing up. I usually hated dressing in anything but jeans and a T-shirt. I didn't like most of the frilly, girly shit that they would dress female "celebrities" in.

That was just me. I was a jeans-and-t-shirt-wearing, "teenage prodigy" author-slash-singer who ate like a teenage boy, could play just about any instrument I was handed, and cussed like a sailor. That's who I was, and, for all I cared, people could take me or leave me.

But, of course, my publicists did. I fought my way hard through them to be as real as possible. Most of the time, I won - as long as I didn't drop F-bombs in the middle of concerts and interviews, that is.

My cell-phone buzzed, interrupting my thoughts. I dug it out of my back pocket and unlocked the screen. It was a text from Niall; Come back to your hotel suite. Plans changed. We're staying in Texas for another night and most of tomorrow, it read. I huffed and slid my phone back into my pocket, grabbing my book and heading out of the tour bus, locking it back up as I went.

When I got back up to my suite, not bothering to check in at the boys', there was another bag in my room. I went to the door that adjoined our two suites and peeked my head in to see all five of the boys gathered in the middle of the foyer part of their suite, conversing.

I cleared my throat. "Uh, why is there another bag in my suite?"

"Oh, we have a guest that's going to share your suite with you." Liam informed me. I cocked my head to the side, forming a puzzled expression. He better have been kidding.

"Are you serious?" I demanded. There was only one bed in that suite; like hell if I was sharing.

"What? You don't want to bunk with me?" an all too familiar voice asked sarcastically. Someone stepped out from behind the boys, a smirk on her face. I gaped in surprise.

The white-blonde, teal-tipped hair, almost-black eyes, skinny, straight figure and bright-colored clothes were all too familiar to me. They were owned by my very best friend, Natalie Summers.

"Nat!" I nearly screamed, and ran over to her, hugging her as fiercely as I could. She hugged me back just as tight. Nat started pulling me back into my suite, while I yelled a "thank you" to the boys. She slammed the door behind us.