It ached seeing Annie's face again.
"The handlers said you guys liked these livestreams, so I'll try making them more often. Um, hi, it's Annie, in case you missed that."
Calum had texted Annie a little bit over the past few days. She knew what happened with Luke, but told Calum that she wasn't thinking about it yet. Sometimes, when you had a bunch of different scary things happening in life, you had to wait to focus on some of them. Annie wasn't letting herself be sad. She had forced herself into a sort of Johanna mindset, where she refused to focus on her emotions. It wasn't logical. She couldn't help Luke by crying, she couldn't help any of them. Right now, everyone needed a distraction. So that's what she was doing.
The fans didn't know what had happened. The one person on the bridge was a fan, and had recognized Luke right away. But they had held to their word, promising not to tell anyone. And so far, no one knew.
Annie smiled, brushing her hair out of her face. "Is the- good, the cameras on. How was all of your Christmas's?"
She surveyed the chat, laughing lightly. "Katie said she got a new iPad. Aaron accidentally set his Christmas tree on fire, nice, nice, smooth moves. My Christmas was... eh. I'm excited to see Calum again."
She kept reading through the chat, and Calum imagined she was trying not to think of her own christmas. "I had this brilliant idea of telling Calum that 'oh, we don't need to be together for Christmas! It's just a few days, we can handle it!' I wanted him to enjoy some quality time with his family, ya know? But I changed my mind about as soon as I got on the plane. I hate this. And to think, only.... half a week left."
Calum tried not to think about it. Half a week was way too long.
He was in his room, leaning on his bed as he watched her livestream. It was the next day, and Ashton was currently with Luke. He still hadn't gone home, though Calum knew that Ben and Jack had gone to see them, and apologized for their parents behavior.
Life currently was a little crappy at the moment. The rest of the boys were trying to stay positive for Luke's sake, but it was rough. It really was. Luke was almost half a year older than Calum, but a lot of times it felt like he was the youngest. It was almost as of they'd decided that Calum could handle himself, but Luke... well, Luke was more fragile. They all made sure to watch out for him.
Even Annie had felt it, especially back when she lived with them. You didn't mess with Luke.
Calum could see in Annie's eyes that this was affecting her more than she let on. But either way, she put on a brave face, and looked at the chat.
"I'll just answer some questions. The managers probably won't see this for a little while, so ask me something good."
Calum chuckled a little bit. Of course she'd say something like that.
"Okay. Um, 'are all the boys in Aussieland?' Yep, all of them, I'm ready for them to come home. 'Who's the most and least gay in the band?'" She tapped her chin, mock thinking. "Well, they're all completely gay, obviously. Yes, that was a joke. Um... Ash is the least gay, and... Calum's the most."
That was a lie, but Annie wasn't about to throw Luke under the bus like that. Calum had to give her credit, she was pretty good at on the spot thinking.
"Why yes, I am a beard! Thanks for asking so nicely. No, I'm dating Calum because he's warm and cuddly, not because I'm trying to get money out of it."
Annie stopped talking, closing her eyes and breathing in deeply. Calum saw her hands shake off camera.
Without thinking about it, he started typing. 'Hold on.'
