Modern Family

Number One

They were about an hour into their recording session when he got the call.

It worried him a bit, the fact that his phone was buzzing when a large percentage of the people who normally called him were currently sitting in the same room. Liam was recording his drums and Ryan was playing around on his acoustic guitar and Austin was taking a nap on the couch to Jace's left. You were at school and weren't in the habit of calling him when you knew he was recording and Savannah was much too busy during the day.

Jace was in midst of coming up with rhythm chords to accompany the melody Ryan was making up when he felt his phone vibrate in the pocket of his jeans. It took him a good ten seconds to dig it out and when he was finally holding it in his hand, he decided that it was probably time to transition into wearing looser pants.

His eyebrows lifted in surprise at the name flashing across the screen.

Casey.

Sliding his finger across the screen, he brought the phone to his ear, his brow pulling into a confused furrow. "Hello?"

"Hey, Jace. Mr. Russo. Jace."

Jace pressed his lips together and tried not to laugh at the ramblings of Savannah's boyfriend of three years. It wasn't often that people found the lead singer intimidating because being the youngest in both his band and his family often meant he wasn't taken seriously, so he relished in the thought that Savannah's boyfriend was nervous to speak to him. Still, Jace felt bad about making Casey uncomfortable because the boy was so easily flustered.

"Hey, Casey," Jace smiled into the phone, the mention of Savannah's boyfriend causing Ryan to look up in surprise and Austin's eyes to flutter open. "What's up?"

Casey answered the question with another question. "Savannah said that you guys were gonna be in the studio all day. Are all of you still there?"

"Yes...," Jace purses his lips, the confusion in his voice causing Austin to sit up and adjust the green knit beanie pulled over his thick curls. "Why? What's going on?"

There was a moment of silence as though Casey was contemplating how to best phrase his next words. He spoke slowly once he finally got up the nerve to do so. "I was wondering if I could stop by, if you guys aren't too busy."

Once again, Jace's eyebrows lifted in surprise and he glanced at Ryan and Austin, who were leaning forward, hoping they might be able to hear the conversation before looking up to see Liam finishing up his recording. "Things are pretty relaxed over here. Come on over."

"Great," Casey replied, letting out a soft sigh of relief. "I should be there in the next hour."

"Sounds good," Jace nodded, shrugging at the questioning glances he was receiving from his bandmates. "See you then."

"What was that about?" Ryan asked as Jace hung up the phone and shoved it back into the pocket of his jeans. "Why is Casey calling you?"

Of course the rest of the boys had all met Casey. Savannah considered her uncles to be pseudo fathers, so once she and Casey began to date seriously, the seven of you had all gotten together for dinner so that the boys could meet Casey properly. It had gone surprisingly well. Casey had been a bit nervous about meeting the most important people in Savannah's life and as expected, the boys did their best to be intimidating, but at the end of it all, they'd realized that Casey genuinely loved Savannah with all his heart and there wasn't really anything more they could ask for.

Savannah and Casey met in a mandatory ethics class in their last year at university where Savannah was studying business in hopes it would help her achieve her dream of one day opening her own ballet studio and Casey was studying politics and history, wanting to go to law school. Casey was shy and sweet, with a passion for photography and absolutely no athletic abilities whatsoever. He confessed to Jace while they were bonding whilst playing pool at a pub a few months after he and Savannah became exclusive that he had been instantly drawn to the way her eyes were always lit with joy because she was constantly so enthusiastic about everything she talked about and it had taken him three months to finally get up the nerve to ask her out while they were studying for their midterms.