Camera Shy || Ben Barlow

Chapter Twenty Seven

"You hate me," he whispered, his hands tucked away behind his back, his chin to his chest. I was still curled up on the sofa, feeling less dazed than I previously had, but Ben was determined to talk. I kicked off the blanket Sam had brought me some time during the day and pushed myself into a standing position. 

"I don't hate you," I told him, craning my neck so I could properly see his face. When he looked down at his feet like this, I could see him better due to the height difference, but I'd rather he didn't pull such a solemn face. I kind of hated him, but I didn't really. 

"You've been avoiding me for ages, Es," he said, practically in a whimper. I hadn't seen him so vulnerable since his father's death, and we hadn't even been friends back then. I didn't care about him, yet. I cared about taking aesthetic pictures of the others to make up for his absence on tour. "I told you I loved you and you told me to go away."

"I know," I whispered, wanting to kiss him. If I stood up onto my toes, only a little bit, and pushed my fingers into his hair, our lips would touch. And he'd allow them to. Looking at him, there didn't seem to be anything he wouldn't let me do, then. I stayed where I was. "I was just hurt."

"I told my mum that you didn't exist." I nodded, pleased that he was acknowledging what he'd actually done to upset me, but close to tears at the mention of it. "While you were in the room with me." I nodded again and sat back down on the sofa. My legs had swiftly turned to jelly once I'd finally met his eyes. "I didn't- I wasn't thinking properly, Essa." I blinked at him and sucked my lower lip between my teeth in an attempt to prevent the tears. "I panicked. She's fussy when I have girlfriends. I didn't want her to insist on meeting you and then let her upset you. Looks like I managed that all by myself, didn't I?" I choked on a muffled sob. "Look," he said, awkwardly jutting a handful of yellow flowers into my chest. "I'm trying to tell you that I'm sorry and I hate myself and I love you and-"

"Ben," I croaked, uncurling his fingers from around the flowers and using his body strength to pull myself from my seat. 

"I love you," he said again, in a rushed whisper this time. 

"It really fucking hurt, Ben," was all I could say to him, his fingers tangled up in mine, the flowers somewhere forgotten on the floor. He nodded his head but looked as though he was trying his hardest not to kick something. Namely, me. Or himself. 

"Don't leave me, Es. Please don't leave me," he begged, barely above a whisper. Ben Barlow had never stricken me as the begging type. He had, however, through his music, stricken me as the type to sit and cry over a girl and that broke my heart more than I'd like to have admitted. "I'm sorry. I'll tell her. We'll go see her and I'll stand up for you if she's bitchy and-"

"Ben, I love you. I love you, too, okay? Shut up." I couldn't hold myself away from him anymore, forcing my arms underneath his and clawing his back. My cheek crashed into his chest as he tucked his face into my hair. I couldn't breathe, but that was okay. It wasn't a pleasant kind of breathlessness, the type that came with meeting your favourite artist or leaving the best show you'd ever attended, but Ben had caused it. So it was okay. 

"Fucking hell, Essa," he said, tears in his voice. Ben Barlow was a crier, as it happened. "I love you."

"A bit gay," I whispered into his upper arm, where he'd crushed my face trying to get his arms around me as tightly as he could, as though I'd fall and smash if he ever let go. 

"Oh, fuck off," He said, his face still pressed into my hair, but I could hear his smile now as well as feel it against the top of my head. 

"Do you want to go on a date tomorrow?" He asked, still not fully calm, still not having let go of me. I forced my body away from his enough for me to see his face, leaving my arms looped around his waist.

"A date?"

"Yeah. We've never been on a date and it's stressing me out."

"How gay are you going to be tonight, Ben Barlow?" I asked with a slight sniffle, hearing Cara and Zach shuffle around somewhere in the bunks. "I would love to go on a date with you," I said. "On one condition!"

"You could ask me anything right now, Essa, and I'd do it. I can't lose you. Not now."

"Stop being silly and let me talk, child." Ben rolled his eyes and turned our bodies so that he could sit on the couch, dragging me down with him to rest my head in his lap. 

"I'm older than you, fuckwit."

"Shut up! I want to go to the zoo. Without the boys."

"It wouldn't be a date if the boys were there, would it, you tit?" He told me, shaking his head in disbelief. His eyes were still bloodshot and his cheeks were still swollen and red like he'd been hit. I concluded a combination of his tears and my hair were to blame. Blotchy Ben was still Ben, and he still was not mediocre. 

"Just checking! I can't look after Dani all day on a date. That's not even my job."

"It's not my job, either, but I've been stuck with him for years." I was glad to have this level of comfort back with Ben. The hostility was hurting me more than I should have let it. This was all I wanted. 

"It's more your job than it is my job," I told him, sticking my tongue out t a funny angle in an attempt to make him smile. 

"My job's to keep cunts away from you. We need to talk about this Kerrang! debacle."

"Was this whole apology just a ploy to force me to discuss this scandal?" I asked, only half joking. I wanted to cave in on myself and disappear. 

"Don't be ridiculous. I'd forgotten about it until just now, you twat." I removed myself from his lap and made my way across the room to sit in the little booth we used as a dining table. "Where are you going?"

"I'm helping you do your job!" He gave me a questioning look. "Keeping me away from cunts?" If looks could kill, I'd have been six feet under years ago. 

"The Kerrang! incident, Essa. Focus." Mr ADHD himself was telling me to focus. Oh, how the tables had turned. 

"I vote we burn their studio to the ground," I told him with a sweet little smile, fiddling with the camera that I'd left on the table last night. "With everyone still inside."

"Maybe something a little bit less illegal, yeah?" He said, genuine concern splattered all over his face. I'd just gotten him back and we'd just proclaimed our young love; I wasn't about to let prison split us up so quickly. We had to have a couple of years minimum before I got myself locked up, right? "What about a really aggressive tweet?" He suggested.

"What about we burn their studio to the ground with everyone still inside?"

"I can't win with you, can I?" Usually, no, but that night he had. I caved moments later and allowed him to craft the perfect one hundred and forty character legal threat against the self-entitled bitches who'd made an advance on the reliability of my career and accused his of being corrupt. Rest in Peace to whoever the fuck managed their legal affairs. 

A/N: HI I'M HERE TO RUIN ALL OF YOUR LIVES IN ONE QUICK SWEEP (kinda sorry, kinda not)

I've chopped two chapters off the end of the plan and squished them in with other chapters, meaning that instead of like 4 more chapters, you now have 2 more after this one until the fic is over

making it 97.4844% completed as of right now

please love me