I Won't Give Up ~ Michael Clifford

0:21

~ a/n: Hiya, so... As you can see, there's a video attached to this chapter. When you see a sentence with all capital letters between stars, play the video. ENJOY x~

*July 23 2021*

Bree;

Today's the day my baby turns 3 years old and I'm beyond happy on how much he's grown, learned so much more than any normal boy should and his speech is amazing.

As of right now, Michael, Ashton and I are setting up our apartment for Declan's birthday dinner, we invited the boys from the band, Niall, Louis and Freddie, Harry and Liam and Bear plus Michael got his parents and my sisters, brother, my mom and Ricky flown out here for this and they get to stay for the weekend, so to say I'm excited is an understatement.

"Where do you want us to put this, babe?" Michael asks, I turn around and see that him and Ashton holding the custom made banner that has 'Happy 3rd Birthday Declan' on it.

I look around and decide that they can put it up around the dining room, "Up there, like above the window and below that, Declan will be sitting in his high chair." I point to the location.

"Alrighty, ma'am." Ashton salutes me and I laugh.

I'm in the midst of setting the table area while dealing with the food. I'm just waiting for Sammy to come over so she can help with the spaghetti and lasagna, we have ordered four boxes of pizza and we set the delivery time for 5 o'clock.

My phone starts ringing and I stop what I'm doing and go to answer it.

Hello?

Hey darling, is Michael around?

It's Michael's mom.

Yeah, hold on

"Baby, phone" I hold my phone out so he can take it. He gives the banner to Ash and takes the phone call in the kitchen.

Ashton;

I'm over at Mikey and Bree's place to help setup for my favourite kid in the world's 3rd birthday. I've known him and watched him grow up since day on, I mean me and the lads were there in the waiting room when he was born; I fallen in love with him and I'd do anything for the tiny lad.

"Baby, phone." Bree hands Michael her phone and she came over to me and grabbed Michael's side of the banner and we put it up, not even making a mistake.

"Is Sam even coming? She said she would be here half an hour ago!" Bree asked, slamming the cutlery down, making my body jolt up in a scare.

"I'm sure she's on her way." I walk over to the stressed out mama and pull her into my arms, "Don't worry about it, love." I kiss her hair in a brotherly gesture and walk into the kitchen, starting on the salad.

"Ash, you don't have to-" I put my hand up, stopping her from talking anymore.

"-I know, but I want to." I say, smiling and she smiles back and we end up cooking up a storm in the kitchen; starting with spaghetti, and then lasagna, then we ended up setting up the barbecuer so we can barbecue hamburgers and hotdogs then we also made cake and cookies for the kids.

Louis and Liam showed up with their boys Freddie and Bear, Harry showed up with Mitch but they didn't really talk to me, and they avoided my gaze- especially Harry. Niall showed up shortly after with a case of beer and I was quick to grab one. One by one, Michael and Bree's family plus Ricky showed up and the only one who wasn't here was Sammy, that kind of made me curious on where she could be.

Bree;

Everyone has arrived, everyone but Sammy. She told me over the phone that she would be here and that was over a little under two hours ago. With the way Ash has been pacing, looking for something to distract him and having to be on his fourth beer already- I can tell he's nervous, curious and worried about Sammy's whereabouts.