ᴛᴏᴏ ʏᴏᴜɴɢ » ᴢᴀᴄʜ ʜᴇʀʀᴏɴ

Chapter Ten

April 5, 2018

"Alright, the fans want to know: celebrity crushes," the interviewer said, looking across at the five boys seated together, each holding their own microphone.
   
Maeve stood quite a ways back, not wanting to interfere, but she was enjoying herself. They had arrived in Atlanta, Georgia the night before and she was given permission to go with the boys for the afternoon.
   
"I'm going with Ariana Grande," Zach said when it was his turn, looking directly at the man interviewing them. He felt his cheeks reddening, acutely aware of Maeve's presence in the room.
   
As Jack went on, he glanced behind the camera to see her leaning against the wall at the back of the room, lips curled into a smile as she tried not to laugh.

***

The tour bus rocked gently as it traveled along the highway, headed toward its next destination.
   
Maeve was sitting on one of the couches, knees facing the window so her back was to the aisle; David had said it was fine for her to be on the bus with Eben and the boys when they were moving, even though she wasn't sleeping there.
   
Someone slid into the seat beside her, and judging by his close proximity, she figured it was Zach.
   
Their friendship had passed beyond the point of cautious boundaries. Hands and arms touching, knees bumping together, and hugs weren't of awkward concern. Maeve would be lying if she said it didn't make her stomach flip over itself when his arms slipped to her waist as he released her from a hug or as he hit his shoulder against hers with that little smile, but she tried not to think about it since he—most likely—was not.
   
"Your legs are supposed to face the aisle, dork," Zach said from beside her.
   
"I enjoy looking out the window."
   
"I know." Then he moved so he was in the same position, shooting her a cheeky smile. She rolled her eyes playfully.
   
They sat in silence for a moment, headlight beams from cars passing by the window cutting through the darkness outside.
   
"So, Ariana Grande, huh?" she started, solely for the purpose of teasing him.
   
He let out an exasperated sigh.
   
"I kind of just said that," he attempted, but she was already laughing.
   
"I don't know, Herron." She patted the side of his face with her hand. "Your face got really red."
   
"Oh, come on," he said in a low voice. He didn't look at her, even though he was smiling. "What about you?"
   
"Hmm?"
   
"Who's your celebrity crush?"
   
She thought it over before answering, "Daniel Seavey."
   
He looked at her blankly, and she let out a snort of a laugh.
   
"Calm down, Herron. That was a joke. It's probably... Tom Holland."
   
"Tom Holland?" he repeated. "Spider-man Tom Holland?" He paused. "How am I supposed to compete with that?"
   
In the back of her mind, she thought, you feel like you have to?
   
Composing herself, she countered, "You're jealous of Tom Holland?"
   
"Well he gets more love from you than I do, so yeah."
   
She swallowed, brushing off the comment as nothing more than the kind of affectionate thing he would say to anybody.
   
"Have you been missing home?" he asked her some time later.
   
She shook her head.
   
"Honestly... not really." She wasn't looking at him but she could imagine the expression on his face. "I love my parents, and I know they love me. It's just... my older sister always did everything right and I never quite measured up. My parents were often disappointed; they don't like that I want to work tech instead of something more practical."

She paused, searching for the right words.

"I don't necessarily miss home because every decision I made there wasn't approved of. It's been weird this past year without Kendra around, since she's traveling. She's always been there, the one to sort of recant everything my parents told me, especially when I was younger. Because she saw how much it hurt when my parents didn't, so I learned to trust her, look up to her."

Zach nodded, but didn't say anything right away.

"I'm sorry," he settled on. "That you had to go through that."

His eyes were devoid of his usual carefree state of mind, replaced with gentleness and care.

She shook her head slightly.

"It taught me that no matter how much you want a certain kind of affection from some people in your life, they're just not going to return it in the way you want them to."

A moment passed.

"Only some people in your life are meant to love you," she said softly.

Zach didn't know that she was no longer talking about her parents alone.