the photographer. [zdh]

twelve

we were currently holding the 'emergency meeting' at the back of the bus. just corbyn, jonah, daniel, eben and i. obviously, zach and leah couldn't be present since the whole meeting was about them, and tyler was supposed to keep them occupied until the meeting was over.

"do you guys see how much they're in love with each other?" exclaimed corbyn. "they obviously like each other!"

"we all know it, dude," jonah shrugged.

"she's definitely better than loren gray. or mackenzie ziegler. or kay. whoever he's being shipped with online." daniel interjected.

when daniel mentioned loren gray, i paled. "guys...loren gray. leah gray. are they...related?"

the room went silent. "i hope not." eben said finally. "that would be...tragic, to say the least."

"i'll do some online digging," corbyn said, grabbing his laptop from the table. "c'mon."

ten minutes later, we learnt that loren and leah were not related in any way. except...

"what's this? adoption records, year 2010-2011 in the dallas area. what is this about?"

"click on it," suggested daniel. as corbyn clicked on the link and scrolled down, a familiar name caught all of our eyes.

leah gray.

**

"no. freaking. way." jack said. he looked thoroughly shocked.

corbyn's mouth was hanging open, his fingers hovering over the keyboard, but he didn't seem like he was planning to type something.

daniel opened and closed his mouth like a fish out of water. "what? what? WHAT?"

jonah was muttering "i don't believe it" over and over again under his breath.

eben just kept shaking his head.

after all, finding out one of your best friends was adopted was a big thing.

after a long moment, eben voiced the question we had all been thinking about. "should we ask her?"

jonah shook his head vigorously. "we can't tell her we've been poking around in her personal life."

daniel nodded. "not yet."

"but we've got to do something," jack argued. "we can't just pretend we don't know anything."

corbyn remained silent for a full minute before looking up at us. "we can't tell her yet. but if you feel like you want to do something, you could stalk her social media, i guess. not that we'd have the time to. these next few days are full of shows."

"what are you saying, corbyn?" eben asked.

"when we have time, we stalk. and when the time comes, we ask the question when she least expects it."

eben sighed. "that's kinda mean. but i'm in."

**

"okay, rehearsal!" yelled tyler as we stopped outside the next venue, the fox theatre in atlanta.

as we stepped out of the bus, i approached tyler, camera in hand.

"ty?"

he turned to me. "yes, leah?"

"my wound has been healing," i said, "and i was wondering if i could take photos again."

tyler frowned at me. he hesitated for a long time before he sighed.

"i'll tell joseph that you're joining him today. and, leah, you better not wander off anywhere else in the venue once the show starts. you can only be at the videographer's location or backstage. okay? i don't want the same thing to happen again."

i nodded. "i promise."

**

the show was coming to a close, and let me tell you, the limelights in atlanta went the hardest so far.

"this crowd," gasped joseph, as soon as he cut the video. "crazy."

i nodded, laughing. "atlanta's great."

as we walked backstage together, joseph looked over at me. "i shouldn't be telling you this. it's not my place to say, but..."

"yeah?" i asked.

"zach's definitely in love with you. i've seen him look over at you countless times while rehearsal was ongoing, and he kept pointing at you while the show was going on."

"maybe he was pointing at you," i said cheekily, laughing as i dodged his hit.

"seriously, though. he definitely likes you, and i know you like him."

"i-" i began, but he shushed me.

"think about it!" he called as he headed to join the rest of the logs crew. only then did i realise that if i wasn't zach's best friend, i would not be getting the special treatment of staying in the same bus as the boys.

he had done so much for me. more than he needed to.

maybe joseph was right. but maybe he wasn't.