lost and found // calum hood

91 | Elizabeth

I woke up from my phone buzzing in the middle of the night. I opened my eyes and I was confused for a second. I wasn't used to waking up in Calum's house and the fact that the other side of the bed was cold wasn't helping me either. The soft snores of Calum I had grown accustomed to weren't present and I felt alone.

Slowly turning to my side, I grabbed my phone from the nightstand and noticed that Calum was calling me.

At three AM.

I rubbed my eyes with one hand while answering the phone with the other. "Hey," I said, trying to sound as awake as I could, but Calum could hear it right away. "Ohmygod - I'm sorry, I didn't check the time in LA. Sorry, sorry," he said before even saying hello.

"It's okay, Cal," I said. "No, it's probably the middle of the night there, you need your rest so you can -" he started, but I cut him off. "I'm fine, Cal. How was your flight? Did you read my texts?" I said and he sighed.

"My flight was good, I'm exhausted. Thankfully we have the day off. Yeah, sorry I didn't respond right away, my phone had died from playing games." he said and I couldn't help but smile. "Did you get home okay?" he asked and I let myself fall back into the soft pillows.

"I did. I'm good. I have to get some groceries tomorrow but I have no clue what kind of food your dog eats." I said, staring at the ceiling. Calum chuckled. "He eats mostly Hill's. The stores aren't that far of a ride. You got maps, you'll be fine." he reassured.

"Do I like, call Jeff for a ride?" I asked.

"That's one option, yeah. But you got a drivers license, right? You can just use my car if you want. The keys are in the brown cabinet you see when you walk in through the front door." he said and I could basically hear him smile through the phone. "Isn't that..dangerous? With Tommy still walking around somewhere?" I said.

Calum sighed. "There is a search for him and he can't fly out of the state without the police knowing. He probably thinks you flew to Europe with us anyway, so if you want to post something on social media or something you need to be sure that your location isn't saying where you are. But you're safe in LA and you got Jeff on speed-dial, right?" he said. "Yeah."

"It's going to be weird, without you," he said and I bit my lip. I didn't want to start crying again. I've done that enough in the past twenty-four hours. "I'm staying in your house by myself. That's weird."

"Our house."

"Stop saying that, that's even weirder," he said and I giggled. "Okay," I said.

"How are you mentally, by the way?" Calum suddenly asked and I wasn't sure what to answer. I grabbed the blanket and pulled it higher up. I then shrugged, even though Calum didn't know that. "I don't know. I mean - I feel okay and I know that feeling okay after what happened isn't normal but I think that's just my brain protecting itself, you know? I think it's because I was so used to him hitting me that even though it's been so long, my brain just put on the defense mechanism again." I started to ramble.

"And I know that going to LA was the best decision for me but I can't help but miss everyone and I miss you and I have this bad feeling in my gut that I fucked everything up and you know how long distance relationships go and what if we end up like that?" I said.

"You're rambling," he said. "I know, I do that when -" "When you're nervous or anxious. I know that." he said with a smile in his voice. He knew me like the back of his hand.

"First of all, we won't end up like those typical long-distance-gone-wrong relationships because you and I both know how to communicate and we've been apart for longer than we will now. We will make it, okay? I don't want you to worry about us, not even for a second." he said, reassuring me once more. "Second, I understand what you're saying with your defense mechanism. It's okay to admit that you want or need professional help. Like therapy or a psychologist. Mike has a good one and he's located in LA as well." he said.