Fixing Us || l.h

Chapter Twenty-Four*

My week with the Hemmings was at a close. The amount of pictures I had taken of him as a baby meant that I could blackmail him any time. "Can you please delete those pictures?" "Nope. And I changed my password so you can't delete them." I smirk. He frowns, crossing his arms over his chest. "Is Luke still pouting?" Liz comes into his room where we were finishing packing.

"Yup." I laugh, and he deepens his frown, if that was even possible. "You look like a freak Luke." I laugh. "He honestly looks kinda stupid." His mom whispers to me. I cover my mouth to hide the laugh and Luke glares at us. "I'm not deaf." He mumbles. "We love you." Liz and I say simultaneously.

"Yeah yeah." He zips his suitcase close and when he turns around he quickly turns back around. "I'll uh, be going out the window, love you mom, please don't kill me Dylan. Goodbye." He hurries over to his window, sliding it open. "Get back in here Lucas." I groan. He peeks at me, watching for a minute.

"I'm not gonna kill you!" I laugh. "Are you sure?" "Maybe back in America I will." I shrug. "I'll be hiding out here for the rest of my life, don't mind me mom." Luke says. "I don't understand?" Liz asks. "Dylan doesn't like being 'yeah yeah'd it's a major pet peeve of hers." Luke watches me, slowly moving towards the bedroom door. He runs into his dad, letting out a yelp. We all laugh and Luke finally begins to laugh too.

"Thank you so much for letting me barge in on your family week." I thank Liz and Andy. "You're always welcome here Dylan, even without Luke." Liz laughs. "Thank you." I smile. I follow Luke down to the car, sitting behind him. "I wish I was, I wish I was, beside you." I sing, poking him in the cheek. "You'll kill me, I'm not coming back there!" I kiss his cheek, and he faces me. "I'm not going to kill you Luke. Just stop yeah yeah'ing me." "Got it." He gives me a thumbs up before climbing to the back.

His mom takes us to the airport and we get on our plane faster than normal.

-

We walk into the hotel room, Ashton and Kiera asleep on the couch. "How do you think it went for them?" Luke asks quietly. "From the tear tracks on Kiera's face, not too well." I frown. Kiera needed all the support she could get right now, so whatever happened isn't good for her. Calum walks out of his room, red-eyed. Damn. What did we miss?

"Oh. You're back." He mumbles, getting a cup of water. Luke follows him back to his room, and I go to mine. Soon, Michael comes in. "Where's Ashley?" "Back home visiting family." "Ugh, so I'm stuck with you?" I joke. "'Fraid so." He laughs. "Where's Luke?" "Seeing what's up with Calum." "We have to get him out of there right now." Michael jumps up, running from the room.

I follow after him a second later, only to see him carrying, literally carrying him, he was over his shoulder, Luke who was complaining. "Okay, seriously? What did we miss?" I ask quietly for Kiera and Ashton's sake. "Katie cheated on Cal. He's taking it a lot harder than we thought he would have." "But she seemed so nice." I frown. "She's majoring in acting, apparently she's really good." Michael whispers.

I peek back towards Calum's room, seeing him through the crack in the door. He was huddled under the comforter, hugging his pillow I think. "I'm gonna change, then do you guys want to go find something to eat?" I ask. They both nod eagerly and I go back to my room.

I pick out a random T-shirt, switching it for the one I was wearing. I look down to see it was the 5SOS shirt I had gotten from hot topic. I slide on shredded black skinny jeans and grabbed my leather jacket, grabbing my phone before leaving the room.

I followed the boys out of the hotel room, down the hall into the elevator. I leaned against Luke's stomach, his arms wrapped around me. "I think she grew, Luke." Michael says, studying us. We both stand up straight, and Luke puts his hand on top of my head and moves it until it hits his nose. "How tall are you now?" He frowns. I shrug. "Let's measure!" Michael says eagerly. The elevator dings and we step out.

"What would we measure with?" I laugh, opening the hotel door and holding it for them. "We buy a tape measure." He shrugs. "We're in Denver, do you know where to get a tape measure?" "No." He frowns. "But we can ask someone." "Or we can wait until tomorrow when I go to New York for my yearly physical." "Ew." "It has to be done." I shrug. "She's being a big girl and going all by herself." Luke smiles. I elbow him, frowning.

"You try going to a place that can put you back in a mental hospital before you can say no." I mumble, looking down. "You're getting better Dylan, they aren't going to put you back into the hospital." He tilts my head up so I'm looking at him. "Got it?" I nod. "Good."

We continue walking, I watch my breath come out in puffs in the cold air. I stepped over snowbanks when Luke would try to push me into them, throwing a snowball at Mikey every so often, then I hit him in the back of the head. I covered my mouth, hiding the laugh. "That's it." He grins, grabbing some snow and forming it into a ball. He throws it at me and I duck, and turn to see where it went.

At least a dozen paps were behind us, taking pictures or filming us. The snowball had hit one of them and we all began laughing. "Let's try this place." Michael points across the street. It was a cute little diner and we crossed, walking in. The barista did a double take, eyes wide and gaping at us. "Hello." I greet, snapping her out of her stupor.

"He-hello, what can I get you?" She couldn't stop smiling. "3 hot chocolates and 3 donuts." Michael smiles. "That would be 13.42." She says, still starstruck. Michael pays and I grab a napkin and pen, signing it, passing it to Luke, and then he passed it to Michael. "Thought you might like this." He smiles, handing it to her. Her eyes widened even more, and she looked like she was about to start crying.

"No, please don't cry." Michael says quickly. "It's just, your guys' music has helped me so much, I ran away from home a few months ago and I was planning on ending it but I began listening to music and heard you guys and," she sniffed, wiping under her eyes. "You guys saved my life and I never thought I'd get to meet you." She laughs a little.

"Do you have tickets to the concert tonight?" Michael smiles. She shakes her head. "Do you have anyone to go with?" Michael produces 2 tickets. Her hand went to her mouth. "I-I can find someone, thank you so much." "Come over here." Michael opens his arms and she hurries over, letting him engulf her in a hug. Luke and I joined a second later.

"Please stay strong for us." Michael mumbles to her. He gives her a kiss on the cheek before letting her go back to work. We take a seat at a table, I glance at the window, seeing the paps still there. I take a bite of my donut, sprinkles falling. I throw one at Michael and it bounces off his nose. I giggle, and he glares at me. "Stop throwing stuff at me."