Even If You Don't // Calum Hood

Chapter 19: Cracks in the Sidewalk, I'm Over All the Small Talk

Calum's POV; 20 minutes later

After coming inside from meeting fans, I strolled throughout the venue in search of Mari. I was a little puzzled when she wasn't in either of our dressing rooms – where she could usually be found when she wasn't outside with fans herself – but I did my best to remain calm. I didn't want to seem like a clingy boyfriend who always needed to know where his girlfriend was, but as I was running out of rooms to check for her, I couldn't help but feel a panic start to bubble up in my chest at the thought of her going missing.

"Please tell me one of you has seen Mari," I said, hurrying to the stage since I could hear Luke and Ashton talking.

"She's fine, Cal," Ashton assured me as he turned to look at me, "Michael just texted me that they were eating lunch; They'll be back soon."

"She went on a lunch date with someone else?" I frowned, but he knew it wasn't a serious question.

"Yeah," he nodded stoically, his eyes narrowing at the blonde who had yet to speak, "Luke, would you like to tell Calum why Mari went out with Michael?"

"What does that mean?" I cocked an eyebrow, my gaze flicking between the two. Luke didn't even make a motion to say anything, so Ashton went on for him.

"Luke here decided to take his anger out on Mari while we were trying to rehearse Waste The Night," he informed me, "He yelled, she left, and Michael went to go looking for her."

"Why the hell did you do that?!" I exclaimed, throwing my arm up.

"She kept messing up her part," he murmured.

"Well, you certainly weren't helping her with it," Ashton rolled his eyes, "You can't expect Mari to know what you want her to do if you don't tell her."

"She's not a mind-reader, Luke!" I reminded him, "I have bad moods too, but I don't take them out on other people for not being able to just know what I want without me telling them!"

"Whatever," he grumbled, shuffling away from Ashton and I. I waited until Luke was out of hearing range to start talking again.

"How's she doing?" I asked Ashton.

"Not sure," he shrugged, "Michael didn't say anything apart from that they were eating. I can't imagine she's taking it too well though – she told Luke that he should have one of the other girls sing it with them tonight. And you know she doesn't really want someone else to – she practically begged everyone to let her do it." I chuckled softly at remembering how desperate Mari seemed to sing the song with us tonight before letting it fade out. I sighed to myself, just accepting that I wouldn't get to see her until she and Michael got back to the venue.

~

10 minutes later

The group and I – minus Luke, of course – were all sitting around on the stage, talking about anything that came to our minds as we waited for show time. We were in the middle of talking about the upcoming Australian leg of the tour and how excited we were to show the girls our home country when we heard laughter coming up behind us. Mari was riding piggyback on Michael, giggling about something he must have said.

"What's so funny, Mar?" Ashton asked, clearly curious as to what was said that drastically changed Mari's mood from the last time he saw her.

"Why didn't you tell me anything about your time in school, Cal?" she asked with a smirk, making my eyes widen.

"Michael!" I shouted, making him laugh.

"I'm sorry!" he exclaimed, "She just knows how to get stuff out of me!"