"Why do we put each other through hell?

Why can't we just get over ourselves?

When I hear you sing, it gets hard to breathe

Can't help but think every song's about me

And every line, every word that I write

You are the muse in the back of my mind

I don't know why I won't admit that you're all I want"

✰

"You're up early." Arlo's brows raise in surprise as she finds Beck sitting at the small circular table tucked in the kitchen nook.

His songwriting book is open in front of him, the cap of his pen between his teeth and his hair still extremely messy from sleep. The hood of his oversized hoodie is flipped up over his head, the fabric so big on him that it completely covers the boxers he wears on his bottom half, making Arlo giggle.

"So are you." Beck rubs his eyes tiredly as he uses his foot to reach under the table and push out the chair next to him for Arlo to sit at. "Where are you off to all dressed up?"

Arlo shoots him an incredulous look as she sits down, for the outfit she had on was the opposite of dressed up. High-waisted denim shorts and a little lace bralette top she wore were simply to keep herself from dying of a heat stroke on her day out.

"I'm going to a bookstore." She says simply, strategically picking up the bagel that sits on Beck's plate and taking a bite so she doesn't have to answer.

But of course, it's Beckham Hale- she should have known nothing would get past him.

"Hold the fuck up." Beck's eyes widen and he waves Arlo off as she tries to hand him his bagel back. She never fucking ate properly unless she was stealing his food, so he let it be. In fact, the boy had made a habit of making more food than he could eat because he counted on her stealing some. "You're going to a bookstore? Like as in-"

"No." Arlo shakes her head immediately. "That bookstore is back home, far, far away." Her stomach twists at the memory of the place she'd come to love.

Arlo had been back to their hometown only a handful of times in the last three years and every time she went she avoided her old street, the bookstore, and even the park like the plague. Basically, anywhere tainted with memories of him was off the table, so oftentimes she found herself meeting with her parents in dimly lit restaurants with prices higher than her rent.

She hadn't so much as seen Hemmings Bookstore since she left three years ago.

"Is it a crime for me to want a new book to read on the road? What are you going to do to entertain yourself tomorrow, huh?" Arlo deflects, setting the half-eaten bagel down on his plate. She'd lost her appetite, anyway.

"I've never seen you read a book in the three years that I've known you." Beck scoffs, although he eventually holds his hands up in surrender. "Look, I'm not here to comment on your reading habits- or the lack thereof." He shoots her a cheeky grin.

Arlo rolls her eyes, trying to ignore the ache in her chest. She didn't read anymore because reading reminded her of Luke. How could it not? When every second of their free time was spent curled up with a book in their hands, or sometimes even reading the same book together.

Truthfully, the reason Arlo was going to find a bookstore to sit in was not that she needed something new to read- she just missed Luke.

After he called her in the middle of the night and left her reeling, unfinished sentences with no distinguishable meaning rolling off of his tongue as if she hadn't been trying to figure out what was going on in his mind for days.

His tone was so soft, so gentle and even the simple act of him taking the time to call her was enough to send the poor girl spiraling. She was up half of the damn night trying to ease the ache in her chest, but the memories came in waves of torturous flashbacks.

Arlo missed Luke, but she wasn't allowed to miss him anymore, so a bookstore would have to do.

Subtly avoiding his comment, she stands from the table, making her way over to the entrance of the small studio apartment where her keys and a small shoulder bag hang on the hook. "I'll be back in a few." Arlo calls over her shoulder.

Just as her manicured hands brush the cool metal of the doorknob, Beck's voice echoes through the small apartment. "Be careful." When Arlo looks over her shoulder again there's a sarcastic smirk on his face, though she can tell it's to mask genuine concern. "Call me if you need anything, I'll be there before you even have time to hang up. Don't talk to strange men-"

"Got it, Dad." Arlo rolls her eye playfully, sending a thankful smile to Beck before slipping out of the front door.

As Arlo exits the apartment building and makes her way down the streets of LA, she doesn't have a particular destination in mind. She walks wherever her feet take her, mindlessly turning corners that have pretty flowers or if she sees a street name that catches her eye.

It didn't really matter where she ended up, she had her phone to guide her back home anyway.

The first bookstore Arlo passes after twenty minutes of walking has a pretty sign out front. It's not as pretty as the sign that caught her eye three years ago, but it's nice and she decides they probably paid some design business a shit ton of money to make it.

But, just as she walks towards the door of the shop, Arlo's brown eyes find over a dozen people inside. The shop wasn't small by any means but it wasn't big either and Arlo preferred to feel like she was in her own world whenever she sat in bookstores.

Despite the fact that she'd yet to finish packing her bag for tour, Arlo keeps walking. She didn't have all the time in the world to kill no matter how much she wished she did.

Going on tour was always weird to Arlo, at least the two times she'd been on tour had been.

Beck invited Arlo to tour with him for the first time right before her nineteenth birthday. It'd been nearly a year since things ended with Luke and Arlo still seemed to be stuck in a slump full of self-hatred. Quite frankly, Beck was worried about her and he didn't feel comfortable leaving her alone.

It took Arlo a while to adjust, although ironically enough she loved sleeping on the tour bus- she loved it even more than when they stopped at hotels for the night. She didn't really know why and she couldn't even really defend herself when Beck called her crazy for it. Although Arlo was pretty sure it had to do with the noise of the bus on the highway. It comforted her in a way, to not have to be alone with her thoughts for once.

The second time Arlo joined Beck on tour was only a few months before- in fact, Arlo was pretty sure she'd still yet to unpack some of her bags.

As the brunette girl walks down the busy street letting the sun kiss her shoulders and cheeks, she isn't too sure if she's excited to be touring or not. Seeing Luke every day, being so close to him when things were so... weird between them was enough to drive her crazy just thinking about it.

Arlo's chest aches at the mere thought of what she'd have to watch from afar. All the girls he'd probably be hooking up with... she was no stranger to how artists acted when they were on tour.

Her phone suddenly vibrates in her back pocket, snapping her out of her daze as she stops at a crosswalk. Arlo digs her phone out of the back pocket of her jeans, finding a contact that hadn't graced her screen in years.

"Calum?"

"Arlo!" The boy answers excitably into the speaker. "Are you on seventh street like... now?"

Arlo furrows her brows, her head whipping around the busy street because she was in fact on seventh street but how the hell did Calum know that? "I am... where are you, Calum?"

A small tap on her shoulder nearly causes the girl to jump out of her skin. Arlo spins on her heel to find no other than Calum Hood standing next to her, a wide small on his tan face that's shielded from the sun by a black ball cap. "How-?"

"Want a smoothie?" Calum interrupts her smoothly, extending out one of his hands to her. He has a drink in both of them, although one looks to be half empty. "I got this one but I didn't like it so I ordered another."

Arlo raises a skeptical brow, but takes the smoothie from his hands. She'd had to have been walking in the sun for nearly an hour and thanks to Beck's pre-tour workouts, her legs were already sore. "Thanks." She shoots him a small smile. "Wanna explain how you found me?"

"I was on my way home from the gym and I thought I saw you." He explains. "I only live a couple of streets over, " Calum says simply, looping his arm through her own as he begins leading her in the opposite direction. "Wanna come over and chat? I got new chairs for my back deck- very adult-like of me, I know."

Arlo twists her lips to the side in thought, faking a deep internal battle as he watches intently. "I guess I can spare a few minutes."

"Oh, I'm honored." Calum feeds into her game with a roll of his eyes. Although his tone is filled with sarcasm, his chest feels warm just from talking to her so normally again. He'd missed Arlo more than he could ever admit aloud in fear of upsetting Luke.

It takes the pair no more than ten minutes to reach Calum's house and he immediately drags the girl to his back deck after shoving a water bottle in her hands.

Calum props his feet up on the outdoor table in front of him, the sleeves of his shirt rolled up to expose his biceps as he leans back in the chair, his hands resting comfortably on his head. "Your tan lines are going to be fucking gold." He scoffs with a smirk.

Arlo cringes, lifting up the lace strap of her bralette top to find that infuriatingly enough, the tan boy was right. "At least I'm getting somewhere." She points out.

"You're right." Calum hums, taking a sip from his own water bottle. "This is the tannest I've ever seen you, you're usually pale as fuck."

Arlo rolls her eyes with a scoff, nudging her foot against his thigh. "Thanks a lot, Cal."

At the use of the nickname, Calum's smile falters. Luke and Arlo's breakup wasn't only hard on them, but on the rest of the band too. Calum loved Arlo, she was one of his best friends, and the first time he had to pick out his own outfit before going on stage, he nearly cried thinking about how much he missed her.

"I really missed you, Abbs." Calum swallows thickly, his eyes falling to his lap. "None of this has really been the same without you... the band, our dynamic. Luke hasn't-"

"Cal, you know I can't talk about him." Arlo's voice is strained, the shift in mood almost palpable. "We broke up three years ago, it's time to move on." The words taste awful on her tongue and even Calum can see the hurt in her eyes as she says them.

"Time makes the heart grow fonder or whatever the fuck they say!" Calum groans, his puppy dog eyes pleading. "C'mon, Arlo. We're leaving tomorrow for tour, that's the perfect time to fix things!"

"It's a horrible time to fix things." Arlo says firmly, unable to look at him any longer. "Who says I even want to fix things, huh?"

Calum rolls his eyes, his blood boiling at how utterly stubborn the two of them were. They were both hurting and all they needed to take away that pain was to get over themselves and just make up, but neither of them wanted to admit it. "The way you look at him says more than you know."

Arlo's throat feels tight at Calum's words and she takes a long sip of water to distract herself from the ache in her chest. "That doesn't mean anything if he looks at me like he hates me as much as his words make it seem."

Calum opens his mouth to tell her she's wrong- that Luke could never, ever hate her and that his hurtful words come from a place of fear, but she swiftly cuts him off. "Let's talk about something else." Arlo practically pleads. "What did I miss? Any new girls?"

"No, I've got a better idea." Calum quickly bounces back, never one to dwell on the sad moments of life when there wasn't a need to. "I've missed out on all of the big brother type shit like giving advice and all that."

A genuine laugh leaves Arlo's lips and she tucks her knees up to her chest, resting her chin on top of them. "What advice could you possibly give me that I already don't know, Cal? Aren't I usually the one giving advice?"

Calum waves her off, sitting up in his chair and leaning forward to rest his elbows on his knees. There's a completely serious look on his face as he looks into her brown eyes. "Arlo, I'm telling you... please, for the love of God never have shower sex right after you've conditioned your hair."

Arlo's lips part in shock, her cheeks flushing. "Why would I-" She shakes her head, redirecting quickly. "What does conditioner have to do with anything?"

Calum looks at her with grief on his face and she can almost see the traumatic memories flashing behind his brown eyes. "It's slippery, very slippery." A fit of giggles leaves Arlo's lips, her eyes going wide as she mentally connects the dots.

"Hey!" Calum narrows his eyes in faux annoyance. "This is serious, it's not a laughing matter, Arlo!" He rolls his eyes, crossing his arms over his chest. "Anyway... so let me tell you about how I bruised my tailbone in the shower- Not having shower sex, simply just showering!"

✰

After a very eventful afternoon at Calum's house where the two spent a few hours catching up, Arlo finally walks through the door of her shared apartment with Beck. She's the only one home, for he had last-minute rehearsals.

With a groan, the girl sets down her bag and makes her way to the bedroom where her clothes sit all sorted and folded, ready to be packed into her suitcase. They are scheduled to leave for tour before the sun even has a chance to rise in the morning and Arlo finds it incredibly frustrating that she can't put off packing any longer.

Hell, she wasn't even sure if she had a suitcase considering the one she had on the last tour ended up losing a zipper. So, with a groan, she makes her way to the small storage closet. Opening the door, Arlo feels a strange sense of nostalgia hit her as she sees a certain suitcase.

It's the same suitcase she'd used three years ago, the very same one that had gone to LA with the band and then to San Francisco with Luke. It's also the very same suitcase that she'd packed to go to New York for the album release party.

Arlo hadn't had the courage to so much as touch the suitcase after she left in fear that it might bring up painful memories, but now it seems like she has no choice.

Warily, she drags the suitcase out of the closet and into the bedroom, cringing at how heavy it is. Arlo takes a seat on the wooden floor, the cool feeling of the wood sending goosebumps raising on her thighs.

The suitcase was heavier than she remembered and it only causes her heart to rise higher in her throat as she slowly begins unzipping it.

Instantly, her heart is sent plummeting straight to the floor.

The very first thing she sees is a black dress- the same fucking black dress that she'd been wearing when she broke his heart accompanied by the heels she'd worn with it. Her breath catches in her throat as she finds one of Luke's t-shirts. It used to be her favorite and she wore it to sleep every night without fail.

A near sob leaves the girl's lips as she holds the material to her nose, finding that his cologne still lingers. That was one thing that she'd noticed after being so close to Luke in the bathroom of the label- his cologne was still the same, even after all of these years.

Her chest aches as she continues to pull clothing out of the suitcase- it was like a fucking time capsule of the worst day of her entire life.

Arlo is nearly to the bottom of the suitcase when her fingers brush against something much firmer than fabric. Her brows furrow as she finds not one, but two books. One is a moleskin notebook, tattered nearly to bits and obviously well used, while the other looks to be an annotated book, tabs sticking out of the side.

It's when her eye finds the writing on the front of the book does her heart truly sink, knocking the breath straight out of her lungs.

"For Arlo..."

OOP

i can't believe you guys forgot about the notebooks smh

i wonder how this is gonna change things?? especially with tour starting tomorrow hmmm