"Hey, all you had to do was stay

Had me in the palm of your hand

Then why'd you have to go and lock me out when I let you in?

Let me remind you

This was what you wanted

You ended it

You were all I wanted

But not like this"

✰

"What do you mean it's fucking jammed?!" Luke shouts, his fist harshly pounding on the door as he stands eye to eye with the door of the tour bus.

"I don't know, it just is!" Calum lies through his teeth as the rest of the band and Beck whisper in his ear what to say- Calum wasn't very good under pressure, after all. "We called someone to fix it but they won't be here for another hour!" The tan boy shouts through the door.

Luke's forehead connects harshly with the door, a distressed sigh leaving his lips as he feels dread settle in his stomach. He was going to be trapped in a tour bus with the love of his life who broke his heart for the next hour and a half and there was nothing he could do but sit and wait.

Arlo doesn't seem bothered in the slightest, but then again her face was blank. Luke used to be able to read her like the back of his hand, her eyes giving away everything she didn't say. Three years later and somehow she'd managed to put up a wall around herself that even Luke couldn't see past.

He wished he had the same ability, for if Arlo Abbott looked at him for more than a few moments he was sure that she would be able to see that he still loved her.

Instead of continuously beating in the door like Luke had decided to, Arlo makes her way over to the small heavily tinted windows above the couch. She stands on the couch and cracks one of them open, finding all four of the boys leaning against the bus.

"Is it really jammed?" Arlo asks Beck, who stands right below her.

The green-eyed boy turns on his heel, looking above him with a shocked look on his face, for they had not accounted for windows. He subtly nudges Calum's shoulder in a signal for him to pocket the keys of the bus before Arlo can see.

"Yeah, sorry babe." Beck scratches the back of his head in a totally inconspicuous way. "It won't be long until help gets here and you have Luke to talk to."

"And food." Ashton chimes in. "I can throw a bag of chips through the window if you want!" The hazel-eyed boy grins.

While Arlo continues to talk to the boys with her head hanging out of the window, Luke Hemmings is beginning to panic. There wasn't much he was scared of in the world, but confined spaces were one of them. Although his claustrophobia was slight, the walls of the tour bus felt like they were beginning to close.

Her head is turned away from him, allowing the blond rockstar to pace the same small area of the bus as frantically as he wanted. Luke's arms are crossed over his chest, hugging himself as he resists the urge to pull at his hair.

Arlo's voice sounds like it's a million miles away to his panicked brain, though one sentence rings perfectly clear. "You know, now that I think about it I could fit through this window-"

"No!" Luke blurts before he can stop himself.

When Arlo pulls her head out of the window, turning around to face him, she finds Luke looking utterly distraught. "Luke..." She begins, her chest aching at the way his blue eyes are wild, his chest heaving.

"I can't fit through the window so please." He swallows thickly, more vulnerable in this moment than he'd been in years. "Don't leave me." Suddenly, the paranoia that the boys outside were listening to their conversation hits the forefront of his mind. "Can you close the window?"

Really, Arlo was using the fresh air from the window as a way to ground herself, but she doesn't waste a second in shutting it. She ignores the calls of the boys below as she steps off of the couch, only feet away from the panicking blond.

His chest was beginning to heave faster and Arlo's eyes can't help but notice the shakiness of his hands. "Why don't we sit down, Luke?" She urges gently. "We can watch TV or-"

"Don't do that. Never mind, just forget it." Luke shakes his head, swallowing down his panic the best he can. He hates the fact that his chest hurts so bad it robs his breath and he hates that he can't hide away from her even more- he hates that he doesn't want to. "You don't have to sit here and baby me when you don't give a fuck about me."

"I do." Arlo answers instantly, not even caring how desperate she may sound. In a bold move, she reaches out for him, her hand finding one of his own. She does her best to ignore the electricity that runs through her veins at the contact. "Just let me help you, please."

Luke bites down harshly on his bottom lip, his eyes pinching shut as her hand gently takes his own. "This means nothing." Maybe it's the panic that's taking over his body that causes him to spill out the words, or maybe it's the denial that follows her touch and the way it makes him feel, even after everything "I don't miss you."

Arlo winces at his words, a million little knives heading straight for her already fragile heart with every syllable that leaves his lips. "That's okay." Her voice is barely above a whisper.

Luke hears the devastation in her tone, he hears how he'd hurt her but he can't stop. With his chest heaving and panic running through his veins he says everything that he's been holding in, no matter the fact that he didn't know if it was true.

"I don't even fucking know you anymore." He says, his tone lethal. "You don't like Arnold Palmers, your hair is different, you don't read, even your goddamn smile isn't the same. I miss us. I miss who we used to be. I miss who we were when we had more."

"I know." Arlo swallows thickly, pushing away the grief settling in her chest and the tears that beg to line her eyes at his words, for all she cared about was making sure he was okay. "I don't like me anymore either."

"You broke me, Arlo." Luke's breaths quicken, his hand that's not in hers reaching up to clutch at his chest. His blue eyes are everywhere but her, on the shrinking walls of the tour bus, the tinted windows, the discarded deck of cards on the table. "What was it about me that wasn't good enough? I gave you my everything-"

Before Arlo can think about what she's doing, her arms are around him. Her hands settle on his strong back, the fabric of his t-shirt clutched in her small fists as she brings Luke to her chest, pulling him impossibly close.

It's almost instant how Luke's breathing slows back to normal. He exhales harshly out of his nose, his rigid body going limp in her arms as he allows her to hug him, his eyes fluttering shut as he basks in the feeling.

Even if she'd done imaginable things, it was undeniable that he found the most comfort in her arms.

Despite the fact that it felt almost torturous to be in her arms again and not be able to call her his own, Luke allows her to lead him to the couch. In fact, he practically clings to her, panic rushing through his veins when she removes her hand from his own for a split second.

Arlo sits on the couch, placing a pillow on her lap and grabbing a blanket that lays next to her. Luke doesn't even need to be told twice as he curls up next to her, his long legs hanging off of the end of the couch as his head rests on the pillow in her lap.

His eyes flutter shut, a sense of peace washing over him as her fingertips hesitantly find his curls. "I knew you'd look good with curls." Her soft voice speaks.

Luke hums under his breath, the feeling of her hands in his hair far too euphoric for him to properly speak. "You like my hair better like this?" He asks, referring to the short waves he had when he was hers.

"I dunno." Arlo answers honestly, for his curls were maddeningly beautiful, but Luke with curls wasn't hers. She almost wished his hair was still short so that things felt normal again. But everything had changed and that was undeniable, there was nothing they could do about it now either.

Luke swallows thickly, his eyes on the wall of the tour bus in front of him. "Have you... have you been back to our hometown since-"

"No." Arlo answers hesitantly. "It didn't feel-"

"The same." Luke finishes her sentence, a pang of hurt radiating through his chest. Nothing was the same as it was anymore and it hurt more than he could ever imagine. In this moment, he wishes nothing more than to go back to being that lovesick eighteen-year-old kid who never thought he'd get out of town.

Suddenly, Luke finds himself basking in her presence. He feels more at home than he has in three years with her hands in his hair and her perfume filling his senses. Lukes's chest begins to ache as he begins to miss her even more, despite the fact that his head is literally in her lap. She was so close, but so fucking far away at the same time.

"This means nothing." The words leave his pink lips lowly, almost like he's not even sure that he means them.

Arlo inhales sharply, her hands stalling in his hair for a split second. "I know."

But this moment in the tour bus meant everything, and they both knew it.

✰

From the moment Luke stepped out of the tour bus, he was intent on being alone.

He was so fucking angry at the world despite that tour usually was his safe space. He knew it was selfish and pretentious of him to be brooding and cursing the sky when he was given the chance of a lifetime touring with his best friends, but he couldn't shake the feeling.

As soon as the tour bus door was unjammed and Luke had spent a good half an hour standing in the parking lot, looking at the sky he was deprived of and trying to work up the courage to get back on the bus.

Eventually, though, he was forced to get back on the bus once again- he was forced to be in her presence and act like laying his head in her lap wasn't the best goddamn thing that had happened to him since the last time she kissed him three years ago.

So, Luke went to the back of the bus and shut the door, pretending like her perfume didn't still linger on his clothes along with the feeling of her hands in his hair.

Instead of doing what he really wanted, which was to take her in his arms again and tell her that he missed her so much he couldn't breathe, that he loved her so much he didn't care if she broke his heart and left all over again, just so he could feel her affection for a little longer- he wrote a song and he called it "More"

Now, as Luke stands backstage, buttoning up the front of his red silk dress shirt, he finds himself fuming.

Why did things have to change? Why did people have to grow up and fall apart? Why did Arlo Abbott have to break his heart in the alley of a club in a fucking rainstorm?

He wondered how different his life would be if Arlo had never done what she did. What if she had gone on tour with them like they planned and spent the next three years loving each other the way he longed to? Where would they be now? Engaged and still lovesick over one another? How many albums would he have written about her? How different would they sound?

Luke shakes the thoughts, instead focusing on warming up his voice. In honor of the opening night of the tour, the band was playing a new song and he was intent on not forgetting the lyrics, but that was likely considering Arlo took up every single fucking free thought in his mind.

The song was about her, as all of them were and it was a million times more nerve-wracking to know she would be standing in the wings listening.

Once his shirt is buttoned and the wires attached to his pants adequately adjusted, Luke runs his hands through his blond curls one last time before exiting the room. Beck is finishing up his last song, the heavy guitar echoing through the stadium as Luke makes his way down the dimly lit hallway.

As Beck's set ends, Luke finds his bandmates, forming a circle with them as they prepare to go on stage. Michael gives the same speech that he always does, and Ashton says that he loves them while Calum practically bounces up and down out of excitement as their intro begins to play.

Luke, however, can't take his eyes off of the girl standing near the curtain, her hands clapping excitably as Beck runs off of the stage high on adrenaline and takes her in his arms. The blond just knows that she's whispering in his ear about how proud she is of him and that only fuels Luke's need for her more.

He remembered how good it used to feel to have her waiting for him, taking her in his arms and kissing her messily as soon as he was done with the show. Luke fucking missed it and it hurt to know that when he left the stage tonight, there wouldn't be anything waiting for him but a cramped tour bus and a glass of tequila.

A familiar sense of adrenaline rushes through his veins as the lights go up on the stage, revealing the crowd in front of them. Luke allows a cocky smirk to cross his face as the screams of the fans fill his ears.

"This is a new one... it's called Youngblood!"