This Is a Reason for Broken Wings

Never in my life would I have ever imagined that five hours could feel like an eternity but here I was, sitting in between a 'barely legal' bassist and my brother who loved to act like moron any chance he got. True, we had gotten the luxury of being in first class but that meant nothing when stuck in the middle of two people who'd rather act their shoe size than their age.

"Hey, you go do it." Johnny giggled, leaning across the front of me to whisper to my brother.

"Dude, I did it last time ... You go do it." He whispered back.

"But ... Eh, fine then." Johnny mumbled, grabbing a couple straws from his drink and climbed carefully out of his seat, sneaking up to a sleeping Syn sitting in the row in front of us.

Zacky leaned across me to peer at them through the crack between the seats in front of us, which were occupied by Amber and Lissa who were sitting on either side of Syn. Seeing as how Syn was sitting directly in front of me I had no idea what the hell Johnny was doing but soon the sounds of some snickering came to my ears.

Syn was mumbling some incoherent words, which only caused Johnny to laugh louder.

"Get the fuck out of here you little bitch." Syn said suddenly, apparently awakened by whatever the hell is was that Johnny was doing.

Less than a second later, Johnny came back to our row looking like a beaten little dog, and dove for his seat but ended up on top of me. I laughed a bit as Johnny looked shyly at me, his face turning slightly red with the fact that he was on my lap.

"Hey, get the hell off of my sister damn it." Zacky said, pushing Johnny back to his own seat.

"Relax Zacky, it was just an accident." I mumbled, shooting him an annoyed look.

"Oh ... well ... " He trailed off, frowning to himself.

"Hey Lauren." Johnny whispered, tugging on my sweatshirt sleeve.

"Huh." I asked, turning to him.

"You wanna help me shoot spit wads at Jimmy?" He asked, holding out an extra straw for me.

I peaked back at Jimmy sitting behind us, listening to his iPod.

"Johnny, you're dumb." I said blankly, turning back around.

"What?" He asked in disbelief. "Man, you're a party pooper just like Matt." He pouted. "Maybe you should go sit with him then and be party poopers together."

I laughed at Johnny's seriousness as he continued to pout.

"Whatever Johnny." I smirked, turning back to my brother.

"Why don't you go sit by Matt?" Zacky asked in a whisper. "He looks all lonely back there." He added.

"Huh?"

I slowly turned around and peaked through the crack between my seat and Zacky's, looking around for Matt but instead caught eyes with Alyssa. She cocked her head to the side a bit and gave me a strange look.

"What are you doing?" She laughed.

"Nothing." I grinned, realizing how crazy I must have looked peaking through a little crack.

"I don't see him." I mumbled, turning back to my brother.

"He's back there." He said, skimming through some random magazine he found. "Just got sit by him." He added impatiently when I got up to peak over the seat.

"But-"

"Go, I'm already tired of looking at your mug." He said, shoving me a bit so I fell into Johnny's lap.

Johnny's pout was instantly replaced by a grin as he wrapped his arms around my waist.

"Hey, hey." He said in a 'trying to be sexy' voice. "I knew you'd come around."

"Ugh, what are you Johnny, like seventeen?" I asked, pushing his arms away and stood up to walk down the aisle, receiving disapproving looks from the business people we were sharing first class with.

"I'm nineteen for your info." He called after me.

I rolled my eyes, coming to a stop once I found Matt sitting quietly, listening to his iPod as well, sitting in the row behind Jimmy, Alyssa, and JB. I smiled as I watched his mouth move with no sounds coming out, lip-syncing to the song that was playing. He jumped a bit when he moved his gaze from the window, realizing that I was watching him from the walkway.

"Uh ... Hey Lauren." He blushed, jerking the ear buds away.

"Hi Matt." I replied. "Is anybody sitting by you?" I asked, pointing to the seat beside him.

"Er...No."

"Mind if I sit by you? My brother pointed out that you were looking sort of lonely."

"Oh, no, go ahead." He said, moving his backpack out of the way so I could have a seat.

"Thanks."

We sat there in silence for a couple of minutes, looking everywhere but each other.

"So...What are you listening to?"

"Def Leppard."

"Ah, I'm starting to rub off on you huh?" I joked.

"Ha, yeah ... You wanna listen too?"

Before I had a chance to answer he was already sticking one of the ear buds into my ear.

"Piss, I hate these damn things." I mumbled as he pulled away. "They never st-" I stopped as I reached up to catch the stupid thing as it fell out. "Stay in my ear." I finished, holding it in place.

"Here then." He said, pulling something over my head. "This should keep from fall out."

"Geesh, thanks." I said, adjusting the beanie so that I could actually see. "Now I'm gonna have helmet hair."

"Yeah." He laughed, ruffling up his hair that was already flattened up by his beanie.

As we sat there listening to the song 'Foolin' I couldn't help but watch Matt fiddle around nervously with his thumbs from the corner of my eye.

"Stop that." I said, placing my hand over the top of his.

Matt's POV
My stomach did an involuntary flip as Lauren's hand settled on top of mine and I jerked my head towards her in what was probably the most un-casual way ever. Her cheeks turned a light shade of red, tearing her eyes from my mine as soon as they connected with one another's.

"It gets on my nerves." She added, pulling her hand away to let it rest in her lap.

"Oh ... sorry."

"Ladies and gentlemen, this is your captain speaking. We are now approaching New York City, our final destination. Please return to your seats as soon as possible; we will begin our decent in five minutes time. Thank you."

"Finally." Lauren mumbled, fastening her seatbelt and I did the same.

I admit that I too was thankful that the flight was almost over because now I didn't have to struggle to think of something to say to her. Most people who know me would say that I'm a loud, random, boisterous, person ... You know, the typical front man type. But when I was around Lauren all the cocky words that would usually spill out of my mouth would all sound really stupid to me, causing me to keep them to myself. And what with this lack of words, I was a pretty quiet person indeed.


"Here we are." I mumbled, leading our gang up to our tour bus.

"Ah, home sweet home." Zacky said sarcastically from behind me.

I came to a stop in front of the door and adjusted my bag some so I could reach over and punch in the code. Climbing up the steps I already felt a sense of claustrophobia settling in around me.

"Hey, it's about time you guys got here."

I turned and saw Papa Gates already making himself comfortable on one of the couches.

"Yeah, we got stuck in traffic." I replied, walking over to shake his hand.

"Actually, I just got here too." He laughed.

I took off to shove my stuff onto my bunk ... scratch that ... me and Lauren's bunk. I heard Zacky introducing her to Papa Gates as I tossed my bags up onto the top most mattress. Not really wanting to go back out there and get caught up in 'traffic,' I crawled up onto the mattress and started to pull my blanket and pillow out to fix it just how I liked it.

"Um ... you don't move around too much in your sleep do you?"

"Er ... no ... At least I don't think I do." I said shyly, glancing down at Lauren with her bags slung over her shoulder, packing her pillow in hand.

"Okay, good." She said, handing her pillow up to me so I could set it beside mine.

I couldn't tell if she was serious or joking about the fact that I didn't move too much in my sleep. I couldn't tell a lot of the time whether or not she was joking about something. But eh, oh well.

"Do you wanna toss your bags up here too?" I asked.

"Um ... Actually I was planning on taking a nap."

"Oh." I said off guard because I was just thinking to take a nap myself. "Well, here you are then." I said, hopping down to the hallway floor and started off towards the front.

"And just to warn you Matt." Lauren called after me, causing me to stop and turn around to look at her. "I tend to cuddle in my sleep."

Alright, I thought to myself, this could either be a really good thing or a really, really bad thing.


About three hours later I was about ready to pass out on the couch I was sitting on in the front room. Johnny's constant randomness was probably the only thing that was keeping me from actually drifting off.

"Dude." Zacky said, shaking my shoulder some. "Why don't you go lay down or something?"

"Well ... Lauren's asleep back there." I said quietly.

"So, just go back there. You guys are just gonna have to share the same bunk tonight anyway."

"I ... " I trailed off, glancing around the room.

"Matt, are you scared of her or something?" Zacky laughed suddenly.

"What? No. Why?"

"Because when I mentioned that you guys are gonna be sleeping together anyway you got a really 'frightened' look on your face." He snickered.

"No, I'm not scared of her." I mumbled.

"Right." He said slowly, smirking at me.

I flipped him the bird as I stood up and slowly made my way back to the bunks. I had a half mind to just take a nap in Zacky and Amber's bunk but that plan was soon squashed when I saw that Amber was already passed out in it. Seeing as how the other bunks were already stuffed with everyone else's shit, I had no other choice but to go into my own bunk.

I pulled the curtains back and saw Lauren, who was still wearing my beanie, asleep and lying on her side facing the hallway. I slowly inched my way up there and poked her shoulder nervously to see if I could wake her up just enough to get her to make room for me.

"Stop that." She mumbled, trying to swat my hand away.

"Lauren, scoot over." I whispered, partly because I didn't want to fully wake her up and partly because I was so effin nervous that my vocal cords didn't want to cooperate with me.

"Zacky, go away." She muttered but rolled over all the same.

Great, she thinks I'm her brother, I thought to myself. This is gonna be a shock for her to wake up and realize it's me. I pulled myself onto the mattress and slowly lay down, trying to keep as far away from her as possible. This was proving pretty damn hard to accomplish due to the lack of space I had to work with but I managed to find a comfortable position on my side and pulled the curtains closed.

Just as I closed my eyes I felt a pair of arms wrap around my middle, leaving a gigantic knot in my throat.

"L-Lauren?" I stuttered, trying to pull her arms off of me.

"Shh, go to sleep." She whispered, still not fully conscious.

I sighed, realizing that I couldn't do anything to get her off of me, and decided to just get comfy myself. I rolled onto my back and pulled Lauren closer so she could rest her head on my chest.

As nervous as I was just then, I couldn't help but smile as she tightened her arms around my middle and cuddle more into me. I wrapped my arms around her fit frame, partly to hold her in place and partly so I could cuddle back with her. Hey, I like to cuddle too you know.
End of Matt's POV

I woke up after a nice, long nap feeling very relaxed. I tried to roll onto my back and stretch but there were a pair of heavily tattooed arms wrapped around me, keeping me from moving at all.

I looked up and came face to face with a sleeping Matt. I admit, I was startled at first finding myself in this somewhat awkward position but then again I didn't mind it at all.

Not because of the fact that he turned me on (which surprisingly he wasn't just then) but because ... I don't know ... I just really liked the comfort of being in his arms.

It was like he was holding me to keep me safe and because he didn't want anything to happen to me. Sounds pretty fruity huh? Yeah, it does. But I don't know how to explain it or what to call it.

It was a completely different feeling he gave me, something I've never felt before. And as much as I didn't want to, I sort of liked this new feeling ... Whatever it was.