Waiting to Say, I Miss You

All Time Low was in a small venue, playing an acoustic show. As of now they were on to Lullabies, and Alex felt nervous about singing this song. But he always gets that way before Lullabies, so it’s nothing new.

“This song’s called Lullabies, I’m sure y’all know this one. Sing if you know the words.” Alex softly said into the microphone, his nervousness taking an effect on him.

He could hear Rian count off the beats before Jack and Zack’s soft strumming clouded his thoughts. Soon after, his part came to start singing the song.

‘Make it a sweet, sweet goodbye, it could be for the last time and it’s not right. “Don’t let yourself get in over your head,” he said “Alone and far from home I’ll find you.” Dead, like the candle you burned out spill the wax over the spaces left in place of angry words. Scream- to be heard like you needed any more attention, throw the bottle, break the door and disappear.’

He sang his heart out, a feeling in the pit of his gut building up. But he didn’t let it get to him, he was on stage. There was no tearing up on stage. The scars on his wrist a distant reminder of his pain, and his eyes stung even more.

‘Sing me to sleep, I’ll see you in my dreams. Waiting to say, “I miss you I’m so sorry.”’

He didn’t even feel like himself anymore, as if he were drifting off to another universe. He could hardly even choke out the lyrics, after all it hadn’t been that long since …it…happened. Lullabies is a new song, so he didn’t expect anyone to sing along.

Jack can tell that Alex is getting worked up, and he feels sorry for his best friend. He just continues playing the riff, trying not to think and make a silly mistake. Back to Alex.

Alex looks out into the crowd, seeing all of their different faces. All had a look of wonder, they had no clue what this song was about. They probably thought his girlfriend died or something, when it was the complete opposite. His brother had committed suicide a few months ago, and it still hurt for him to think about Daniel.

He had gained back his stability, making sure his voice wouldn’t give up on him. The stool he was sitting on was getting annoying, so Alex just got up and kicked it out of his way. Putting his microphone on the stand and grasping it with both hands, he began to sing the second verse with closed eyes.

‘Forever’s never seemed long, as when you’re not around, it’s like a piece of me, is missing. I could have , learned so much from you but what’s left now. Don’t you realize you shot this family a world of pain? Can't you see there should have been a happy ending we let go?’ from somewhere in the crowd, Alex could hear the soft cries of a girl crying. He re-opened his eyes to look out and see a girl in the first row with her head in her hands, crying. She has a friend with her, who was rubbing her back and whispering what looks like from 3 feet away comforting things in her ears.

“Hold up. Stop the music.” Alex says into the microphone, and he can still hear Jack playing. Probably because he has the ear plugs in, so Alex goes over and rips them out of his ears and growls at him to stop the music.

Jack’s eyes grew wide and he immediately stopped his picking, and set his guitar down on his lap. “Thank you.” Alex sighs into the mic, and looks out into this crowd.

“As some of you might know, I wrote this song about my…brother. He-he committed suicide a few months ago.” he gets up, his eyes welling up for the second time this night. Obviously the girl doesn’t care that she’s crying in public because her crying becomes harder and her friends whispers even louder into her ears.

Alex just stares down at the blonde head, until she looks up at him with bloodshot, hazel eyes. “You, girl.” he points at her, and she hiccups. “Come here.” Alex tells the security guards to let her come up on stage. As soon as he gets the okay from them and their manager, Matt, he lends a hand to her. Her friend in a hushed voice whispers for her to go, and her stare is blank for a bit until she realizes that Alex Gaskarth is letting her go on stage.

The girl’s name was Audra, and she had been an All Time Low fan from the beginning. Going to a lot of their hometown shows, since she was from Towson also. Out of the whole band, her favorite was Alex, and this seemed like a dream come true. But, she was hiccupping and her hair was matted to her face. She thought she looked horrible, but that’s what happens when you cry. Not to mention the fact that her mascara was leaving its mark trail down her pale cheeks.

Before anything, Alex puts the mic on the stand and gives Audra a big bear hug and whispers something into her ear, that no one else could hear. But of the course the third person narrative knows. He whispers into her ear that everything would be okay, and what was her name. “Audra.” she quietly says, her voice strained from all the crying she had been doing. He then asked was she crying because of the same reason as the song? She silently nodded tears started coming down her cheeks again, and she turned away from Alex.

Did she really want her biggest idol to see her crying? This was probably the most sufficiently awkward moment in her life. Alex gets the fact that she’s crying again, spins her around and wipes the tears off of her cheeks with his thumb. Audra’s eyes were set straight at the floor of the stage, making sure not to look up. “It’s okay.” he whispers again to her, before whispering that they could talk about this last, backstage.

He lets her stand awkwardly by herself while he goes to the girl’s friend and let’s her up on stage, and I can see the googly eyes she makes at Jack. Not like he’d notice her, he was completely oblivious to anything, really.

Alex watches as Audra was led off stage by Matt, who was probably going to give them a long speech about trying not to rip all the boys’ clothing off. But to Alex, Audra wouldn’t do that. He really liked her.

“Well, how about we forget about that song and continue on with the set, shall we?” Alex asks the crowd, pulling his mic back out of the stand and sitting on the stool that magically re-appeared. The crowd screamed, signaling for Alex to start the next song.

“This one’s called Coffee Shop soundtrack.”