I Got Your Picture I'm Coming With You

LEXIE'S POV

Today was the day. The day we would leave for Reading. I was going to make Jack meet my mom and aunt. I'd met his family, and his mom was nice enough. She wouldn't stop making me cookies. I had to laugh. But to be honest I was grateful for them, I was so hungry lately. It was probably due to being stuck in a coma for like a month. At least that was what the doctors told me. At least I knew it wasn't just greed, I had a medical reason to eat however much junk food I wanted. It felt awesome!

I called my mom just to remind her that we would see her tomorrow and Jack did the usual yell down the phone hello. It was his way of getting to know my mom I guess, which I thought was sweet. It was nice, this new closeness I had with him. It wasn't like anything else before. He was...different. He made me happy.

"You ready to go babe? They're all waiting for us," Jack asked as I finished brushing my teeth.

"Yup, all done. Where's my suitcase?"

"I already got it in the car. As if I was gonna let you carry it anyway, it's so fucking heavy. Like what did you pack? Zack's weights?"

I laughed at his bemused face. "Nope, just all that sexy lingerie you hate so much," I said standing close to him on my tiptoes.

Jack raised an eyebrow. "Oh, including those ones that..."

I nodded slowly and a devilish look crossed his face.

"How about we see if they still fit you right now...I mean after all the crap you've eaten-"

Moment. Ruined. "Fuck you Jack!" I joked, slapping him across the arm.

His eyebrows did a dance as he said "Yes please, right now, we can delay the plane."

I chuckled and shook my head at him. "No Jack, come on, we gotta go. We can play later."

With that promise he unwillingly lead the way to the car, and even opened up my door for me. I felt a little weird. I had been feeling like that for a while now. And I didn't know what to do. I'd figure it out.

The plane was a little jumpy, which just made me feel sick. I was normally okay travelling unless there were loads of potholes or airpockets or rough waves. The guys had discovered that on our roadtrip last year.

"Ah fuck!" I yelled as the plane hit another air pocket. Jack squeezed my hand and Alex and Rian just laughed at me...little bastards. They were cute, but they were fucking bastards. Damn, if I'd have known they would laugh at my suffering when I was just another fan I really wouldn't have been too keen on them. I glared at them, that was, until a stern stewardess made her way over, painted like a doll.

"Excuse me miss, would you please mind your language, there are children on this plane too." I stared at her. Was she fucking kidding me? THERE WERE NO CHILDREN IN THIS SECTION! We were the only ones! The band and crew, no one else. What the hell?

She left before I could reply, and as soon as she had gone Alex and Rian burst into more fits of laughter. "Oh my god, Lexie, your face! Oh god, Jack, please, can I have her instead just for that face?" Alex choked out through the laughter as Rian tried to get his breathing under control.

"Fu...I mean sod off Gaskarth!" I said, catching the eye of the stewardess. I fought the want to stick my tongue out at her.

Alex bit his lip, holding back another laugh and patted my head. I swatted his hand away, then he caught my hand and started inspecting it. Like what the hell? "Alex, what are you doing?" Jack asked for me.

Alex got a thoughtful look on his face, then showed my hand to Rian, who's eyes popped.

"Dude, you asked her to marry you?" RIan asked Jack.

Oh. They'd spotted the ring. Jack had bought it the day after we'd finally sorted ourselves out and he had asked. It was simple. A solitaire diamond. Not too flashy. I liked it. But in all the excitement we had forgotten to tell everyone else. I can't even remember telling my mom...boy was she gonna be mad.

Jack shrugged, a smile playing at his lips. I guess he liked them knowing. It made me happy too. Like it was more official if people knew about it. I just couldn't believe we hadn't told anyone. It had been over a month...wow. I guess we really were caught up with everything. "She's wearing a ring isn't she? I guess I must have," he said smiling.

Alex opened his mouth in shock. "Seriously dude? You never told us? Like did you just forget? I'm hurt. Really, I mean I feel so left out...RIAN HOLD ME!" Alex yelled and flung himself into Rian's arms, who shook his head and pushed Alex off. "NO! Rejected again...I feel so unloved," Alex sighed.

I rolled my eyes. "Oh come ON! There will be plenty of girls at Reading who will be more than willing to love you in any way possible."

Alex sighed again. "I guess so...but seriously though, why didn't you two tell us?"

I shrugged, feeling too sick from the bumpy ride to risk opening my mouth. So Jack answered. "I guess we just...forgot..."

That was the wrong thing to say, because Alex looked genuinely hurt. It just caused me, Rian, Jack and any of the crew who were actually paying attention to laugh. Alex pouted and stared straight ahead, refusing to talk to any of us the whole way. I found that incredibly amusing and just snuggled into Jack for the rest of the way.

Before I knew it we were back in sunny England. Yes, I did say sunny. We can have nice weather here sometimes. But the only problem is as soon as the sun comes out you get most of the girls walking around in the most revealing shorts known to man and tight little tops. Which I'm sure was a view appreciated by all the single members of the crew and Alex once we stepped off the plane. I did a little dance of happiness when we were on the bus heading to our destination. We had actually already slept on the plane, so it wasn't too bad. It was like eight in the morning here. There was just a little jet lag, so Jack and I snuggled up in a bunk and slept for a little while.

Eventually we had arrived in Reading, and I was going to meet my mom. We parked the bus, and I was jumping up and down with excitement.

"Jack Jack Jack, let's go!!! COME ON! JACK!" I yelled as he stumbled out of the bus, coming to my side so he could hold my hand.

"Okay, okay, I'm ready. Where are we meeting them?"

"Starbucks!" I replied and we headed off using a sat nav on Jack's phone to direct us. We got lost as we were walking too many times, but it was a little funny, and we kept bumping into people because we were walking with our heads down, intently watching the screen.

"Jack, where the fuck are we going? Are you sure this thing knows the way? We're already late!"

"i'm sure, it'll be fine...I think. We just have to turn left...or right...hang on, is it telling me to go forwards?"

We stood in the middle of the street trying to figure out where we were and where we were actually heading when I heard a familiar voice call out my name. I turned, and sure enough there they were.

"MOM! AUNT MOLLY!" I screamed and ran towards the most important women in my life. I cried as I ran and flung my arms around them both as I got to the entrance of Starbucks, nearly knocking them to the ground. "I've missed you so much!" I cried out, tears falling. I really didn't realise how much I had missed them.

Mom pulled back first and aunt Molly wiped my tears. "So is this him? This Jack that impairs my hearing every phone call?" mom asked, directing her question towards Jack who I had just realised was right behind me.

I took a glance at him and answered in all seriousness, "nope, I've never seen this man in my life. He's been following me the past few streets. I was hoping he'd have stopped by now."

Jack nodded. "Yup, it's terrible. I just have this fixation. I'm a creepy stalker."

Mom cocked her head, not knowing what to say. I chuckled at her. "Yes mom, this is Jack. Shall we go inside for coffee?"

Mom was kind of surprised to hear we were engaged. Like Alex she was more annoyed with the fact that I hadn't told her. She didn't understand how I could just forget to mention something like that. To be honest, I agreed with her. I don't know how it had slipped my mind. Aunt molly was really happy for us, and couldn't stop congratulating us and telling us how cute we were. Mom was worried about the age gap...being six years. But aunt Molly stopped her by saying that love knows no age and what did it matter if we were happy? There was also the fact my dad was ten years older than my mom. So she couldn't really complain.

However, it didn't take long for mom to get onto the topic I really didn't want to talk about.

"You know, you should see how many posters Lexie had of you up in her room when she lived here," she stated, not so innocently.

"MOM!" I shouted, cheeks flushing. God, this was worse than baby photos. Those I could handle.

"She always used to go on and on about you, and this one time you retweeted her or something and she just started screaming. I thought she'd hurt herself, she wouldn't shut up for weeks. And then she kept printing out pictures of you to put above her bed, quite a few with you shirtless. And whenever she had control of the tv she would put on your dvd and pause at all the parts where-"

"MOM! He doesn't need to know that!" I said, feeling the crimson invade my face.

"Oh, I think he does, please, tell me more," Jack said, leaning forward, smiling cheekily.

If I wasn't so attracted to him I would happily put his face in a blender right now.

"Well I do recall one particular day when-"

"OKAY JACK IT'S TIME TO GO FOR REHEARSAL!" I yelled, pulling Jack away from embarrassing tales of my fangirl days.

"Oh but Lexie, I want to hear more from your mommy!" Jack whined.

"She always went on about wanting your barakittens or something...which reminds me, any chance of any of those soon?" mom asked. I swear she didn't have an ounce of shame in her body.

"MOTHER!"

Jack chuckled. "Maybe, when Lexie feels up to it."

Aunt Molly nodded. "Well don't keep it too long will you? I want to be able to see these barakittens as you call them."

"Oh we'll get working on it straight away, I promise," Jack said, winking at me. Oh god. He had no shame either.

I rolled my eyes, we said our goodbyes and headed back to the venue. Mom was going to come watch us tomorrow with aunt Molly, which I found quite amusing. I couldn't wait to see aunt Molly at eighty years old with a crowd of teenagers rocking out to their favourite bands. I had a feeling hardly anyone would stick around for my set if they didn't know me or my music, and I probably wasn't their style anyway. I was kind of nervous. I really didn't think that many people would tune into my music. I hadn't even checked to see if my album had done any good. i was too scared. Jack offered to look for me but I told him I didn't want to know, so he and the band were under strict orders not to breathe a word if they knew.

"Well, I think that went rather well," Jack said with a smug smile as we walked back.

I punched his arm. "Well you would think that wouldn't you? God that was awful, I can't believe she mentioned all that stuff!"

Jack smiled huge. "I'm just thinking if you freaked out when I retweeted you, how the fuck did you stay so calm when I met you?"

"I actually don't know. I was probably in shock. I mean you are Jack Barakat."

Jack teased me the rest of the way about my fangirling and creepy obsession. I loved him...but god was he annoying.

When we reached the venue I was shocked. I literally couldn't move. Jack realised why and just smiled, urging me to go forward.

Because there were fans who had noticed us. Screaming fans. In sleeping bags with banners. Crying with excitement and freaking out. Yelling.

Yelling my name. Not Jack's. Mine.

They were waiting for me outside our bus, barely noticing the fact that All Time Low were all out the bus and trying to make their way towards Jack and I. I was engulfed with fans. I was in shock.

"Oh my god, Lexie, I absolutely love you! You're amazing! Sign my album!" Those were the sorts of comments I was getting. There were so many of them, I could barely keep track. Some wanted my picture, some wanted autographs, some wanted hugs...I was amazed. What was more amazing was that there was a huge crowd of about maybe two hundred all trying to get to me. I was stood there for well over two hours trying to get through them all. I just didn't understand how I had become so popular, like popular enough to warrant people waiting for me and screaming my name. Some even said i helped save them. How? I didn't understand. My album was half covers for goodness sake! One fan told me they were so happy for me for getting into the top ten on iTunes. Wait, what?

Finally I had gotten through everyone, because at some point security guards had come and made an official barrier so people couldn't just stay waiting there and we could actually get to our bus. I gave everyone a quick smile and and wave, told them I loved them and disappeared onto the bus. I just sat down on the couch in shock, rehearsals all but forgotten.

"How...I mean...what?...I just...I don't understand...how do they know me?" I asked perplexed, not sure any of them knew either.

Rian answered me. "We all tweeted about your album and posted about it. And you did all the hard work with gigging, people spread the word."

"But if they were your fans why weren't they asking you for autographs? I saw some with hustler wristbands for fuck's sake!"

"Maybe they just love you more. You really can't believe that you're that popular?" Jack asked, sitting next to me.

I shook my head. "No. I've never had a huge social network...I don't understand why poeple would be waiting for me!" I was so confused!

"Oh come on," Alex said rolling his eyes. "How can you not know how good you are?"

"Because she doesn't have an ego the size of Russia?" Jack suggested.

Alex threw a cushion at him.

"Guys...what number did my album get to on iTunes?" I asked quietly, still not sure if the fan was telling the truth when she said it was in the top ten.

Jack smiled at me. "Number one. I'm telling you, people love you. I sure as hell do."