No One Does It Better

Josh’s P.O.V

I opened my eyes cautiously, the sound of faint grumbles stirring me from my otherwise peaceful slumber. Sleep heavily fogged my brain, eyes half way lidded as I tried feebly to wake myself up faster to investigate the strange noises, realization yet to dawn on me. Finally I came too, sitting up as much as I could and reaching for the lantern, after flicking it on, I gave my eyes a moment to adjust. Oli was staring wide eyed at me, body deathly still and mouth slightly open as he gasped for air, I cursed under my breath, reaching down so I could pick his small shoulder up and lay his head in my lap, I smoothed his hair down in an attempt to comfort him.

“It’s alright Oli, everything’s okay. Don’t worry, I've got you, sh.” he glanced up at me, fear clearly evident in his facial features, as he desperately closed his eyes and opened them, trying to shake the paralysis away. We sat like this for awhile, before he shot upwards like a dart, immediately wrapping his arms around my chest and burying his head in my neck, still trying to catch his breath. I rubbed circles in his back, ignoring the chills that were sent down my spine by his hot breath on my collarbones.

“Thank you…” he whispered, clinging to me tighter as he shook the last bits of sleep from his body, I only nodded, not entirely knowing what to say. It was a strange feeling, during his waking hours Oli was such a strong person, independent as could be, and confident over his self control; but when he awoke in the mornings he was so…fragile. Easily scared by the lack of control his body forced him into, in a way; it was kind of horrific to see him at such a loss of words and motion.

I clung him to my chest, taking him with me as I leaned against the wall of the van, his body laid stretched out between my legs and his torso resting gently against mine, he was still as a mannequin. The only sign of life was the soft breathing he admitted and his heart beat which thumped against my shoulder.

“I don’t know what I would do without you, Josh.” he sighed, slowly pushing himself up and out of my grasp, it didn’t go without disappointment on my end. As mental as it seemed, he meant a lot to me already, not in the friendly sort of way either. More in the way that I was dying to close the distance between, to lay my lips firmly against his, and let my arms encircle him and never let him go again, but it was simply a fantasy. I would never have the courage to try such a feat, especially since I wasn’t exactly sure of his sexuality, another part because I knew he would never go for someone like me. He was a standard that, forgive me for saying this, that even god himself couldn’t touch, he was perfection in every sense of the word. His hair was beginning to dirty from days without a shower, I could only imagine how awful mine was looking, but despite the greasy sheen that resided, the dark locks fell in a perfect fashion, stray blonde streaks framing his perfectly shaped face. His Hazel eyes were beyond captivating, a small tattoo of 3 dots under his right, only added to the mystery that was…Oli. I ducked my head down, silently aware that I hadn’t been daydreaming about his looks, but instead, boring holes in his skin as he stared cautiously back at me.

“Sorry.” I admitted, taking an interest in my fingers instead of the man who chuckled from the other side of the van, embarrassment flooded my cheeks. I glanced up when I heard the doors begin to shake, Oli glanced at the doors in confusion as much as I had, he shot me a questioning look before unlatching them.

“-thought I had a key but…Oli?” the voice belonged to none other than the man who accompanied Oli on the night we had ‘met’ at the meet and greet, he widened his eyes in shock as Oli began to shake, incoherently mumbling out sounds that sounded like a mix of words, the doors swung open some more, the sunlight exploding inside the vehicle, successfully blinding me for a few moments. It dawned on me then, Oli mentioned his friends were unaware of his living conditions, and there before us were the same 4 men from the days before, baffling looks adorning their features. It was clear that Oli was horrified; it wasn’t exactly like he could hide this anymore, not when all the bands gear was piled in the front part of the vans storage space, and an air mattress, lantern, and blankets took up a majority of the van.

“Oliver Scott Sykes, is this…this where you’ve been staying all this time?” a tall reddish blonde man spat out in disbelief, throwing his hands up and motioning at the makeshift ‘apartment.’ Oli opened his mouth to speak, but quickly closed it in defeat, nodding his head as tears spilled out of his eyes. I scooted downwards towards the doors, laying a hand on Oli’s back, he cried out, pulling his knees to his chest before leaning on me for support.

“Josh…” the man I recognized spoke up, looking at me with worry etched on his face, I nodded for him to go on.

“How long has he been doing this, do you know? He won’t speak, I know him better than that, just tell me. I don’t mean to drag you into this, but since you have obviously been staying with him, it’s now part of your business.” said man asked, sighing as he leaned on the open door, taking his red beanie off and running a hand through his sandy hair before placing it back into Its spot. I gulped, not entirely sure it was my place to spill the story to his friends, but seeing as he was still sobbing into my chest, I guess it was up to me.

“Years.” I answered simply, frowning down at Oli as he choked; I brought my arms around him, pushing him closer to my body, silently trying to calm him down.

“Oh Oli…” a short man muttered, his face was still quite child like, despite the fact he was probably a few years my senior, I shot him a sympathetic glance.

“We’re going to mine to figure this out, and Josh let’s get this part over with, I’m Matty, this is Lee, Jona, and Matt; long time friends of his. Jona and Matt will drive the van back to mine; you and Oli can ride with me and Lee.” I nodded, silently hoping I could remember all these names, I glanced down at Oli, his face was still buried in my chest, as he whimpered uncontrollably, successfully breaking my heart. I hated seeing him so vulnerable, but he knew this was happen eventually, so maybe getting this over with was the best thing that could have happened.

“Do you wanna walk?” I asked him, licking my lips and trying to push back the thoughts of how desperately I needed water and food, he shook his head. Jona grabbed the keys off a small rack as he and Matt made their way to the front, Lee and Matty motioned for me to follow them to a small black car opposite of the parking lot, my things would have to stay in the van for now, at least I knew they would be in the van at our next destination. I then stared down at the man in my arms, watching how his body twitched with every heavy breath he took, he didn’t mutter a word. I tried to fight the urges to pull him closer, to capture his lips and tell him everything was fine, but I gave in to a little to temptation, and moved his hair out of his face, kissing his forehead, before telling him to hold on. I swung my legs off the back of the van, before hopping on the ground, Oli still peacefully in my arms, I carried him to the older vehicle, Lee opened the door so I could slide in with him, I thanked him; placing Oli in the seat, much to his dismay as he desperately clutched onto my neck, trying to keep hold of me. I felt my heart rate soar as I climbed in after him, and he returned to our former position, why did he want to be so close to me? Sure, I may have been half way decent at comforting someone, but why not cling to his friends, why on earth would he want to be so close to me? I once again, took a daring risk, kissing the top of his head again, and muttering that things would be okay, that I wasn’t going anywhere, and I wouldn’t let anything happen. He still didn’t make a sound.

-*-

Oli’s P.O.V

“Oli, I know you don’t want to talk about it, but we need to know why you’ve been keeping this a secret.” Kean whispered, clasping his hands together as he leaned forward. We were sitting in Matty’s living room, his parents were out working, so it gave us a bit of privacy. To be honest, I was still in a state of shock, I hadn’t expected my secret to come out as soon as it had. In retrospect, it wasn’t soon, I had been living this way for many years, but that didn’t mean I was prepared to share this with my band mates. I shot a glance to Josh, who was sitting next to me with his arm draped over my shoulders, hugging me to his body. I was not one for physical contact, but I wanted nothing more than to be close to him right now. I had given up trying to ration with my emotions, deeming that Josh in fact, was someone I may hold a higher level of interest in. He had become a constant in my life for the last 4 days, someone I had absentmindedly begun to rely on, and someone in a sense, to come ‘home’ too.

My friends were stationed on the sectional, sipping the tea they had prepared, I reached for my cup, but Josh beat me to it. Grabbing the mug, and handing it off to me with a small smile, I thanked him, ducking my head down to avoid his piercing Chrystal colored eyes.

“Well…” I spoke up for the first time since the beginning of the incident, I took a swig of the tea, before cradling the mug between my hands. “Mum and Dad kicked me out, because of my…uh…habits…that I had developed, they claimed I was horrible influence on Tom. I know I was, but I guess the selfish part of me longed to stay, because I had nowhere to go. So I bought the van with the little money I had, I know I said it was just for the band, and I never said a word about not having a place to stay, because I know you all have your own issues to attend to before the needs of your friend. So I’ve been staying there, I haven’t been able to speak to my family, not even Tom, but I'm positive they told him that if he talked to me then they would kick him out too. Tom’s always been their perfect little angel, and I was just going down a dark path, they didn’t need, nor want me around. That’s all there is too it, I'm done with all those habits now, I'm clean, and in fact, I'm doing better.” I watched their faces fall to sad smiles, as Josh squeezed my arm.

“You wouldn’t have been bothering us by saying anything Oli, you could have came and stayed with me.” Jona offered, “you still can, both of you. I'm sure Josh is in a similar boat if he’s been staying with you, I have a small spare room that you guys are welcome too. You can start looking for work, and we can play more gigs, we will get it figured out.” I shook my head,

“No way, I'm not going to be a burden on you, Jona.” He grunted, standing up and parading over to me, getting down to eye level, I bit my tongue.

“Your coming to stay with me, you’re not a burden to anyone, I don’t know why you’d ever feel that way. So long as you do your part around the house, both of you, are more than welcome over. We will work harder than ever with our music, we need to get a break with it. If we do that, we don’t have to worry about other jobs, Oli, you know It's bound to happen, we just need to work our asses off.” I didn’t know what to say to that, I nodded my head, sighing in defeat.

“Jona, thank you, I really can't stress how much that means.” Josh spoke up, reaching out to shake his hand, Jona mumbled that it was no big deal before grabbing my vans keys and tossing them too me.

“Let’s go get you both moved in, and let you all clean up, is there anything you have to get done today?” Jona questioned, sliding his coat on and grabbing the keys to his car.

“Josh joined a band with those lads who come to every one of our shows, he has practice at six. Other than that, no.” I spoke quietly, still feeling a bit embarrassed about the whole situation.

“You’re in a band now? That’s awesome! Once you all get your stuff together we should play a show, what’s your band called? I could work on a flyer tonight.” Kean inquired, Josh chuckled, shaking my body from our close contact.

“You Me at Six, and I agree. We will work just as hard, and I’ll try promoting it as much as possible. I may have lost a big chunk of my following with my sudden departure, but I still have a shit ton of followers on twitter and instagram, I'm sure some of the kids would enjoy your alls music, and hopefully mine as well. I’ve been itching to play an underground show for years,” he removed his arm from my shoulders and stood up, shaking everyone’s hands, before offering one to pull me up. I took it, standing on wobbly legs that ached from sleeping on the hard ground of the van, before hugging all the guys and apologizing to each one.

“No worries, Do you think we could tag along with you and Josh tonight? I think we should all get acquainted if we will be working together in the future.” Matty spoke up, standing up and stretching out his back.

“Should be fine, I will call and talk to them, and text you letting you know when to be ready. We just started yesterday, so we don’t have much done, but having an opinion of a well formed band would be a bonus for us.” Josh replied, and they all nodded in approval.

“Alright, so see you all at six.” Jona waved goodbye, before ushering us out the door. As we got outside, I walked over to the van, unlocking it and opening the doors.

“See you at yours Jona,” I waved, and watched as the taller man shook his head.

“Ours, Oli.” He corrected, sliding in his beat up car and pulling out of the drive, Josh slid in next to me as I started the engine.

“You okay, Ols?” he whispered, resting his head on my shoulder, I blushed as I glanced down at him, earning a small smile from him in return.

“Yeah, in fact…I feel like this is the start of the future.” I gave him a smile, as relief finally washed over me. This was going to be the start of something great, I had a gut feeling that things would be better from here on out…at least, I hoped.