Stay

It all started with a phone call.

After finally being able to shut my eyes that night, I was awakened by the shrill sound of my cellphone ringing at full blast in my ear. I shot up out of bed and cursed under my breath for thinking it was a great idea to place my phone so close to me and once I was done rubbing my eyes, I picked up the device to see who would possibly want to call me at this hour. That’s when my eyes widened at the sight of her name in big letters on the bright screen while the ringing continued.

Hayley Williams

She and I were close. Closer than I ever expected us to be. So close that it had gotten to the point where we could turn to each other in times of need. We had met a few years back, the both of us reaching our late teens at the time and somehow keeping in touch despite the huge distance between us. The phone calls that we exchanged made it seem as if she was always right beside me. As if we weren’t always traveling all over the world to perform in all these cities along with our respective bands. There were times where she was in Brazil while I was out somewhere in Australia. Other times she was going all over the US while I found myself going around Europe.

But all she had to do was call and it would feel like I was in the states with her. Or wherever she was. Or she was with me. Laughing at her jokes or listening to some of her rants, letting her lean against me while we talked about everything we wanted each other to hear. The more we called each other as the years went by, the clearer the picture in my mind became and the more she felt close. Once in a while, we would really see each other and those times I spent with her on her tour bus were arguably the most I’ve had fun while on the road.

I would be sitting with her on the worn leather couch, entertaining her with my latest tale of humiliation that occurred at the most recent show I’ve performed. Some of those stories involved me tripping on the cord of my own microphone or somebody throwing a waterbottle at me. She’d be resting her head on my shoulder, pointing out that she had seen those things happen to me, thanks to her watching the events from the side of the stage. I would let out a chuckle and didn’t even need to see her face to know that she wanted to laugh at me. I could already sense a smile tugging at her lips from her voice alone.

“You’re always such a klutz,” she had teased.

My response to her jab was a simple shrug. “They all seem to like that about me anyway.”

And she had looked up at me, nodding in agreement. “I like it, too.”

Then she’d give me her own embarrassing stories. One of them was how her makeup sometimes smeared all over her face during her shows, making her look like she was crying tears of eyeliner, eyeshadow, and mascara. I knew what she was talking about; I’d once seen her backstage afterwards. To be honest, that didn’t really stop her from being beautiful, but I let her continue with her story. It was sort of an attempt to make me feel less stupid from my own embarrassing moments, but I didn’t mind telling her about them because the whole point was that they made her happy.

I couldn’t help but grin at seeing her green eyes light up when she giggled. Sometimes I wanted to brush her orange hair out of her face, just so I could be able to look her in the eyes. Of course, I always stopped myself from doing this gesture. Instead, I laughed along with her and she’d put her head back on my shoulder and I’d rest my own head on top of hers. We talked for hours until it got late and I had to head back to my own bus. This was how our hangouts usually went.

Her bandmates would either be playing video games in the back lounge or they would be out of the bus, probably off to go mingle with all the other people we were touring with. After all, our bands weren’t the only ones around. Which made me value our friendship even more. Of all the guys she was surrounded by, she decided she wanted to hang out with me. She wanted to tell me all her secrets, she wanted to lean against me as we talked, and she overall thought of me as one of her best mates.

And she was calling me at two in the morning.

Normally, I would’ve ignored the call. I would’ve thrown my phone off of the bed and put the pillow over my head to block out the ear-piercing noise until it stopped. I would’ve went straight back to sleep and that would’ve been the end of it. If it was anybody else but her, I wouldn’t have hesitated to end the call before it reached the second ring. But not this time. I couldn’t just ignore the call. Not if she needed me.

I finally answered. “Hayley?”

There was no response at first and for a moment I was afraid that I had answered too late and that she had hung up. I held my breath and listened closely for any sign that she was still on the other end, letting out a sigh of relief when I heard something that indicated she was there. However, my relief immediately turned into worry when I got a better listen of what the noise was. I didn’t hear her voice. In place of that, all I heard were small gasps of breath and sniffling, with her attempts at uttering a sentence only coming out as unintelligible sounds. It was then that I realized that she was crying.

“Hayley?” I repeated. “Hayles, are you okay?”

She took a few deep breaths and eventually her sobs and gasping had toned down. Though her voice was shaky when she spoke, I was able to understand her.

“I n-need you t-to...” she stammered before the sobbing returned, this time even louder. I couldn’t take hearing her like this. Hearing Hayley’s voice—the voice that was usually so strong and so energetic—struggle to finish just one sentence was heartbreaking. In all my years of knowing her, I had not once ever heard her sound so broken, so hurt. And to make matters worse, I was not there beside her and it killed me to feel so helpless, unable to do anything for her when clearly, she needed me more than ever.

“Just calm down,” I said softly, getting out of bed. “Take deep breaths again and then talk when you’re ready.”

She did as I told her and this time I waited a little longer until she had calmed down. She spoke again, but this time she wasn’t stuttering and tried her best to remain composed. “I need you here.”

“What?” I asked, not sure if I had heard her correctly. For most people, this would’ve been a completely fast, easy, and possible thing to do. If these were normal circumstances, I would’ve driven down to her place in a matter of minutes. But obviously, the reason why I was surprised by Hayley’s words were because these circumstances were most certainly not normal. Possible? Yes. Easy? No. Fast? Far from it.

Hayley lived thousands of miles away from me. We didn’t even have the same time zone and in order to get to her, I would have to get on a plane and it would take me hours to finally reach her. Besides worrying about that, I was confused on why she needed me there. She had her band; two guys who were way more reliable than me. Sure enough, I got my answer.

“Something’s happened,” her voice was faltering again. “I have nobody else to turn to. Taylor’s away visiting family and Jeremy and Kat are gone, too. I don’t want to be alone right now. I...I can’t. You’re the only one I thought to call...”

The sobs were muffled this time, making me guess that she was probably covering her mouth to keep herself from being too loud. That just made her sound even more distressed than she already was and I only pictured her doing all she could to keep it together when in reality, she could barely stay on the phone with me without falling apart. Whatever happened to her, it was bad and there was no way she should have to go through it alone. She didn’t deserve something like this. Not Hayley.

“I-I’m sorry for sounding so ridiculous,” she murmured when I didn’t say anything. “I shouldn’t have called you. I know there’s no way-”

“I’m coming.”

I once made a promise to her that I’d always be there for her if she needed me. Far away or not, I couldn’t just leave her like that when I could be there with her. I was going to stick to my promise, even if that meant packing my things in the middle of the night and heading to her place.

“A-are you sure?” she asked. “Because you really don’t have to...”

“No, you need me, so I’m heading over there.” I assured her. “Just hold on a little bit longer, Hayles. I’m coming for you.”

“Okay,” she muttered. Though she sounded exhausted and slightly hoarse, I could also tell she was grateful. “I’ll see you soon.”

Before I could say anything else, she hung up on me, but I was more focused on getting my things. I still didn’t know what was going on and what happened to her, but I knew I had to get there as soon as possible. I changed into an old t-shirt, put on the first pair of jeans I could find, and then I grabbed my bag. I stuffed it with whatever was important to bring with me and once it looked like I was all set, I slipped on my shoes.

I was out the door before the time had even hit two-thirty.


I was on the next flight to California, meaning I was past the point of no return. There was no way I was going to back out. Not when I had already gotten this far and definitely not on the girl who had called me in tears. Despite barely getting any sleep by the time I had gotten on the plane, I wasn’t tired anymore and couldn’t even think about relaxing. Hayley was all I could think about and I could only hear her voice, her pleas, her desperately reaching out for me.

The band didn’t know I had left. At least, not yet. I was fully aware that they were going to be furious with me by the time they found out because it happened to be a few days before we were going on tour again. Hopefully they would understand my actions, though I anticipated them to still be angry about what I did.

By the time the plane had landed, it was the early hours in the morning there. She lived in Los Angeles, something I thankfully remembered before getting a last minute plane ticket and I only knew her address because she once wanted me to send her a copy of my band’s latest album. Fortunately, since it was still so extremely early, traffic wasn’t as chaotic and I was able to get to her house. With my bag in hand, I made my way up the walkway and stood in front of her door. Taking a deep breath, I lifted my arm and knocked.

It felt like I had been standing there for what seemed like forever and my heart was beating rapidly, waiting for her to answer. I felt bad because she was probably sleeping or at least trying to. Who knows what she had been doing since we talked on the phone?

When the door finally opened, I dropped my bag and felt a pang in my stomach at the sight of the girl who had always been known for her bright and cheerful personality. The girl standing in the doorway looked almost nothing like the Hayley I was so used to.

Her hair was completely disheveled, strands of it sticking out in various angles. The red crewneck she was wearing was stained with tears, especially the ends of the sleeves, indicating she had used them as her own personal tissues. There were bags underneath her swollen eyes and there were also dark circles around them from her lack of sleep. Not only that, but they were also bloodshot and glassy from hours of crying. In fact, she was still crying and my heart sank when I looked at her tear-stained cheeks and dry lips. It was already painful to just hear her, but to see her in this state just twisted the knife.

Her lips parted as if she was about to say something, but then she moved forward and threw her arms around me. I responded by wrapping my arms around her as well and held her tightly as she buried her face into my chest, breaking down and letting the tears fall. We both stood there as I allowed her to release all the emotions she had been trying to hold in until she managed to say something in between her gasps.

“You’re here,” she whispered. “You’re really here.”

I just nodded and gave her a small smile. “I told you I’d come.”

I took her inside to where the couch was so she could sit down and after making her a cup of tea, I joined her. She took a few sips of her drink before she set down the mug on the coffee table and returned to leaning against me. Hayley looked so tired, but she didn’t want to fall asleep and I didn’t either, even though I was finally starting to feel exhausted myself. What I really wanted was to know what exactly happened to cause her so much pain.

“What happened to you, Hayles?” I leaned back on the couch and shifted my body so we could both be comfortable.

At my question, she curled up against me and I noticed that her lips were quivering. Wiping the tears away from her eyes, she faced me, but our eyes didn’t meet. She wasn’t ready to look me in the eyes yet, mostly because she was afraid she would end up losing it again.

“Chad left me.”