Close as Strangers

6 months. I has been 6 months since you last saw your boyfriend Michael Clifford. You weren’t even sure if you should say boyfriend anymore with how many fights the 2 of you had gotten into since he left to go on tour. You didn’t even know when he would get back from tour and it was literally tearing you apart. The first few weeks were hard on you, whether it was the inconsistent texts from Michael or the amount of hate you received from the fans saying that he had left you for good, you didn’t know which hurt more. You soon found yourself putting up the walls that he helped break down and you became just as withdrawn as him.

You can’t even remember the last time you text him. I was probably the night after you broke down and called him crying. You didn’t mean to call, but your fingers were finding his contact in your phone and pressing call before you could even think. He answered after a few rings and you could assume he was outside meeting fans from all the screaming in the background. He scurried off to be able to hear you, but you were sobbing so badly that you were incoherent and had to force yourself to slow down. You told him about how you missed him every night. How you missed the feeling of his arms wrapped around you as you slept next to him. Hell you even missed how he would scream at a video game when he would get angry. By the end of it you could hear strangled cries at the other end of the line and mumbled ‘I’m sorrys’ and hung up before anything else could happen.

You figured that you should maybe text him and ask what he want to do about your relationship. You loved him, oh god did you love him like there was no tomorrow, but you couldn’t keep living like this. The pain of being away from him was worse than the pain of heartbreak. You knew heartbreak well, hell Michael was the one that helped you get over most of you heartbreaks when the two of you were still in school. He was you best friend, your shoulder to cry on, and your secret love since primary school. So when he confessed that he was in love with you it was like a wave of happiness just flooded every part of your body. But just as your relationship started, the band started on tour with One Direction and you were left alone at home.

You started to cry again. Fuck did you hate crying. You grabbed your phone to text Michael when you best friend Y/B/F/N messaged you a link to a video. You grabbed your laptop and sat at the foot of your bed and opened the link there. It was a video of the band, you should have know. It looked to be a segment of a twitcam video the band liked to do with the fans. Truth be told you haven’t watched one of them in a while. The video was dated yesterday and was skipped ahead a bunch from where it started and showed the guys sitting on a couch. You pressed play seeing as your friend wouldn’t send you this without proper reason.

“So the next song,” Calum began. “Was written by Michael and Ash and is called Close As Strangers.”
“It’s a bit emotional, so make sure you have some tissues near by,” Ash joked.

As Luke got the song ready you noticed Mikey sitting on the end of the couch with a very sad look on his face, Cal’s arm was around his shoulders and his head was resting on Cal. He was on his phone and Calum whispered something in his ear that caused Mikey to lock his phone and look at the camera. He honestly looked terrible, like he hadn’t eaten or slept in weeks and his hair was so faded you couldn’t even tell what color it had been. You hear hurt seeing him like this and you felt yourself start to tear up a bit.

Finally Luke started playing the song and while it was a bit distorted from being played on a different laptop and being streamed over the internet you could still hear everything perfectly.

Six weeks since I've been away
And now you're sayin' everything has changed
And I'm afraid that I might be losing you
And every night that we spend alone
It kills me thinking of you on your own
And I wish I was back home next to you
Oh, everyday
You feel a little bit further away
And I don't know what to say

Michael's voice sounded so beautiful. You were taken back a bit by it since you didn’t usually hear him sing like that. The guys looked over to Mikey who was looking at his hands.

Late night calls and another text
Is this as good as we’re gonna get?

Another time zone taking me away from you

Living dreams in fluorescent lights,
While you and I are running out of time

But you know that I’ll always wait for you

You could feel the tears threatening to spill over. Mikey on screen was still looking at his hands and Ash was leaning across all of them and rubbing Mikey’s knee to try and comfort him.

On the phone, I can tell that you wanna move on

Through the tears I can hear that I shouldn't have gone
Every day, it gets harder to stay away from you

So tell me are we wasting time, talking on a broken line?

Telling you I haven’t seen your face in ages

I feel like we’re as close as strangers

Mikey’s head was looking off camera away from everyone. You could see him biting his lip and assumed he was holding back tears. You were letting your tears flow freely now however. You body shaking a bit at how much emotion was running through you.

Six months since I went away
And I know everything has changed

But tomorrow I’ll be coming back to you

Michael’s voice ended the song and on camera Mikey had excused himself and left the couch. The guys were looking at each other and you just barely hear Luke say, ‘I hope this works.’
You stopped the video and placed your laptop on the floor before you curled up into a ball on your bed and let your emotions free. You were wailing at how bad your chest hurt. At how much you heart yearned to be with Michael and you knew he felt the same. The song proved that he had at least felt something. You didn’t know how long ago it was recorded, but the video showed it brought back something. You still hurt. If he wanted to be with you he would have at least texted you after that video, but you hadn’t heard from him in a least 2 months.

Another wave of pain hit you and you screamed out. You screamed so loud you didn't hear your bedroom door open. You didn’t even notice anyone was in till you stopped screaming and hear someone choke on a shaky breath. Your eyes shot open and your body sat up. You looked and saw a shaking, sobbing Michael in your doorway.

You jumped off your bed and ran into his arms. You started crying into his chest and felt him kiss the top of your head and rest his forehead there; crying into your hair. Your body shook from the sobs coming from your body and you could feel his breathing hitch every so often as he cried. You just stood there hugging each other and you heard him mutter repeatedly how sorry he was that he left you.