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You looked over at Calum and he squeezed your hand, “They’ll love you, it’s fine.” It was a difficult thing for you to just believe that everything would be all right, for some reason things always seemed to go wrong. It was like your life was a crappy story written by an angst riddled teenager and you had no say in it. But at this point there was no getting out of it, you promised you’d meet the guys, and you knew it was important to Calum. After all, you guys had been dating for well over two months and the guys had never even seen you in person. It wasn’t that you didn’t want to meet them, you were just afraid that you wouldn’t be what they expected. Calum and the guys were always loud and boisterous, and you were a little bit more shy than you liked to admit. As you walked inside the restaurant you felt Calum tighten his grip on your hand. He was obviously nervous too, but why would he be nervous if he thought everything would be fine?
When Michael saw the two of you coming towards the table he remembered what Calum had told him, “Guys, Cal said that y/n can be a little touchy, and a little different, so just watch out for that, okay?”
Ashton looked up from his menu, “Different? How?”
Michael shrugged, “Maybe she’s a little weird, I mean if she’s touchy then maybe it’s that she’s just really friendly and can come off a little odd?”
Luke fidgeted in his seat, “Should we hug her then?”
“Yeah, that way she knows we’re comfortable with her!”
Ashton noticed that the two of you were getting close to the table and darted his eyes back at his menu, “Everyone be friendly!”
When you and Calum walked up to the table, Luke jumped up and wrapped you in a hug. You didn’t know what else to do, so you hugged him back awkwardly and smiled. You held out your hand to Ashton since he was sitting, but he completely ignored it and stood up to hug you as well. Calum looked over at Michael, wondering why they kept hugging, especially after he told them how shy you were. However, Michael took this as Calum being annoyed that he hadn’t hugged you yet. So, Michael got up, walked over to you, and picked you up in a big hug. “Y/n! It’s so great to meet you!” After they had all finished their initial greeting, Calum pulled out a chair for you and sat you down next to Ashton, thinking he’d be the most mild of the group.
The five of you looked through your menus silently for a few minutes, but once you had ordered you were back to being awkward. Ashton nudged you in the side, “So y/n, tell us about yourself! Anything interesting?” You explained your job to them and waited for someone to say something, but they all just stared at you, like you were about to deliver the speech that would create world peace.
Michael looked at you confused after a few seconds, “Really? I would’ve thought that you did something more - compelling. Not that that’s boring, but you’re just so different.”
You choked on your water, “Uh, different?”
Luke smiled, “Yeah, Cal said you can be a little odd sometimes, and we’re all pretty weird so we just figured you’d do something more creative.”
You immediately stood up from your chair and excused yourself to the restroom, completely embarrassed that Calum would say something like that. “Why would you say that I said that! Are you trying to get her to break up with me? And while we’re talking about this, why are you guys being so affectionate? ” The guys looked at each other, completely confused as to why he was offended. Michael looked at Calum seriously, “You said she was touchy and different? We thought we’d hug her so that she knew we were comfortable around her. And we weren’t sure what different meant, so we assumed it meant she was weird.” Calum put his head in hands and looked extremely frustrated. He stood up and put his napkin on the table, “I said she was touchy - as in sensitive! And DIFFIDENT, as in shy!” He stormed away from the table to go check on you, worried that you were trying to climb out a window or something. Luke and Ashton both turned to glare at Michael, who was desperately going through his texts to prove that Calum did say different and not diffident. “To be fair, he could’ve just said shy, and not tried to seem so fancy with his big vocabulary.”
“Y/n, are you okay?”
You opened the door slightly and replied, “I’m fine, I just feel like they don’t like me, and I don’t fit in with you guys.”
Calum held your hand, “I swear this is all just a misunderstanding, please just come back to the table and everything will make sense.”
The two of you headed back to the table and when you sat back down Luke explained everything. Turns out, Michael was right, Calum texted different and not diffident. Damn autocorrect. They all apologized for being so affectionate, and you of course forgave them, it was just a simple mistake. As the evening went on, you all talked and you ended up getting along with guys. It wasn’t exactly how you had pictured your night - almost leaving because it was so bad, but things ended well.
When you got into the car after dinner Calum spoke, “So, that was…interesting.”
“Yeah, but I had fun.”
He raised an eyebrow at you, “How close did you get to popping the restroom window out of the frame?”
You giggled and kissed him, “One more kick and I would’ve been out of there.”