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It was getting harder and harder to keep the invisible line in the sand intact between us. Each show brought us closer and closer together, on stage and off. I knew it was wrong; she was fifteen, and I was eighteen. We had met while I was sixteen, she was fourteen, but really, it was only a two-year and seven-month age difference between us. If she were eighteen and I was twenty, I don’t think anyone would care that much, but because she was still a minor, what I was feeling was illegal.
How could this connection between us be wrong, though, even the fans could see it, the edits of us on stage, or on lives, were increasing every day, everyone was shipping us together, so would it really be so wrong to act on this? Besides, I know she feels the same way; she never shies away from my touch, always leaning in or pushing us further. I mean, she had leaned in as if to kiss me just tonight on stage. I know we have our bet of seeing who will break first in moments like that, but tonight felt different. I had nearly leaned in. We still had months of touring left, and I had to get myself together.
“Oy, Mal, come on, dude, everyone is waiting for you,” MK calls me from outside the bunk. We all were going to do a late-night stream, MK, Freya, and me.
“Coming, dude, just gotta throw on some pants,” I call back.
I had taken a short nap so that we could be live for longer. I pull the sweatpants that I had bunched up at the end of my bunk up onto my body and hop down from the top, where my bunk was located. I grab my camo hat before exiting the area, already queuing up my phone for the intsa live.
I entered the bus's living room space and saw that Freya and MK were already seated on opposite couches. Freya is in a dark grey hoodie, her matching camo hat on, and these tiny, sweatpants material, short shorts. I audibly groan, causing Freya to look up at me.
“You good, Mal?” She asks, those gorgeous, sweet, earnest eyes gazing up at me from underneath the brim of her hat. I stare back at her, trying to lose myself, and the image of her in those shorts, from my mind by focusing on her eyes. She truly has no idea the effect that she has on me. What having all of her legs exposed as they are now does to my heart rate.
I slid up next to her, picking up my guitar that is rested on her lap, setting half of the back side in mine, our legs pressed up close to each other, the heat of her seeping through my sweats, what I would give to also be wearing shorts right now, able to feel her skin against mine, just some of it, anywhere on me. I lean in close to her ear and whisper, so that MK might not hear me; he does have headphones in, luckily.
“I just don’t know if these shorts are totally live-friendly; we do have to consider the Disney contracts after all.” I croon into her ear, a smile tugging on my face, trying to convey that I was teasing her. Her face flushes, causing her head to tuck in closer to her chest, and my guitar in shyness. She looks back up a beat later, directly into my eyes, the space between us almost non-existent.
“So, you care about the Disney contract now, huh?” She asks in an equally hushed tone, but hers has the hint of a laugh tucked into it, like she knows some secret that I am yet to learn. “'Cause you don’t seem to care that much when you tell everyone that you have to go shit, or when you slip in naughty dance moves on stage.” She’s full on grinning now, knowing that she caught me in a lie. I move ever so slightly closer, forgetting that MK is just on the other couch for a minute, tucking my hand under her chin and tilting it up towards me and to the side, turning her ear back to my lips, they are lightly grazing her ear with every breath I take.
“Well, that’s concerning my contract, I don’t have to care that much about it, when it comes to you and your contract though, gotta make sure I look out for my scene partner. Couldn’t do the movies without you after all. And those shorts.” My voice is deep and gravely at this point, finding it impossible not to let some of the emotions I am feeling seep through into the open.
“Those shorts are going to cause quite a scandal, especially if you stand up. Besides, we are almost matching already, might as well complete the look with the proper pants,” I say, shrugging, trying to come off at least a little bit casual after admitting the truth about her shorts.
She grabs the hand that I still had connected to her face and sets it down in her lap, holding onto it the whole time. As she turns her head back to face me, she has to look up just slightly to make full eye contact with me. She wets her lips and draws in a breath,
“What exactly about my shorts is so scandalous, Malachi?” She doesn’t know the resolve that she is crumbling, asking me these sorts of questions. Now, how to answer this question without coming off as a sexist pig, or telling the truth, that I was completely enamoured with all the things she does.
I take another deep breath, closing my eyes for a second. I feel her hand on my right cheek. “You feel a bit flushed, Mal, you doing good?” She is obviously amused by how I am reacting, based on the chuckle in her voice. I open my eyes, and she is staring right back into mine. I slip my hand out of hers, the one resting in her lap, and use it to grab her thigh, squeezing and pulling it slightly.
I clench my jaw and growl out lowly, “I think you know exactly what I mean, Fraya.” She flushes even deeper, and I lean closer, passing by her face closely to lean into her left ear. “Now, please, for my sake, your contract's sake, please go put on some matching sweatpants, the fans will eat it up that we are matching.” I lean back, patting her thigh before letting go. She just lightly nods her head, handing my guitar to me and getting up to go change.
I was right to ask her to change, as once she was facing away from me, I saw just how short the shorts were, and how far they had ridden up in the back, the lower half of her ass cheek open to the bus, to my eyes, which I could not tear away from her retreating form, that was until MK cleared his throught, trying to get my attention.
I turn to look at him, and he is shaking his head at me, a grin on his face.
“Dude, you are so whipped for her.” He whispers over to me, laughing a little. I throw a pillow at him. “Shut up, I am not.”
“Oh yeah, you're not?” He mocks back, “Then what exactly was that exchange I just witnessed, as, even though you both seemed to forget, I was sitting here for the whole flirty, exhausting exchange.”
I know I have no good excuse for what he just saw, but I can’t help but try and deny it.
“That was nothing, I’m just trying to look out for her, we are best friends after all.”
“Yeah, sure, because you totally have done what you just did with her with me before, and we are best friends as well.” MK quips back. I just smile and shake my head.
“Come on, man, drop it, you know it’s not possible, she’s too young,” I say. MK and I had discussed this before; he had seen through my bullshit almost immediately when I was around Fraya. We had talked about it before; he understood that no matter how much I wanted her, I enjoyed being around her, longed to be able to hold her hand casually, or hold onto her at all times, that it would not happen while she was fifteen.
Not to say I was waiting for her to turn eighteen, I wasn’t trying to catch grooming allegations. Though how not even a full three-year age gap could be considered qualifying for grooming, I am not sure. Mysteriouser things had occurred on the internet before, though, so I was not about to risk it, no matter how tempting Freya made it.
Sometimes I thought of the edits fans made of us, how huge the shipping went between us two, sometimes I rationalized that it would be okay, that because they shipped us that way and everyone seemed to be okay with it, it would be okay to do something. No, I couldn’t think that, it would lead to dangerous territory, especially considering I was to be on a live with her for the next few hours.
“Dude, be so for real, it’s not that big of a gap, she clearly is jonesing for you as well, she was practically putty in your hands when your hand touched her leg.” MK points out, thinking he is being helpful, but is really just starting to annoy me. Luckily, it’s then that Freya returns, matching sweatpants to mine on.
“Better?” She asks happily, giving a slight twirl to fully showcase the pants.
“Perfect,” I respond, my own smile beaming back up at her. She reclaims the seat next to me, sitting just as close as before, taking the guitar back into her lap, her hands brushing mine as she grabs it. I tuck a strand of hair that had fallen from her ear back behind it, enjoying the way she flushes slightly at the touch.
“Thanks, Mal.” She replies, patting my thigh in appreciation. I hear MK groan and turn in time to catch him burying his head into his hands, shaking it, clearly exasperated by me, us.
I clap my hands together, standing up, “Okay, it’s time to start the live. I’ll start by coming from the hallway and then set it up propped against the other couch, then join Freya on hers. Sound good?” I ask, glancing at them both as I move to start where I said. They both give a thumbs up, and I start the live.
Most of the live consists of Freya and me singing songs, something that comes as second nature at this point. We also answer some fan questions. The chat is usually too fast to read, but we do our best. Tons of the comments are talking about how close Freya and I were on stage tonight, especially during the audition tape of us singing, while we danced to it.
“Ooo, they are calling you out for folding tonight, Malachi.” Freya prods at me.
“Okay, okay, I’ll admit I folded tonight, Freya got me with that head jolt.” I smile into the camera, trying to play it off nonchalantly.
The clips from tonight's show were already online, and it was safe to say that everyone was freaking out over how close Freya and I were at tonight's show. There were so many moments where it felt like I could just lean in and kiss her then and there. I know that all of them were caught on camera, that everyone was dissecting how close our lips were to each other, our heads, how much I touched and pulled her in, how we did that couple trend.
It was just so hard to contain myself, especially when we are singing together; the energy that flows between us is sometimes just too hard to ignore. Besides, the fans ate up all the contact between us, which gave me an excuse to do it even more. What’s good for PR is good for everyone, especially when what is good for PR is me being touchy with the person I had a crush on.
“Yeah, I totally won tonight.” Freya gloats, soaking in all the positive energy the fans in the comments were sending her way.
“Hey, I came up with doing the pick up trend,” I exclaim, trying to gain some points back, looking at Freya from my position in front of the camera. She smiles back down at me, petting my hat-covered head, tilting hers to the side, “Yeah, that is true, that one was fun to do as well.” She says, still smiling down at me, This feels like a private moment between us, not something that was being seen and probably analyzed by the 41,000 people watching.
I get back up from the ground and exit the frame, going to grab a drink, feeling parched, due to the dry bus air, not to do with her looking at me like that. I settle back into the couch, Freya freestyling on the guitar once again, the moment from before long gone.
“I’ve never tried that flavor,” Freya says, referencing the Gatorade in my hand. Not being from America, there were still a lot of things that she had never tried before. Part of me wanted to make a stereotypical deez nuts joke at her sentence, but resisting the urge, knowing that that would not go over well in this situation, it would be read into too much.
I take a sip of the gatorade before putting it up to her lips, she opens her mouth, I am unable to take my eyes off of her, she tries to drink it at first without touching the bottle, but it is not at the right angle, and she ends up having to grab it, making a disgusted face as she pulls away. I try and think of anything other than how she looked just now, knowing that this is not the time to be feeling what the blood rushing south is feeling.
“Don’t spill on my guitaro.” I sing, trying to pick up the improv singing we were doing back up, which causes her to chuckle as she says, “I don’t like that,” referencing the flavor of the drink.
The live continues, Freya and I giggling and joking around the whole time, making up little songs here and there, or just dueting on other songs. I tried to show her a magic trick I had learned, but she was not amused by it, claiming that she already knew it. All the laughing she was doing told me otherwise, though.
I tried to flex my muscles to the cameras toward the end of the live, but Freya swatted my arm down and giggled while she tried to cover me up. “Big gains,” I said, just trying to hear her laugh again.
We finished the live off with a parting improv duet, “What a fun time we’ve had, the end.” Freya sings out. I lean close into her space, trying to get her to pick up on what I am about to sing, “ with you my ffffffff.”
“Oh!” She exclaims.”
“Friend.” I finish
“That was good, that was good,” she cheeses up at me, pointing a finger into my face.
“Ohh, we hit that.” I cheer back to her, rocking back and forth with my guitar, which has been sitting in my lap for a while now.
We both move to get up, me grabbing the phone to end the live, her to put my guitar away. I sit back down on the couch, plugging in my phone as I tumble to the cushions, fully lying out on them. MK had already turned into his bunk for the night, something that I thought Freya was going to join him in doing, considering how late it was now, but she surprised me by coming back out into the area.
“My guitar all put away?” I ask, glancing up from the screen on my phone. She walks over and flops down on top of me, something that is not completely out of the ordinary. We may just be friends, but we are no strangers to cuddling; none of us on this tour is very shy about cuddling with each other, to be honest. Though she had never lain directly overtop me like this, every inch of us was pressed against each other, and I could feel every curve her body held against mine.
My arms instinctively wrapped around her, one around her waist, the other coming up to rest on her head, running through her hair. She pressed her hands against my chest a little, raising her top half so that her face was a few feet from mine, enough so that I could see her eyes, but still feel her breath on my face.
“Yep, it’s all tucked away, safe and sound.” She responds. My hand shifts from the back of her head to the front of her face, sliding up to cup her cheek. Taking a gamble with the next words out of my mouth, knowing that this could be pushing it too far, I respond, “Such a good girl,” while stroking her cheek with my thumb. She sighs and leans into my touch, seeming to go a bit limp in my arms.
“Malachi,” she breathily whispers out, more of a whimper than my name, something I had never heard from her, “what are we doing?” This was something I had been dreading her asking, as I did not know how to respond. What were we doing?
Sometimes it felt like we were more than friends, the moments on stage where I would hold her close, spinning her into my arms, booping her on the nose, touching her face, bringing us closer and more connected than we had been the previous show. Each night, I grew even bolder with my touches, hiding behind the guise of just doing it for the show, for the characters we were playing, but what about all the moments off stage where I would do the same thing, without the excuse of people looking at us?
I know I should just play her question off, say we are friends, best friends, keep the barrier in place between us, however thin it might now be, stay in the safety of the lie, but a larger part of me wanted to say to hell with it and just give in, give up, let the chips fall where they may, to hell with our age difference, if we were the same age, or this was a few years later, there would be no issue. I had never tried to pursue her, I mean, I didn’t even feel this way at first, these feelings have built slowly and uncontrollably. We did meet when we were both minors, so I mean, it’s not like I have been stringing her along, waiting til she was legal.
That thought stills me, making me feel sick; she wouldn’t be sixteen til October, that was still one month away, maybe I just shouldn’t do or say anything til then, it would be a bit better received then, though we would have to contend with the, he waited til she was legal bro, jokes, but she is here now, an exasperated and longing tone in her question, one that begs of me to answer her with the truth, laid across me, looking at me as though what I said next would make or break the future of her life.
I readjust my grip on her face, pushing her hair behind her ear, and returning my hand to her face, giving it another caress, “I, I don’t know.” I admit shakily, just trying to be honest with her at this point. She lays her head back down on my chest, snuggling in, burying her face into my chest.
“Is it because of our age?” She asks, sounding disappointed, but also sad. I was hoping that it was sadness because she understood the dilemma we are in. “Yeah,” I responded, gripping the back of her head and hair, leaning down, placing a small kiss to the back of her head, “the fact that I am eighteen and you are only fifteen does complicate things a bit, but we are also colleagues, and we have this three-movie deal with Disney for the Zombies spin off, so that adds to it as well.” I try and sound reasonable and not as devastated as I feel about having to actually admit our situation out loud.
Freya sighs loudly, grabbing my biceps tightly, “It’s not fair!” She exclaims, lifting her head again to look into my eyes. “Besides, it’s not like I’m going to be fifteen forever, I turn sixteen in a month and a half.” It sounds like she truly is frustrated by this fact, but also proud of the fact that she would be a more acceptable age in the public eye next month, never mind that it wouldn’t actually change who she was as a person, or make me any less eighteen.
I chuckle, gazing up into her eyes, “Well, you aren’t sixteen yet, and anything between us would complicate things deeply.” I say, trying to sound resolute about this conclusion and not discouraged or disappointed, like I actually was.
She shrieked in frustration, squeezing my biceps harder, as she hit her head against my chest. Her legs had fallen between mine, pressing our lower halves even closer, a fact I was trying to ignore.
“Dang, girl, I guess that TikTok I saw about you loving my biceps was real, huh?” I try and joke with her, referencing a clip I had seen on TikTok of us hugging on stage, her hands grasping around my biceps. Her head shot up again at the mention of that, her face red, her hand not leaving my bicep, though, one of them let go to hit me on the chest.
“Malachi!” She exclaimed, surprised that I was acknowledging something like that. “What?” I ask, grabbing her hand that was coming down to hit my chest again, linking our hands together before it made contact. “It’s not like I don’t recognize when you reach out and touch them, even when you really have no reason to.” Her face is even redder now, and she is trying to hide it behind the hair that has fallen back down into place.
I give a light chuckle, releasing her hand to reach out and tuck her hair back again, resting the palm of my hand on her cheek again. “There is no reason to be embarrassed, I mean, it’s not like I have ever tried to stop you, or that I don’t enjoy it. It’s cute that you like to squeeze them. I know, I think about squeezing things enough as well.” I say, adding a bit of edge to our conversation now, getting rather close to naughtier and more dangerous topics, especially the kind that involve feelings.
“Malachi!” She squealed out, turning her head to muffle her exasperation into my hand. “Hey, get your head out of the gutter, I just meant your face or your waist, in a hug,” I exclaimed back, easily telling that she was too shy to be ready for any other kind of topics yet. She squeezes my bicep, her way of signaling that she understood what I was trying to do for her.
“We should probably head to bed,” I say, sitting up a bit, bringing her with me. She had to adjust her legs to fit the new position I had put us in, causing her legs to straddle onto either side of my lap, creating a whole new, and way too intimate position for the moment.
She adjusted her seating, causing me to groan and grab onto her hips to still her, “Freya,” I whispered dangerously low, “for the sake of both our dignities, I suggest that you please don’t move at all right now.” Her face was flushing again, as she understood what I was saying.
She breathed in a deep gulp of air, as though she was preparing to say something she wasn’t sure she was supposed to, letting it out shakily, right into my face, somehow, even her breath smelled good, like fresh mint.
“Before we go to bed, can you do one thing for me?” She asked shakily, clearly very nervous about whatever she was about to ask me. “Yeah, of course you can,” I say, squeezing her waist in a way that I had hoped was reassuring, but proved to cause a different reaction altogether, one that I could feel pulsing on my lap. “I know that we didn’t confirm or deny anything tonight, that we can’t really until my birthday passes, or I hope that’s what the plan is.” She says, her eyes closed, so she can’t see me nodding my head at her. “It is,” I respond, lightly moving my hands along her hips, causing that reaction again, the one I secretly was starting to crave, feeling more. “B-but, I was hoping that you wouldn’t mind doing something for me, giving me something, to tide me over until then.” She responds, sinking into my touch and lap more, squeezing my bicep again, bringing her other hand to cup the one I had on her cheek, opening her eyes, looking directly, deeply into mine, conveying everything she was trying to say, without having to actually say it.
I didn’t respond with my words, just slowly leaning forward and up into her space, my other hand coming to grip the other side of her face, her sliding along my arm, still residing on my bicep, just from a new angle. My face stopped millimeters from hers, her breath fanning out over my lips, and mine on hers. She just nodded her head, bringing herself a little closer, but still not breaking that barrier yet; she was waiting for me to lead this, needing me to be the one to make the first official move, even though she was the one who had prompted this, had asked.
I closed the rest of the distance, my lips softly melding to hers, in a gentle kiss, her bottom lip very lightly sucking into my mouth. Her reaction to our kiss was not something I was prepared for. She leaned in closer, harder, trying to close the distance between our bodies, causing her hips to drag against mine, creating a friction that neither of us was ready for, a groan coming from both of our joined mouths, mingling into one sound, just as our bodies seemed to be trying to do.
My hands slid further into her hair, hers coming up to do the same. We both deepened the kiss at the same time, my tongue slipping into her already parted mouth due to the moan she had just let out with me. The feeling of our tongues meeting in her mouth was even better than anything I had ever thought up. Our tongues tangled together, fighting for dominance, mine easily taking over, coaxing hers into submission.
I pulled back slightly, turning the kisses back to lighter and more tame sucks and pecks, just enjoying the feeling of having her so close, something I knew I should cherish as it wouldn’t happen again for a long time.
After probably enjoying her mouth on mine for another five minutes, we both pull back, a string of spit clinging between us, both our lips were swollen, our faces flushed. The only noise in the room being from the bus driver, and our heavy breathing. Freya leaned back a little in my lap, that pulsing still slamming into me, I knew she could feel me, probably could for the past ten minutes, it didn’t seem to be bothering her. It would be annoying to go to bed like this, but taking care of it was out of the question right now. I would remember this moment when I was alone later.
“Well,” Freya is the first one to break the silence, her breathy voice curling through the air, luring me back to the present, to her. “I guess we can safely say that that works.” I chuckled back at her.
“Way to understate things,” I respond, tucking that elusive strand of her perfect hair back where I prefer it. I liked to see her face unobstructed by anything, including her hair.
“I guess we need to go to bed now, yeah?” She questioned, a hopefulness in her tone, as though she wanted me to say no and just carry about kissing her for the rest of the evening.
“Yeah, we should. We have a long day tomorrow.” Every day was a long day when on the road for a tour, so I knew she would understand. I give her a few more pecks before standing up, her still attached to me. She clings on, burying her head into my neck.
I laugh, jostling her a little, “Freya, we have to go to bed now, you need to get down.”
No.” She responds, sounding resolute, “You have to carry me to my bunk.” I just shake my head and do as she asks, knowing that she won’t let go til I have delivered her where she wanted.
She slowly drags herself down my body, reaching up on her toes for one last lingering kiss. “Goodnight, Freya. I will see you in the morning.” I lean in closer, whispering this last sentence into her ear, “and I will kiss you again in a month. Consider this evening as an early birthday gift.” She frowns up at me.
“If you think that I am going to wait a whole month to kiss you, then you are very mistaken. I don’t care that you are older; I know what I feel, and I know what you feel. Why must we wait?” She sounds disappointed in how the conversation has turned.
“Now is not a good time to talk about this, Freya. We can discuss how we are going to go about this more in the morning, maybe after we talk together, we can bridge to the topic with your mum as well?” I knew we would need her mom's permission if anything was to happen again at all.
“Okay, goodnight, Malachi.” She relented, finally tucking into her bunk, leaving me to stew over the ramifications that tonight would bring for both of us