Strained

Chapter 21

Gabriel spent his 19th birthday in his hometown surrounded by his family, friends and Louis. As Gabriel was the youngest, 'Young Up Spirit' was not formed with little boys anymore but young men. He celebrated it again two days later with his London clique and with Louis still at his side and this time he partied hard and was completely wasted.

They rehearsed for the new tour. They will perform in arena in front of at least 25 000 fans instead of theatres or other smaller venues. They opened their mouth in surprise when they looked at the size of the stage, it was impressive. They will have more props like stairs and a moving platform, technical effects such as fire, smoke machines, bigger screens, and hundreds of LED beam lights. They will have to run everywhere during the performance, to maximize all the space. The choreography was a pain to remember, they always forgot where they had to go.

The first date was set in London mid-February, they were stimulating with the new songs, the new atmosphere. They felt like rock star with all the improvement that was made on stage. It really gave a spectacular effect and it increased their mood. The sound was louder, the lights effects were incredible and the fans who were still there, shouted their names at the top of their lung.

The number of their fans from all over the world reached ten millions and the impact they had on them became even more powerful. They knew that everything they were saying or doing had an influence on them and tried the best they could to act as role models but as they were themselves young and still learning, the task was sometimes difficult. Louis, William and Alex refused to quit smoking and tried to not get caught with a cigarette in their hand but they failed and some of the fans took their Twitter account to remind them how their behaviour was irresponsible. They were glad that they did not know about the weeds though. Oliver and Gabriel were also reprimanded, Oliver told a crude sex joke during a live interview before their concert in Liverpool making Gabriel burst into laughter and the fans were not happy about this. It bothered them greatly to still being judged, it was like having a thousand of mothers watching them and they did not want this but the fans were the reason why they were so successful.  They were absolutely nothing without them. In order to respect them and to avoid any future uproar, the boys did their maximum to behave in an irreproachable way and took the habit to think twice before speaking or acting. This, led them to hide even more their true personality and they turned into the shell of themselves in public.

But even if the boys slipped sometimes, the fans were quick to forgive them. They were too dependent on the boys and their happiness belonged to them. The boys felt like a fraud, they knew that they were not perfect and it was hard to match the high standards of the fans. Some of them bestowed upon the boys a role of heroes, thanking them for saving their lives. They boys were honoured but did not understand why, they were just boys singing love songs and they felt the need to take care of them but they were not strong enough themselves to take this huge responsibility on their fragile shoulders. At their horror, they sometimes came across tweets from girls saying that they will commit suicide if they didn't follow them. A handful of fans were too emotionally involved with the boys and the boys were truly affected. Charles said they should not bother, it was all bluff but they could not. They did not want their fans to hurts themselves because of them. They kept interacting and helped them the best they could but by doing so they became also emotionally too involved with them and they let them took a piece of their soul forever.

Another thing began to upset them. As they were handsome they tended to be objectified but even if flattering, they despised being considered like a piece of meat. They were fed up to read banners during concerts, tweets and comments under their Instagram pictures asking them to 'put their dick in their pussy' or other detailed sexual requests. Some of the girls, despite their young age, were talking and acting in an inappropriate way. For example, the boys could not count how many times they saw them flashing their breast to them or they tripped over bras thrown on stage. The boys were finding hard to respect those girls and their perception about them was biased. They were disposable and easily replaceable and William, Alex and Oliver did not have an ounce of guilt to make fun of them or never call them back after sleeping with them.