Anxiety • part 1

46 • panic

[[Michael and Crystal announced their engagement a couple days before this chapter]]

Walking through the streets of Oslo was a hard wake up call. Jackie, Ashton and I had decided to go explore the city one last time before leaving tomorrow morning.

Two streets ago, paparazzi have started following us across the streets and so far, 5 fans have stopped us. And surprisingly, I was okay with it but Jackie was slowly understanding why I tried to keep her out of this life for so long.

"I want to go." She finally said as she looked at me. "I'll just go visit boring museums with mom and dad but I can't do this."

"If you take Jackie to your parents, I'll just walk around a little. To make sure they won't get followed later." Ashton said and I nodded before taking my phone to call them. "I'll see you later." He said before kissing my cheek. He walked further while we waited a few seconds to make sure the people following us kept following him before walking to the museum street.

"They are just a street away so you'll be there in a minute." I said to her and she nodded slowly. "It won't always be like this, usually they just leave us alone when we're in LA but for these people it's rare to see him walk around, so they follow and stop us. It's annoying but it's what I've been trying to save you from."

"Do they do this when you're alone in London?"

"The following stopped after a week, the stopping never did but they're usually nice and as long as I'm not racing to be somewhere, it's okay. I got used to it." I said as I shrugged my shoulders. "Okay so they should be in that museum and they were almost done so we just had to wait at the exit."

"I'm sorry for not being able to do it." She said softly as we waited.

"That's nothing you should apologise for. It's a lot to ask from you because this isn't an easy life." I replied with a sigh, "One day you will just stop seeing them."

"Hey girls." Mom said as she approached us, dad following behind her.

"Hey, I'm going to go back to Ashton but I needed to make sure Jackie was safe with you first." I looked at them with a smile and they nodded understandingly.

"Just make sure you're at the restaurant at 8 for dinner and be safe." Dad said to me. He hugged me quickly before I walked away again and texted Ashton so he would let me know where he was. I followed the directions to the location he sended me and when I finally reached it, I could not see him anywhere. I saw the paparazzi guys so I was at the right place but he was nowhere to be seen.

Sam 🦁: where the hell are you
Ashton 🦘: did you forget your contacts again? I'm literally right behind you.

I turned around and he waved at me, he was just standing a few meters behind me. I laughed at my own stupidness before walking over.

"I'm so blind." I said with a smile before he kissed me softly. I smiled as I looked at him, "The street art tour next?"

"Yes, I've been looking forward to that all day." He said with a chuckle. He put his arm around my shoulder and I put my arm around his waist as we walked to the start of the street art tour. "Will we go see the Opera house after?"

"Have been kind of hoping you'd ask that. We could have lunch there and then go visit the Opera house."

"That sounds perfect." He looked at me happily while we walked and I just had a smile on my face. We agreed to taking Jackie with us this morning but that also meant avoiding anything that could make them follow us.