take her to the moon // calum hood au

chapter one

Author's note: Hello! Welcome to my first book in a long time, it's been a while since I've written (2 years!!!) but I'm also a better writer now. I am publishing the first two chapters at the same time so make sure to read both before deleting this from your library or just clicking out of it because the introduction is a lot of background stuff and we get into the good stuff going into the second chapter. Another note for those of who are new around her, I hardly do author's note and I update really fast, like several times a week, just make sure to let me know if you're liking the story (or what you don't like about it) and here we go.... if you want to see pictures of the characters and other fun stuff check out my updating schedule and click on the chapter with the title that matches this book (will be updated in a few days.)

I am back in America, this time permanently - kind of - after doing a foreign exchange year in high school I knew that I had to attend a University here. I was able to visit Penn State on a class trip and although I applied to several schools I decided on this one since I was already familiar with the area and my host brother and sister were both going to this school as well.

My host mom, Melanie, was waiting for me in the airport and I was ecstatic to see her again. She found me before I found her and ran up to me giving me the biggest hug.

"I'm so happy to see you again, you look so grown since I last saw you, how was your flight?"

"Decent," I replied, "but exhausting, I couldn't really sleep and it's like 2 a.m. at home right now."

She helped me get my bags and started to tell me about Lena and Leo's graduation and their open house and how Sammie their dog was and pretty much anything you could imagine. I've talked to Lena and Leo a ton over the phone this past year but I had only talked Melanie once in awhile after I went back home. The entire ride home was spent with her just catching me up on everything even though tomorrow I would be leaving again to go to school.

A few weeks ago I had shipped most of my stuff here so that they could help me move in when Lena and Leo did so that I wouldn't have to do it alone. All I had brought with me this time were a couple of bags, mostly just some clothes. My host parents were then going to bring me to the store after moving all of us in so that I could grab anything else that I needed. Since they already had to move two in they didn't see how it would be much different moving in a third.

When I walked into their massive home, which was my home junior year, Lena was in complete frenzy mode trying to pack everything up last minute, which didn't come to a surprise to me as she always did everything last minute even though it stresses her out, Leo was the exact opposite in the fact that he always got everything done right away because he knew it would stress him out later. Lena and Leo were shouting back and forth and too carried away in their conversation to even notice that I had walked in.

Their younger sister, Lydia, was the first to notice me.

"Gwen!" She shouted, running over to me.

That caught the attention of the others and suddenly all three of them were surrounding me.Leo gave me a bro hug while the girls just completely engulfed me, after all they were my siblings for a whole year.

"I still can't believe you came back," Lena exclaimed, "we're going to have so much fun."

Leo chimed in, "and I live right down the hall from you guys so even though Lena wanted to get rid of me, I'll still be around."

They keep talking and I look around their living room to see that they still have their family photos with me in them hanging up next to all of their other family photos and it makes me smile.

"I missed you all so much but I am exhausted so I think I'm just going to go to bed if that's alright," I say while yawning.

They seem disappointed but Melanie says, "that's fine dear, we're leaving at 10 tomorrow so make sure you're up around 8 to help us pack the cars. I'm taking Leo's stuff in my car and your stuff is going to go in with Lena's in Mark's car since your rooms are next to each other."