Realize That It's Gone

Warnings: None

Word Count: 2416

Author's Note: Chapter two! As always, thank you so much for all the support on the first chapter. I'm glad that all of you are just as excited to have the series back as I am :)

I stirred my noodles around in their plastic container as I walked towards the couch, nearly bumping into the side table as I did so. Josh looked up at me as I took a seat on the opposite end of the couch from him. He reached forward and paused the TV show that he had been watching.

"Glad to see you woke up," he smiled, scraping up one of the final bites of his own food.

I muttered something incoherent before taking a large bite of noodles. Josh had been nice enough to pick up some thai food from the place by my old apartment while I was taking a nice, long nap. It was the second thing that I had done as soon as we arrived back in Columbus, right after setting up my new bed so that I would actually have a place to sleep.

Management had insisted that we move into a new apartment together, something about it being easier for us to work on the album if we were in the same place all the time. Josh had been on board from the beginning, but it took a bit of convincing for me to agree to it. The apartment they had suggested for us was nice - that much was obvious - but it was also twenty minutes further from Y/N.

In the end, management had won.

"Did you sleep well?" he mumbled around the food in his mouth.

I watched him close his food container and set it on the coffee table while I stuck my fork in a particularly large piece of chicken.

"Yeah. Having the fan on was really nice, the air conditioning isn't doing a great job."

Josh's eyebrows furrowed, "Is it even on?"

"Didn't you turn it on?"

"No, I thought you did."

I laughed, "There's our problem."

Josh stood and picked up his empty thai container in one swift motion. His bare feet padded softly against the wood floors as he moved throughout the apartment. After a moment, the vents began to hum from the steady stream of cool air.

"That will help," Josh sighed as he collapsed back onto the couch. A few strands of his hair were stuck down to his forehead.

I nodded and took a bite of food, not really in the mood for talking in my post-nap state. My noodles were still warm, which was a welcome surprise. I wasn't entirely sure how long I had ended up sleeping, but based on the pink sky outside and the noticeable lack of cardboard boxes in the living room, it seemed to have been a considerable amount of time.

"Thanks for unpacking our stuff," I finally said, breaking the silence.

Josh merely shrugged. "It wasn't a big deal. Management dealt with a lot of the stuff from our old apartments and we didn't bring much on tour, so it didn't take long."

"Still, you didn't have to so I appreciate it."

Josh smiled and picked a bit of fuzz off the couch, twisting it between his fingers until it fell to the floor.

"Have you heard from Y/N?"

My shoulders tensed at the mention of her name. Josh was too busy picking more bits of fuzz off the couch to notice my reaction.

"I texted her that we were back in Columbus, but then I fell asleep and haven't checked my phone since."

"I thought she would be over here as soon as we got home. You know, helping you unpack and checking out the new apartment and whatnot."