xxPUDDxx - i read somewhere that he did have a frog at some point, and it fits with him so well haha xD

116 Toms POV

"alright, I'll start on Tom first, you three, out." Mellissa ordered, sending the others out, without much protest at all. "now what are we going to do with you, to make this mess look presentable." She turned back to me and sighed, crossing her arms, looking disgusted at my hair. "I-I'm sorry, I should have had it cut before. Its just, I've been...busy." I apologised, coughing to try and clear my throat a little, I still sounded croaky. "its okay, its my job to make you lot look presentable. Sit down, we'll have a chat while I sort this out. I'll cut it Radio:ACTIVE style, okay? So its not a complete shock because all this lengths been suddenly cut off." Mellissa smiled, pushing me down into a chair, right in front of a mirror. D*mn, I hated mirrors.

I avoided looking at myself the whole time, just nodding and shrugging to whatever Mellissa said, not really wanting to talk. "Tom, you're not alright, are you?" she hit the nail on the head there. "I am, I'm just nervous, you know? First shoot in over a year, that is kick starting the band again. Its nerve wracking." That was half the truth, I was nervous for the shoot, I knew I didn't look okay still (I never had looked okay, so I didn't know why I was worrying now) and I just wasn't exactly excited to be stared at for a morning. "nerves never stopped Tom Fletcher before, especially when it comes to his band and his dreams. Whats up?" Mellissa thankfully put her scissors away, sitting on the counter where all her styling bits were, facing me. "nothing, I'm fine, its nerves. I haven't been around people, cameras, or anything for a year. I think I'm allowed to be nervous." I tried to be nice, but really, I just didn't want to talk about this.

I was scared, and nervous, what if I looked disgusting, or ill, it would draw all the wrong kind of attention. We didn't want, or need, any kind of bad attention, we needed good attention. There was of course going to be some bad comments because of me, but at least, if I looked like nothing had happened, it would lesson a little. I was terrified they would make me wear short sleeves, or anything that was revealing in anyway, I didn't want people to see my pale skin, my cuts, or anything. I wanted to go hide in a room by myself with those scissors.

"okay, your nervous, I get that. You just look like your going to throw up. If your not ready, I'm sure Fletch and the guys will understand, we'll reschedule for another day. Don't push yourself too far, its not like all this is going to go away if you admit to needing more time." Mellissa didn't understand the half of it. I couldn't ask for more time off now, it would only cause more trouble, I had made so many people get up and come here today, there was a studio being set up now, if I back out now, then it would all go wrong. Everyone would get so annoyed with me, the people setting everything up probably wouldn't get paid, and Fletch would have such a go at me, because I was messing him around.

"I'll be fine. If I don't go out there now, I never will, and I won't throw up. I can keep my food down, don't worry." I tried a smile, succeeding, then let Mellissa carry on making me look a least a little presentable. At the end, I still looked like death warmed up, and ridiculous, all scrawny and weird angles. I shuddered, lets hope I was at the back today, and for the rest of my life. The last time I had been at the front had been our last photo shoot before I ran off. I couldn't even look at the pictures, I looked so, so awful, like I was actually deformed. The magazine had picked up on it too, and as usual, taken the p*ss. They had called me the-one-who-used-to-be-fat, the-one-who-was-trying-too-hard-to-fit-in, and the worst one, the-one-who-was-there-only-because-he-can-write-songs. They had ripped me, us, to shreds, had basically written an article on how much I didn't fit in, how much I didn't really deserve to be here. It had broken my heart, shattered it from existence. It had shattered me, but opened my eyes to the truth at the same time. That had decided it, after receiving so much abuse over the years for being the odd one out, that had been the last straw, the reason as to why I ran away.

117 Dougies POV

Eventually, the door opened and we were all allowed back into the dressing room. Tom had changed his clothes, and obviously had his hair cut. It was now back to the style he had in Radio:ACTIVE, long with a sweeping fringe over his eyes. "right, I'll have Danny next, you two go get changed." Mellissa ordered before we could even say anything, so we followed orders, getting changed into whatever clothes there were on the rack. Tom was sitting on the windowsill, looking outside, biting his finger nails to shreds. So I pulled Harry over and sat down with the blonde, pulling his fingers away from his mouth.

"stop that, you'll hurt yourself." I whispered gently, keeping the warning there, but trying to make it sound like I wasn't angry at him, because I wasn't. "sorry, nerves." Tom whimpered, and it made me glad that he was talking more now. "its okay, just calm down. It'll be alright. Its just another photo shoot. Nothing more, nothing less, you'll be fine." I smiled, squeezing his hands before he took them away, crossing his arms across his chest.

We all took turns in encouraging Tom that everything would be okay today, and we were sure we would be allowed to have breaks if he needed one. Fletch led us out and through into the set, where we met the photographer, he seemed nice enough, but I wasn't sure if he would tolerate any of us mucking about too much. "right, the main idea of this shoot is to really say 'Toms back.' That your all still together and nothing has changed." I heard Tom whimper quietly to himself behind us all, "so I'm thinking that we need some shots of you all playing about and being yourselves, and a few solo shots, we'll see how we go." The photographer, whose name was Misha Collins, rubbed his hands together. I sighed, looks like a day of fake smiling and pretending that everything was okay. I just wanted to scream out that everything was wrong, nothing was right in any way, we shouldn't have been doing this, we should have been at home, making sure Tom was well rested and healthy again, not doing a photo shoot!

"Dougs, we'll get through this, just deep breaths okay?" Harry whispered in my ear, rubbing my side, carefully bringing me with him on the set. "I don't want to be here, not now, not when everything is wrong." I whispered back, giving him large puppy eyes. "I know, but at the moment, Toms improving already, he's talking right now. Just go with it, he might get better now if we give him our old lives. We'll see how this goes, we'll see if this helps." Harry reasoned, kissing my hair gently, ignoring the camera going off.