Ash’s POV

Eating lunch with Harper and her friends actually wasn’t that bad. They were actually nice to me and they allowed Lianne to sit with us, which totally didn’t make any sense. Alex kept telling me that nobody talked to Lianne, but they accepted her just like they accepted me. They didn’t hate her or judge her. What Alex had said made no sense to me. Over time Lianne, Harper, and I actually became pretty good friends. Who knew that rejecting Alex would lead to me having these great friendships? Speaking of which, we decided to hang out Alex’s place, which I will started calling my place to make things easier. Normally I was too busy with school, but this time I decided to make some time for them.

I found Alex standing by our lockers, so I walked up behind him to tell him my plans, “hey, Alex.”

He jumped and fumbled around before dropping all his books, “umm, uh, hey, uh, hi…”

I helped him collect everything and saw Jack standing there just staring at us and grinning stupidly. He was probably talking to Alex before I came, but why he didn’t even bother to help, also didn’t make any sense to me. But, hey, he was Jack; Jack was weird.

I stood back up, brushing the hair out of my face, “Lianne and Harper are coming over today, so don’t wait up for me, I’m driving with them.”

“Oh, uh, yeah, that’s cool,” Alex pulled up his hoodie and made sure to hold his books tighter.

“I’ll see you in English,” I skipped away.

“Umm, yeah, see you.”

Alex had been acting really awkward. He dropped the whole I-hate-you-and-think-you-are-annoying act, but it only turned into him saying a lot of ‘uhs’ and ‘ums’ whenever we were talking. It was like he was always stumbling over his words. I just hoped he was going to start acting normal soon. From what I figured out between all his mumbles, he was actually a pretty cool and nice guy. He was probably just having a lot of trouble talking to me without insulting me, causing him to think over everything he wanted to say before speaking up. To be honest, I had never seen somebody stutter so much unless they actually had a speech impediment… And that sounds very mean. I’m not trying to insult anybody with a speech impediment. Luckily, I hadn’t said it out loud.

After the rest of the school day, I quickly ran out of the building with Harper and Lianne. We didn’t want to get stuck in the horrible traffic jam that always formed at this time. It was solely created by our school. Students would stop in the middle of the road to talk to their friends, and others just weren’t paying attention. If you wanted to get home fast, you had to either make sure you were one of the first to leave, or you had to wait some time until everything cleared up. And this is why you don’t let 16 year olds drive. Forget about all the other problems, the main one is that the traffic just get’s too bad.

We blasted music during the car ride. I already knew the entire way back home and easily told Harper where to go to. She eventually knew where she was, having driven from her house to Alex’s before, but not from school. In case you were wondering, the music was both good and really crappy music. I won’t elaborate on which music it was; I’m too afraid I will offend anybody if I do.

So, now we were in my room, quietly having a Green Day CD, which we stole from Alex before he came up and caught us in his room, playing in the background. Harper was gossiping about some guy she thought was ‘totes super hot’, and Lianne was looking around in my box of random pencils I had. Moments like this reminded me how different the two girls were. How they were friends, made no sense to me.

“So, how’s it living in one house with Alex Gaskarth,” Harper fell back onto the double bed I was already lying on stomach first.

“It’s ok, I guess,” I mumbled, but I came out more like I question, “I don’t know why people freak out about it.”

“Because he’s hot,” Lianne blurted out and dropped a green pencil back into the box.

“Ooh, look at that,” Harper grinned, “Lianne is actually showing some qualities that most normal girls have.”

“Shut up,” Lianne rolled her eyes and sat down on the bed as well, “I just don’t like talking about guys, because I don’t like judging people. It makes me feel awkward, I wouldn’t want boy talking about me like that. But Alex is just hot; it’s a fact. I’ve known him for a couple of years, we used to go to the same private school, he’s grown up pretty well.”

“You’ve known him for that long!”

“Yeah… We used to be friends, but that obviously changed. But it doesn’t matter.”

“That just makes Alex even weirder,” I sighed and rolled onto my back, “I don’t know what his deal is!”

“I know right!” Harper exclaimed and threw her hands up in the air, “one moment we were kissing and taking each other’s clothes off and the next he stops and says we shouldn’t do it. I mean, we had done it before, so why not again?”

Lianne and I both gave her a confused look. We both did not know anything about this. But then again, it was to be expected. Alex was quite a man-whore (I’m sorry for using that word! I’m just quoting Harper!), and Harper, well, let’s just say she didn’t often reject guys.

I continued to try to process what she was telling us, “That’s not what I meant! But now you got me interested; when did that happen?”

“At his party,” Harper shrugged and inspected her nails.

I burst out laughing. There was no way that happened. Well, they probably did get that close, but the fact that Alex was complaining about not getting any, just made it so much better. He literally did it all to himself. And he was so upset about it! Everytime I tried to compose myself, I would think about Alex throwing his phone against the wall and groaning, making me start again.

----
Alex’s POV

“Alex! Come over here!” A high-pitched voice sounded from the other side of the hallway.

I groaned and paused my video game before going to Ash’s room, where Harper was calling for me. What did they need me for! I didn’t want to be covered in makeup and be their doll. Maybe they were going to make me choose which outfit was better. I couldn’t do that! This was fucking shit. I just wanted to play my video game, not fucking be called into a room full of girls that didn’t even have any intention of using me for things I would have liked them to use me for.

Harper was standing in the doorway, expecting me. She glared at me and crossed her arms, her fingers tapping on the elbow. There was laughter coming from inside and I quickly glanced in to see Ash was basically choking. I never saw Ash act like this; she wasn’t one to have fun like this. But something about me liked knowing under her whole ‘goody two shoes / daddy’s girl’ act, she was just like any other teenage girl.

“Have you been spreading lies?” Harper caught my attention.

“Lies, what?” I questioned. What was she going on about? Couldn’t I get any context?

“You know, your party,” she acted like it was the most obvious thing ever.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

The laughter from inside was getting louder and louder, and it was starting to make me feel self-conscious. Was I doing something weird? Did I look stupid? Were they judging me? Oh God. The sound started filling my head, and everything seemed to fade away. Nothing focused and I started getting dizzy. I couldn’t get an attack; not now.

“Can you fucking shut up!” I snapped and shot daggers at Ash. She stopped immediately and looked taken aback. Great, I fucked that up too. But then her mouth started twitching and her nose flared. At first I thought she was about to cry, but her laughter was trying it’s best to break free.

“I’m sorry,” she giggled and pointed at Harper, “just look at her.”

“Why did you not want to sleep with me!” Harper demanded and hit the door.

“What? I don’t know what-” I started to defend myself.

“At your party! After you tried kissing Ash you came over to me. One thing led to another and we ended up on your bed. But you stopped before we could get to the good stuff. And then Ash told me you were complaining about not having sex the morning after! What the fuck Alex!”

I felt my cheeks heating up; they were probably showing an embarrassingly blooming red. My eyes wandered to Ash, who was still trying to keep her cool, but now she was hiding behind her hair. Her smile was so beautiful, and I made her hide it. Wasn't I a great person! (Notice the fucking sarcasm?)

“Oh. My. God. No fucking way,” Harper whispered and pulled me into the room, shutting the door behind me.

It was quiet. Even Ash had stopped laughing after the door closed with a loud thud. The only thing making this less awkward, was Green Day’s Nimrod album playing in the background. That was totally my CD, and they fucking stole it. But I wasn’t going to dare say anything. I had already gotten mad at Ash once, I didn’t need to take another thing away she was enjoying.

“That’s my album,” I still pointed out, not knowing anything else to say.

“It’s a good album,” Ash agreed and nodded, looking around the room. At least I wasn’t the only one that felt really awkward.

“This is a good start!” Harper exclaimed and gathered us all to sit on Ash’s bed, making sure to make me sit next to Ash. I did not know what was going on, and I did not know if I liked it or not.

Lianne got more comfortable, “Harper, why are you acting so weird?”

“I just think we should get to know each other a bit more.; I just realised we don’t know much about each other,” Harper looked in between me and Ash, but only I realised. I knew what she was trying to do. She probably saw me looking at Ash! Shit, shit, SHIT! With Harper knowing, it was going to go around the school in no time. Fuck!

“So… how about we start easy?” Harper clapped her hands and looked around our small group, “let’s start with siblings.”

“I’m an only child,” Lianne raised her hand. I actually knew that. It’s pretty embarrassing to say, but Lianne and I used to be really good friends when we both still went to a private school. We were basically best friends. But public school changed everything. People liked me, but didn’t like her. I I just followed everybody else.

“Me too,” I murmured, not sure exactly what to say with my situation.

“I’ve got three younger brothers: Jaxon, Kayden, and Charley,” Ash played with the hands in her lap.

“I also have a younger brother. And he annoys me so much,” Harper groaned, “seriously. I’ve got better things to do than to do stuff with him. You know what I mean?”

“I actually like my brothers…” Ash mumbled.

“Oh, ok,” Harper didn’t really seem to agree, but still respected Ash, “Umm… what about favourite hobby?”

“Making music,” Ash and I said at the same time. We looked at each other and I could see that her eyes had the slightest green in them. She was only getting more beautiful the more I got to see her and study her; the way her hair carefully framed her face and ran down her shoulders elegantly, her nose, which perfectly complemented the rest of her face, but here eyes were still the one thing that infatuated me the most. It was unfair to any other girls, she was just that pretty.

We continued go through many questions, getting more personal each time. I actually learned more about these three girls in less than an hour, than I had with Jack. This was a weird method, but it was fucking working. I even learned more about Lianne, which I thought was pretty surprising. She hadn’t changed much, but at the same time a lot had changed. Harper wasn’t just some popular girl. And Ash, Ash was just getting even more amazing. She told us about her travels and there were some pretty fucking awesome stories. I wanted to travel the world as well. It sounded so fucking amazing.

There was a knock on the door and Ash called the person on the other side in. My mom opened the door and was about to start talking to Ash when she saw me sitting on the bed and laughing as well, “do I want to know what is going on here?”

“We’re obviously just about to have a foursome,” I rolled my eyes and sighed dramatically as if she just interrupted.

“Oh, yes, I see. I’m sorry,” my mum played along, “please be safe. We do not need three Gaskarth babies, not at this age.” With that she closed the door and Lianne suddenly became very quiet. If I wasn’t this awkward, I would have asked her what was wrong, but I wasn’t really her friend. I couldn’t just expect her to let me in like that.

“How about our biggest secret,” Harper suggested next. Everybody looked skeptical and was about to argue, but she sighed, “I promise I won’t tell anyone. Not everything I hear will become gossip. I’ll even go first,” this for some reason got us all to oblige, and Harper started, “my parents fight a lot. They don’t seem to want a divorce, but there is a lot of shouting at home. I know, I said I don’t like my brother, but at times like that he often comes into my room while he’s scared, and I let him stay there. Sometimes even I’m scared. But for there’s not been any abuse, it’s just fighting. But you never know.”

Wow. Ok, I did not know that. People always seem perfect, but deep inside they weren’t. Things like this are nearly never talked about, but they were actually pretty important. Knowing from myself, I knew that bottling up didn’t help at all.

Next everybody’s eyes shifted to Lianne. We were going to go through this round without making comments. She looked back at us and sighed, “I can’t have kids when I’m older. Because I’m an only child, I would be the only one that could give my parents grandchildren, which they’ve always really wanted. But that’s not going to happen… I guess there’s always adoption, though.”

That did explain why she suddenly went quiet when my mum joked about them all getting quiet. It must suck to not be able to have any children. Like, fuck, even I wanted to have kids when I was older.

And then all the attention was on me.

“Umm…” I didn’t know how to say it, “my brother died when I was twelve… I guess you could say I didn’t take it that well.”

Next came Ash. But instead of just saying straight up what she was thinking about, she stayed quiet for a while. When she finally opened her mouth, I thought she was going to say something amazing, but she didn’t.

“I don’t know,” she shrugged and played with her fingers.

“Oh, come on, there must be something!” Harper urged.

She shrugged again. This time, I decided to say something as well, “you must have at least one secret.”

“Oh, I do,” Ash nodded, not looking at anybody, “I just don’t know which one is my biggest secret.”

She had more than one big secret? But she was perfect. There couldn’t be more than one thing she was hiding, or at least they couldn’t be bad. Ash wasn’t somebody that would have done much daring, so the secrets couldn’t be embarrassing. This just made me want to get to know her better.

“Ok, umm,” Ash ran her fingers through her hair, “I always say that I don’t get sad about my mum, but after she died, I had a complete mental breakdown. I’m not going to go in any detail, though.”

As normal as that secret sounded, it still shocked me. I, myself, knew that having a family member die really fucking sucked. But something about Ash made it so much different. She wasn’t supposed to go through that pain. I just wanted to wrap my arms around her and comfort her, even though she seemed completely ok. Do you know that feeling? When you just think someone is so fucking special that you have to fucking protect them as much as you fucking could. Well, that was how I felt, and I couldn’t shake it off.

Notes

So this chapter is pretty long... I wasn't intending on it being this long. There's some back story on the characters, but it's nothing much. This is more like a filler chapter... a very long filler chapter...

Anyway, once again, school is demanding a lot, so you'll have to do with this chapter for a bit. I'm hoping to write the next chapter soon, but I can't promise anything. I have to make an animation about a poem (I don't even know why the teacher thought it would be a good idea) for Thursday, but it's not going too well.

At least it doesn't look like I will be failing this term, so that's something good... I guess.

Anyway, here's the best thing Jack has ever said: