Ash’s POV

I had survived a full week of school and it was finally Friday; a day to relax and do nothing. Alex hadn’t talked to me much and sometimes even avoided me. I like him more when he was being mean than when he was ignoring me. This was just creepy and I didn’t know what I had done wrong. Luckily I still had Lianne. Now that Alex didn’t want me around at all, I hung out with her. Alex didn’t bother me about it, so I got to do whatever I wanted.

So, as I said before, my plan was to do literally nothing this evening. Alex’s parents were out until tomorrow afternoon and I had ordered pizza for myself, which I was eating while doodling in a sketchbook I had. I was playing my weird playlist whenever I wasn’t in a specific mood. It had both punk and classical music; the two genres I actually liked.

There was a knock on my door and Alex entered, “umm, hey.”

“Hi,” I said with my mouthful and picked up the box of pizza, “want a slice of pizza?”

“Uh, yeah, sure,” he ripped of one of the pieces, making him stand fully in the room, “thanks.”

“Since when do you say ‘thanks’ to me?”

“Since you gave me free pizza,” he rolled his eyes as if he was stating the obvious.

“So what do you want?” I continued doodling the wierd cartoon monster I was drawing.

“We, umm, are having a party downstairs, and umm, I forgot to tell you, but yeah…” he looked so awkward as if he was hiding something from me.

“Ok, I get it. I’ll stay up here so your friends don’t have to see me.”

“I, umm, actually wanted to ask you if you, umm, uh, wanted to, umm, come as well?”

“Oh,” he really surprised me with that, “umm…”

“I promise my mom and dad know about this. They even bought the alcohol,” it sounded like he was trying to defend himself.

“Ok, I wasn’t going to say anything about that, but nice to know.”

“It must suck to not be able to drink legally, right?” he forced out a chuckle, “you know, age limit in Germany is 16, here it’s 21.”

“I don’t drink,” I told him bluntly.

“Oh,” his face went pink and he tried striking a casual pose, “I mean, there’s also other stuff…”

“I think I’ll pass, Alex,” I tried being as polite as possible, “I might come downstairs for a second or so, but I don’t really party.”

“Oh, ok… umm, I’ll go then.”

“Thanks for inviting me, though.”

“No problem.”

What was wrong with him? He seemed so nervous and kept stumbling over his words. Looking back at everything, his parents probably had forced him to ask me to come as well. I could just tell he didn’t want me there. The messing up his speech was because he just didn’t want to talk to me. Why would he ask me to come to his party after not talking to me for an entire week?

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Alex’s POV

I went back to the living room where Jack, Zack, and Rian were waiting. They came here to help me set everything up and asked me whether I had asked Ash to come or not. When I said no, they went ballistic. I just thought it was common sense for her to come. She lived here, why would I have to ask her to come? But they forced me to go upstairs and ask her.

I know, I had been avoiding her for the entire week. The car ride to school was always so awkward. She would try to talk to me, but I couldn’t answer. I was too afraid to mess up. Realising you actually have feeling for someone can be pretty alarming. I just needed to get over her. This was just a schoolboy crush, nothing else.

“How did it go?” Rian put the last solo cups in the kitchen.

“Terrible,” I groaned and cringed inside thinking about what I said to her, “I fucked up. I did this weird stupid laugh,” I tried doing the same cringeworthy chuckle, “what the fuck is that! She looked at me like I was crazy.”

“You got a slice of pizza, though,” he pointed at the pizza I was still holding, making me take a bite, “that must mean something.”

“No, it doesn’t. She offered it to me as soon as I came in, it could have been anyone that got it,” I flopped down on the couch and groaned in despair.

Jack came from the basement, having gotten stuff ready there, “is she coming?”

“No,” I moaned, “stop rubbing in my face that I fucking messed up!”

“You got some pizza, though.”

“Why is everybody mentioning the pizza!”

“I’m not mentioning the pizza,” Zack piped up. I really didn’t know where he came from or what he was doing, but he was here as well.

“You just mentioned the pizza,” I whined and rolled off the couch.

“What’s wrong with him?” A voice came from the stairs.

I looked up to see Ash. A god. This was fucking embarrassing. Here I was, throwing myself a fucking pity party about the girl that was standing right in front of us. I couldn’t cover this up; I looked like a fucking idiot. Why couldn’t I just be normal! She was never going to like someone who acted this weirdly. Nobody liked shit like that!

“Period pains,” Jack blurted out. Why the fuck would he use that as an excuse! That was the stupidest thing he could say-

“Ah,” Ash nodded and walked past us, probably going to throw the pizza box away, “been there, done that.”

When she turned the corner I glared at Jack, “what the fuck was that!”

He raised his hands in defense, “I’m just trying to cover up for you. You’re never a whiny bitch like this. You’ve got it really bad.”

Ash came back out, having heard the last part, “they say masurbation help with the cramps. I don’t know. Maybe you could go on instagram and find some pictures again.”

“What?” Jack asked, but I knew exactly what she was referring to.

She looked at me before disappearing upstairs, “I saw your screen. It’s actually pretty disgusting, don’t ever do that again, please.”

“What was that about?” Jack looked at me with wide eyes.

I got up slowly, “nothing…”

“You did not,” Zack gasped.

“He totally did,” Jack smirked while I was trying to hide my flushed face.

“What are you guys talking about? I have no clue what she was talking about. Rian do you know what she was talking about? They seem to know,” I did not want to talk about this. Normally I wouldn’t be embarrassed, but this was really bad. Why would Ash do this to me!

“Oh, I do know,” Rian grinned smugly and nodded.

“You see, she hates me!” I exclaimed, “she wouldn’t have said anything if she liked me. I didn’t need anybody knowing this!”

Everybody kept staring at me. What? Did I say something wrong?

I groaned and went to get the last things ready, “I just need to get laid, I don’t actually like her.”

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Ash’s POV

Loud music and booming bases were filling the house. I could hear people talking, screaming, and singing. The entire school was probably here, yet I was still upstairs. But I actually didn’t mind. I didn’t like how loud everything and everyone was being. Things were going crazy and I was once again hiding away. I never went to parties back in Germany. People would get too drunk and things would always go wrong.

I only dared to go downstairs when things started to quiet down. Sure, I wasn’t wearing the most attractive clothes - a sweatshirt and blue jeans, and my hair was messed up and in a ponytail - but I was really thirsty and I wasn’t going to dare drink some water out of the bathroom tap. Who knew what Alex had done in there. He did a lot of disgusting things, including looking a pictures of me. It was obvious he only wanted sex.

I creeped out of my room, locking the door behind myself; I wasn’t going to dare have anybody go in there and do stuff. The party had died down quite a bit, but there were still quite a lot of people. Most of them looked pretty drunk. Jack was making out with some girl on the couch, Rian and Zack were each talking to some friends, and Alex was nowhere to be seen. He probably already went upstairs and was having sex with some poor girl. Or so I thought.

He suddenly appeared in front of me, “Ash! You came,” he was completely wasted and was being very touchy-feely, “you have no idea how much I wanted you to come!”

“Great,” I tried walking past him so I could go to the fridge and get some nice cool water.

But he stopped me by sloppily placing his hands on my shoulders, “no, really. I really really wanted you to come.”

He swayed from side to side and I tried getting him off me again. But instead he leaned forward and tried to kiss me. I gave him a weird look and moved backwards, pushing his face away with my hand. What was he even trying to do? He was so drunk that he actually thought he wanted to kiss me. This was actually pretty funny.

“Ooh! Alex got rejected!” A girl shouted as she raised her beer bottle.

I ignored everybody else’s calls and hollers and went to get the water I came all this way for. After finding a bottle, I maneuverered through the crowd, trying to leave unnoticed. But something was bugging me. After I had pushed Alex away he actually seemed upset. But he couldn’t be. The alcohol was just playing with his mind.

Notes

So Alex has been acting really awkward around Ash, will he be able to fix this? And he tried to kiss her! Like woah there, Alex, calm down and take it slow! He's left Ash so confused. She doesn't seem to have the same feelings though... Will Ashlex ever happen?

School started again today. One week of vacation wasn't enough! I barely slept the last three days, so I'm basically already dead. Just two more weeks and I'll have a couple of days off again because Easter is coming soon (yay?). But that also mean school will be really busy. WHY SO CRUEL!

By the way. Never ever mention the pizza