The Jerks Next Door || Ashton Irwin [5 Seconds Of Summer]

Chapter 24 | Woah

Ashley POV

Al closed the door behind her, giving me a look that meant she was giving me the same advice that I had previously given her: Don't do anything you'll regret. 

I turned, expecting Ashton to still be sitting on the couch where I had left him, and was surprised to find him no where in sight. I half-heartedly assumed that he had gone to the restroom or something, and sat down on the couch, turning the TV on. Though my eyes were trailing over Ray Romano's face on the television, my mind was completely elsewhere.

After a little over five minutes, I decided that I should go find Ashton. I quietly went into the kitchen to see if he would be there, but saw that the entire room lay untouched. I went upstairs, tip-toeing for a reason unkown to me, but it felt like the right thing to do.

I checked the bathroom: empty; Al's bedroom: empty; my bedroom: empty. I didn't know where else he could be because he couldn't have left. As I paced around the hallway, I thought of one more place I hadn't checked. The closet.

For some reason, when Al and I had moved in, there was a tiny room (or, as Al and I call it, a closet) randomly placed in the wall of the hallway. We didn't really need to use it as we both had fully functioning closets in our own rooms, so we put all of our cleaning supplies inside of it. I was still convinced that the previous owners of the apartment had used the closet as some escape to Narnia. Al obviously disagreed.

But now that I thought about it, I didn't see where else he could have gone. So I slowly inched towards the closet, not making a noise. As I got closer, I heard whispering and was momentarily confused as to who he could be talking to. Then I realized that he was talking to himself.

"You can do this. You can do this.... You can't do this at all. What are you thinking, you idiot? Stupid. Stupid!"

I decided that I should make my presence known. I cleared my throat loudly and heard a sudden crash from inside the closet. There went the cleaning supplies. "Ashton?" I asked nervously. "Are you okay?"

I reached to open the door, but the knob was locked from the inside.

I knocked quickly. "Ash?" I asked, trying to coax him out. It wasn't my place to use his nickname, but I was a fan, so I knew that the boys called him that. But I had no idea why he had gone in there in the first place.

I heard fumbling then more supplies fall down. I heard him swear, and I knew that something had hit him.

My knocks became more desperate. "Please come out! What's wrong?"

His voice came out but it was forced. "I'm fine. Hold on."

A few moments later, the door was wrenched open. Ashton was in sight, biting his lip and holding his arm behind his back. His eyes never met mine.

"You're definitely not fine. Show me your arm," I commanded him, holding my hand out.

He reluctantly put his arm into mine and I gasped. I single cut went down his left arm, starting just under his shoulder and ending in the middle of his forearm.

"This is fine? Come on, I have to fix you up."

I then dragged him down the stairs and into the kitchen, making sure not to harm him any more than he already was. I forced him down into a seat and gave him a serious glare to stay there and not move while I went to get the first aid kit.

I came back into the kitchen after finding it and saw him sitting obediently in the same chair, glancing at his arm every so often, looking in a lot of pain.

"What did you do to yourself?"

He looked up at me. "The dustpan fell on me. It's surprisingly sharp." He gave a weak smile but his eyes never left mine.