A And A

Chapter 3

"You are so beautiful." Ashton says. I blush. "Thank you." I say. He wraps his arm around me and leans in to kiss me. "ALICE." My mother shouts as I open my eyes from my strange dream. Ugh no this can't happen. I run over to where I heard my mother's voice. She look at me. "It's time for breakfast." She says with a smile. I return the smile and sit in one of the chairs. "When you're done with that, you might wanna get dressed and brush your hair." She says. I look over at her. "Why? Is my hair really messy?" I ask. "Yes, and also you never know when someone will come by and I don't really know if you'd wanna answer like that." She says. I nod. Answer the door? Wait. My eyes widen. "Mom! Ashton, Michael, Calum, and Luke are comming over!" I shout. I eat my breakfast as quick as possible and run to my room to get ready.

For the first time since I met these boys. I don't know what to wear. I finally end up wearing a pink tank top and blue shorts. I decide to leave my hair down today, no matter how darn hot it is. I put some light blush on and lipstick... What am I doing? I never wear makeup around them. This is so unlike me. I immediately put it back down.

"We're going to the beach if you wanna come." My mom says opening the door. "Oh no, like I said the boys are coming over. " I say. She gives me the same weird look as yesterday. "Okay. Have fun, I guess." She says. "Bye I love you." She says. "Love you too bye." I say. She leaves. I hear the front door close and I know they are gone. So I am here left alone with my thoughts until the boys show up. I think about Ashton for a minute. I think it's become clear now that I definitely have feelings for him, I just wish I had known sooner. Now I'm in too deep and I don't wanna risk losing him just because I have feelings for him. I can't let that happen. 

I hear a knock at the door and run to answer it. I see all four of the boys. They must have worked out a time together or something. "Hey guys, come on in!" I say. Calum walks in and gives me a quick hug. So does Luke and Michael. When Ashton walks in, he stares at me for a moment, then smiles and hugs me quickly too, but not as quick as the other four. Or maybe it just felt that way to me...

Or...

Maybe Ashton knows what happened with me yesterday... If so, then I need to fix it and act like I did before... Even though I may not be the same again. "We got you Christmas presents!" Calum says. He hands me a small wrapped box, and so does Michael. Luke hands me what kinda looks like a wrapped cd, and Ashton hands me a smallish box and smiles.

"We have something for your sister too." Luke says. Really? My sister too? They hand me what looks like a clothes box. "You told us your sister likes our band so we took one of our t-shirts and signed it." Michael says. I smile. "You guys are the best. She'll love it!" I say.

"It was Ashton's idea." Michael says. "Well it was a great idea Ash." I say. He smiles and then his expression quickly changes. "Wait your sister's not here is she? I don't want her to hear what she's getting." He says. "She and my parents are at the beach." I say. "Oh okay good." He says.

I place the presents over where the others are and we all hang out in the kitchen. "Would you guys like something to eat or drink?" I ask. Ashton asks for a Red bull, Calum asks for water, Michael calls him lame and asks for a red bull too, and Luke a coke.

"Thanks for coming over yesterday." Ashton says. "Well I couldn't say no to my best friend!" I say. He smiles widely. "Wait you went to his house?" Luke asks. I nod. Luke and Calum look at each other weird. "What did you guys do over there?" Calum asks. "We just hung out a bit. It was fun cause I got to meet Lauren, Harry, Mrs.Irwin, and Indie." I say.

" Ash can I talk to you for a minute?" Luke asks. Ashton nods and stands up. They both leave. "What was that about?" I ask. " Dude I don't know. Calum and Luke have been acting weird since we got here. " Michael says. Calum rolls his eyes. "No we haven't." Calum says. I laugh. "What!?" I hear Ashton angrily yell. Luke and Ashton return to the room. Ashton looks kinda upset and Luke has a goofy grin. I decide not to ask what the yelling was about.

My phone starts ringing so I pick it up. It's my mom. "Quiet it's my mom." I say and immediately regret it. All four of them get stupid grins. Great "Hey sweetie just checking in on you, what's up?" She says. "The boys came over and they're drinking soda, energy drinks, and water." I say. "Oh. How are they?" She asks. "HEY ALICE I DIDN'T KNOW YOU DRANK BEER!" Michael yells. Luckily my mother didn't seem to hear.

I walk out of the room because it looks like Luke's about to yell something too and I don't want to know what it is. "Well about a minute ago Luke and Ashton went off to talk and Ashton came back looking upset, Luke had a goofy grin, Michael seems fine and he thinks Calum's being weird. So, I have no idea." I say.

I turn around and see Ashton right behind me. I hope he doesn't say anything that would make my mother upset. "So tell me again. Do you or do you not think Ashton's hot?" She says. Oh shoot. She does this a lot, but now wasn't the time. I hope so badly he didn't hear. He gets a funny smile on his face and crosses his arms and raises his eyebrows at me as he leans closer to me. "Well?" He says quietly making it even harder to answer. " I'm not answering that. " I say.

"That means yes doesn't it?" My mom says. Dangit. Can she please stop now? "Mom can we not talk about this? I mean he's standing right in front of me." I say at hopes she'll get the hint. "Unless it's on speaker you shouldn't have anything to worry about. Now tell me again about how hot you think he is." She says. Ashton's stupid grin gets bigger. Okay that's it. "Mom I think we're br..eak..ing up OK lo..ve y..ou b..ye" I say and hang up before she could answer.

"Ignore her." I say. "So... You think I'm hot?" Ashton says. "Pssh.. no." I say. He laughs. " How come your mum thought you thought that if it's not true?" He says. I groan. "I must have said it a long time ago before we became friends I used to sort of... never mind." I say and run into the kitchen. I walk in and Calum gives me a weird look. "You okay?" He asks. I nod. I hope I don't look upset. Ashton then runs in behind me. "Do you think I'm hot?" He asks. The boys give us really weird looks. I think of something clever to say. "Look, I'm your best friend, I'm not blind." I say. "So is that a yes?" He asks. "Okay yeah." I say. I feel my cheeks heat up so I turn away and walk over to the counter. "Oh.. Are you embarrassed?" Ashton asks. "Well, I just called my best friend hot to his face so... yeah just a little." I say, a bit more sarcastic than planned.

He puts his hand on my shoulder and my heart race increases again. "I'm sorry I made you embarrassed. You don't have to be." He says. I roll my eyes and turn towards him. "And why is that, Ashton? Not to mention you already know you're hot why would you make me say it?" I say. I admit, I wasn't being too nice there, but neither was him making me say it. He looks a little upset. "I don't know why I did that. I'm sorry. And you don't have to be embarrassed because I think you're really... uh... hotiful." He says. "Hotiful?" I ask. "Yeah, it's a combination between hot and beautiful!" He says with a big smile. It's hard to fight off my own smile. "If you think making up words is gonna make me stop being mad at you then you are incorrect." I joke. He sticks his bottom lip out and pouts. "Pleaassseee forgive me." He begs. I dramatically roll my eyes. "Oh fine." I say with a smile. "Yay!" He says and hugs me. I wish he would stop doing that. It's just gonna make my heart rate increase again and he'll find out. I'm sure he can feel it.

"Well that was weird and unnecessary." Michael says. I roll my eyes at him. "Don't worry about it Alice. He's just jealous that he's not as cool as us." Ashton says and does a strange pose. He's so weird, but I like that about him. "I wish I had videod that." Michael says. Everyone laughs. Maybe it won't be so hard to pretend nothing happened when Ashton and I hugged. "Can you believe tomorrow's Christmas eve? This year's gone by too fast." I say. The others nod. "There's so much cooking we have to do tomorrow." Calum says. "Wow you're lucky. Your mum makes great food." Luke says. "Not so lucky if you have to make it all day as well." Calum says. "That's how I'm spending my Christmas eve."

The boys go home around 5 and promise not to open their gifts till the day after tomorrow. My family arrives home half an hour later. Time goes by pretty quick after that and before I know it I'm laying in my bed thinking about what Ashton said earlier. Does he really think I'm hot and beautiful? The thought gives me butterflies. I wish I had acted less scared. If Calum had asked me if I thought he was hot the way Ashton did, I would have told him to get over himself, but that yes he is indeed hot. Now I can never answer that question normally again, without coming across strange. Everything is so complicated right now. I wonder why Ashton and Luke went off to talk. What did they talk about and why did Ashton yell and why did Luke look like that when he came back? If only I could just ask them.