❝I don't care what's at risk. I am going to murder that bastard.❞
NEARLY SIX YEARS have passed since Ashton's been to this God-forsaken place. Merely sitting in the driveway staring up at the massive house brings back his darkest memories. Eighteen years of living with wealthy parents who harbored indigent hearts.
There was his father who refused to acknowledge his existence. Never speaking a word to him. Never even looking at him. Ashton can barely recall a single one of his father's features.
Then there's his mother. The woman who claimed to love her family while running off with Sophia's father every chance she got. The woman who pretends to be a parent whenever she feels like it.
A parent is supposed to be a teacher and your best friend. You love them and they love you back. If your parents die, you're supposed to be overwhelmed with complete and utter devastation. Grief beyond imagine. Agony. A pain that is indescribable. It's like losing a piece of your life.
Yet Ashton feels absolutely nothing.
There was not a single pull of emotion when his mother told him the news. Hearing his father died is like hearing a complete stranger died.
"Are you going to be okay?" Ria places a gentle touch to his thigh as they continue to sit in her car. She's been hesitant over the situation, not saying much, probably in fear of saying the wrong thing.
"I'm fine." He shrugs. "I honestly don't care. I just don't want to go into that damn house again."
Too many memories reside here. Times he experimented new drugs that Vivian brought to him. Times she'd sneak into this house, broken and battered, searching for comfort. Long nights when his parents filled the hollow walls with their screams, arguing over whose affair was worst.
Pain sears his very soul. His skin is too tight. Uncomfortable. He itches to shed a layer and free himself of this torture.
I don't want to be here.
"We can wait for Sophia and Dea to get here," she whispers.
"No." Ashton swallows his pain and burns the memories that corrode in the back of his mind. "Let's just get this over with."
Together, they climb out of her car. Ria is quick to stand by his side and slips her hand into his, giving it a reassuring squeeze. They approach the massive suburban home that's still picture-perfect like it was plucked from a home and living magazine. Only he knows of the horrors that rested inside this place.
When they reach the burgundy front door, Ashton rings the doorbell. They wait. Mere seconds later, Charlotte swings it open. Shadows encircle her red eyes. Her skin is pasty white. She looks awful. Sickly.
"Ashton," she exhales with relief and her lips pull up into a half-smile. Though the expression falters when her eyes flick to Ria. "You," she trails off and shock molds her aging face. "You're the mute woman."
"I'm not mute," Ria speaks softly. "I'm his girlfriend."
"B-but that was nearly a year ago." A scowl digs into her expression. "You're still together?"
"Mom, this isn't important." Ashton fights to keep the annoyance out of his voice.
"O-of course." She blinks rapidly and steps back. "Please, come in. Your father is in the living room."
Ashton hesitates as they pass the threshold. The house is warmer than outside, yet he still gets chills. "What do you mean?"
"I-I didn't know what to do with his body," Charlotte stumbles over her thoughts and moves frantically to relieve them of their coats and scarves. She hangs them by the door with shaky hands. "I had him c-cremated and he's been in the living room ever since. Joseph has been sleeping over to give me company-"
"Are you kidding me?" Ashton snaps at the mere mention of that bastard's name.
Charlotte flinches and runs shaky hands down her jeans. "I-I know it isn't right. I just can't be alone in this house. It's so big and e-empty and I'm so terrified." Icy eyes plead for him to understand.
He will never understand his mother's attachment to that low-life.
"Joseph is the reason this family fell apart!" He fights back his urge to vomit. Even in the wake of her husband's death, she seeks comfort in her affair.
"No." She shakes her head and presses her fingers into her eyes. "I'm the reason. It's my fault. I'm the one who had Sophia. I shouldn't have had an affair. My affair is the reason Michael didn't love us. W-why he never spoke to you." Tears fall down her tired face and her voice trembles under the weight of unbearable remorse. "I'm so sorry, son. It's too late to make things better now b-because he's dead. It's all my f-fault," she chokes out and begins to sob.
Unease passes through Ashton. The emotion tightening in his chest makes it almost impossible to breathe. He's not sure what emotion. He just knows he's never seen his mother in a weak position before. She's never cried. She's never apologized for anything. Seeing her like this awakens a dismal storm to rain over his frenzied thoughts.
What do I do?
Ria squeezes his hand and pushes it forward, urging him to get closer to his mother.
So he does. As Charlotte's shoulders shake and she covers her face, trying to hide her guilt, he slowly wraps his arms around her. Not because he loves her or feels bad. Rather, because she needs it and she is his mother.
It's a foreign sensation. He's never embraced his mother before.
Charlotte claws onto his shirt and cries. She sobs out her guilt and how awful she feels. She blames herself for everything and apologizes profusely.
Ashton listens. Even if it took death for her to come to terms with this.
"How did he die?" Ashton asks softly, rubbing her back with staggering motions.
"D-drug overdose," she blubbers. "God, he was worse than you with his addiction."
Ashton's heart stops and so does his movements. Addiction? There's no way his father was an addict.
"I found him passed out in the bedroom," Charlotte continues, growing more hysterical with each recollection. "I-I tried to wake him up. I didn't want to believe he was really gone, but he never moved, Ashton. He wasn't breathing and I didn't know what to do. He was just limp. Lying there."
The world around him disappears. A memory so vivid it could be reoccurring invades Ashton's mind.
"What would I have done if I had lost you?" Daniel demands, face red with fury. "Do you realize how terrifying that was? You were just lying there dead, Ashton. If I hadn't found you in time, I would have lost you forever! Are you seriously going to leave me because some woman broke you?"
"I don't want to do this anymore, Dan," Ashton sobs weakly and covers his face in shame. "I can't be here anymore! Why did you save me? I didn't ask you to save me!"
He goes for the pills on the bathroom sink, but Dan is stronger and much faster. He snatches the bottle, pours them into the sink, and turns on the faucet. The drugs begin to drain and dissolve.
"Why are you doing this?" Ashton yells and attempts to salvage the drugs as they disappear. "I just want to die, Daniel! I have nothing. No family. Vivian left me. I've killed people just like me. I can't live with myself anymore, Daniel. I-I can't do it."
There are so many demons around me. They haunt me. Laugh and taunt me so much that I can't sleep at night. I can't live with them anymore.
"You have me, Ashton. Goddammit, listen." Daniel grabs his arms and forces his back against a wall.
Ashton is forced to look up at his distraught friend with shame and disgust in his heart. He doesn't want to be here. He doesn't want to live like this.
"You have me and Dea. We care about you and we will always be here for you." Daniel pleads with his eyes for Ashton to understand. Never has so much emotion been in this man's voice as he utters, "You are not giving up. I can't lose you. I just can't."
"Ashton?" Ria's soft voice touches the outskirts of his consciousness.
He blinks hard and fast, removing himself from that dismal time of his life.
Yet the memory poses a daunting question.
Had his father been like him? What if he overdosed on purpose? Now he's just gone. Left this world with a wife and child lingering across the plains.
What if Daniel hadn't found me?
What if my depression pushed me too far one day?
He looks at Ria in horror. I could have left her behind.
Suddenly, moisture stings his eyes as he stares at the love of his life. The love that stares back at him, waiting to be there for him in any way that she can. The love that shares his pain so that life won't be so hard for him.
All those times I was using drugs, I was risking leaving her forever.
Bile rises in his throat and suddenly he's sick to his stomach. He's never felt so disgusted with the idea of taking another dose of drugs before in his life. Now Ashton knows for sure, he'll never ever relapse into such a dangerous habit again. He can't.
Not just for Ria or Vivian, but because he doesn't want to die. He doesn't want to end up like his father. There is so much life he has to live. It's not worth risking for a few hours of escape that could become permanent.
"Do you..." Ashton clears his raspy throat and looks down at his mother who still bows her head and cries softly. "What drugs was he taking?"
"Everything," she croaks and lifts her head. "I hid his stash from the police. I only let them see the cocaine. H-he shouldn't have to leave this world with such a bad reputation."
Ashton says nothing to this but follows Charlotte as she leads them down familiar halls. Vast and hollow. No family pictures or memories hang on the cream-colored walls. They climb upstairs towards the bedrooms. He deliberately keeps his gaze forward, ignoring where his once was.
His room held too many horrendous nights alone with his parent's screams to fill the silence. Too many nights with a beaten and slightly drugged up Vivian searching for his comfort.
When Charlotte leads them to her room, she goes into their grand closet, flicks on a light and begins digging around. Ria stands next to him again and slides her hand down his arm before slipping it into his hand. She doesn't say anything, but he can feel her asking him if he's okay.
He's not.
He never thought he'd be back in this place again. He never thought he had so much in common with his father. Never in a million years did he imagine he'd be comforting his mother.
Yet here he is.
When Charlotte steps out of the closet, she holds a small black shoe box and hands it to Ashton. "He did everything you could think of. Him and his...mistress."
Ashton sets the box on their king-sized bed and lifts the top. The first thing is the bag of cocaine. He refrains from breathing. His limbs freeze as he stares at the logo on the bag.
A fancy black V is engraved in the plastic. Poisonous vines are wrapped around it with blood dripping from the sides.
Ashton knows this logo too well.
"Vincent," he breathes and rage slowly boils through him. "Vincent did this." He turns around to Ria whose hazel eyes are wide and terrified. "That's it," he declares, voice falling dangerously low. "I don't care what's at risk, Ria. I am going to murder that bastard."
"H-how do you know it was him?" she asks with so much desperation her voice cracks.
"This" — he shoves the bag in her face — "is his fucking brand. He sold these drugs to my father. He killed him trying to get to me." He drives a trembling hand through his hair and laughs. "Even if I don't care about him, the bastard still killed someone in my family. What if he had killed my mom?"
"We don't know this, Ashton." Ria grabs his wrists and tries to make him look at her. "Maybe he just knew Vincent through you."
"Bullshit." He pulls away from her and begins pacing around the space between them. "He must have given him a stronger dosage or laced it with something." He whirls to Charlotte with desperation in his gaze. "Did they say it was just an overdose? Nothing else was found in his system? How high was his intake?"
"I-I don't know," she stutters, avoiding his hysterical gaze. "I don't think so. They would have tried to interrogate me otherwise, right?"
Ashton shakes his head. "He's messing with me. He's trying to draw me out."
Ria parts her reddish lips to further deny this. "Ashto-"
The doorbell resonates through the house and everyone freezes. The room becomes deathly silent and Ashton nearly forgets how to breathe.
Was this a trap?
"That must be Sophia," Ria whispers hopefully.
Charlotte gives her a look of pure horror and holds her fingers to her mouth. "Sophia?"
"She's with Dea. They're coming to support him," Ria utters without much enthusiasm. She seems quieter, weaker than normal.
"B-but I can't see her. I haven't seen her in years," Charlotte declares hysterically. "Oh my..." She covers her face and cowers back into a far corner of the room. "She can't know that I'm here," she hisses. "She can't know. She can't know. She can't. She can't."
The doorbell rings again. This time, Ashton is out of the room and downstairs in a flash. When he reaches the door, he checks through the peephole to see none other than Daniel waiting on the porch bundled up in a black trench coat.
"This son of a-" Ashton swings the door open and glowers. "What the fuck are you doing here?"
Daniel doesn't flinch. He fixes Ashton with a hard expression and drags in a deep breath, expanding his chest and broad shoulders. "I heard about your dad from Dea."
"I don't need your support," he spits. "You can go. I can't believe you have the audacity to show your face to me."
Pain creases Daniel's face and he steps closer, but Ashton doesn't move an inch.
"Ash, you're my best friend and-"
"Are you joking?"
"You can't stop me from being there for you."
"Sure the hell I can. Get out."
"Ashton..." Ria's voice touches the air weakly behind him.
"One minute," he grumbles, but keeps his glare fast on Daniel. "You have no right to be here. Go before I literally make you leave."
"You won't hurt me," Daniel rasps. "We're like brothers, come on." He extends a hand that slightly wavers.
"Don't come any closer," Ashton growls, making him flinch.
"Ashton," Ria's voice comes again. "I-"
"Ria," he says over his shoulder, "give me a minute to handle this, please."
Daniel's eyes flick to behind Ashton and widen. Shock forms in his murky irises. Ashton's heart skips and he turns around to see Ria appearing so much paler than she had before. Her gaze loses focus as she stumbles towards him.
"Ria?" he asks, suddenly panicking and reaches out for her just as she faints and falls limp in his arms.
Oh noo 🙊 Ria passed out. What ever could that mean???
Sorry if this chapter is trashy, I am currently sick and very bleh atm and did not edit a thing.
Sooo Daniel popped up...
I just want to make clear that even though he is a sociopath it is very possible for him to pick what he cares about in life (Ashton and Dea) but still lack empathy and be manipulative. He can mimic certain emotions that he knows are appropriate during empathetic situations.
I know its been eons, but thoughts on Charlotte?
Think Vincent was involved with Ashton's father's death?
-bri💕