"You're going to pass out, Luke, knock it off." Ashley said, gently slapping Luke on the knee. He was rocking back and forth on his chair, his breathing heavy and uneven, while everyone else in the classroom went about their usual business.
"I got two hours of sleep last night, two." Luke stressed, looking back up at Ashley. His eyes were burning and they hurt to even keep open, and he felt like he was going to faint any second now. "I have a huge Chemistry test today and a mountain of homework to make up when I get home. I'm gonna die."
"You're not going to die." Ashley sighed. She glanced around the English room again, making sure that no one was paying attention. "This is your fault, you know."
"I know, I know." Luke groaned, rubbing his eyes again. "God, I'm so stupid."
"Why did you stay up so late?" Ashley questioned. This wasn't the first time he'd come to school practically in tears because he hadn't gotten any sleep the night before. He could barely function on only a few hours of sleep, but it was something that was completely out of his control.
"I couldn't sleep." Luke groaned. "I tried but I had a bad dream and then I woke up and couldn't fall back asleep again."
"Aw, you had a nightmare." Ashley pouted. Luke felt like she was making fun of him, so he just sighed and looked down at his lap.
"It's not funny." He said, shaking his head.
"I know, I don't think it's funny at all." Ashley said, but Luke still thought that she was being sarcastic. "I'm sorry that you couldn't fall asleep, Luke, and I wish that I could help you but unfortunately I can not."
"You can write me a fake doctor's note to get out of school for the day." Luke pouted. He rested his head in his hands and sighed, trying hard to keep his eyes open.
"Just ditch." Ashley shrugged. "I can ditch too and drive you home."
"But I have a test." Luke answered quickly. He knew that Michael ditched class all the time and Ashton used to leave school early all the time, but Luke had never ditched school before and he didn't plan on starting. He'd had a pretty good attendance record for these last four years of high school and Luke didn't want to mess it up right now just because he was too stupid to get any sleep the night before.
"You can make up the test." Ashley said simply, shrugging again. "Did you even study for it?"
"No, I never need to." Luke said slowly. He rubbed his eyes again, trying to do something, anything, to wake himself up a little more.
"Okay, Luke. I'm not going to pressure you into doing anything that you're not comfortable with - "
"Oh my God, are we gonna have sex?" Luke mumbled tiredly, not even seeming very enthusiastic about this.
"Shut up!" Ashley groaned. "Wouldn't you rather take the afternoon off, go home and sleep a little, then come back tomorrow and retake your test? Or do you want to take it while you're, like, a zombie?"
"I do not want to take my test while I'm a zombie." Luke sighed. "I can't ditch, though, my mom will get mad at me."
"I can call you in. You said it yourself, I sound very motherly, the lady at the office will totally believe that I'm your mom." Ashley smiled. Luke could tell that Ashley had done something like this before, either with her own friends or just herself.
"I don't know, Ashley." Luke said, hesitating a little. He'd never cut class or left school early before and the whole thing made him really nervous. What if he got caught? "Maybe I can just take a quick power nap in the library during lunch - "
"Luke, come on. You're still eating lunch in the library?" Ashley sighed, brushing some hair away from her face. Luke nodded slowly, slightly embarrassed. "Okay, we can talk about that later. Anyway, I think that your best bet here is to just go home and get some sleep."
"But my mom - "
"I'm sure that if your mom finds out - and I say if, Luke, because she won't - she'll understand completely. You just can't make a kid take a test when they got no sleep the night before. It's cruel and unusual punishment." Ashley explained quickly.
Luke could tell that Ashley was a lot more excited about the idea of ditching than he was. She probably got some sort of thrill from this, whereas the only reason why Luke was even considering skipping school was so he could get a few hours of sleep.
"It sounds like you just want an excuse to leave school." Luke said, folding his arms over his chest.
"Okay, fine, I do." Ashley sighed, her cheeks tinting pink. "There's this guy in my fifth period class that I'm really trying to avoid."
"Oh, okay - A guy? What guy? Who is he? Why would you need to avoid him? Did he do something? Do I need to beat him up?" Luke asked quickly, a little caught off guard.
He didn't think that Ashley talked to any boys except him and occasionally Michael when she was yelling at him. The thought of Ashley and another guy interesting made Luke feel funny.
"Sweetie, you can't beat anyone up." Ashley chuckled. She shrugged, trying to brush this conversation off. "He's just this annoying kid that sits behind me, it's no big deal."
"If it's not a big deal then why are you trying to avoid him?" Luke questioned. He looked at the clock and noticed that there was only a couple minutes left of class, so Luke began to pack up his things.
"Well, he asked me out the other day and I say no." Ashley said slowly, almost like she was ashamed of herself.
"Why would you do that?" Luke gasped.
"Because I didn't want to go out on a date with him?" Ashley explained, sounding as if she was a little confused about it herself. "He wanted to take me to a movie, and movies make bad first dates."
"Oh, they do?" Luke asked, completely clueless. He was glad that Ashley had told him this, otherwise he may have made the mistake of asking a girl to go see a movie with him somewhere along the road.
"Yes!" Ashley groaned, frustrated with how stupid Luke was sometimes.
"That's a good tip." Luke mumbled to himself. The bell rang and Luke got up from his desk, immediately feeling dizzy at how fast he'd stood up. "I can't do this, I need to go home."
"Yay!" Ashley cheered, clapping her hands together. She grabbed Luke's hand, lacing their fingers together, as she pulled him out of the classroom and down the hall.
It'd been about two weeks since Ashley and Luke had gone out with Charlie and Ashton, A.K.A when they awkwardly held hands in the back of Ashton's care on the way home. Since then they'd both gotten a lot more comfortable with these things, like holding hands and cuddling and sharing clothes. Luke liked it, in a "we're-just-friends-so-nothing's-ever-gonna-happen" way.
They stopped at Luke's locker so he could get some books and his coat (it was this puffy jacket that Ashley called "obnoxiously adorable"), then went to Ashley's locker to collect her things, and soon enough the two of them were slipping out the back door of the school and making their way to Ashley's car.
"Wait." Luke said once they were in Ashley's car, realizing something for the first time. "Can we go to your house? My mom will be home."
"Yeah, of course." Ashley nodded. She turned on the radio, which was already blasting the Taylor Swift mix CD that Luke had made for Ashley a few weeks ago.
"Will your parents mind?" Luke asked. He felt bad for inviting himself over, but he really hadn't thought this through. If they went to his own house Luke's mom would definitely be there and catch them, and Luke didn't think that she would be very happy.
"No, I don't think they'll even be home until later." Ashley shrugged.
Luke liked the way that Ashley was so casual about this, and her staying so calm was keeping Luke calm as well. If he had decided to ditch school with one of his other friends, like Calum or Michael, Luke would definitely have a panic attack.
"We should go to a Taylor Swift concert together." Luke said, leaning back in the passenger seat. He really should have been trying to sleep, but it was hard to when Ashley was playing his favorite song.
"No." Ashley answered quickly.
"Please?" Luke whined.
"No." She repeated.
"Okay." Luke nodded. "Can I finger - "
"No." Ashley snapped, quickly looking over to Luke and sending him a glare.
"Okay." Luke said again, nodding slowly to himself.
"If you get me tickets to a One Direction concert I'll let you finger me right then and there." Ashley added, catching Luke completely off guard.
"At the One Direction concert?" Luke gasped, trying to clarify for himself.
"No, no. At your house, before the concert." Ashley laughed, once again acting totally casual about something that Luke was getting way too excited about.
"I don't have enough money to get us One Direction tickets." Luke pouted, staring down at his lap.
"Exactly." Ashley giggled.
Luke glared at her and purposely turned up the volume on the radio a lot, which was something that he knew really annoyed Ashley. She hates when the music was too loud, especially when it was Taylor Swift.
It only took them a few minutes to get back to Ashley's house and when they did Luke cautiously got out of the car, still afraid that his mom was going to pop out of the bushes and skin him alive.
"Are you sure your parents will be cool with this?" Luke asked softly, reaching out for Ashley's hand as she walked behind him. Luke had only been over there a few times, but he felt that he knew Ashley well enough to be confident around her house.
"They won't care, honestly." Ashley said. She smiled up at Luke as they walked to the front door and Ashley unlocked it, both of them immediately kicking off their shoes as they walked inside.
Luke awkwardly rocked back and forth on his heels, waiting for Ashley to direct him to somewhere where he could go to sleep for a few hours.
"You should eat something." Ashley said, breaking the silence between them.
"Why?" Luke pouted. He just wanted to curl up in a ball and sleep, he didn't need food.
"One of the reasons why you feel all sick and dizzy is because you haven't eaten a lot today. I'll make you a sandwich." Ashley decided, turning around and heading towards the kitchen.
Ashley's house was nice, she lived on the rich side of town while Luke lived on the less-rich side and he was always secretly jealous of the people who lived around here. It wasn't fair that Luke and his mom had a shitty house and dumb people like Ashton and Michael got cool houses.
"How did you know I felt sick?" Luke asked, taking his time to look around a little as he walked into the kitchen.
"I can just tell." Ashley said blankly. She turned around and grabbed some stuff from the fridge, preparing to make Luke a sandwich.
"Oh yeah, you have those vibes." Luke said, letting out a nervous laugh.
"The vibes never lie." Ashley chuckled. Luke sat silently while Ashley made him a sandwich, admiring how fancy her kitchen was. When Ashley was done she set a plate down in front of Luke along with a glass of water. "Here you go."
"You're the best." Luke smiled widely at her, his stomach suddenly grumbling at the sight of food.
"I know." Ashley said playfully, flipping some hair over her should.
Luke practically inhaled his sandwich and drank two glasses of water before he felt satisfied enough, and he didn't want to admit it, but Ashley was right. The reason why Luke had felt so sick earlier was because he'd stayed awake all night and then only had half of a bagel for breakfast.
"That was the best sandwich I've ever eaten." Luke said, brushing a few crumbs off of his shirt.
"You're welcome." Ashley laughed, leaning up against the counter and folding her arms over her chest.
"Thank you." Luke said quickly, looking up at Ashley. He watched her as she stared down at her feet, giggling quietly to himself about how cute Ashley looked when her hair fell into her eyes.
"What are you laughing at?" Ashley asked softly, looking up from the floor.
"Your hair is pretty." Luke giggled, biting down on his bottom lip.
"Oh." Ashley blushed again, subconsciously tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. "Alright."
"Yeah." Luke nodded, also blushing.
"So..." Ashley trailed off, "Do you normally get really bad nightmares?"
"No, not really." Luke shrugged. "They were really bad when I was a kid, I had to be put on a medication so I could sleep though the night because I'd get so scared that I'd refuse to go back to bed."
"Is that kind of what happened last night?" Ashley questioned.
"I guess. They haven't been that bad lately, like, usually I'll just have a semi-scary dream and I'll be able to fall back asleep right away." Luke explained.
He usually wouldn't like talking to someone about this, he'd never told any of his other friends about the dreams he had. But Luke felt that he could trust Ashley and he wanted her to know these things about him, and he enjoyed the fact that she seemed so interested.
"What happens in the dreams?" She asked.
"Well, they're different every time." Luke sighed, rubbing the back of his neck as he tried to think of an example. "Sometimes I dream that I'm falling off of the top of a skyscraper and sometimes I dream that I'm being eaten by a bear."
"Wow. That's a pretty wide range." Ashley said, letting out a small chuckle.
"Yeah." Luke nodded. "The scariest ones are the ones that seem real, you know? Like, I've had dreams where my mom just packed up and left me all alone or I've been stranded by myself in an unfamiliar place. Those are the worst."
"What happened last night?" Ashley asked carefully.
"Uh, I don't remember." Luke said, not wanting to tell Ashley what his dream was really about. It was a lot more embarrassing than getting eaten by a bear.
"Oh, alright." Ashley nodded.
"I'm tired." Luke coughed, trying to change the topic of conversation. He hadn't meant to compliment Ashley like that, it just kind of came out. "Can I go sleep in the basement or something?"
"No, we can go in my room." Ashley shrugged. She pushed herself away from the counter and walked out of the kitchen again, Luke trailing after her.
As they passed by the front door again Luke heard it start to open, and he stopped dead in his tracks. He knew that someone was coming home and he knew that they were going to get caught. It was only 11:30 in the afternoon, Ashley and Luke were supposed to be in class right now, not here.
Ashley stood in front of Luke with her arms folded over her chest, totally unphased by this. She stayed staring at the door, waiting for whoever it was to enter the house.
"Oh, Ashley, you're home?" A middle-aged woman asked as she shut the door behind her, a confused expression on her face. Luke assumed that she was Ashley's mom, and he was scared that she'd start yelling soon.
"Yeah, we're taking the afternoon off." Ashley said, a blank tone in her voice. "This is Luke."
"Oh hi, Luke, I'm Ashley's mom, - "
"He doesn't care." Ashley said bitterly, cutting the woman off. "Luke doesn't feel good, so we're going to go upstairs for a while."
"He doesn't feel good? What's wrong, I can - "
"I can handle it myself, Helen, but thanks." Ashley cut her mom off again, startling Luke a bit. She wasn't usually this rude, Luke didn't know why Ashley was acting like this.
"Oh, okay. Well, let me know if you need anything." Helen nodded, and Ashley grabbed Luke's hand again, dragging him up the stairs with her.
"You call your mom by her first name?" Luke asked softly as they entered Ashley's room, not sure what to make of all of that. If he ever talked to his mom with that much attitude she'd probably ground him for a week, and Ashley got away with it like it was nothing.
"She's not my mom." Ashley scoffed. She sat down on the edge of her bed, letting out a big sigh.
"Oh." Luke said, still confused.
"She's my step mom, her and my dad got married three years ago." Ashley explained, refusing to look up at Luke.
"Oh." Luke repeated, nodding slowly to himself.
"You can take a nap if you want, I'll be right here." Ashley said, gesturing to the bed. Luke nodded and finally took his dorky jacket off, letting it fall to the floor. He got under the covers of Ashley's bed, but something didn't feel right.
He could tell that she was upset, and that there was something that Ashley wasn't telling him. Luke never wanted to push her to tell him something that she didn't want to, of course, but he didn't like the idea of Ashley bottling everything up inside. He told her about his problems, she should tell him about hers.
"Do you want to talk about it?" Luke whispered, slowly sitting up.
"No, it's fine." Ashley shook her head. Even though she wasn't facing Luke he could see that she wiped under her eyes with her hand, and he knew that things really weren't fine.
"Come on." Luke said, patting a spot next to him on the bed.
"I'm fine, really." Ashley said, but she turned around and crawled over to Luke anyway.
"Talk to me." Luke said, hoping that this time Ashley wouldn't be so stubborn and actually tell Luke what was wrong.
"There's nothing to talk about." Ashley sniffed, wiping under her nose with the sleeve of her shirt.
"Ashley, you're about to cry." Luke said softly.
"Yeah, I noticed." Ashley sniffed again, trying to stop herself from crying any more.
"Please, I want to help." Luke begged. He was really trying to make an effort to be a good friend to Ashley, because Luke had realized that most of the time it was all about himhimhim. Luke rarely ever cared to ask how Ashley was doing or checked if everything in her life was okay.
Ashley shook her head, hugging her knees to her chest and trying to hide her face away from Luke. After a few minutes she joined him under the covers, a big pout still on her face.
Luke gave up and laid down next to Ashley, realizing that it was impossible to get her to open up and he'd have to just stop trying. Ashley was upset and not in the mood to talk to Luke and there was nothing that he could do to fix it.
"Love fucking sucks." Ashley said after a long silence. Luke turned over and looked at her, taken back by her sudden outburst.
"Oh, okay." Luke said nervously, not sure what he was supposed to do. "Go on."
"My dad and my mom, my real mom, were married for 11 years before they decided that they wanted a divorce. I was 9, and my parents let me choose who I wanted to live with." Ashley explained, tears slowly beginning to form in the corners of her eyes. "I chose to stay with my dad, because he used to be really cool. Then they signed all the papers and my mom moved to Florida, so now I only see her every Christmas."
She rolled over and looked at Luke, like she was making sure that he was still listening. He nodded, telling her to go on.
"I just don't get it. Because if my parents were 'so in love' then why did they just break up after 11 years? Isn't the whole point of getting married to spend the rest of your life with that person? For better or for worse?" Ashley questioned, seeming to get a little off topic. "Why would they just waste 11 years on each other only to get divorced in the end? There's no fucking point."
"I - " Luke began to speak but was cut off by Ashley again. He didn't mind, though, because what he had to say wasn't all that interesting and he wanted to let Ashley vent some more.
"And then my dad married Helen, which was probably the stupidest decision of his entire life." Ashley continued, wiping her nose again. "I'm not supposed to know this, but they're thinking about getting divorce, too. They fight all the time when I'm supposed to be asleep, I can hear them."
"Go on." Luke said again, making sure that Ashley let everything out before he started to say what he was thinking.
"It's just so ridiculous, I don't understand why these people are wasting their time with someone that's not right for them. If they were really a perfect match then they wouldn't have these problems and I wouldn't even be worried about stuff like this, but I am." Ashley huffed, now more frustrated than anything, crossing her arms over her chest.
"I think that people waste their time on the wrong person because it takes a while for them to realize that who they're with isn't who they really want." Luke said slowly, once he was sure that Ashley was done.
Ashley turned and looked at Luke, a slight scowl on her face.
"What?" He asked, not understanding why she seemed so upset.
"Nothing." Ashley said, shaking her head. She wiped under her eyes one more time, getting rid of all her tears. "I just find it really ironic that you said that."
"What? Why?" Luke asked.
"I'll explain later." Ashley sighed. "Just go to sleep, I'm sorry that you had to listen to me rant like that."
"I liked it." Luke said shyly. "It made a lot of sense, actually. I agree with what you said."
"Yeah, thanks." Ashley said, bringing the blankets closer to her.
"Is Helen nice?" Luke asked after a moment of silence, suddenly not as tired as he was before. "Is she mean to you? Is that why you hate her?"
"No, she's not mean at all." Ashley shrugged. "She just tries way too hard, it's annoying."
"Oh." Luke nodded. For once he couldn't relate to Ashley about this; he'd never had any experience with an annoying step parents.
"It's fine, though, because she'll probably be about of here within the next year." Ashley said bluntly.
"That's good, I guess." Luke said, even though he didn't think it was a very good thing.
"Yep." Ashley said, letting out another big sigh as she stared up at the ceiling.
Luke took this opportunity to look around Ashley's room, having never gotten a chance to get a good look at it. He took in a lot of details, from the big pile of clothes on the floor in front of her closet to the cluttered desk all the way on the other side of the room.
"You have a very girly room." Luke said, noticing the pale pink color on the walls.
"Yeah, I'm a girl." Ashley chuckled.
"The walls in my room are blue." Luke said, trying to keep the conversation alive even though he knew that one of them was going to fall asleep at any second.
"Why is that?" Ashley asked, rolling onto her side so she was facing Luke. He awkwardly brought his arm around her, pulling her closer to him.
"Well, I'm a boy." Luke answered softly, a small smile appearing on his lips.
"Oh, I thought so." Ashley joked. She ran her fingers through Luke's hair again, something that he'd really grown to like.
He really liked when she did that. Luke liked when Ashley did cute little things like pinch his cheeks or boop his nose or play with his hair. He'd never had a girl be interested in doing things like that with him, every girl that every came close enough to Luke to do something intimate only expected sex, they never cared about any of the little things.
"I think you're amazing." Luke mumbled, not even realizing that the words were coming out of his mouth.
"I think you're amazing, too." Ashley whispered back, her whole face turning red as she spoke.
They didn't say anything else for a while, and after some time Luke felt his eyelids grow heavy and he finally fell asleep. The last thing he remembered was Ashley moving closer to him and wrapping her arms around his torso, nuzzling her face into the crook of his neck. And, wow, Luke really liked that too.
-
THIS IS ANOTHER FILLER CUZ I HAVE A GOOD IDEA BUT I WANTED TO SPACE IT OUT MORE SO YEAH HERE YOU GO
sorry it's short