Work Text:
Ashton, as it turns out, has a nearly nonexistent attention span. It's not Luke's fault, of course, but strangely enough, Luke feels guilty.
"This is my third year taking algebra," Ashton chirps, ignoring the block of text on the book lying open in front of him. "I've kinda lost all hope at this point." He fidgets with the eraser of his mechanical pencil, in an effort to distract himself from doing math.
"But you need to pass," Luke explains, gently nudging the book closer to Ashton. He's been trying to get him to concentrate for the past ten minutes. Unfortunately, Ashton stares down at the book the same way he stares down at vegetables on his plate. He never liked textbooks, always deemed them to be too "professional" and confusing. For some reason, the bright colors and pictures designed to capture attention only give him a headache, and those pictures paired with boring equations and theorems are a recipe for disaster.
"I can't focus right now," Ashton mumbles. He can't focus ever, really. "The rain's too loud." He rolls onto his back and studies the ceiling instead; they've been lazily sprawled out on the carpet for the entire lesson, partially because Ashton doesn't think math is important enough to require him to sit up at a table.
"You already used that excuse," Luke says.
Ashton decides to change the subject. "Aren't you, like, two years younger than me?" he asks, still looking up at the ceiling. Luke catches the hint of a smirk on his lips and briefly looks up at the ceiling as well, wondering why Ashton finds it so interesting. He decides the plain white ceiling is boring and looks back down at Ashton.
"Maybe," Luke replies. "I'm sixteen. I'm two years younger than a lot of people."
Ashton laughs quietly and rolls back onto his stomach, cringing as he eyes the algebra book. "How can a sixteen-year-old be taking calculus already?"
"It's not calculus; it's pre-calculus. Way different."
"Alright, genius boy," Ashton mutters. "Since you know everything, tell me this: why is factoring so hard?"
"You haven't even tried it yet."
"True," Ashton admits. "But it looks hard and I kinda don't want to try it."
Luke points at the lined notebook paper, which is essentially blank aside from the neatly-written "Ashton Irwin" in the top-right corner, accompanied by the date and the page number of the assignment. "Do the first problem," he orders, and Ashton groans.
Luke starts off by telling Ashton to write the problem down, and the fact that he complies is at least a step in the right direction. Luke guides Ashton through the rest of the problem, although it's a little clunky and confusing at first. He's never tutored someone before, never even planned to teach Ashton. His mom volunteered him for the job, despite his protests, claiming he needed another hobby that didn't just consist of him staring at the TV while his brain rotted away. Luke thought it was highly offensive that his mom would discredit Spongebob like that.
Fortunately, he only has to tutor Ashton twice a week for the rest of the school year, and with only four months left, he's hoping it'll be a breeze.
In fact, Luke thinks he's off to a good start with Ashton, all things considered. He knows essentially nothing about Ashton, which scared him at first. For all he knows, Ashton could be a druggy or a major douchebag. Gladly, he seems nice enough to not be either of those things, so Luke lets his guard down a bit.
After finishing the first problem, Ashton sighs in relief and closes the book. "That was great," he says with a smile. "Think it's time for a three-hour nap, now."
Luke reaches over and pries the book back open, then points at the blank space underneath the first problem on Ashton's notebook paper. "Do the second problem."
"Wait, do you have one of those cool graphing calculators?" Ashton asks with a subtle change in topic, and Luke nods. "So you can cheat, then?"
Luke considers that for a moment. "Sort of? If you know the calculator well enough, it definitely comes in handy."
"Can you draw things on it?"
"Yeah."
"Are there games on it, too? Can you take pictures with it? Dude, wouldn't it be cool if you could text people with your calculators?"
Luke taps the book again, trying to get Ashton to focus on homework. "Do the second problem," he repeats.
Ashton groans, mumbles something about Luke being "utterly boring," and rests his head on his hands as he scans over the problem. Suddenly looking back up, he questions, "Can I use the calculator next time I'm over?"
"Sure. But only if you finish this assignment."
Stubbornly, Ashton resumes glaring frustratingly down at his book.
Luke feels his phone buzz in his pocket and contemplates ignoring it at first. He plans to hold a certain level of professionalism with Ashton, and texting in the middle of a lesson would easily break that plan. But after deciding that staring at Ashton while he struggles to do math isn't of any benefit to him, Luke pulls it out and unlocks the message from Calum. It's a pretty boring message, just Calum being his usual clingy self, asking Luke if he has some time to spare for a game of FIFA.
Ashton glances up from the textbook, looking vaguely pissed-off. "Texting?" He grimaces.
Luke finishes typing his response to Calum — "sorry i'm busy right now :(" — sends it, clicks the power button and sets the phone down next to where he's lying on the floor. "I'm the teacher, I can do what I want." Ashton opens his mouth to protest and Luke cuts him off with, "Did you do the second problem?"
Ashton gets as far as writing the problem down on his paper before he's stuck again, and Luke ends up having to borrow his pencil to finish the rest of the problem for him.
"You have to see if you can take any numbers out first," Luke explains, using the pencil to point at different parts of the math expression. "There's a 2 here and a 6 here, so you can take a 2 out of both of them, get it?"
When Luke looks back up, Ashton's eyes are glued on Luke's face with some sort of dazed expression, as if Luke's explanation was in a foreign language and has entirely missed Ashton's stream of consciousness. It's going to be a long four months.
---
Luke's busy unloading stuff from his locker when he sees Ashton in school the next day. Catching Luke off guard, Ashton comes up behind him, ruffles a hand through Luke's hair and greets him with, "Hey, genius boy." Luke's face flushes a deep red when he turns around, and his books slip out of his arms, falling to the floor like a pile of bricks. Ashton exclaims, "Shit, sorry!" and ducks down to pick them up before Luke can even register what's just happened.
He takes the books back from Ashton and sheepishly says thank you, turns back to his locker and anxiously stuffs them in to hide the blush on his face that's only deepening in color. By this point, the students around them are all staring and a few of them are laughing. Luke doesn't know how he feels. Embarrassed, probably. He can't really tell. Ashton's gone when he turns back around.
---
"Why is factoring important?" Ashton asks, furiously erasing the problem he's screwed up.
Luke chews on his bottom lip and leans his head back against the bed he's sitting up against, crafting an answer in his mind. "Because it breaks down the expression into smaller terms so you can take shortcuts by cancelling out terms or solving them separately."
"Whoa." Ashton sounds impressed. "Alright, genius boy." Ashton blows the eraser dust off the page. The late afternoon sunlight filtering in through the windows seems to emphasize the point that it's sunny today, meaning Ashton can't use the rain as an excuse this time. On the contrary, he's tried using "it's too hot for me to study" and "the sun is shining too brightly in this room and it's giving me a headache," though neither of them get past Luke.
Ashton's grown a little more independent this time around, claiming he can solve the problems by himself and shooing Luke away whenever he tries to help. His tongue sticks out the corner of his mouth when he's trying to concentrate, and Luke thinks it's kind of cute.
The room fills with silence as Ashton tries to process the problem he's on, when suddenly a buzzing noise resonates from Luke's desk.
"Is that your phone again?" Ashton lets out bitterly. "Put it on silent, you're such an awful teacher."
Ignoring Ashton, Luke retrieves the phone from his desk and isn't surprised to see it's a message from Calum again. He texts him back, telling him he's busy tutoring again today, and flops back down on the floor, asking Ashton, "You need any help?"
"I'm going to solve this problem if it's the last thing I do," Ashton states.
Accordingly, Luke gives Ashton a few minutes on his own, allowing him to solve the problem by himself. However, Ashton's stubbornness gets him practically nowhere and Luke ends up forcing to take over after he catches Ashton doing nothing but staring down at the paper for five minutes straight. Ashton grumbles and pouts like a five-year-old (Luke is strangely endeared) but accepts Luke's help because, well, that's why he's at his house anyway.
"You should just do my assignments for me," Ashton decides after he needs to ask for help on the fifth problem in a row.
"But I can't do your tests for you," Luke says. "So that's a dead-end."
"You're around my height," Ashton points out. "Don't speak, move quickly, and keep your head down low and I'm sure the teachers would think you're me."
Luke wrinkles his nose. "That's a horrible idea that I'm not willing to test."
Ashton pouts. "Suit yourself. It might be the only way I can graduate, to be honest." He holds his arms out and presses himself off the floor, walking over to the tiny CD player sat on the corner of Luke's desk. "Mind if I put on some music?" he asks, ignoring the fact that the thin layer of dust collecting on it is a sure sign that it hasn't been used in ages. Luke isn't even sure if it still works, but he requests Green Day anyway.
While Ashton shuffles through the stack of CDs, Luke turns back down to squint at the math problem Ashton was previously stuck on. No wonder Ashton was getting the wrong answer; he kept forgetting to check if he could monomial factor the problem first.
The opening guitar riff of American Idiot suddenly cuts through the calm silence (at a startlingly loud volume) and Luke's head snaps up. Ashton cringes, twists the volume knob to the muted setting and cries out, "Sorry!" He turns the volume up to a low setting before joining Luke on the floor once again, letting out an intentionally loud sigh. "Don't you ever get bored of math?" he asks.
"Not really," Luke replies. "Math is fun, especially when you get into the zone, you know?"
Ashton doesn't say anything, simply puts on his best disgusted face. Luke does the only logical thing — he grabs the nearest pillow off the bed and hits Ashton with it.
"Oi!" Ashton cries out, ripping the pillow out of Luke's hands. "At least I'm not some weirdo that thinks math is fun." He uses the pillow to hit Luke back — twice.
Luke twists around and grabs another pillow off his bed, and they spend a good half minute or so just smacking each other with the cushions. Ashton complains every time Luke hits him in the head, claiming that head shots are "unfair and dangerous," to which Luke responds by hitting him in the head again and giggling when Ashton gets grumpy about it.
Their war is cut off when there's a knocking at the door and both of them drop the pillows (not before Luke can get in one last hit, though). Luke and Ashton glance over at the door and Luke's older brother, Jack, cranes his head in.
"Sorry, but, I'm trying to read in my room and you two are screaming bloody murder," he says. "Like, could you tone it down or something? I didn't know math turned into such a noisy subject."
Without even a moment of hesitation, Luke launches his pillow at Jack's face and catches Jack swearing when it hits him. He doesn't linger for any longer and leaves the room immediately.
Ashton laughs and high-fives Luke.
---
"Just bone already," Michael mumbles — rather loudly.
"What?" Luke says. Calum, the supportive friend, elbows Michael in the ribs so Luke doesn't have to.
Michael shrugs lightly and wipes the pizza grease off his fingers, onto Calum's carpet. Calum deepens his scowl, and Michael ignores him and says to Luke, "You're literally always talking about what's-his-face. May as well just hook up."
Luke shoots Michael a disgusted frown and tears the GameCube controller rather forcefully out of his grip (usually they meet up at Michael's house and play on his Xbox but due to a sudden living room remodel, they've had to settle for Calum's ancient Nintendo platform).
"What's-his-face is a Year Twelve, isn't he?" Calum asks lightly.
Michael lets out an astounded laugh. "Little Luke managed to impress a Year Twelve." He holds his fist up for a fist-bump, but Luke doesn't return it and he pouts and puts it back down. "Look, I don't know what's-his-face personally but I bet he's a great guy. I would probably talk about him a lot, too."
"I don't even like him!" Luke protests. "And he has a name, you know. It's Ashton." There's a fraction of silence where Luke blushes a bit. "Anyway, I'm just tutoring him, that's all."
Michael waggles his eyebrows suggestively. "Tutoring him in what subject?"
Calum sighs and shakes his head with secondhand embarrassment, but the underlying message goes completely over Luke's head and he innocently responds, "Math."
"Why don't you ask him to go to the dance with you at the end of the year?" Michael suggests.
"Because I'm not an idiot?" Luke says. "Plus, the end of the year is ages away."
"No, I think Michael's brought up a good idea," Calum smiles. Luke wants to slap both of them because, no, fuck no. He's not going to ask Ashton to the dance. That dance is for, like, real couples with real relationships.
"I disagree," Luke comments. "And if I ever wanted advice, you guys are the last people I would go to."
"Ouch," Michael says, bringing a hand up to his heart. "That hurts, you know?"
"Last time I asked you for help with someone you printed off a list of math pickup lines and told me to use them."
"Hey, you should try that again with Ashton!" Calum grins. Michael nods in approval and Luke glares at them. "It would make sense," Calum explains. "Since you're teaching him math, anyway."
"I'm not desperate," Luke states, reaching a hand over to open the pizza box and feeling a surge of disappointment wash over him when he finds it empty.
Michael waves him off with a hand (is he implying that Luke is desperate?) and says, "I think I still have the list of pickup lines! I'll bring it in on Monday for you."
Before Luke gets a chance to protest, Calum hits the play button on the game they'd paused and Luke lets out a yelp while he tries to properly get a grip of the controller.
---
Luke finds himself looking forward to Tuesdays and Thursdays after awhile; Ashton comes over at exactly four o'clock on those days with a backpack on and a textbook in his hands, looking surprisingly prepared to study, despite his hatred towards math. Often times Luke sits by the door when he knows Ashton's coming, just so he doesn't have to keep him waiting.
It's pouring rain outside on this particular Thursday and Luke's room is gloomier than usual since there's no sunlight streaming in through the windows. They've been doing the tutoring thing for around a month now and even though it's still clear that Ashton fucking hates algebra, he tries his best just for Luke, hopefully to make his job a little easier. But, honestly, there's only so much he can do, and he ends up asking for help on nearly every problem, as per usual. It's not his fault.
Surprisingly, Ashton's still stubborn about asking for help. He doesn't ask for assistance until he's thoroughly examined the problem for a few minutes and decided it's impossible, and even then he still doesn't want to verbally declare he's stuck. Usually he just lets out a very loud groan and collapses face-first onto his book, and that's when Luke gets the message.
So Luke's texting Calum, waiting for Ashton to give up, when Ashton suddenly says, "You promised me I could use your graphing calculator a few weeks ago."
Luke looks up from the phone in his hands. "Did I?"
"Yup."
"Oh."
Neither of them say anything for a few seconds — Fall Out Boy plays quietly in the background to mask the silence and the sound of the raindrops pelting the windows — and Ashton smiles brightly, waiting for Luke to retrieve the calculator. But when Luke doesn't move, Ashton says, "So can I?"
Luke's about to cave in and get the calculator out of his bag when he remembers he's supposed to be teaching Ashton and he's supposed to be helping Ashton with his graded assignments that could decide whether he graduates or not. So he says, "Finish your homework first."
Ashton pouts but Luke stands his ground, trying his best to look intimidating. To make it easier, Luke guides Ashton through the last few problems and Ashton practically scribbles down the last answer in excitement before flinging his book shut, resting his chin on his hands and asking, "Can I see the calculator now?"
Luke rolls his eyes (fondly?). He pushes himself off the floor, walks over to his raggedy backpack resting by the door and unzips the outermost pocket, reaching a hand in and pulling out the bulky calculator. He slides the cover off and hands it over to Ashton, who lights up like an excited puppy at the sight of it. Honestly, Luke doesn't get it.
"The screen's in color," Ashton says in awe, his mouth forming a perfect 'O'. Personally, Luke doesn't think it's that fascinating. He sits next to Ashton and leans over to watch him punch the buttons, just to make sure he doesn't destroy it or something.
"There's nothing really cool about it," Luke says in a boring tone. "Like, it's really handy when you want to graph or do sigma notation, but it's still just plain old math."
Ashton momentarily peels his eyes away from the screen. "What's a stigma quotation?"
Luke spends a good half hour just introducing Ashton to his pre-calculus book, trying to explain to him what sequences are and how logarithms work, though most of his explanations are met with blank confusion. He shows him how to graph functions and change the colors of the lines and somewhere down the line Ashton ends up deleting the entire graph, along with its x- and y-axes. To say that Ashton panics is an understatement; he in fact lets out a gasp in horror when the screen goes blank and frantically presses random keys in hopes of getting something back. Luke just laughs at him.
They end up having to press a switch in the back of the device using the tip of a pen in order to reset it and Ashton apologizes, several times, but Luke keeps on laughing.
"You know, if you ever want to swap calculators, just hook me up," Ashton says; he holds up his simple scientific calculator, looking scrawny in comparison to Luke's high-tech state-of-the-art graphing utility, and Luke cringes. Ashton, looking plainly offended, smacks him on the arm with the weaker calculator. "Bobo's a great calculator — I've had him for three years and he hasn't let me down yet."
"You named your calculator?"
"You haven't named yours?" Ashton fires back. "That's so disrespectful. In fact, you know what's a good name? Steven."
"Steven?" Luke asks.
"Steven," Ashton confirms.
---
"Steven?" Calum whispers patronizingly. Luke blushes and whips his head around to make sure Ashton isn't in the general vicinity. Luke's sitting with Calum and Michael in the empty corner of the cafeteria, away from the louder, more popular kids, so they should be safe but he doesn't want to risk it. He catches Ashton seated in the middle of the cafeteria surrounded by other Year Twelves, and it appears they're squeezing ketchup packets onto the tables and laughing hysterically at whatever one of them has drawn with the sauce. Luke frowns and turns back to Calum.
"Yeah. I don't know. Ashton came up with the name and he was really excited about it so I wasn't gonna, like, say no."
Michael coughs and mutters, "Whipped," then hastily takes a bite out of his sandwich as if he never said anything. Luke glares at him.
"Anyway," Calum mumbles, concisely glaring at Michael, "Michael said he found the list of math pickup lines."
Michael lets out an excited noise and reaches down to dig something out of his pocket. It's a thin, folded piece of paper that barely looks like it's in one piece, and Michael hands it over to Luke, who frowns down at it before carefully opening it up.
"'Are you a ninety-degree angle, 'cause you are lookin' right'," Luke reads, and Michael snickers. "'My love for you is like pi — never-ending'." Luke looks up from the paper and declares, "Michael, these suck."
"You don't know that until you try them," Michael says. "Be optimistic, Hemmings."
Calum leans over and reads aloud, "'You must be the square root of negative-one because you can't be real'."
"Ash wouldn't even understand these jokes; he's still in algebra," Luke points out. Calum seizes the opportunity to point at a joke at the bottom that reads, "I'm not good at algebra but you and I together make 69". Luke makes a gagging noise. He sets the list down, folds it up, and slides it back in Michael's direction. "This is sweet, but you can keep it. Maybe you'll find some use for it."
Michael retrieves the paper and says, "You're missing out on the opportunity of a lifetime."
---
Although Luke and Ashton share no classes together, it suddenly seems like Ashton's everywhere. Luke's in the library, skimming the shelves for a book to use for his history presentation, when suddenly he catches Ashton out of the corner of his eye, seated at a table and folding... paper cranes?
Midway through lunch, Luke's headed to the student store to buy a packet of Skittles when he suddenly spots Ashton standing behind the counter, ringing up someone's Hershey's bar. Ashton lights up when he sees Luke, but Luke locks up with some strange sense of anxiety (since when did he start getting nervous around Ashton?) and doesn't say anything apart from "Hi!" and "Do you have any Skittles?" and "Thanks."
At the end of the day, Luke's sitting at a computer in the far corner of the lab, stressed out and struggling to finish typing his Oedipus report when he hears someone set their bags down at the computer next to his and he looks over to see Ashton. Luke's got headphones in, though, so they smile at each other and then spend the rest of class in silence. Luke discovers that writing an essay is twelve times more difficult with Ashton seated next to him and their elbows occasionally bumping.
And it would be totally normal if they, like, went to a small school or something, but with a student body of over a thousand people, there's no way it's normal. When he tells Calum and Michael about it, Calum says, "You probably just didn't start noticing him until recently," and Michael says, "He's fucking stalking you, I know it."
Luke doesn't know what to believe.
---
"So who do you like?"
The question catches Luke so unexpectedly that he feels his stomach drop as soon as the words leave Ashton's mouth. Luke falls silent and is suddenly grateful that Marianas Trench is playing on his stereo to cover up the inevitable awkwardness hanging in the air, and Ashton glances up from his homework.
"Uh — I like a lot of people?" Luke tries.
Ashton laughs quietly and rolls his eyes. "No, like, who do you have a crush on?"
Luke just shrugs.
Ashton tilts his head, deciding he doesn't like that answer. "Come on. You're dating someone, right?"
Luke feels his brain, as well as every muscle in his body, seize up like a car stuck in the mud, like he's trying to get somewhere but is essentially motionless.
"No." He says the next part really quickly and in a hushed tone. "Never even kissed anyone."
Ashton drops his pencil onto his notebook in shock and looks Luke straight in the eyes (which definitely isn't helping Luke's nervousness, nope, not at all). "You're lying," he says.
Luke figures there's no point fighting the blush that's flooding his face now, so he tries to change the subject instead, sheepishly prompting, "We should go back to talking about math."
"No, I need the full story," Ashton says, pushing his math book out of the way and sitting up so his back is rested against the bed and his shoulder is just barely touching Luke's.
"There is no full story," Luke says slowly. "I'm the biggest virgin on the planet and that's about it."
"But you're hot and, like, really smart," Ashton states. At the sound of those words, Luke feels a million rampant light switches flick on and off in his head like some fucked-up low-budget disco party has commenced in his brain. He wants to scream, but he decides to go dead silent and let Ashton continue. "Girls are flirting with you all the time, man."
Luke's taken aback that Ashton knows that because it means he's been paying attention to Luke and, presumably, he's done it a few times. Maybe Michael was right about the stalking.
Deciding he has nothing to say, Luke leans down and pulls Ashton's math book closer to them. "How many more problems do you have left?"
However, Ashton completely ignores the textbook and keeps his gaze locked on Luke. "A few," he responds vaguely. "But seriously, you're not just screwing with me? You haven't kissed anyone?"
"Ash," Luke whines. "Let's just finish the math homework, okay?" He doesn't intend for it to sound harsh or rude; he just doesn't want to accidentally admit things he's not ready to admit. Maybe things he hasn't even admitted to himself yet.
Basically, he doesn't want to admit to Ashton that he kind of wants to kiss him.
Thankfully, Ashton seems to notice Luke's discomfort, lets out a half-hearted, "Fine," and lays on his stomach, staring blankly down at his homework. "I don't know how to do this," he states glumly in reference to the plethora of problems in front of him.
Luke lays down next to him and helps with the rest of the assignment, praying that Ashton doesn't bring up the girlfriend topic again. He has no trouble telling Calum and Michael about his love life (or lack of a love life, really) and should have no trouble telling Ashton either, since he's learned to trust him a lot over the past few weeks, but telling Ashton is... different?
When they finish the assignment, Ashton thanks Luke for the help and begins stuffing his textbook in his backpack. Luke feels his phone vibrate in his pocket and pulls it out at the same moment Ashton asks, "Can I see Steven again?"
It takes Luke a few seconds to remember who Steven is. "Yeah, he's in my bag."
Luke unlocks his phone and snorts when he reads Calum's desperate text, asking for the answers for their history homework. He'll be disappointed to find out that Luke doesn't know the answers either.
"What's this?" Ashton asks. Luke doesn't look up at first; instead he scrambles to finish his text to Calum and nearly drops his phone when Ashton states, "I'm not being obtuse, but you're acute person."
Ashton's holding a thin piece of paper that's barely in one piece and laughing as he reads down the list, and Luke suddenly wants to shove his entire body into a blender.
"Fuck, how did that get in my backpack?" Luke reaches for the page of pickup lines and Ashton giggles and dodges it away just in time.
"Some of these are good!" Ashton beams, his eyes glued to the page. "Some of them don't make sense, though. Probably because my math knowledge is minimal. But, like, what are these for?"
Luke swipes for the page again and Ashton pulls it away just in time.
"They're Michael's," Luke mutters. "Where the hell did you find it?"
"'You're sweeter than pi'," Ashton recites with another giggle. "Dunno — it came out when I pulled the cover off your calculator. I've never spoken to Michael before but these are brilliant."
Okay, so Ashton likes the pickup lines. Maybe it's not all bad. And Luke thinks Ashton looks cute when he laughs, so that's a bonus.
"Also, why does it say 'For Ashton' at the top with three poorly-drawn hearts next to it?" Ashton questions.
This time, when Luke reaches for the paper, Ashton doesn't pull it away and Luke finally gets a chance to properly look at it.
And, sure as hell, in the top-right corner, written in Michael's barely-legible handwriting and accompanied by three poorly-drawn hearts, are the words 'For Ashton'.
For a brief, brief moment, Luke thinks this is the end. This is it. This is the end of his surprisingly short life. Honestly, he thought he would at least make it to the age of thirty, but, courtesy of Michael, it looks like he's being cut off early.
Then, when Luke realizes that he is in fact still breathing and Ashton is still staring at him, patiently awaiting an answer, it might not actually be the end.
But since Luke doesn't know what to say to Ashton, he kind of wishes it was.
Not knowing what to say, Luke settles with, "Just ask Michael."
---
Luke throws his backpack on the ground next to the empty bench across from Calum and Michael, trying to look threatening and upset. But instead of looking intimidating, he ends up looking rather clumsy because it turns out his backpack wasn't actually zipped and a few pencils clatter out and onto the cafeteria floor. Alerted by the noise, several kids whip their heads around to stare.
Anyway.
Luke should probably retrieve those pencils, but he has priorities.
"Congratulations, Michael," Luke says, taking a seat across of his friends. "Ashton Irwin thinks you have a crush on him."
Michael sputters on his sandwich and coughs for a few seconds, reaching for his water bottle and frantically unscrewing the lid. After downing a few gulps, he hisses, "What?"
Luke merely shrugs. "The pickup lines were your idea, right?" Michael nods. "Well, they worked," Luke reported. "For you, at least."
"Why'd you tell him I gave them to you?" Michael asks incredulously.
Luke says the next part painfully slowly, attempting to drill an underlying "I hate you" into Michael's head without directly saying it. "Because you wrote 'For Ashton' on the paper with three hearts next to it."
Calum bursts out laughing and Michael just smirks. "Yeah, what's wrong with that?" Michael asks.
"Nothing!" Luke says. "I told him it was you, though, so" — Luke sarcastically flashes two thumbs up — "make sure to invite me to the wedding."
Luke knows he sounds bitter when he says those words, but it's intentional. The goal is to inflect as much acrimony into his speech without verbally admitting his jealousy. He thinks he's on the right track.
"So I pretty much accidentally stole your man," Michael states.
"He's not my man," Luke mumbles, and then turns to Calum, who has been oddly silent this whole time, and says, "And you — stop texting me when I'm busy tutoring. Especially if you know I'm busy tutoring."
"Tutoring your man," Michael throws in with a smug grin.
Luke scowls, grabs a french fry off Michael's plate and throws it at him.
---
Luke supposes he knows Ashton well enough to host a sleepover. After all, that's what friends do, right? He's done it with Michael and Calum a million times so this can't be much different. Anyway, Ashton initially came up with the idea for a movie night, claiming they needed to get together sometime and watch The Maze Runner because Luke has it on DVD and Ashton's apparently been dying to see it (and suspicioisly promising several times that he's not desperate to watch it just so he can gawk at Dylan O'Brien).
Luke wasn't going to tell Michael or Calum about it at first, knowing that at least one of them would make some sort of sensual comment about Luke and Ashton "sleeping together". But he caved in the night before, bashfully admitting that Ashton was going to be spending the night at his house, and he regrets telling them because — unsurprisingly — the first thing Michael said was, "Use protection."
Thankfully, Luke's parents aren't home for the weekend, having left the day before for a business trip; unfortunately, Luke's brothers are still lounging about the place, and Luke had made it abundantly clear to them on Thursday and Friday that he would be having a friend over and they were recommended to stay in their rooms and leave them alone. Though they both mumbled some vague agreements, Luke doesn't think they were really paying attention or really understood how important this movie night could be for him. Whatever.
When Ashton appears on Luke's doorstep with a sleeping bag and a tight-lipped smile on his face, Luke immediately knows something is wrong. Something about the expression on his face. Luke's only known Ashton for a month, but he knows him well enough to catch when something isn't right.
Regardless, Luke lets Ashton in the house, closes the door behind him, and directs Ashton to toss his rolled-up sleeping bag by the couch for now. They can move it later.
"We should make some popcorn," Luke suggests, looking to Ashton for approval. Typically, Luke would expect Ashton to freely agree or disagree, and maybe even tack on a witty joke at the end. This time, Ashton simply nods.
Ashton follows Luke into the kitchen without a word, which is unusual for him, and Luke begins debating whether he should confront Ashton or not. After all, they're going to be spending an entire night together and Luke will never forgive himself if Ashton is sad the entire time, in spite of it not being Luke's fault. Wait. It isn't Luke' fault, is it? It can't be.
Luke opens up one of the cupboards and pulls out a box of popcorn. He takes out one of the packets and tears it open while Ashton takes a seat on one of the barstools. After placing the packet in the microwave and pushing the popcorn button — Luke can't be assed to follow the directions on the box — he turns to face Ashton and asks, "Are you okay?"
It takes Ashton a moment to react, as if his mind was off somewhere else, and then he says, "Yeah."
Luke waits a few seconds, because Ashton almost never gives one-word answers. But Ashton doesn't say anything more, so Luke says, "I know you're lying," and hops onto the barstool next to him.
"I'm fine," Ashton insists. "Just a little family drama, you know."
"You're not fine," Luke says, turning his body so he can rest his arm on the counter they're seated in front of.
Ashton huffs and sarcastically mutters, "Yeah, because you know how I'm feeling."
At a loss for words, they both fall silent, and the humming of the microwave fills the room and the aching silence. Luke doesn't know what to say, doesn't know if he should say anything, really. This sleepover is off to a terrible start.
"Sorry," Ashton finally mumbles. "I'm not in the greatest of moods, as you already figured out."
Nodding, Luke asks quietly, "Wanna talk about it?"
When Ashton doesn't say anything, Luke questions himself again. Fuck, he shouldn't have even asked. Obviously Ashton doesn't want to talk about it or else he would've said something a lot sooner. Obviously he would've told Luke earlier or —
"I told my mum I might like boys and it didn't go as smoothly as I was hoping it would," Ashton says quickly.
Luke bites on his bottom lip and knows he's bitten too hard when he tastes blood. Truthfully, Luke should know exactly what to say since he dealt with this exact issue not even a year ago. But coming out to his family was a breeze for him, and Luke's fortunate for that. As much as Luke would like to offer helpful advice, his mind is drawing a blank.
"And now I just told you, too," Ashton adds on, pursing his lips together. "So, congratulations on being the second person to know."
The microwave goes off and Luke distracts himself by hopping off the stool and retrieving the popcorn. His thoughts are swimming through his head, all of them mixed and swirling together, and he wants to say something, wants to provide Ashton with some words of comfort, but he doesn't know what to say.
"I shouldn't even be that pissed," Ashton goes on, looking down at his hands and nowhere else. "Like, it could've gone a lot worse. I should be glad that I'm at least not getting disowned or something. I just. I wish she could've been a little more positive? I don't know. Fuck, she said I was confused. Maybe she's right."
Luke feels his heart sink. "Don't say that," he says, dropping the bag of popcorn on the counter and whipping around to face Ashton, who looks even more upset than he did five minutes ago. "Ash," Luke breathes. He opens his mouth to provide words of reassurance, but ends up ditching them and stumbling forward, wrapping his arms around Ashton and pulling him into a hug. He's surprised to feel Ashton hug him back, sinking into his arms like it's the one thing he needs right now. And maybe it is. Luke can't imagine what it must feel like to finally build up the courage to tell the truth and then be shut down like that, to be told that you're just not thinking clearly.
"I'm sorry," Luke says, pulling away a few seconds later.
"Don't apologize." Ashton takes a deep breath. "Thanks. For listening. It's nice to, like, get it off my chest and not have to worry about being told that I'm wrong."
"You're not wrong," Luke states, finally managing to sound concrete with his words. "You're just yourself, and that's cool." He twists around and grabs the bag of popcorn off the counter and gestures for Ashton to head into the living room. Ashton steps off the barstool and walks out of the kitchen, Luke following behind with the popcorn.
Luke plops down on the couch next to Ashton, handing the popcorn bag over and letting Ashton reach in. While Ashton munches on the popcorn, Luke decides he's probably never going to say anything this inspirational ever again, and it's either go big or go home, so he decides to go big. "I know what it's like to admit these things, and I know it takes a lot of courage." Pause. "So just wait it out, because she's your mum and she loves you and she'll support you no matter what, because that's what mums do, even if it takes her awhile to adjust."
Ashton stops chewing and looks at Luke, then smiles brightly, dimples becoming prominent. Luke feels his face flush red for some reason unbeknownst to him. "Didn't know you were so uplifting, genius boy." Ashton tosses a popped kernel at Luke teasingly, and Luke retaliates with a handful in return. "And, what do you mean by you know what it's like?" Ashton questions.
Shrugging, Luke hands the popcorn to Ashton and pulls himself off the couch. Someone's gotta set up the movie, eventually, and Luke decides now is the perfect time for that because it'll also help him avoid Ashton's question.
"I just know," Luke mumbles vaguely, pressing the power button on the remote. Fortunately, Ashton doesn't ask any more questions.
Just one movie. They'd agreed on just one movie, no more, no less. The entirety of The Maze Runner is accompanied by Ashton's joking commentary and Luke ends up throwing popcorn at him several times throughout the movie to get him to stop talking. But in all honesty, Luke's seen the movie twice before, this time being the third time, and doesn't mind Ashton verbally giving his two cents after each scene. It makes it a bit more enjoyable.
The Maze Runner ends at midnight on somewhat of a cliffhanger, and Ashton complains about the unsatisfactory ending, demanding they watch another movie to make up for it. After discovering Luke has Up on DVD as well, Ashton begs Luke to watch it with him, promising it'll be worth it.
Just two movies. Two movies couldn't do much harm, as long as neither of them are falling asleep yet. When Up finishes, Ashton is showing no signs of exhaustion yet, so they look at each other, shrug, and decide to watch The Lego Movie.
Okay, so, two and a half movies. Ashton falls asleep midway through The Lego Movie, and although Luke and Ashton were originally seated at opposite ends of the couch with a large gap between them, they ended up drifting towards each other as the night rolls on and Ashton falls asleep with his head on Luke's shoulder.
This shocks Luke at first. There is a cute boy sleeping on Luke's shoulder and he doesn't know what do. Luke should probably get up and switch the movie off since there's no point in him watching the movie alone, but he can't bring himself to do it because there is a cute boy sleeping on his shoulder. He can't move, what if that wakes him up or something? There is a cute boy sleeping on Luke's shoulder and Luke has never been more conflicted in his entire life.
The thing is, Ashton looks comfortable and peaceful in his sleep, and Luke's never seen a peaceful Ashton. When he comes over for math lessons he's usually fired up with so much energy he's about ready to spring off the walls. It's especially unusual seeing him this quiet, and Luke kind of likes it, spending most of his time admiring Ashton instead of the actual film. Light from the television flickers over Ashton's face, and Luke studies him with more intensity than he would ever like to admit.
But Luke can feel his eyes pulling shut after fifteen minutes of Ashton being asleep and there's no way he can make it through the rest of the movie alone, so, tentatively, he pokes Ashton. Ashton stirs a bit, but not enough to bring himself back to consciousness. Luke pokes him again, a little more forceful this time. Ashton makes a "mhhrrrr" noise but still remains asleep. Luke decides poking him isn't a very effective method and whispers, "Ashton?"
Groggily, and with his head still leaning on Luke's shoulder for support, Ashton mumbles, "What?"
"I think — I think we should go to bed."
Despite being half-asleep, Ashton just laughs and cheekily questions, "Together?"
Luke nearly chokes on his own tongue, but doesn't answer. He gets up from the couch (Ashton complains when his leaning post has moved) and shuts the TV off, blanketing the room in darkness. Luke awkwardly fumbles around in the dark for the switch on the lamp, and it takes him several tries to finally get the light on. Ashton is now laying on the couch, cozily wrapped up in the blanket like a burrito, and Luke feels bad nudging him awake again.
"What?" Ashton says again, the word coming out muffled since the bottom half of his face is still covered by the blanket.
"We're going to bed, remember?"
"Oh, right," Ashton agrees, shifting a bit and squinting his eyes open. "Together." Ashton lazily pushes himself off the couch and reaches down to grab his sleeping bag, keeping the blanket around his shoulders like a cape cascading around him. Luke grabs his phone off the coffee table and switches on the flashlight function, then turns the lamp off and allows the room to be flooded with cold darkness again. They navigate their way up the stairs slowly and with great caution, and Ashton misses a step, apparently, judging by the way he swears halfway through. Luke has to remind him to be quiet.
The first thing Luke does when they've made it to his bedroom is fall face-forward on his bed. He doesn't move for a long time, either, and he probably wouldn't ever move if it wasn't for Ashton curiously whispering, "Luke?"
"Yeah?"
"Oh. Just makin' sure you're alright."
Luke is fortunate he's already in his t-shirt and sweatpants, because the clock next to his bed reads in a threatening, red, glowing font that it's two-thirty in the morning and he would hate to have to sneakily change into his pajamas without Ashton noticing.
He waits for Ashton to unroll his sleeping bag and make his way inside before he turns the light off, and then blindly tip-toes to his bed, being careful not to step on Ashton by accident.
Less than ten minutes later, Luke's mind is already drifting off and he's got his comforter warmly cocooned around him like a silky cloud that should seal out all other sounds, but he doesn't miss the quiet, "Hey Luke?" from the floor, followed by the rustling sound of Ashton squirming in his sleeping bag.
"I'm awake." Luke hates how his voice sounds unreasonably loud at this time of night, even when he's whispering. The silence somehow makes everything just a little bit more intimate and Luke feels vulnerable.
There's a pause before Ashton continues. "I know I was kidding about the sleeping together thing, but, no offense — I'm not sure if I can lay here for eight hours."
Luke doesn't really know what to appropriately respond with. Ashton's made a good point and it's certainly unfair to make the guest sleep on the floor by himself, but he can't just invite Ashton into bed with him, can he? That would make things weird, right?
Which is why that's exactly what Luke does.
"You can sleep with me if you want," Luke suggests, trying to remain nonchalant about it, just in case that's not what Ashton wants.
But apparently it is what Ashton wants, because he mumbles a quiet, "Thanks," and Luke makes space in his bed to accommodate him. He feels the mattress dip with Ashton's weight, and restrains from reflexively reaching an arm out to wrap around him. Ashton isn't a stuffed animal and Luke (unfortunately) can't cuddle him.
"I like you," Ashton states, the words piercing through the silence. Luke can't see Ashton but he knows Ashton's facing him, and he's suddenly very, very grateful that Ashton can't see him either, because he probably looks really stupidly in love right now.
"Go to bed," Luke replies, and Ashton can hear the smile in his voice.
"I'm already in a bed," Ashton quips. "Do you like me?"
"Maybe. I'll tell you in the morning."
"But the morning is so far away," Ashton complains.
"If you go to sleep, it'll come faster," Luke points out.
Ashton is definitely pouting. Like, there's no light to prove it but Luke just knows.
"Alright, genius boy." Ashton's tone is inflected with an expendable amount of stubbornness and Luke feels pressed with guilt, so after a few seconds of silence he admits, "Yeah, I like you. I mean. Obviously I like you or else you wouldn't be in the same bed as me."
Ashton finally hums in agreement, as if receiving the answer he wanted. "Good point."
They fall quiet, Luke's eyes begin to drift closed, and his mind prepares to make the transition to dreamland. It's been a long — albeit fun — night and his body is craving the rest. He's brought back to reality briefly when Ashton whispers, "Goodnight, Lukey."
The way Luke's heart leaps at the nickname probably isn't normal. For a brief second, Luke considers just not answering and pretending to be asleep instead.
But he can't bring himself to do that, so he softly responds, "'Night, Ash."
---
Single beds are, obviously, designed to only fit one person. Or, that's Luke's excuse when he wakes up the next morning with Ashton's arm wrapped loosely around his waist. He supposes they ran out of space in the middle of the night and the only logical option was to spoon?
Reasonably, Luke should probably move or something if he wants to save them from having a very awkward encounter when Ashton wakes up. The clock next to his bed reads that it's already eleven in the morning and muted light from outside is streaming in between the half-closed blinds, projecting a small patch of bright stripes across the floor.
But Luke has a problem, and that problem is Ashton.
He first looks at Ashton's hand wrapped around him, and inhales a sharp breath. Then he awkwardly twists his head around to get a look at Ashton, feeling his neck pop as he cranes it back, and Ashton's eyes are sealed shut.
The worst part is that Luke is fine with this. He should not be fine with this — he should be leaping out of bed in a flash, scrambling to make breakfast — or lunch — or something. Luke doesn't do that, though. He instead takes a deep breath, relaxes, and pushes his nose into his pillow some more, and is suddenly very, very aware of the arm comfortingly holding him. It shouldn't be comfortable; they're just friends for god's sake. If this was Michael or Calum, Luke definitely would have shooed them away by now and probably criticized them for getting too cuddly.
Ashton, on the other hand, is an entirely different story. There are a lot of things Luke is unsure of, like what he wants to study in college and what he should eat for breakfast in a few minutes, but the one thing he knows for certain is that he trusts Ashton. A lot. With Ashton lying in bed next to him, protectively holding him close, Luke feels a wave of security wash through him and he has never felt more at ease —
Ashton's arm retracts and Luke tenses up. He feels Ashton shift next to him and — oh, fuck — has Ashton been awake that whole time?
The silence in the air suddenly feels inexplicably heavy. "Hey, Ashton?" Luke whispers after a moment of hesitation.
"Yeah?"
Okay. So Ashton's definitely awake. How long he's been awake remains a mystery, however. Luke turns around so he's facing Ashton and feels the oxygen get sucked out of him when their faces are only inches apart. Damn it.
"What do you — uh — what do you want to eat? For breakfast. Or lunch? Brunch?"
Luke is smooth.
"Truth be told," Ashton admits, "I don't really want to get out of bed."
Luke offers a smile and ignores the way his heart clenches at that, at the thought of spending an entire day in bed with Ashton. "Pop-Tarts sound good?"
Ashton pouts. "Pop-Tarts sound cliché."
"Pop-Tarts it is, then."
---
Michael actually, literally drops his phone onto the floor, then groans and reaches over the edge of the bed to pick it back up. He then resumes to joining Calum at their mission to stare at Luke with an amalgam of shock and envy.
"You're telling me you cuddled in bed with Ashton and talked about how much you guys like each other?" Calum's tone isn't patronizing, but it's filled with surprise.
Luke rolls onto his back and looks up at the light on Calum's ceiling, hoping that laying in this position will make the blush tinting his cheeks a little less palpable. "Roughly, yeah."
Weighted silence fills the room as Calum and Michael exchange a glance.
"So, like..." Michael mutters, turning back to look at Luke, "did you bang each other as well?" Rolling back onto his stomach in one swift movement, Luke makes eye contact with Michael and his eyes bug out of his head, as if it's the most outrageous thing he's ever heard. In response, Michael just shrugs and makes an expression that reads hey, it's a legitimate question.
"No, we didn't," Luke says. Simultaneously, Calum and Michael groan. Luke glares at them.
"Sorry," Calum mumbles. "It's just. I'm not sure how much longer I can stand watching you and Ashton devour each other with your eyes in the lunchroom anymore." Michael nods in agreement and Calum continues. "The way he looks at you is enough to make me sweat."
"Are you saying you want to go blind?" Luke asks. "Because I can definitely make arrangements —"
Calum scowls and brings a hand up to cover Luke's mouth in an effort to get him to stop talking; Luke licks his hand and Calum retracts his hand with a yelp, reaching over to wipe it on Michael's shoulder.
"We're taking it slow," Luke explains calmly.
Frowning, Michael states, "Yeah, I can fucking tell."
Calum lightly nudges Michael with his elbow, giving him a look that he's switching into his serious mode. Turning back to Luke, Calum reassures with a smile, "It's okay, Lucas. We understand. Do what you think is right."
There's only one problem — Luke doesn't really know what's right. Rationally, he wants to act like he has a plan formulating in his head, carefully mapping out what to do and when to do it, just to make sure he doesn't go overboard and fuck everything up. Realistically, he has nothing of the sort, and his chances of fucking up are rather high.
---
Ashton progressively loses more and more interest in math as the year drags on. Luke tries to keep Ashton on track so he'll focus on his homework, but Ashton spends most of his time mumbling about how boring algebra is. When it comes down to it, yeah — the lengthy concepts and rules and theorems are pretty sleep-inducing, but they're important enough to determine whether or not Ashton graduates.
Ashton seems to find more interest messing around with Luke's calculator — Steven — than doing his actual homework, anyway. He still doesn't understand why so many buttons are necessary and why each button comes along with about ten different sub-categories when pressed, but it still captivates him. Sometimes he asks Luke to show him something he's learning in pre-calculus that day and Luke will open his book up and Ashton will stubbornly try to figure out one of the problems, despite his lack of knowledge in the area of trigonometry.
He usually gives up pretty quickly and resorts to fooling around with Steven's graphing features. Ashton learned about the "Draw" button last week and ever since then he's been eagerly doodling tiny, pixelated pictures every chance he gets. He's drawn a lopsided dog and an ice-cream cone and his own name, and one time even a heart (Luke thinks Ashton was blushing when he showed Luke the heart, but he can't be certain).
Math was never an enjoyable subject for Ashton, but suddenly it's become even more tedious for him. Like a good teacher, Luke explains the solutions slowly, using simple words to help Ashton make connections quicker. Despite all this, Ashton still frequently appears impartial to his homework.
Also, he stares at Luke a lot. A pang of uncertainty bubbles in Luke's stomach every time he catches Ashton watching him, mostly because Luke's unsure if he's just imagining it. Ashton looks away every time Luke looks back at him, and Luke spends far too many hours when Ashton isn't with him, debating whether he should confront the older boy about it. But a confrontation would certainly guarantee some sort of awkward interaction and, frankly, that's the last thing Luke needs.
It's a sunny Thursday afternoon and they're blasting Good Charlotte's "The Young and The Hopeless" album for the third lesson in a row because it's all Luke ever wants to listen to, and Ashton doesn't mind it.
Additionally, Ashton is sprawled on the carpet like a starfish, looking up at the ceiling. He'd claimed to need a "short breather" after finishing the first half of today's assignment, which is totally understandable. It's convenient for Luke, as well, giving him an opportunity to finish up his chemistry homework.
Aside from the music pulsing out of the stereo, it's silence between them. But, ever since the first lesson, it didn't take Luke long to discover that Ashton's not a quiet person, which is why that silence is broken after thirty seconds.
"You've never even wondered what it's like to kiss someone?"
Oh.
So they're back to this subject.
Luke hates this subject.
"Well, yeah, I've thought about it," Luke says nervously, furrowing his brow. "Just, never really gotten the chance to try it, I guess." He shrugs lightly, as if this is just another casual conversation between them. But it's far from casual for Luke — he can feel his face heating up and his heart-rate quicken and, fuck, this never happened when he told Calum and Michael.
Ashton replies with a simple, "Oh," and falls quiet again. Luke returns to finishing his chemistry homework. Upon getting the wrong answer, he grumbles and begins erasing the problem so he can start over.
"Do you want to try it?" Ashton asks.
Luke feels his heart leap into his throat and his eraser tears a tiny rip on his paper. Right. Kissing. Kissing? Is Ashton talking about kissing?
"What?" Luke looks up quickly and his chemistry book annoyingly slides out of his lap. "Like, right now?"
Ashton giggles and teasingly throws his pencil at Luke. "Not right now, genius boy."
Luke flushes and tosses the pencil back to Ashton. "Dunno."
"Unless you want to," Ashton offers, pulling himself up into a sitting position so he and Luke are both seated on the floor, up against the end of Luke's bed. He waggles his eyebrows at Luke suggestively, which definitely isn't helping Luke fight off the blush that's deepening on his own face. Luke just laughs because he doesn't know how else to react. "I'm being serious," Ashton finally says, and Luke's smile disappears.
"No, you're not."
Ashton keeps eye contact with Luke and scoots closer to him. It's a miracle that Luke doesn't flinch when he feels their shoulders knock together. "No, I am," Ashton says. "You and me. Right here, right now. You wanna?"
Ashton says it with such a casual tone to his voice that it should set off alerts in Luke's head that this is probably just a test of some sort. But this air of nonchalance is simply a defense mechanism Ashton uses in times of anxiousness, and Luke knows that. Ashton has a laid-back attitude about subjects he's really scared about, like the time he told Luke about his father leaving when he was just a kid. He had explained it to Luke so calmly, as if having a parent completely abandon him didn't affect him at all. As if having someone you love get up one day and walk out the door without a simple goodbye was entirely okay.
And then there was the time Ashton told Luke he probably wouldn't graduate with the current grades he had, explaining it as if education meant nothing to him. But Luke knew that wasn't true because Ashton would never have wanted to be tutored in the first place if that was the case. If graduating didn't matter to Ashton, he certainly would've dropped out of school a long time ago and surely wouldn't be at Luke's house, asking for algebra help. The fact that he chooses to even try to raise his grades speaks a thousand words.
Luke turns and looks into Ashton's eyes, searching for some sort of sign that says this is all a joke and I'm just testing you, but he doesn't find anything.
"You can say no," Ashton says, noticing the way Luke's gone dead silent. Luke takes those words as the confirmation that Ashton's being genuine about this offer. His stomach flips at that. And his mouth opens and closes with no words or sounds coming out, which is definitely not what he had planned.
Finally, what feels like centuries later, Luke manages a strangled, "Yes."
Without another moment to spare, Ashton immediately closes the gap between them.
And, yeah, it's kind of awkward, because first their noses bump together and Luke lets out a quiet, "Ow," and Ashton apologizes frantically. After that, it's probably all Luke's ever wanted.
The kiss is soft and sweet and a lot shorter than Luke would've liked, so when Ashton pulls away out of fear of making Luke uncomfortable, Luke simply kisses him again.
Ashton laughs at Luke's failed attempt to keep his eagerness under control and kisses him back gently. Time feels like it's stretching on slowly and all Luke can hear, aside from Good Charlotte's "Hold On" fuzzily playing in the background, is the sound of his heart pounding in his chest.
He makes the decision to pull back when his lungs are begging for air, and then he looks Ashton up and down like he's some sort of miracle. And, to Luke, maybe he is.
"Thanks," Luke says, then lets out a groan and buries his face in his hands at the realization of how fucking stupid that sounded. There are over a million words in the English language and all Luke can say is 'thanks'. Great. English was never Luke's strong suit, but really?
Ashton laughs and gently grabs Luke's wrists, pulling his hands away from his face and forcing Luke to look him in the eyes. "You're welcome." He lets go of Luke's wrists.
"Why?" Luke asks. "Why'd you kiss me?"
"Why'd you kiss me back?" Ashton prompts.
Okay. Good point. Luke feels his face burning up even faster.
"I asked first," Luke states.
"Fine." Ashton breaks eye contact for a second, and then looks Luke straight in the eyes. "You make it really quite difficult for me to focus on math. Your turn. Why'd you kiss me back?"
Luke feels his heart racing and his mind aimlessly reaching out for the right words, for a proper explanation. Now is the time. It's the perfect chance for him to release everything he's been keeping bottled up since the first day he spoke to Ashton, and he can't find the right words for it. Fuck.
"Like..." Luke starts, "I've wanted to kiss you for a long time? I guess?" Luke suddenly feels like his life has been thrown into some cheesy romance film and he's the stuttering mess of a character that can't form words.
"Oh," Ashton says, a smug smile forming on his lips. He leans back against the bed and laces his fingers in his lap, as if he's getting ready for a story. "Feel free to elaborate."
"Fuck you, you didn't elaborate!" Luke protests, but still smiles, nonetheless. He doesn't want to be smiling; it was only a kiss, anyway. Damn it, Hemmings, be cool, for god's sake. The butterflies in his stomach and the dopey grin on his face are certainly not cool.
Ashton clears his throat. "I wanted to thank you for helping me survive this year of algebra, so I decided the best gift would be a kiss."
Luke cocks an eyebrow. "You haven't technically survived yet. You've still got another two-and-a-half months plus the final exam."
Laughing lightly and rolling his eyes, Ashton slings an arm around Luke's shoulder. "And you're going to help me pass it, right?"
"Depends." There's a moment of silence where Luke appears to consider the question. "Do I get more kisses?"
Ashton doesn't say anything; he simply leans forward and presses a kiss to Luke's cheek.
---
While Christmas decorations are supposed to signify the holidays and the spirituous "joy of the season" and all that, they also mean the school-year is drawing to an end. The green and red accessories and candy canes and multicolored ornaments represent school being over more than anything, which is a huge sigh of relief for Luke, because he feels like his classes have pretty much roasted his brain at this point.
Unfortunately, with the school-year coming to a close, it also means exams are tauntingly just around the corner. For the record, exams are far from pleasurable when you've got a roasted brain.
So who can blame Luke if he spends most of his free-time locked up in his room with a textbook propped open in front of him? He knows he shouldn't work his brain to a point of exhaustion, but he also knows that he's still having trouble keeping track of a lot of things he's learned this year. Luke's been listening to music while organizing his notes from different courses, in hopes of making studying with a roasted brain a little less painful.
Also, he may have forgotten that it's a Thursday and Ashton's supposed to be coming over for algebra help.
There's a knock at Luke's door and he looks up from his textbook to see Ashton cracking the door open slightly. "Hi?" Ashton says, the greeting having a questioning lilt to it. "Your mum let me in."
"It's Thursday!" Luke shouts with wide eyes, flinging his textbook shut. "Shit. I didn't forget."
Ashton steps in and gently closes the door behind him with a soft click. "If you're busy, we can just skip this time," Ashton offers, rubbing the back of his neck nervously. "I know you probably have to study and stuff, and your classes are way harder than mine, so —"
"No, it's fine," Luke says, his tone sounding particularly dull and unconvincing. Studying for hours after school each day has only drained him, so it's no miracle that he sounds unenthusiastic about everything. "I should probably take a break from studying, anyway. I need something to distract me." Luke gets up from his chair and moves to sit cross-legged on the floor, just like they always do. He pats the spot next to him, signaling for Ashton to take a seat, and he obliges.
Ashton sets his homework down in front of him, staring at the papers for a few seconds but not moving to get started. Then he looks at Luke and states, "I don't want to study, either." It isn't the first time Ashton's admitted that, and normally Luke would disapprove and find a way to motivate him.
This time, however, Luke simply shrugs and says, "Okay."
"Okay," Ashton repeats. They stare at each other for a few seconds, neither of them moving and neither of them saying anything else. Then, like a grenade being set off, Ashton surges forward and kisses Luke, catching him so off-guard that the two of them go falling to the ground.
Falling onto his back with Ashton on top of him, Luke wraps his arms around Ashton's neck, pulling him closer. It's been months since they first kissed that one Thursday afternoon, and the time in between then and now has only been filled with a superfluous number of stolen kisses. In all honesty, Luke knows he's a bad kisser. After all, he only had his first kiss three months ago, so it's kind of expected. Ashton knows, too, and in fact uses it as an excuse to kiss Luke with every chance they get as soon as they're alone, claiming it's just for "practice" when both of them know that's only partially true.
That being said, Luke and Ashton never kiss in the middle of a lesson. Luke turns stone-cold serious when he's tutoring Ashton, taking his job sincerely despite Ashton's bitter complaints.
But Luke doesn't like following rules, and this was bound to happen eventually, so he decides to just live in the moment, for lack of a better expression. Anyway, when Luke had implied he was looking for something to distract him from studying, kissing Ashton was definitely an option he was considering.
Still kneeling over Luke, Ashton suddenly breaks the kiss and curses. "This was going to be all cute," Ashton says. "I was going to ask if I could kiss you first and then we were going to do the almost-kiss thing where we lean our foreheads together like those couples on the covers of Nicholas Sparks novels always do."
Luke makes a face. "Too bad," he says half-heartedly, craning his neck up so he can connect their lips again. They kiss for a few more seconds, soft and slow yet still with great intensity, before they're interrupted by a persistent buzzing sound from Luke's desk. Luke curses and mumbles, "Damn it, Calum," but goes back to kissing Ashton.
The buzzing sound doesn't stop, though, and Ashton pulls away briefly to ask, "Are you gonna get that?"
Luke decides to respond to the question by pressing their mouths together again and mumbling against Ashton's lips, "Clearly, no."
And Luke sticks to his promise for a few more seconds, because he fucking told Calum not to bombard him with texts and calls when he's tutoring Ashton, but then Ashton stops kissing him again and says, "I really think you should get that."
Groaning, Luke mutters, "Fine," and Ashton crawls off of Luke, busying himself by fumbling with his backpack zipper while Luke gets on his feet. "Gonna fucking block him," Luke complains as he walks over to his phone.
Essentially, Calum's reasoning behind the call is that he's bored, which only pisses Luke off even more. Calum doesn't hang up until Luke has thoroughly convinced him that he and Ashton are busy studying (because Calum is skeptical at first, questioning whether they were really studying or not, and, honestly, fuck him for being smart).
When Luke sets his phone down and turns around, he finds Ashton lying on his stomach, punching away on Luke's calcu — Steven.
"Sorry," Ashton apologizes when Luke takes a seat next to him. "Didn't want to study, decided to mess around with Steven instead." He slides the cover on the calculator and hands it back to Luke, then surprisingly falls silent and reaches for his algebra book. Usually Luke has to open the book for him since Ashton is always over-dramatic about how the textbook disgusts him, but this time he crack it open himself and flips it to the correct page on his own. Weird.
The room falls silent as Ashton focuses on his homework and Luke says, "Just tell me when you need help." He decides to take the cover off of Steven and entertain himself with the calculator while he waits for Ashton to begin desperately whining about how unfair algebra is. It's only a matter of time.
But when Luke presses the power button, the first thing he sees in the recorded history are the words, "WILL YOU GO TO THE DANCE WITH ME?" and Luke drops the calculator on the floor, startling Ashton.
Looking up from his homework, Ashton nervously asks, "Are you okay?" and wide-eyed Luke nods hastily before tackling Ashton with a tight hug. Ashton hopes that's a good sign.