Runaway - Ashton Irwin *completed*

twenty-six

Thursday, March 16 I walked into Starbucks and ignored Ashton sitting on his phone scrolling through something and walked right up to the counter where Luke was standing, seeming to watch something.

"What are you looking at?" I asked him as he began putting my order into the register.

"Nothing." Luke turned away and looked back at me. "Just zoning out."

"You never 'just zone out,'" I said. "Is something wrong?"

"No, I was just thinking about tomorrow," he shrugged. I handed him a couple dollars and he handed me my change back and began making my drink.

"What's tomorrow?" I asked.

"Um..." Luke stopped and looked at me from behind the counter. "Your birthday?"

"Oh," I stopped from putting the change back into my wallet. "Oh wow it is."

Luke rolled his eyes. "Who forgets their own birthday?"

"I've just had a lot on my mind lately." I thought about what happened my last birthday. I didn't want to remember that.

"How old are you going to be?" Luke asked. "42?"

"24." I took my drink from him and he smiled at me.

"You know I'm just teasing you. Go love on Ashton, he looks far too enthusiastic right now."

I looked over and Ashton seemed to be zoning out as well. I looked back at Luke, who winked at me before walking away and I headed over to Ashton.

He looked up at me and smiled. "Hey Taylor Parks. Guess who is finally joining the world of 24 year olds tomorrow?"

"Don't remind me," I sat down with him and let him take my drink and take a sip of it before handing it back to me.

"You're not big on birthdays?" he asked.

"Not really. Too many bad birthday parties," I said.

"What, are you the Grinch when it comes to Christmas too?" he teased.

"Not as much, but yeah I'm not big on Christmas either," I said. "A lot of bad experiences have ruined a lot of things for me."

"Well I'm going to make them better," he said. "And trust me, I'm going to try to make this your best birthday yet."

I smiled and leaned into him, grateful for his ambition. It was nice to have a little bit of that. It'd only been 2 and a half weeks since we'd gotten together so we were still in our honeymoon phase but that didn't mean I didn't appreciate what he did for me.

"I believe you," I said.

-

"Happy birthday, Taylor!" Michael yelled as I stepped off the elevator Friday morning and Niall blew into a kazoo while Megan threw confetti on me, covering me in copious amounts of glitter.

I laughed as they pulled me into a group hug and let me go to my office after thanking them and attempting to brush off some of the glitter and confetti.

When I walked into my office I was startled by the fact that my desk wasn't cleared and organized like it usually was. It had a few envelopes with birthday cards from coworkers and balloons tied to weights sitting on my desk. Inside the cards were a couple gift cards to multiple places.

A bouquet of flowers sat on the end, and I looked at the note. Of course they were from Ashton, informing me that he had dinner plans for tonight at 6.

I was surprisingly motivated for the day. My birthday was so far off to a good start and I prayed it wouldn't go down the drain like it usually did and stayed optimistic for the day.