The Chase ▹ Ashton Irwin

CHAPTER FORTY TWO

I was silent the whole ride from where Ashton picked me up to his house. He didn't seem to mind, because he kept quiet as well. I still didn't feel well, but I didn't take much notice into it until we pulled up to his house.

"My grandma needs the car," Ashton said as we both hopped out of our seats. "So, uh, yeah."

"Thats okay." I finally spoke up. We walked into his place, and I instantly crashed onto the couch. Ashton's grandma was here breifly, but she left with the car to go to work. Ashton slumped down next to me and ran his hands through his hair.

"So what happened?" He asked. He scooted closer to me and turned his body to face mine.

"She was being really demanding and quite mean to you." I replied with a sigh. Ashton nodded, and shrugged.

"It can't be that bad, right?" He said, with a somewhat positive tone. He tilted his head slightly to the side, and looked at me for an answer. I thought about every negative thing Jessie said about him, but one particular statement echoed through my mind.

"Make sure you tell Ashton I'm glad his mom is still nowhere to be found." The words left my mouth and I wish they hadn't. I was looking down at my sweaty hands, and I looked back up at the sound of Ashton's breathing hitching.

"Well shit." He said, followed by a desperate laugh. 

"Don't listen to her, Ash." I said.

"Oh don't worry about me, I'm not," Ashton replied. I he got up and took my hand and brought me up to my feet. By now it was starting to get dark outside, and the sky was a light purple with a couple stars in the sky. "C'mon." He said.

"We don't have a car." I laughed.

"We don't need one!" Ashton smiled. He intertwned his fingers with mine and I looked out infront of us. The enterance to the city isn't actually that far away.

"Can you show me that appartment?" I asked, looking up at him. His face lit up slightly and he nodded.

...

"Its just down the road." Ashton said. We had walked for aboout 20 minutes, just talking about random shit. I think Ashton forgot about Jessie, which I was thankful for. I sure didn't forget about it, but thats okay. 

By now we were back by the liqour store we had stolen from last time, and I was a little scared. I'm still not used to this part of town at all. I squeezed Ashton's hand a little tighter, and Ashton let out  small chuckle.

"What?" I asked.

"You're cute." Ashton replied, looking down at me with shimmering green eyes. I tilted my head to the side and giggled.

"What do you mean?" I said.

"I don't know, you just are." He said. I jumped and let out a small scream at the sound of a car's tires screechig on the road not too far away. Ashton laughed and wrapped his arm around my body and I rested my head in the crook of his neck as we kept walking. We began to talk about nothing important, just school and people and whatever else came out of our mouths. Ashton cracked a few cheeky jokes, and I began to feel a little bit more comfortable with my surroundings. 

Eventually, Ashton ceased walking almost instatly. I stumbled on my feet at his sudden hault and looked over to him. His eyes were squinted slightly as he looked up at an old building. It was pretty run down, with a few cracked windows blocked off my heavy metal bars.

It looked almost as sad as where Ashton lives now.

My eyes wandered down to a little bookstore that sat below it. It was dark inside, because it was obvioulsy closed at this time of night, but I could deffidently see the shelves of books all throughout the store. I could also picture Ashton in there all day, just reading whatever book caught his eye.