The Drummer || a.i [completed]

56 - try to slip past his defence

without granting innocence

(a/n I hope you all remember the flowers Luke brought to her in chapter 34 - omg that was so long ago - and her reaction)

Saturday... date night.

I didn't know what to do anymore. I had hidden what I had seen from Ashton for three days now, but every time I looked at him I saw the bully that I now knew him to be.

However, he still managed to get my heart racing when he turned up on my porch Saturday evening with a bouquet of perfectly arranged white lilies. I invited him inside and we moved into the kitchen. Ash took a seat while I put the lilies in a vase and set them in the middle of the table.

Ash watched me and I watched the flowers, and we stayed like this for a while, before my boyfriend cleared his throat.

My eyes located his, and my heart stopped when I realised, just from his eyes, that he knew. He knew that something was wrong.

"You know, your face gives away a lot to a person, Tavie," Ashton observed, his head titling slightly as he stared at me. He held the eye contact, making me squirm in my seat.

"Like what, exactly?"

There was a pause before he asked, "what's wrong?"

I didn't know how to answer. Ashton had been perfect to me. If I told him that I wasn't comfortable, he wouldn't understand. Our relationship had been perfect, just like the lilies, since I confided in him on that first day back at school.

If I confided in him once more, would the outcome be the same? Would he turn up on my porch next Saturday with lilies or roses? Would he turn up at all?

"Ashton..." I sighed, not wanting to continue. Everything had been so perfect, why did I have to stumble upon such a catastrophic scene? Why did I have to ruin it?

But... sometimes it's better to know things than to not know them.

"Tavie..." he mimicked my sigh and giggled quietly, but I couldn't smile. I looked out of the window next to me and stood up. I stood and stared out of the window at the flowers in the flower bed. My mum was so sweet, she never grew roses, even though the colours would make the flower beds look perfect.

"I saw you on Wednesday, with your friends. You locked Jason in a closet. I... I helped him get out and he seemed so scared just by the simple fact that I was your girlfriend. When I told him I was helping him, it was like I'd told him I was descended from a long line of unicorns or something," I said, chuckling dryly. No sound came from Ashton. I just kept looking at the soil that the flowers grew in. What was living in that soil, despite the plants? Were they helping the roots grow, or were they parasites?

"I don't need to know everything that goes on in your life, Ashton. But I do want to know who I've fallen in love with... and who's fallen in love with me. I want to know who I'll be worrying about when he goes on tour, and who I'll be crying over when he eventually breaks my heart. I want to know him enough that I will actually cry. I don't want to not cry over you Ashton..." I muttered. My eyes focused on his reflection in the glass of the window, and I saw that he was staring off to the left, his chin resting on his fist. His eyes were somehow angry.

I turned around to look at him, and his eyes met mine with a spark of fear.

"I thought you knew who I was, Octavia."

My heart dropped at the betrayal in his voice. It was as if I had led him to believe I was someone I wasn't.

"You were always going on about how bad of an influence I was, about how rebellious and infuriating and stupid I was. You called me Jerkton. You knew the whole time, you just didn't want to admit that you'd fallen for Jerkton. You said it yourself, I'm not going to change, so please don't act like I was supposed to," he said.

And with that, I was broken.

Everything he had just said was true. I knew. I knew the whole time that I couldn't trust him. He was a smooth-talker, his voice alone could lead me to believe anything, but deep down I knew all the facets of Ashton.

"So what do you want to do now...?" I mumbled, looking down at my feet. I shifted my weight from foot to foot, feeling uncomfortable under his gaze.

There was a pause, and then he said the words I didn't really want to hear.

"We need to talk this through, Tavie. If you want us to work, we can't just move on and forget about it. If you don't think you can have a boyfriend who locks people in closets and drinks and says all the wrong things, you need to tell me," he said, as if all that was the most natural thing in the world.

I didn't know whether to say all the stuff that came into my head in reaction to those words, but he had just asked for it.

"How can you brush it off as if it is nothing? You locked Jason in a closet and blatantly insulted his sexuality! Jason is a guy just like you. He's gone through stuff in his life that you don't know about, just like he doesn't know about the stuff you've gone through. Imagine if people found out about Ellie and then made fun of that?"

"Don't bring-"

"You picked on his weaknesses, Ashton. Everyone has weaknesses and it's soul-destroying to have them used against you. Jason has been tormented by you. It's slow and painful and he's buckling under the pressure of it. He is so strong. You can't even begin to imagine how much strength he must have to be taking all of the abuse you are handing him. I don't understand how you can do that to a person. How do you live with yourself...?"

Ashton was silent. We stared at each other for what seemed like forever, and then he looked away.

"Human nature."

I cocked my head to the side. What did he mean?

"It's in human nature to pick on weakness. There's always been a hierarchy, it even exists in animals. The strongest can't afford to have a weakness in it's pack or something and so... it gets rid of it. I know that that's no excuse, but it is in my nature," he explained.

I crossed my arms and shook my head.

"We've evolved, Ash. We're not wolves anymore. Society is so much more accepting of anything and everything, and people like you threaten that acceptance."

"People like me?"

"I-"

"What, you mean big, hulking, cavemen jocks like me? I'm a threat to your little perfect world, right? And what, does your world have unicorns? Fucking flying cats with rainbows flying out their arseholes? Wake the hell up, Octavia."

"No. You don't have the right to say that to me. I'm not the naïve, gullible girl you imagine me to be."

"You're not? You fell for me, though."

By this time tears were rolling freely down my cheeks, and Ash had been slowly inching closer to me.

"Yeah," my voice cracked, "I'm beginning to see that maybe that was stupid of me. Yes, maybe I did believe you might have changed, Ash. Is that so hard to believe? You've been the perfect guy for so long. We ate pizza on my bedroom floor, we talked outside in the moonlight, you brought me lilies instead of roses. I mean... how did you even know I was allergic to roses?"

He smiled at his feet. It was tiny, but it was still a smile. "Cassy told me when I was freaking out in a flower shop over what to get you," he replied quietly.

I nodded. "Of course it was her. Look, maybe I am gullible and naïve, and maybe you are a caveman or jock or whatever, but I still don't know whether I love all of you or not, or even if you love all of me. I don't know what to believe anymore."

He stepped back and looked out the window while I looked at my feet. Somewhere along the line a brick had been put between us. It was tiny, but the beginning of a wall. We had to decide whether we'd build the rest of the wall, or get rid of the idea completely.