The Drummer || a.i [completed]

62 - the best thing

about tonight's that we're not fighting

Fighting became a natural occurrence between Ashton and I, and I could see that it was tearing him apart. When we were suddenly thrown into the midst of exams, I knew neither of us would be able to bear the stress of it any longer. One of us would have to break it off.

And I knew it had to be me, but I couldn't bring myself to do it.

Our screaming matches began to irritate my family, and my brother especially. So we had to take them elsewhere, and suddenly we seemed alienated. People began turning in the opposite direction if they saw us coming; they had had enough of us.

One day, after a particularly horrid English A Level exam, I just needed some company. Calum and Cassidy were both in the same state of depression as me, but I needed someone to cheer me up.

Naturally I turned to my explosive relationship for this comfort...

Don't ask me why, it just seemed like I still had hope for us, I guess. I still dreamt about the relationship we had in the holidays, the boy I had picnics with on my bedroom floor. The boy who gave me butterflies, not the acidic man who was slowly corroding through my heart.

Ashton came over to my house at ten that evening and we lay on the sofa in my living room. Mum and Dad were out, and Aaron was with Sophia.

Ashton sat on one side of the sofa, and I leant my head on his shoulder, my feet tucked next to me.

His arm was around my shoulders, and his thumb gently rubbed circles through the fabric of my pyjamas.

"How are you doing, Ash? We've talked about me all evening..." I muttered.

I heard his breaths deepen. "I'm okay. A Levels have been killing me, just like you. I'm sorry about how your English went."

I looked up at him and smiled. "You've said that a million times already. I'm over it."

His eyes sparkled. "Good, that was my aim," he replied.

For a second, we just looked at each other. Neither of us seemed willing to look away. His eyes seemed to hypnotise me, draining the energy out of me so that all I wanted to do was sit here all night, staring at him.

I seemed to lose all memory of fights with him, of screaming matches or of promised curses. All I was left with was his eyes.

I found myself being drawn into them, staring into pools of hazel and slowly inching towards them.

We were kissing. I hadn't realised how long it had been since I kissed him until now. And I now know how much I'd missed it. Tonight was some kind of blessing, a relief from all the fighting, all the shouting.

"I've missed you," Ashton whispered, pulling away from the kiss.

I closed my eyes for a second, imagining that all of our arguing had not happened. I wanted our relationship to be as perfect as this.

But that's not how my life works. I'm not that lucky.

"I miss you too, Ash," I muttered.

He lifted his fingers to trace along my cheek, tucking strands of hair behind my ear with a feather-like gentleness. "I'm so sorry. I haven't been strong for you. I told myself I would be strong for you..." he was almost talking to himself, so I just listened. "You have so much faith in me. I know I'm letting you down, but I need you. I really need you, Octavia."

"I know, Ash."

"I feel like if I try to fix it it'll have to get worse before it gets better, and I'm worried that if that happened you'd finally break and leave me," he was working himself up so much that he was almost in tears. I just grabbed him and pulled him closer so I could hug him tightly. I stroked the back of his head, my fingers running through his hair, and we were quiet.

After a couple minutes, I pulled away and jumped up from the sofa. "How about we play a game?"

He grinned, playing along with me. "We've already played 'I think I love you', Tavie," he said, causing the memory of the first time he told me he loved me to flash into my mind.

"No, a card game or a board game or something," I suggested, and he nodded and stood up, following me to where we keep our vast array of games.

Haha no, we just have the classics. Like Monopoly, Cluedo, Articulate, Balderdash and a couple others. Oh, and of course the deck of cards.

Ash grabbed the cards and we sat down at the table. He dealt them out and we played a couple games of Gin Rummy and some others.

He won the majority of our games, and I am quite a sore loser so I guilt tripped him hard, which is why he didn't win all of them (yes, he let me win a couple of times).

After an hour or so we went back to the living room and put on a movie. Some weird one that neither of us were really interested in.

"You know you're going to be alright, don't you?" Ash suddenly spoke up about twenty minutes into the film.

I glanced at him with a questioning look, confused about what he meant.

"You may not have done as well as you hoped you would in the English exam, but you'll be okay," he assured me, genuine concern in his eyes.

I smiled gently and nodded. "Yeah, my second choice uni should accept me even with a bad grade. As long as it's only in one of my subjects." That was my hope, anyway.

"Yeah, but even if you don't, you'll always end up okay. You can take a gap year and reapply, you can retake some exams, you could even just skip uni and find a job without it. There are so many options, I hope you know that." Ashton was overwhelming me a little bit, what with all his sudden ambitious talk about what could happen in the future. He generally never really talked about the future with me, and I didn't really think anything of it. But now... I didn't really know what to think.

I paused before replying. "You're right. I shouldn't worry."

He hugged me to his side comfortingly, and gently stroked my upper arm. His hands were warm, and I tried to focus on the movie instead of my strangely-acting boyfriend.

I think I must have fallen asleep, because I woke up in my bed after I don't know how long. I looked at the clock on my bedside table and saw that it was 2am.

I laid on my back and stared at the ceiling, thinking back to my evening with Ashton. I loved him. I knew that because I just could not stop thinking about him. I had no idea what to do about the fact that he was cheating on me. I knew that he needed me.

Nobody else could love him like I did.

// i'm sorry for the long wait for this chapter. it's been a really long and tough couple of weeks. there's also another reason, but i'm not going to drop them in it ahaha, you know who you are...

wait! also, happy fifth birthday 5sos! i've been listening to 'This is Everything We Ever Said' all day, ngl //