lingering love » lashton.

5

Hey guys! Here's chapter 5! I don't have much to say except thank you all for even reading this book and please comment and vote! :D This chapter is dedicated to the author of one of my favorite fanfics at the moment columnhoods :) her story is called already home and it's amazing!

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While Calum and Michael were going through their bags getting out their "ghost hunting equipment" which was really just a couple of flash lights, a voice recorder and a video camera, I took the opportunity to go over to the closet to talk to Luke quickly. "You remember the plan right" I whispered to Luke while turning my back every few seconds to make sure Calum or Michael weren't looking."100 percent" he nodded doing a devious smile. Luke and I had a simple plan, just scare the shit out of Michael and Calum. I was never one to pull practical jokes on anyone because frankly I was terrible at them, well I was terrible at basically everything but I won't get in to that. Luke was pretty innocent too from what I could see so we both had trouble coming up with something so we decided just to wing it. Luke was going to move some shit around, throw some things, hide in the shadows, and he had to do it all without Calum seeing him, which I still couldn't understand how he could? I'll figure it out later. "I'll lead them out of the room and then you can go wherever okay?" "Okay" Luke replied. "Ashton we're ready!" Calum said, I quickly turned around from my closet and laughed at the sight in front of me. Calum and Michael both looked ridiculous, they had night vision goggles on, black paint on their cheeks, all black clothes and their "ghost hunting equipment in their hands. "Really guys?" We're searching around my house not hunting for an endangered species in the Amazon" I said mentally high fiving myself for that one. "Well we just want to be prepared for anything" Michael strugged fixing his goggles. "Oh I almost forgot Ash we have equipment for you too!" Calum exclaimed lifting up his duffel bag and pulling out an extra flashlight and tape recorder. "Wow..thanks" I said in a monotone as Calum handed me the items. "This is the most excited I've been for something since the pizza place opened up downtown" Michael added in clasping his hands together in a childlike way. "Then let's start?" I smirked shutting off the lights in my room before heading to the hallway and shutting off those lights as well. Harry and Lauren were in their rooms and I told them to stay there so we wouldn't have to worry about them.

After shutting off all the lights in my house I walked back in to my room to see Michael and Calum turning on their night vision goggles "holy fuck these things are epic" Calum said walking in circles around my room like an amused 5 year old. "Ashton you look green" Michael laughed. Switching on my flashlight I shook my head and smiled at their amusement. "Let's go" I said signaling them to follow me, I was going to take them to the attic first since that's usually where Luke hangs out and I didn't know exactly where he's hiding plus, I have yet to go up there.

I pulled down the attic stairs and looked back at Michael and Calum who already had nervous looks on their faces. "Well um maybe this isn't such a great idea" Calum said looking down at the ground and twiddling his thumbs nervously. Perfect. They were going to be scared shitless. "You guys insisted we do this and we already started so there's no stopping now" I told them looking between the both of them "Fine" Michael sighed "let's go." I started walking up the attic stairs with Michael and Calum walking closely behind, they looked like they were about to jump in to each other's arms at any minute and it was hilarious.

Once we reached the top I could feel the cool breeze coming from one of the slightly cracked windows. The area around the attic was very dark and dusty. There were a few old boxes scattered here and there and quite a few bits of old furniture, I couldn't comprehend as to why Luke liked to spend so much time up here. For the next few minutes we explored around, picking up dusty boxes and spilling out the contents which seemed to be mostly old clothes and books. "Hey look what I found" Calum said lifting up a photo album. "Let me see that" I said grabbing it from his hands rather rudely, he just shrugged it off and continued searching around with Michael. I took the photo album with me to a secluded corner of the attic and sat down in one of the creaky old chairs. I admired the front of the photo album for a bit, it looked just to be made of simple black leather with nothing on it but it had a sentimental feel to it. Most of the pictures in side of it seemed to be of this young couple who looked to be living in about the 80's or 90's, but with each page it seemed to be a different stage of their relationship; from going on dates, to getting married, to buying their first house and finally having children. It was rather sweet. I continued going through the pictures not really paying much attention to the details of each of them until I stumbled across one, it showed the couple, now a bit older standing in front of this house, but instead of it just being the two of them there was another person in the picture, a boy, who looked to be about my age...shit it was Luke "Oh my god" I said loud enough for Michael and Calum to here "What! what is it?!" they said running over taking out their voice recorders and camera's "did you see a ghost?!" Michael asked scanning around the area with his eyes, " "Uh no I thought I saw a spider" I lied to him. "Dammit" He sighed "I wanna see a ghost" He then stomped like a child "Let's go somewhere else, there's nothing here and this area is really starting to freak me out" Calum rambled pulling Michael's arm. I would follow them but I wanted to take a closer look at Luke in this photo. He was wearing a simple pair of black jeans and a red sweater and he had his arm around his mom with the biggest and most beautiful smile I had ever seen. I didn't realize he had been here that long. I grabbed the photo from the album and folded it up shoving it in my back pocket I would ask him about this later I knew he was sensitive about his death and his family but I feel like I just really need answers, how did he die? why is he still here? what happened to his family? Maybe I could finally ease him in to it after tonight. But first I had to find out where he was and even if he was going to scare Malum like we planned I put their names together, yes I know I'm clever I praised myself in my mind.