savior

epilogue

DEADLINE: TWO YEARS, 3 MONTHS AGO 

There was a wedding. It was a cute one; all of our families and friends joined together and watched what was the best moment of my life. But before I talk about that, I should explain everything that had happened since the day I saved Ashton's life. 

It was a few months after, and my mom had gotten herself a new job. Oh, and that guy she was telling me about—the man who interviewed her that day—ended up getting really close with her. Close enough to ask her to be his girlfriend. And so when Kaitlynn asked if she could move in with my dad, there were no hard feelings because my mom wasn't going to be alone anymore. 

So Kaitlynn moved in with Dad. And since then, everyone had been happy. There hadn't been anymore arguements. Everything was peaceful between everybody. And that's how it stayed. 

After many months of talking about it, I eventually moved out of the apartment also. Ashton had invited me to move in with him, Lauren, and Harry, and I told him I would think about it. And I did a lot. I had a conversation with my mom about it, and she said if that was what I wanted to do, then I should go for it. About a week later, after confirming it to myself, I moved in with him. 

And then one night, when we were laying together, in our bed, Ashton mentioned something pretty important. "I'm thinking of going to rehab, Armel," he had said, as he played with a few strands of my hair. "I mean, I'm still pretty messed up. It'd probably be good for me to, you know, try to get a little better." 

We took some time to talk about it, and eventually Ashton was kissing me goodbye. It was only for a few months anyways, as much time as he needed until he felt content with himself. While he was gone, I spent time taking care of Lauren and Harry, all while finishing my senior year of high school. Ashton was basically labelled a drop out, but he didn't care. He just wanted to get his life on track. 

In those few months that Ashton was gone, I had spent a lot of time hanging out with Michael, and sometimes Calum. Luke and I talked a few times, but once it got awkward, we both stopped the conversation and returned our attention back to the other two, who liked playing video games together. 

Yes, Michael and Calum eventually ended up being good friends. The whole Anna-love-triangle thing was put behind them and they stopped talking to her altogether. The two of us made up, but we never actually spent anytime with each other. 

Ashton came back a few months later, greeting me with a kiss. "I missed you, Armel," he said as he entered the room, dragging his luggage behind him. 

"How was it?" I asked him, helping him unload everything he had packed for his little trip thing. We spent a few minutes hanging up shirts on his side of the closet, avoiding mixing his clothes with mine on the other side. 

"Well, I mean, I'll always be a little messed up. That's unavoidable. But I think I did something good for myself by going," he told me, kissing my lips inbetween each sentence.

A few nights later, Ashton and I had spent the most of the night making out on our bed, which ended up leading to something else. I was just so happy that he was there with me after being gone for so long, and he was really happy to be there, too. That night happened to be the night that we both lost our virginity—it was actually kind of awkward because I kept thinking about what Lauren had told me about being in the bedroom right next to ours almost the whole entire time.

Eventually, all of those events led up to something huge. We were both twenty by the night the big thing happened. Ashton had taken me to this really fancy restaraunt in town—we had finally gotten jobs to support ourselves with—and in the middle our meal, Ashton popped the question.