Doritos (Lashton)

Calum Broke His Wee Wee

A/n: Lauren and Harry's ages aren't accurate to real life in this. Lauren is about 14-15 in this, starting high school, and Harry is about 10-11, so in middle school. Just to clarify.
*****
Luke stared silently up at the ceiling, before straightening his back out. His eyes fell to Ashton's unconscious figure, and before he could stop himself, tears began to drip down his face.

It had almost become a routine now, the sight or mere thought of Ashton bringing tears to his eyes. Luke wondered how he had so many tears inside of him, and how they hadn't run out yet.

He heard a gentle cough, so he quickly wiped his eyes and cast them up to see Michael, Calum, and his own family standing at the door. Luke pushed his chair further up, closer to Ashton's head, and made space for the others.

They all stood silently around Ashton for a moment, and it filled Luke's heart. They were there to protect him. He'd be ok.

"T-thank you being here with Ashton"

Luke mumbled out quietly, eyes fixed on Ashton's closed eyes. He heard a sniffle, and felt Calum sit beside him, and bury his face into Luke's shoulder. The tears soaked through Luke's shirt, and he felt another weight on his other side not long after, one glance at the purple hair indicating it was Michael.

Luke's on family was on the opposite side, and he saw his dad read the note by the Dorito, before glancing up at Luke.

"He always ate my Doritos...he never turned them down, a-and I thought I was helping him. Thought I was fixing him"

"You were Luke. He was getting better. He was so close, b-but I don't know what broke him"

Anne stands in the doorway with both Harry and Lauren gripping either one of her hands. Liz wraps Anne in a hug immediately, and gently shushes and comforts the crying woman.

Lauren was old enough to know what happened, and while Harry didn't understand anorexia as clearly as the others, the fact that his older brother was in a hospital made him upset as well.

Jack and Ben had already began to talk to Harry, despite their age gaps, they'd connected with the younger boy. Luke would've provided comfort as well, if he didn't need some himself.

It was silent for a few moments longer, before Lauren spoke up. Her voice was hushed, as if she were scared to ask, but when Luke finally processed what she'd asked he couldn't help the smile that filled his face.

"What's your favourite memory with Ashton...and how did you know you liked him?"

"Laur, sweetie, let Luke be. He-"

"Cuddles"

Luke spoke up, and all eyes fell to him. He hadn't spoken in a while, and it became clear that he needed to talk about Ashton. Perhaps everyone did. Maybe they just needed to talk about Ashton, needed to use their pleasant thoughts of him as reassurance and hope, that he would be ok. Harry questioned Luke's one worded answer, prompting Luke to say more.

"Cuddles? What do you mean Luke?"

"His cuddles were the absolute best. He's small and he just fit perfectly in my arms when we cuddled"

"That's strange, because whenever Ash cuddles with Lauren or me, he's a lot bigger than us"

"Well, I'm a lot bigger than he is"

Luke cracked a small smile, before he turned his eyes back to Lauren, almost as if he were thanking her. Luke turned to Calum, seeing if Ashton's childhood best friend had anything to share.

"My favourite memory of him is when we were around 8, and I fell off the slide, and landed balls first on the seesaw. Ashton ran inside the school and screamed 'CALUM BROKE HIS WEE WEE' up and down the halls' and then convinced the principal to ice them...and then got in trouble because he wanted to lick the ice"

Calum shook his head and chuckled through the tears that were slowly beginning to cease.

"My best memory of Ashton is him making out with Luke and us walking in"

"Shut up Ben! That's one of your only memories of Ashton"

"But it was kinda funny, if we hadn't walked in you guys would've taken it all the way to third base..."

Luke rolled his eyes at Ben, before turning to Michael, who had begun to talk.

"My favourite time with Ashton is either when he and Luke decorated for my mums birthday, or when we were rehearsing for our performance and I found he didn't like FIFA so I threw a pop tart at him and we had a whole food fight"

They went around, and soon the circle wound back to Lauren who smiled sadly down at her brother.

"When he randomly started screaming and I went to check on him, he was laying on the floor with a stupid smile on his face"

"How come?"

"He was looking through your Instagram Luke"

Luke's cheeks tinted rose, and he stared down at his sleeping boyfriend, before looking up at the others.

"I think we all needed that"

Murmurs of agreement erupted from the others, and Luke smiled softly down at his boyfriend. Slowly, everyone began to leave, exchanging goodbyes, until only Luke, Anne, Lauren and Harry were left.

"Thank you Luke. For everything you do for Ashton, and for us. Your whole family, coming here for us meant the world"

"It's nothing big Anne. They know what Ashton means to me, and mum loves you guys so much"

"It's getting late, would you like something to eat?"

"O-oh, yea. I can go grab something?"

"It's alright, you stay with Ashton. I'm going to take Lauren and Harry down to the cafeteria, I'll bring you some lunch"

Anne nodded at the boy, before she lead the younger two out, leaving Luke with Ashton. Luke spread three chairs side by side, so he could lay beside Ashton. His legs hung off the edge but it was ok, because he was elevated enough that he could easily intertwine his fingers with Ashton's.

He laced them as best he could, and despite all the tubing between them, Luke found comfort there. The moments they'd shared helped him, a lot and he was now almost confident that Ashton would be ok.

"You know, Lauren also asked how I knew I liked you. Admittedly I was a douche, and didn't quite learn that I liked you till later, but you forgave me, so it's ok. If I'm being honest, I think I liked you the day I first laid eyes on you. Wanna know how I know?"

Luke thoughtfully tilted his head towards Ashton's, before smiling up at the ceiling.

"You took my breath away, and never gave it back"