The Outsider || Ashton Irwin

Chapter 8

Ashton's POV-

I watched as she cautiously walked into the car. Her clothes were soaked, water was dripping from each strand of hair on her tiny little head. She was shaking like mad, gose bumps covered her arms. Her lips were a dark blue colour and there were dark black circles underneath her eyes from her mascara.

I reached into the glove compartment, reaching out for the blue blanket I left in there for emergencies. "Here." I said, wrapping the blanket around her.

"Thanks." She mumbled, her teeth chattering.

I turned on the heating in the car up to maximum, making the car feel like we were sitting in a sauna. I started to drive down the road. I tried to keep my eyes on the road but I couldn't stop myself from looking to her every turn, after a while I think she noticed.

"Where are we going?" Zoe asked, still shaking, colour reaching her face again.

"Um, well I thought we could go round my house because we need to know each other better, you know for the creative writing thing and that." She nodded. "You don't have to be anywhere or anything like that do you?"

She shook her head and smiled, "Thanks for this by the way." Looking down to the blanket.

"No problem." I looked back towards the road.

__________

When we reached my house, Zoe looked out the window in disbelief.

"You live here?" She sounded surprised.

I nodded. "My foster parents are quite rich."

"More than quite." She looked back out the window.

Dawn and frank's house was very modern. It had 4 floors, 5 bedrooms, a balcony that looked out to a forest on the other side of the house, a humongous kitchen and a mini gym. They were rich, but never showed off about it. I didn't either.

Whilst we walked to the house , Zoe had a worried look on her face. She kept fiddling with her hands and her hair. "Are you sure that your um foster parents will mind me being here." Her normal rebel act had dissepeared into a shy girl act.

"They'll be overjoyed." I said, giggling a little. She didn't seem so sure. "I promise you. Just make sure you don't get too close."

"What do you mean?" She raisedher eyebrows, looking confused. She had no idea.

Before I could touch the handle, the door swung open. A smiling Dawn came running out, looking like she had just won the lottery.

"Who's this Ash?" She said in her high pitched voice, looking towards Zoe.

"This is Zoe, my...friend." I said, awkwardly smiling over to Zoe, who still looked terrified.

Dawn let out a little squeal and pulled Zoe into a hug. "Ashton has a friend!" She continued to squeal. I wanted to bury my face in my hands. "Oh my gosh I need to tell Frank!"

After she let go of Zoe she ran back inside and called out to Frank. I looked over to Zoe, who was now giggling. I started to giggle with her.

"It's okay to be creeped out." I told her.

"I think she's nice." She smiled, however she couldn't hide the fact that she was still in a lot of shock, from my crazy stepmother.

When we walked inside Frank and Dawn approached us.

"See I told you she was pretty and she's Ashton's friend!" Dawn pointed at Zoe. Sometimes I wished I lived with normal parents.

Frank stepped towards Zoe. "It's lovely meet you. My name is Frank." He held his hand out to Zoe.

"I'm Zoe." She shook his hand.

"That is such a lovely name. We were going to name our daughter Zoe but obviously me and Dawn can't have children." His voice started to tremble. He stepped back to Dawn and put his arm around her shoulders.

"I'm so sorry." Zoe looked over to Dawn and back to Frank. "It must have been hard for you."

"It's fine, we have Ashton now." I gave them a quick glance and looked back towrds Zoe, feeling awkward,

"Okay, me and Zoe are going to go now." I grabbed onto Zoe's hand. Her faced blushed as she looked down at our hands, that were now entwined.

"Okay." Dawn and Frank said together, both grinning. I shook my head at them and took Zoe upstairs.

I silently lead Zoe down my hall, reaching my bedroom at the end. My room was very big. In all my other foster family's homes, I usually got a small little room with a bed and no extra space. However, this room was massive. There was a bed in the corner, shelves and drawers all over the place, and my own en-suite. It was perfect. But it didn't feel like home, nowhere did.

"Wow," Zoe gasped. "This is your room?"

"Yep." I sighed.

She walked around the room, taking everything in. Something caught her eye. She walked towards the drum set in the corner of the room.

"Do you play?" She asked, pointing towards the drums.

"Sometimes. It releases stress I s'pose." The drums did mean a lot to me. Whenever I was angry or I remembered about the past, I could just sit on the little stool and lose myself into the drumbeat.

I looked back towards Zoe, realising her clothes were still soaked from the rain. I Reached out into my drawer for a grey top and some joggers and offered the too her.

She took them out of my hands. "Thanks. Do you mind if I can use the bathroom."

"Yeah of course you can." I smiled to her.

She was beginning to walk into the bathroom but something stopped her, she turned around, looking at me again. "About earlier, why did you save me?"

"Like I said, I couldn't leave you out there in the rain-"

"No not that." She bit her bottom lip. "Why did you save me from Calum?"

I froze. I knew she was going to ask eventually. The only thing was, I still wasn't sure myself why I saved her. When I saw her standing there, she looked scared, I knew I had to help her. Before I knew it, I was fighting calum, again.

She was still standing there, waiting for an answer. "I don't know." I shrugged, "I guess I didn't want to see you get hurt."

"And why was that?" Why did this girl ask so many questions?

"Because," I thought for a second, "your the only one in this school that actually bothers to talk to me. Everyone else looks at me like I'm invisible. But you, you look at me like I'm an actual person. And when I saw you there, looking helpless, I had to help you."

She gave me her sweet smile. "Thank you Ashton." She paused for a while. "I know you might not want to be, I totally get it if you don't, but can we be friends?"

"Of course, I'd love to." Happiness swept over me. As sad as it was, nobody had ever asked to be my friend before and it felt good.

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A/n - I don't know if I should carry on with this fanfic anymore I think it's getting boring so vote and comment if I should carry on because it's your opinions that really matter.