The Sweet Silver Song || An Ashton Irwin fanfiction

Thirty two.

"Why didn't you talk to me?" Ashton asked as soon as my brother had left my apartment.

He sounded hurt and I had to look away for a second to make sure I wasn't going to cry.

"I didn't know how you would react" I weakly answered and I heard him let out a long sigh as he leaned against the couch.

"And so it was better to let them win?" he added and I suddenly felt really tired. Like everything was suddenly falling down and I was too exhausted to control myself as I felt the tears spill from my eyes.

"I was afraid that you were going to react the way you did the first time" I confessed and he ran his hands over his face in an annoyed gesture.

"Are you ever going to let this go?" he asked as he raised his voice and looked straight at me.

"I couldn't risk it, Ashton they were talking about killing people" I replied and he looked at me intently as he opened his mouth to answer.

"AND YOU THINK I WOULDN'T HAVE BEEN SMART ENOUGH TO DO THE RIGHT THING?" he yelled and I flinched as the pounding in my head started again.

"I was just lost, Ashton... They could read my texts... It just felt like they knew everything and I was just scared" I said and I placed my head in my hands as I couldn't handle the way he was looking at me any more.

He didn't say anything back and we stayed quiet for what felt like hours as I let silent tears roll down my cheeks. I understood that he was upset and mad and I knew that I would have felt the same if it had been the other way around... But I was tired, and stressed out because I still didn't know whether it was over or not and I didn't feel like fighting with him again.

"You had no problem letting me believe you had cheated on me" he whispered after a while and I closed my eyes tightly as I tried to find a good answer.

"It was the hardest thing I ever had to do but I just wanted it to be over" I explained but I still couldn't read his face. "I just knew that they were going to get what they wanted eventually and I could see you getting more and more upset each day and I wanted it to stop"

He started nodding his head and relief washed over me as I finally got a small reaction from him.

"Just try and think about what you would've done if it had been the other way around... If they had started by threatening your siblings, then my brother, don't you think you would have done anything to protect them and me? That's what I was trying to do and maybe it wasn't the right thing, maybe I should have told you and we would have figured something out but all I could think about was how bad it could go... Please try to understand" I begged and he slowly let his eyes travel up to mine and looked at me for the first time in a while.

I waited for him to speak but he seemed completely frozen and I was holding my breath. He suddenly held his hand out toward me and my eyes widened as I looked at him and he gave me a small nod. I took his hand and he tugged on my arm as I stood up and he pulled me to him so that I was on his lap on the couch.

I immediately wrapped my arms around his neck as he placed his around my back and held me close to him. It felt like I could finally breath and tears kept falling from my eyes as I nuzzled my face into his neck.

"I'm sorry, I'm so sorry" I murmured against his skin and he didn't answer but kept soothing my back.

"I'm still super mad" he let out and I nodded as I tried to calm myself down. "I promised you I wouldn't let him hurt you again and you didn't let me keep that promise" he quietly added and I sniffed as I brought a hand to my face and wiped my tears away.