Fools

Part 41

that same night, lilah's pov;

I looked at my phone and saw the time was 3:30am, Ashton and I had just left the party a little bit ago and were walking back to my dorm.

"I really had a great night, thanks again for inviting me." I told him, he put his arm around me and pulled me closer as we were walking, we were both pretty drunk but still there so that's good.
"Of course, I'm glad you had a good time, so did I. We'll have to do it again sometime." We both laughed. We reached the door to my building, he let go of me.
"Would you wanna come up? We don't have to do anything, we could just put a movie on or something to fall asleep to, I'm exhausted." I asked him, he smiled.
"Sure, I'd love to." I took his hand as we walked upstairs to my dorm, I unlocked the door and as we walked in, he plopped himself stomach first on the bed then turned to face me. "I love your room, it's got a really good vibe. You don't share it looks like, do you?"
"No, I have it to myself, it's real nice but it does get lonely sometimes, but I'd rather have my own space."
"Understandable and must be nice though, I share mine with Tyler." I laughed.
"You guys are really close huh?" I asked, I went over to my dresser to pick out some pajamas.
"Yeah, the closest you can get really. We went through grade school together, Tyler and I anyway, met Drake middle of high school then met Liam our first year at our other University. We've all been inseparable since."
"That's really sweet. So are you an only child?" I asked, he covered his eyes as I started getting undressed, I smiled a little.
"Yep. Those dudes are my brothers, we've been through a lot together." He told me, I smiled again. "What about you?"
"It's kind of a long story of my childhood haha, but yes I have 2 siblings, an older sister named Jaylie and a younger brother named Derick." I finished getting dressed and sat on the bed next to him.
"Why's it a long story? You don't have to tell me if you don't want to."
"No it's fine, I can. If you're willing to listen." I joked, he sat up on his elbow.
"I am."
"Okay, well my biological mother passed away when I was 11, Jaylie was 13 and Derick was 9. So we went to live with our dad, he had all sorts of drinking problems and he was really aggressive and had constant mood swings. We were there till I was 13 almost 14, Jaylie was 16 and Derick had just turned 11 when they took us out of his care and placed us with our aunt. We were there for years, she had a son, our cousin Nico, he was just a baby at the time we got there." I began telling him, I could tell her was so interested, I loved that I knew he was listening. "At first it was good but then it got bad around age 15 for me, my aunt was gone constantly and left Jaylie and I to basically raise both Nico and Derick. At 17 for me, Jaylie had already left for University the year before I even turned 17, she now studies and lives full-time in America."
"Oh wow, that's something, where in the US?"
"We don't keep in much contact these days, she started out in New York but now she lives in California. I hope one day I go there to see how she's living and just to see America." He placed his hand on my knee, I smiled faintly. "So yeah, when I was 17 I had decided that I just needed to get out of there. So..I left." He squeezed my knee in reassurance, I put my hand on-top of his to let him know it's okay. "When I left, my brother and cousin had both been put in foster care. Derick had the choice to not stay there, but he was also too young to make a decision for schooling with no support. Eventually he got adopted though, he lives with our parents in Manchester. When I had came back on a holiday, we had went to the court-house to legally have them claim me as their child also." He smiled.
"Aw, that's sweet. So what happened to your cousin?"
"I'm not sure, I think and hope that Derick still keeps in touch with him but I don't know for sure."
"Ah okay, so are you originally from Manchester then?"
"No, we're actually from Liverpool."
"Neato."
"Haha yeah, well thanks for listening, I've never told anyone the full story."
"Why's that?"
"Just never had anyone who was interested I guess."
"Well that's a shame. It's good to know someone's background, it goes in depth to who they are. I think you're really strong too, to have gone through that during your childhood." I smiled.
"Thank you. That means a lot, I'm just glad we've found our forever family now."
"Yeah totally, I'm happy for you."
"So, you, what part of Australia are you from? What was your childhood like?"
"Well, I'm from Melbourne originally, like I said, I'm an only child. My parents were together all through-out my younger years but my dad had some issues with keeping it strictly to my mother and they divorced when I got into high-school. My mother relocated to Sydney and my dad stayed in Melbourne. I was so sick of bouncing around from house to house cause every year it'd change who I was with and I just couldn't take it anymore." I squeezed his hand, reassuring him now. He smiled. "Tyler was with me through the whole divorce and what not, and sometimes he'd come stay with me months out of the year I was gone at my mothers. When we met Drake, a year I was at my dad's, we came up with this plan to just try out different locations till we found one that fit us."
"In a way you were kind of used to it already?"
"Yeah, exactly. So the plan kind of fell into place, Drake's parents were actually the same without moving to different cities so he was on board from the jump. And now I'm here."
"Do you still speak to both?"
"Yeah, I don't think of myself as that I still live in Australia but it will always be my home, so I like to get out there and visit both of them every now and then, we meet somewhere in the middle so I'm not traveling to and fro. They can handle themselves for the sake of me for a couple of days." We both laughed. "Do you wanna lay down now? I'm kinda taking up a lot of your bed here, I don't want to be rude." He laughed again. I smirked and then nodded my head. He scooted over to make room for me to lay down. I picked up my light remote and dimmed the lights so it was almost dark in here. He put his arm around me as we laid there. "Man I just feel like I know you more than we do at this point in time."
"That's the alcohol talking." He picked his head up and gave me a dumb look, I laughed. "I'm just kidding, I was honestly going to say the same thing but didn't want to be weird. I feel so close to you already."
"You could never be weird and even if you are, we're all a little weird." I turned to look out the window and smiled. "Goodnight Lilah."
"Goodnight Ashton." I could hear him and know he was fast asleep already, I just laid there for a while. So many thoughts were running through my mind, I felt like I was never going to fall asleep. This night was so crazy but so good at the same time and I'm really glad Ashton and I ran into each other and that he actually gave me the time of day to get to know me. The last thing on my mind though was Cate, where do we go from here? Will she even remember our conversation by tomorrow? That's a situation I'll leave for another time. I closed my eyes and tried to fall asleep, eventually I did.