Loving Him (Ashton Irwin a.u.)

Chapter 10

[AN]: many deep apologies for the delay. It took me forever to write DMAF. There's a nice long excuse for that on the most recent chapter over there.

Hallelujah by P!atd is so amazing, give it a listen!!!

Also thanks so much for 2.1K reads!!!!!

Enjoy!

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"Ashton!" I called from the hallway where I was slotting some earrings in. "Are you nearly ready?"

"Just trying to find my shoes, babe!" he called back. "Are you all packed?"

I told him I was, retrieving my suitcase from my bedroom, pointing out his shoes to him at the same time with a playful roll of my eyes.

"You've never been very good at looking for things," I commented with a shy smile tugging at my lips.

"That's because I don't usually have to look. I leave shoes by the door and keys in the kitchen. But when I'm sleeping over here you...move my stuff."

"I move your stuff?" I questioned with a quirk of my eyebrow.

"You do," he agreed, wrapping both of his arms around me and locking them in place. His hands rested low on the small of my back. With a confident smirk on his face, he repeated, "You move my stuff."

I laughed lightly, swatting his bicep. "I do no such thing."

"Of course you don't," he humoured before pressing a kiss to my lips. "I love you."

"I love you," I returned with a grin.

Within a matter of moments we had left my apartment, after bidding Kia goodbye and a merry Christmas, and were in Ashton's car on the way to my family's home. It was the day before Christmas Eve - December 23rd - and Ashton and I had agreed to spend the days before Christmas with my family, including Christmas Day, then leaving on Christmas night to go back to his home and see Aiden. Ashton wanted to be there for his second ever Christmas, understandably.

My family lived a little bit further outside Sydney to where I was so they could afford to have a bigger house. My family weren't rich, but we got by with all the necessities. My dad was a history lecturer at the University of Sydney, and my mum was a party planner. They met at the university when my dad was studying history and she advertising. They had now been together for over twenty five years, married for twenty one. My parents were in love. I knew that whatever relationship I would get myself into would never be as beautiful as theirs; I had never seen two people worship each other like they did. All I wanted to achieve in my life was to fall in love with someone the way they did - gently, humbly, beautifully. And I was pretty close to getting there with Ashton.

Ashton and I held hands as he drove. He didn't let go to change gear on the car and he didn't let go to turn on the indicator. Our fingers remained intertwined for the forty-five minutes it took us to drive to suburbia.

Our relationship had been like this since we shared three little words. We were almost inseparable if we had anything to do with it, sickly sweet with each other, getting glared at by parents and the elderly when we kissed in public. We were so close physically and emotionally and I loved it. Every day I fell deeper in love with him in a way I now find almost impossible to describe. It felt so secure and perfect in its imperfections. It was a flawless relationship, and sometimes it worried me. It worried me that one day the perfection of it would crack, and something would happen to make us crash, whip us apart violently and painfully, destroying us, aching from our hearts. At some point something would get in the way and we would be falling so quickly from cloud nine that we would break our necks. It felt almost unavoidable, inevitable. It wasn't a feeling I enjoyed, but I couldn't seem to shake the worry that my reciprocated love for Ashton was too good to be true.