5SOS Preferences and Imagines

#87 You Find Him Self Harming

A/N: PLEASE READ!! This may be triggering to some people so read with caution please!!

Luke: "Luke?!" you called out frantically. You needed to find him as quickly as possible before he could do anything. About 15 minutes you had received the most devastating text you could have ever gotten from him. '(Y/N), I'm sorry, but I can't do this anymore. I love you sweetheart... Luke xx'. The minute you had received it, you were in your car, rushing through traffic. You didn't even bother turning off the vehicle or taking the keys. You couldn't waste a minute. You searched through literally every room in the house until you came up to the bedroom. "Luke!?" you called out again, throwing open the door only to catch your boyfriend mid-cut. "No..." you murmured watching the blood pour from the two previous ones. They were deep. Too deep. And he was in the middle of making the third. His jeans had the crimson liquid covering them, some even falling onto the cream coloured carpet. But he was frozen, the razor still partially in his skin. His face was red and splotchy with tears and his eyes were red and bloodshot. You snapped yourself back into the reality of the situation and ran to grab a towel. Upon your return, you could see that Luke was still in shock from being caught. You tried to keep calm as you kneeled in front of him, gently taking the sharp, blood stained blade from his hand. "Luke this is gonna sting, but trust me it's going to help." Lifting his arm, you firmly placed the towel over the gashes. He jumped, coming out of the shock and yelled out, trying to pull his arm away. But you held it in place. "Luke, no," you instructed, not wanting to hurt him any further. He settled down, and sniffled, looking down. "Please don't be angry at me," he whispered, just loud enough for you to hear. "Luke, I'm not angry," you replied calmly and gently, keeping the pressure on it. "You have no idea how scared I was when you texted me..." you trailed off. He looked up at you and you could see the tears pouring hard from his eyes. "I-I'm so s-sorry," he choked out. "No, no. Luke, I'm just glad I got home in time," your voice shook as you said that but you managed to keep it together for him. "These are going to need stitches though..." you told him as you took a look at the cuts on his arm. "I know. I'm sorry," he said weakly. You just shook your head, helping him stand up. "Let's go okay..? Then we'll get home and you can rest. We'll talk when you're ready," you assured him. He held onto you, his feet fumbling a little with the first few steps. You were terrified that he had thought to resort to such a devastating end, but you only needed to focus on the fact that you had gotten to him in time. You didn't know what you would do without him.

Calum: Unaware of the situation going on just outside your bedroom on the balcony, you set your shopping bags down on the bed and slipped your shoes off. You knew Calum was outside, most likely having a cigarette, but you would never have guessed that smoking wasn't the only thing he was doing. "Hi Cal," you said loud enough so he could hear you through the crack in the door leading to the balcony. There was no reply, yet you could see his outline through the curtain. "Calum?" you repeated, walking towards the door. You were sure he could hear you, but why wasn't he answering? Thinking he was ignoring you, you slid the door open all the way, ready to ask him why he wasn't answering. But you stopped, freezing in your tracks when you realized the reason he wasn't answering. Staring down at his arm, you could clearly see he wasn't using his lighter to light a cigarette. Calum appeared to be in a trance, running the small, hot flame under his arm repeatedly. You could tell he had been doing it for a while because the skin was black, bleeding and blistered. His whole forearm was like that. And it almost appeared as the skin was melting off. "Calum!" you exclaimed, snapping him from the false reality he was stuck in. He jumped, immediately hiding the small plastic lighter behind his back. But there was no point, you had already seen it. "W-what are you doing?" you cried, staying in your spot. "(Y/N)-" "Why would you do that?!" The tears had started falling faster, and you were already choking on sobs. He was crying now, seeing you like this. "(Y/N), please..." he whimpered quietly. "No! Calum no... not you..." You didn't want to believe it. You couldn't. Not Calum, not the one who had kept you together. "Calum... why didn't you tell me something was wrong? Why? I... I could've helped..." You ran your hands through your hair, frustrated, not in him, but in yourself. "We have to take you to the hospital," you said as you pointed to his arms. "W-we need to get those taken care of Cal," you finished, beginning to settle yourself a little. "Please Calum." You couldn't tear your eyes off of the burns. They were brutal. "(Y/N), I'm okay," Calum said, his words shaking. "No. No you're not okay. Calum... Please..." He stared at you for a minute before giving in and nodded, putting his head down. Taking a few steps towards him, you carefully took the lighter away and replaced it with your hand. "I promise Calum... it will be okay." You didn't care how cheesy or repetitive you sounded, you wanted him to know, and have it stuck in his head, that you would never judge him or get angry for something like this.

Michael: You had left Michael in the kitchen to finish chopping vegetables while you went and had a shower. You felt much more refreshed when you got out, changing into some comfortable clothes before going back down to help Michael finish. Once you got to the bottom of the stairs, you began talking, walking into the kitchen where Michael had his back to you. "Almost done there Mikey? I think the chicken is almost done. I'll just check and see if it needs-" You stopped abruptly when you reached him, standing behind him. "Michael?" His back was hunched and he was completely still. You came up next to him and your mouth fell open when you saw what had happened. He had stopped cutting the vegetables and started on his wrist instead. There were only five but they were long and fairly deep cuts. "I-It was an accident at first but... I-I just couldn't stop once I started..." Michael stuttered. You were shocked. He was just laughing and making jokes not 20 minutes ago. "Michael I... Why..?" was all you could ask him. "I don't know.... I just... it slipped and I was going to clean it up, but I made another because I realized it felt so good and then... you walked in so I stopped." He finished his explanation and stood in silence. You couldn't help but do the same. "Michael it's okay," you finally spoke up after a couple of minutes. "No it's not. Why couldn't I stop (Y/N)?" He turned to you, sadness and disappointment spread across his face. "I don't now Michael... I don't know... But what I do know is we need to deal with this before it becomes more of a habit. Please. I promise you won't have to do it alone Mikey..." He immediately nodded. "I honestly don't know what got into me," he finished, his head falling to your shoulder. You put your arms around his torso. "Shh, Mikey it's okay," you reassured, rubbing his back. On the outside you were calm, but on the inside you were scared. Scared, for him, if it was going to happen again. If he couldn't stop himself this time, what would happen if he had another accident when you weren't home? Then what... All these questions ran through your mind as you held onto him, not wanting to lose him anytime soon.

Ashton: Ashton had been under a lot of stress and pressure lately. You could tell because whenever he would come home, all he would want to do is go to bed. His appearance and mood showed signs of depression and you were quite worried about him. He had never been this tired or upset in a really long time. The job was taking too much out of him. In the few minutes you were able to maintain his attention, you two had talked about getting time off but no matter how many times he would ask management for even as much as two days off, the answer was always no. Ashton was going crazy. The lack of sleep, over-working method was not working for the poor guy. You saw the transition happen in front of your very eyes. The happy, bright Australian guy you knew had transitioned into this gloomy, quiet, depressed guy that you hardly knew. You just wanted him to be happy again. It was about 9:00pm and you were sitting on the couch, flipping through the channels. Ashton had gone up to bed the minute he got home but it was just too early for you to follow so you had just decided to make yourself a small dinner and just watch something on TV. Assuming Ashton was asleep, you shut the TV off and took your dishes to the kitchen, just deciding to clean up in the morning. Just as the last light switched off, a loud bang captured your attention. Weird. You started towards the stairs, only to hear it again, this time louder and this time it didn't stop. Running up the stairs, heading straight the bedroom, you knew it was Ashton. It was his way if hurting himself. You had seen it before. Him punching the walls until his knuckles were bloody. You whipped the door open and caught him right in the middle of punching his fist through the plaster. There was specks of blood on the wall starting to smear around with every hit. You couldn't just stand there and watch. You had to stop him before he hurt himself anymore. Jumping behind him you grabbed his arms restraining them back so he couldn't hit anymore. He struggled a little but gave in quickly, too tired and worn out to put up a fight. You didn't have to say anything. Ashton turned his body around and almost immediately began sobbing into your t-shirt. "Oh Ash..." you soothed, wrapping your arms tightly around him. Backing up towards the bed, you both fell back. Manoeuvring your bodies so both of you were in a comfortable position, you pulled the blanket up over you while he continued to cry. You brought his knuckles up to your lips and kissed them gently. "It's okay Ashton... sleep. You're taking the day off tomorrow." "But..." "No but's you need sleep... I promise I'll take care of it," you promised. You immediately felt his body relax and his breathing steady a little. "T-thank you..." Ashton stuttered, holding onto your body. "Sleep Ash. I love you so much."

A/N: Hi again! I have received a few requests to do a part two of the previous preference and I will be doing that! I need to an imagine and then I will do a part two for that one and another one. Thank you so much for all of the support with this as well! I can't believe it has gotten this far!