Coming Up For Air

0.9

"I want to have control

I want a perfect body

I want a perfect soul

I want you to notice when I'm not around

You're so fucking special

I wish I was special"

-Radiohead, 'Creep'

⚑ Luke ⚐

"Luke?" Ashton mumbled against the course softness of his jacket.

"Hm?" Luke sighed back. Ashton wasn't crying anymore but neither of them had wanted to let go just then.

"Um. Thank you. For...being here. Again."

"Anytime." Luke told him, putting a tidal wave of meaning behind seven letters and hoping Ashton would understand the writing in the sand. "Anytime you need me, I'll be here."

Two days of acquaintance and Luke already felt a magnetic kind of kinship with Ashton, similar to the way he felt about Calum but different. Different because it was sharper and softer and sweeter and a different kind of deep, a different shade of red.

It was more than a little terrifying.

It was more than a little wonderful.

(Luke vaguely thought he might just be going insane. But that was strangely okay with him because damn, insane felt pretty good when Ashton was pressed against his chest.)

"Ashton?" Luke said after forever and a half. "I'm kind of cold now."

"Oh!" Ashton exhaled and all of a sudden he was rocketing away and struggling out of the too-big jacket, getting tangled halfway and flushing like rose petals. "Oh. You can--here, I'll give you this back--,"

"Or we could just go home." Luke said. "It's pretty late."

Ashton's face caved in and he held the jacket out to Luke like it was evidence to a crime. "Oh. Okay. I...it was nice to see you again. I guess--,"

"I meant you could come to my house." Luke said, forcing the words out and praying for an answer he wasn't sure he should want."I--you know, it's late and it's dangerous to walk by yourself and plus you seem like you kind of don't want to be alone and I mean we have a couch except I don't think Calum's at home today so maybe you could take his bed or I could take the couch I don't care but...but yeah. We have hot chocolate too. If you like that. Or tea. We could make tea. I'm just saying. You know. If you want to."

Ashton stared at him for 17,000 years.

"Never--"

"Yeah." Ashton interrupted. "Yeah, okay. Um... Hot chocolate sounds really good. And couches--I mean not couches. But like what happens on couches--fuck! Sleeping on couches. Nothing else that happens on couches. Not that that's not nice--wait. Never mind. I--yeah. I'm tired."

Luke smiled like the sun as they walked home in the rain.

-

"So you live with...Calum?" Ashton ventured as they hurried through the drenched darkness.

"Yeah." Luke told him. "He's been my best friend since I moved here when I was thirteen."

"I actually know him," Ashton said. "I think. He's a Kiwi, yeah? From Sydney?"

"That's the guy." Luke responded. "Calum Hood. Six feet of musical, soccer-playing muscle."

"Accurate description, from what I can remember about him." Ashton chuckled a little and Luke's chest flared because he loved the sound of it. "I took a music class with him when I was...sixteen? Yeah, I think so. He was quite good on the guitar and he's got a really nice voice as well."