terrible things - ashton irwin

forty six

In the early afternoon, somewhere in North Carolina, we took an exit off the highway and ended up in a park, near the shore of a small lake.

"Let's stop for a little while," Ashton said. "I like this spot."

Ringed by trees and rolling hills, the lake was calm, reflecting the blue sky back at itself. I rolled down the window and breathed in the smell of clean, piney air.

"It's pretty here," I agreed.

We climbed out of the Mustang and walked toward the edge of the shimmering water. Ashton bent down, selected a flat stone, and then skipped it across the surface-one, two, three, four times.

He snorted. "Terrible. I used to be able to do twelve."

I stood beside him and snaked my arm around his waist. It felt so good to be off the road, to feel my muscles loosening, my gas-pedal foot slowly uncramping.

"Maybe we should rent a paddleboat or something. Take a break. Drive some more later."

It was like he hadn't even heard me. "I used to love coming here," he said.

"What?"

His eyes swept over the lake, but he seemed to be seeing some other thing. Or some other time. 

"We used to build these crazy rafts and tow them over in wagons. Then we'd see how many kids we could pile on them before they'd sink. We'd get in trouble because you need a permit for a boat. And we'd always argue that we weren't on a boat-we were on a raft made by nine-year-olds out of packing crates and big pieces of styrofoam."

"Wait a second," I said, dropping my arm from his waist and taking a step back. "Are you talking about this lake?"

"Of course," Ashton said. "I was born three miles away."

Before I could stop myself, I shoved him, and he stumbled a little. "I'm so sorry," I said, grabbing his hand. "But wait. You bought me...home?"

"I wanted you to meet my parents," Ashton said, as if this were the simplest, least surprising thing in the world.

I was totally gobsmacked. I didn't even know where we were, really, and now I was about to meet Ashton's parents, who until now had been about as real to me as a couple of unicorns.

"Welcome to Asheville, North Carolina," Ashton said, gesturing to the trees and paths and joggers around us. "Formerly Tuberculosis Central, and now know as the Paris of the South, or , to the writers of Rolling Stone, the New Freaks Capital of the US."

I shook my head in disbelief. I didn't know whether to kiss him or kick him. "You wait until now to tell me?"

He smiled. "A guy ought to surprise his girl once in a while," he said. "It's romantic that way. Now let's go see the sights, such as they are."

And for the next hour, he showed me around his hometown. I saw the shop where he bought his first guitar and drum set; the elm tree that he broke his arm falling out of; the elementary school where he'd started a rock 'n' roll club. ("It got huge, even though some super-ancient dudes protested, saying rock 'n' roll was 'the devil's music,'" Ashton said proudly.)

Nothing was particularly special, and yet everything was extraordinary because it was a part of Ashton's previously classified childhood. I wanted to stop at every corner, peer in every window. I wanted to stop strangers and ask them to tell me a story about Ashton. He'd opened the door to his past, and I wanted to walk right through it.

 Ashton touched my arm, directing my attention a drugstore sandwiched between a café and a crystal shop. "Look." he said. "There's even a place like John's. But the coffee's even worse, it's like battery acid. I swear it once ate a hole in my jeans." He shook his head at the memory. "Of course, it could have been actual battery acid that did that. I certainly spent enough time in my dad's shop."

"His sop?" I asked.

"He owns a car repair shop. Ashton's Auto Repairs."

"Wow, he named it after you?"

Ashton shrugged noncommittally. "Sort of."

"What do you mean, sort of? Who else would it be, the Swiss Family Ashton? Jackie Ashton? Ashton Crusoe? Smokey Ash-?

"Hey, see that?" he interrupted."That's the streetlight that my brother ran his custom built Cheemer into."

"Cheemer?" I said. "I don't know what a Cheemer is." Clearly the shop-naming conversation wasn't going anywhere.

"A Chevrolet with a BMW engine," Ashton explained. "You know, Chevy plus Beemer? Jay Leno has one."

"Oh," I said, wishing these names meant anything to me. "So it's like an automotive mash-up."

He laughed. "Exactly. It's the car version of that Eazy-E and Johnny Cash thing, 'Folsom Prison Gandstaz.' I got a beat for the street, ta pump in ya jeep-"

"You should probably stop," I said. "That guy over there is looking at you funny."

"Like I care," Ashton replied, but he stopped anyway. He seemed tired again. "Drive that way, why don't you?" He pointed vaguely to the east, and that was how I saw the Biltmore House. It looked like a fairy-tale castle, a place where Cinderella would live happily ever after with her prince.

Where was my happily-ever-after, I wanted to know. Why did that silly girl get one when my chances were so slim?

Without even thinking, I pulled into the shoulder of the road. I looked at Ashton as if I were about to ask him questions.

"Oh, this is perfect," he said. "This is a very special place." 

I looked around. We were stopped in the middle of a bunch of trees. "What's so great about it?"

Ashton unbuckled my seat belt and pulled me toward him. He bought his mouth close to mine and whispered, "It's where I did this."

And then he kissed me, so ling and sweet and tender that I almost cried, because here we were, together and maybe this was finally the end of the road.

word count - 987