Don't worry so much-hood

Part 5

Calum stood in front of you, holding out an arm and keeping you on the counter, placing himself between you and Ashton. He didn't want you getting in the middle of whatever was about to happen. "Ashton, mate, I know how this must look to you, but..."

"Oh you know; do you?" Ashton took a step into the kitchen, cracking his knuckles in front of his chest. "You know how it looks to walk in on your best friend taking advantage of your sister while she's feeling vulnerable?! Just because you saved her from that scumbag doesn't give you the right to finish what he started!" Ashton got up in Calum's face, practically screaming at him in his fit of rage. He'd trusted Calum with you, his innocent little sister, and this is how he repays his trust.

"Ashton he didn't...." You tried to defend Calum, but you were quiet, and Ashton had started yelling at him again, drowning out the sound of your pleading voice.

Ashton shoved Calum back away from you, forcing Calum to let go of you before you fell off the counter. Calum stumbled but took the blow. He wasn't going to hit back; he didn't want to fight with Ashton. He wasn't about to give him more of a reason to be angry. Calum understood why Ashton was mad; he would be too.

"If you think," Ashton put a finger in Calum's face, "I'm ever going to let you near her again, then you've got another thing coming, Cal."

Calum rolled his eyes. He found that to be ridiculous; just because you and Ashton lived alone didn't mean Ashton owned you. "I think that decision is up to your sister, my friend. If she wants to see me again, you can't stop her, or me."

Ashton's voice came out in a growl. He gripped Calum by the front of his shirt and pulled him close, lifting Calum's feet a bit off the ground in the process. "I can, and I will. You get out of here. Don't come back, or I will knock you senseless."

"This is her house too," Calum knocked Ashton's hands away and landed easily back on his feet, getting just as close to Ashton as Ashton had been to him. "This is as much her decision as it is yours."

"Fuck you, Calum!" Ashton pushed Calum hard, sending him hurtling back into the corner of the counter, making Calum groan out at the sharp edge in his spine. "She's my sister, and this is my house!"

Calum was fed up with this. Ashton wasn't listening to reason. He pushed himself off the counter and shoved Ashton back against the wall, pinning him there. "She's my girlfriend, Irwin. You think you can keep me away from her? Even if that was a good idea, she's mine now. I'm staying till she tells me otherwise."

Ashton gritted his teeth and sent his knee up into Calum's crotch. Calum groaned and bent over in pain, and just as he was getting back to his feet he saw Ashton winding up for the first real punch.

You'd had it. Ashton was being completely irrational, and Calum wasn't doing much to diffuse the situation. You saw Ashton winding up a punch, and you jumped down off the counter. You were not about to have them, two best friends for as long as you could remember, beat the shit out of each other just because you kissed Calum.

You ran forward and pushed Calum out of the way of the punch. He was still aching and bent slightly from the knee Ashton had gave him so it really didn't take any muscle to make him tumble out of the path, thank goodness.

But by the time Ashton realized that you had intervened, it was too late. He couldn't stop the force behind his fist, and it was almost slow motion watching his knuckles collide with the side of your cheek.

You crumpled to the floor in a heap. If there was one bad boy stereotype your brother filled it was that he got in a lot of fights, and in those fights he had certainly learned how to throw a punch. You only realized this now as you lay on the floor, seeing stars with a horrible pain on the side of your face.

"No," Ashton said breathlessly above you. His other hand slapped over his mouth, and his fist that threw the punch stayed clenched at his side. He had just hit his own sister. The singular most important person in his life was sprawled out on the floor in pain, and he was the one who threw the punch. His eyes welled with tears as he stumbled back away from you, collapsing to his knees when his back hit the wall.

Calum was on his knees a few feet from you, where he'd landed when you pushed him out of the way. He was literally speechless. After all the time he'd spent with Ashton he'd come to realize that Ashton loved you more than he'd ever loved anything. He'd seen Ashton punch a lot of people; hell, Ashton had even punched him a few times over the years. Calum had gone his entire life knowing, without a shadow of a doubt,that you were the one person Ashton would never lay a hand on, or allow anyone to lay a hand on.

Yet there you lay, between the two of them on the floor, a bruise already forming on your cheek, a trickle of blood running from your mouth onto the floor.

Calum snapped out of his daze as he saw you bleed onto the kitchen tile. He crawled over to you and stroked a piece of hair out of your face, trying to gage how you were. Your expression immediately read fear, and Calum's hand dropped away. Your eyes were closed but the way you scrunched up away from his hand said more than your words ever could. "(Y/n)," Calum spoke in as soft a voice as he could manage. "(Y/n) I'm going to pick you up and take you to my car okay?"

You didn't respond, but this time when Calum touched you, you didn't shrink away. He took that as a good sign and slid his hands under you, lifting you to his chest and rising from the floor. Calum spared a glance down at Ashton as he left, but Ashton wasn't looking at him. Ashton was staring at his fist, like it was some kind of alien creature, like he wanted it chopped off and thrown out at sea. He looked disgusted with himself.

Calum kept walking and carried you outside. He walked to his car, parked at the middle of the block halfway between Luke's and Ashton's houses. "Hang on, beautiful," he shifted you to one arm for a brief second and opened the door, setting you down in the passenger seat and making sure you were buckled in. "I've got you," he whispered. Calum spared a moment to glance back up at the house as he circled around the car. Ashton was standing there in the doorway, red faced, his body shaking with silent sobs from the tears that flowed freely down his cheeks.

"I'm so sorry," Ashton whispered, but Calum had already turned away, and your eyes were still glued shut. No one saw; no one heard. And you and Calum drove off, leaving him there in the doorway, hopeless.