therapeutic ; irwin

week nine

ninth group therapy session

Ashton seemed to be even worse this week. I called him a few days ago, but it went straight to his voicemail. I really wanted to talk to him to ask if he was okay, because I was genuinely worried. I didn't want Ashton to be sad, because he didn't deserve it in the least. All he ever did was make other people happy so it was most important he was happy.

Michael sat next to me again and unlike Ashton, he seemed more confident and happy this week. It was nice to see him like that because he was usually so glum. But though I was very happy for Michael, I was more worried about Ashton.

"Ashton, do you want to come to go do something after this?" I leant over to ask Ashton, as Charlie continued to ramble on about some inner happiness thing.

Ashton stayed silent and didn't turn to look at me for a good ten seconds.

"That'd be nice, Luna," he replied finally, with a soft smile. He then turned his head back to Charlie.

Nothing really happened in the group anymore. We were working mostly on self-confidence, which was really helping, but we weren't doing much else. We did talk to the other people in the group quite a bit too, to all get to know each other. Luke was still mute though and it was getting to a point where I thought it was completely ridiculous he was here. If he couldn't contribute to the group, what was the point of attending this? There was no logic behind that. I didn't have any problems with Luke himself, but I just thought that he shouldn't be here.

"Luna?" Ashton whispered, tapping me on my arm. His tone of voice sounded like he'd tried to ask me something a second ago, but I wasn't listening. I turned quickly towards him.

"Yeah?" I replied. I'd obviously zoned out again while he'd asked me something. I'd been zoning out a lot lately and I had no idea why.

"Can we not go anywhere after? Well, not nowhere, but just your house or my house or something?" He asked, softly.

"Yeah, sure. We can go to mine if you'd like?" I suggested. Ashton still hadn't been to mine, because I had been avoiding letting him see my house. Ashton had a huge, expensive house, but mine was the complete opposite.

"Okay," he smiled weakly. He then turned back to Charlie and his constant talking and bit his lip, kind of nervously. Ashton was so on edge and I felt so concerned. I wanted to hug him and tell him that I wanted him to be okay, but I didn't feel like he was comfortable with that.

-

"Ashton?"

"Ashton?" No reply.

Ashton and I were sitting in his old car on the way to my place and he hadn't said a proper word the whole time we'd be in it. I knew he wasn't giving me the silent treatment or anything, he was just thinking. The only noises he made was when he was quietly humming along to whatever was on the radio and when he would softy mumble something like "yeah" or "okay" in response to whatever I had to say.

"Ashton?" I repeated myself for the third time, tapping his large bicep softly.

"Hmm?" He hummed in response, not really turning to me, but clearly giving me more attention than he had been.

"Are you okay?" I asked softly.

"Yeah. I'm just thinking," he replied, tapping one long finger to the beat on the steering wheel

"About what?" I asked. I was trying my hardest to get as much out of him as I could, but not pushing it. I knew of nothing I hated more than when I was feeling like complete shit and some disrespectful idiot bothered me by trying to get into my business.