Walkman [Lashton AU]

Chapter 7

October, 1991 | Come Out, Come Out, Wherever You Are

"Dad, please, the Halloween party next weekend," Luke begged, following his father to his office. "I know I'm grounded, but I promise I won't do anything but hang out with my friends."

His dad sighed heavily, looking at him displeased, "Your mother made it clear that she does not like you at these parties."

"They're really not that bad," Luke assured. "It's just a costume party."

"Greasers have been crashing teen parties a lot this year. Have you seen the news? It's very dangerous," his dad pointed out, sitting at the desk. "I don't want you at the party. For all you know, there could be tons of greasers there and they have no shame in bringing knives to these things. Did you hear about the kid that got stabbed?"

Luke winced at the reminder and told him, "But, it's at Aleisha's house and nowhere near the border between our towns."

"Aleisha's, huh?" his dad raised an eyebrow in curiosity. "Well, I guess if it's at her house then I can try to talk to your mum. But I can't make any promises, Luke."

"Really? Thank you so much!" Luke grinned widely and hugged his dad briefly.

The man chuckled and patted his back, "Yeah, yeah. Now get going to school, I don't need you being late."

"When am I ever late?" Luke asked rhetorically, but smiled and headed to his room to finish getting ready.

When he went to the room, he spotted his stack of comic books that he got from Michael. It was hard to explain why he wanted them, but thankfully Michael didn't question him much. Luke wanted to hang out with Ashton and he needed some comics, considering he did say he was an avid comic book lover.

Over the weekend, Luke was binging the comics and trying to put some pieces together with Ashton at the same time. When he found out he was talking to Ashton on the phone the whole time, it really struck something inside of him. Knowing that Ashton was dealing with so much mentally and emotionally broke his heart.

Ashton was always vague, but it didn't take a genius to put together what he's going through. His dad left, his mum wasn't taking the lead role in the house and Ashton was basically parenting his siblings. He felt alone and was depressed. He even sounded suicidal at times and Luke hated knowing that. Honestly, it just reminded him of Degrassi High.

Luke headed out, bag tossed over his shoulder. It was drizzling outside, and he groaned at the sky, wondering if this was a foreshadow of the day ahead.

On the bus, he saw Ashton sitting with the CD Walkman that he leant the boy. Luke smiled, glad that Ashton was enjoying the music. Luke sat down with him and Ashton looked up, nodding at him in a hello manner.

"Do you want your Walkman back?" Ashton asked, puling the headphones down to his neck.

Luke shrugged, "Are you finished with it?"

"Yeah," he said slowly, but didn't seem convincing.

"If you wanna keep using it, then keep it with you until you're done," Luke assured, pushing the Walkman toward him cautiously. "I want you to keep it, yeah?"

Ashton eyed him curiously, but accepted it nonetheless. "Thanks."

"No problem, I don't use it that much anyways," Luke lied, smiling albeit himself.

While he does listen to it a lot, especially now that he takes the bus, he really wanted Ashton to have it for now. Knowing that his mum broke his Walkman made him feel guilty, even if Ashton did get in trouble on his own. He can tell music keeps Ashton at peace. He would hate for him to miss the joy of music because of his mum.