Coming Up For Air

5.5

"Buy a one-way out of this city,
Everything that I need, got it with me,
No more white picket fences,
No more lace veils or vows,
No more "You're the only one" 'cause that's all done with now."

-ZZ Ward, 'Last Love Song'

☂Ashton☂

Ashton was staring at his hands and tangling his fingertips together when a serene female voice came over the loudspeaker on the airplane to announce that they would being preparations for landing soon and that everyone should fasten their seat belts.
He reached over rather numbly and did as he was told, glancing up for a split second to see that the lady next to him had her eyes trained on him. She was all dark--dark skin and dark hair and dark eyes, and she was one of those indiscernibly ageless people--she could have been forty or eighty, as far as Ashton could see.

"What?" He asked, and it might have come out rude but he couldn't tell because he was too busy trying to keep his voice from cracking in half.

"Nothin', dear." She said, smiling in a soft way. "It's just--I been sittin' next to you for comin' up on 24 hours, and you ain't said a single word the whole time--just sat ova there twiddlin' your fingers and lookin' like your whole world's rainin' down around you."

Ashton sighed and pressed his lips together.

"It kind of is."

x

"Baby!" Ashton's grandma greeted at the arrival's deck. She was a small woman, and she looked older than she was due to the thirty years she'd spent chain smoking until she quit on her fiftieth birthday. She had long, curly grey hair that seemed to take up more space than her actual body, and eyes exactly like Ashton's.

Ashton could almost make himself feel glad to see her.

"Hey, Grandma." He said, dropping his backpack and pulling her into a quick hug.

"Lauren and Harry are waiting at home. They're so excited to--,"

"Can we go to hospital first?" Ashton interrupted. He was tired and heartbroken and terrified and he just wanted to see his mum. Ashton's grandma studied him for a long moment, and for some reason Ashton was suddenly certain she knew everything even though she knew nothing.

"Alright." She said softly. Ashton nodded and grabbed his bags and followed his grandmother out of the airport to where she'd parked. Soon they were halfway to the hospital, her amiable chatter filling the air with things Ashton had missed and his breathing filling up the gaps in her monologue with the sound of him trying not to suffocate under the weight of it all.

"You never tell me about things with that Olivia girl. How is she? What's her major? If you end up staying here for a while, we could find a way to fly her out and--,"

"We broke up." Ashton said flatly, hating and hating and hating that he was so terrified to be honest but wanting to tell little particles of the truth, too.

"Oh." His grandmother said like a punch. "Oh. Why?"

"Because I was ready for something more serious than...than--," Ashton choked and choked on the 's'. "--she was."

"Is that so? Your leaving had nothing to do with it?" His grandma asked, the odd intuition she seemed to have concerning Ashton's life kicking in.

"It did." Ashton said shortly. "But this--Mum--that's more important to me than trying to fix someone who doesn't want to change."

"Fix?"

"H-uh, Olivia has some...abandonment issues. I guess." Ashton said, kind of glad he didn't have to say Luke out loud because he was certain the syllable would taste like broken glass.