Wildflower | A. IRWIN

Part Twenty One

     "I mean, do you think he's home?" Michael asked, looking through the windows, peeking into his bandmates home.

"Why wouldn't he be home?" Calum questioned.

"Well maybe he could be out or something," Luke suggested.

"Ashton? Out of the house by eight in the morning? Come on, you must be kidding," Michael scoffed.

"I'm just saying that you both could be blowing this whole thing out of proportion," Calum shrugged, "he's probably fine?"

"Why would you say that like a question?" Michael asked.

"I don't know, he really liked the girl. Even if it was a few weeks he was still really happy with her," Calum said.

After a while of knocking, calling, and ringing the doorbell, Calum took it into his own hands and grabbed the key that he hid under the few rocks in the front yard. He turned it in the lock and the door opened. "What?" He asked, glancing back at Luke and Michael who wore dumbfounded expressions.

"You couldn't have unlocked the door twenty minutes ago?" Luke asked.

"Well, one, I just remembered where the key was hidden like twenty seconds ago," Calum said, "and two, it's rude to break into people's homes."

"Let's just check on Ashton," Michael pushes his way into his friends house, heading straight to the bedroom.

Calum goes straight to the office where he could hear the faint sound of drums, Luke following closely. They crack the door open just enough to see Ashton playing, his headphones probably blasting music at full volume. "Well he looks fine to me," Luke says.

Ashton continued on playing for a while, until he looked up and jumped. He ripped off his headphones and got up to open the door fully. "What the hell?! How long have you guys been there?" He asked.

Luke and Calum looked at one another wondering what the right thing to say is. "Not long," Luke started, "we were outside for a while and then Calum broke in."

"I locked the door behind me so at least I broke in respectfully," Calum defended.

"Oh thank goodness. Wouldn't want anyone else to break in," Ashton said in a sarcastic tone.

"Yeah, well Michael brought food but he kind of disappeared so we don't really know where he went and your best buds, Luke and I, are here so we can have some bro time, y'know?"

Ashton looked confused back and forth between the two. He then rested his stare on Luke, "did Mo tell you?" he asked. Luke nodded subtly. "Well, thank you guys for checking on me, but I'm fine," he said, "Iris and I are still friends so it's not like we lost anything."

Calum gave him a look telling him that he was not impressed. "Whatever you feel or anything, just know that you have three uneducated therapists at your disposal." He smiled knowing that he got a laugh out of his friend.

"Okay, well I'm going to go look for Michael, cause you said something about food." As Ashton left them down the hall, Calum and Luke shared a look that said they weren't convinced that he was fine.