“Ready to go, love?”
You look up at the sound of a deep voice calling for you, and you pull out your earburds, finding yourself staring at the thick-framed hazel-eyed Ashton Irwin staring back at you, tapping his fingers impatiently on your desk.
“As cute as your wide-eyed confusion is, we haven’t got all day – time to go before we get trampled in the World War 3 that are the hallways.”
He’s grinning down at you, and you find yourself instantly blushing when he calls you cute, bowing down your head and quickly packing up your stuff so you didn’t have to meet his amused eyes with your flaming cheeks.
You hurriedly shove your remaining books and pencils into your bag, nearly stumbling out of your seat in haste when you’re down, clumsily brushing yourself off, cheeks red from your growing embarrassment.
He merely laughs quietly and shakes his head, taking one last lingering look at you before he heads out the classroom.
You find that Ashton’s predictions are right, as you’re surrounded by a rush of busy students the moment you step out of the classroom and into the hall; the chatter of several conversations floating around as hordes of people passed by.
You’re instantly pushed towards the general direction of the crowd, people hurrying to their next class or to the cafeteria, jostling you as you tried to regain your footing again.
You try to peer over heads and spiked hair and broad shoulders, looking for a familiar mop of messy bronze curls and thick black-framed glasses, but even on your tippy-toes, you can barely make out the faces in front of you and the crowd pushes you this way and that as you try to stay steady.
And suddenly someone’s grabbing your arm and you turn to see Ashton there, eyebrows quirked up in amusement, a small smile playing on the corner of his pink lips.
“Trying to lose me so you’ll miss our lunch date?”
His shoulders are broad and sturdy enough for people to walk around him instead of pushing past him like they did with you as he casually stood in the middle of the hall, caring less about the swarm of people around the two of you.
“I – what, no – I just got pushed and I was looking for you – wait what?“
You’re stammering as you try to explain yourself, and you almost miss the fact that he called it a date.
You think you might’ve misheard it with all the chatter and conversations going on around you, but his satisfied smirk at your flustered response makes you think that’s exactly what he said.
He doesn’t answer you, merely slipping his fingers in between yours as he tugged you through the hall, his strides loping and long in comparison to your small scurries.
His hands are large and warm against yours, nearly encompassing yours completely. You know he’s just holding on to you so he wouldn’t lose you against the crowd, but you can’t help but to feel the butterflies starting to flap in your stomach and you’re glad he’s facing the other direction or else he would’ve surely laughed at your flaming cheeks.
It doesn’t take you long to realize that he’s going the wrong way; the two of you being the only ones walking in the opposite direction of the crowd, away from the cafeteria behind you.
“Wait, Ashton – the cafeteria’s the other way – “
You try to call out to him, tugging him lightly in the other direction, but he merely plows on through the crowd.
He turns back to you, his long curls swinging back, partially covering his gleaming hazel eyes.
“We’re not going to the cafeteria, love.”
