Chasing Ashton

Michael

The photo attached is what Michael looks like, but with galaxy hair, not red.

~

"Hey, bud. You dye your hair again?"

I turned to my blonde friend, Luke Hemmings, and sighed.

"Yes. Why?"

You could say we have a love-hate relationship. I want to kill him. He wants to kill me. But whenever one of us needs the other, we're there for each other. It's weird.

"Just asking. I could've sworn on Friday it was skunk stripe," he said with chicken tender in his mouth.

"Swallow your food, Hemmings."

He chewed aggressively with his mouth open, and then he closed his mouth and swallowed his food when I cringed and flicked him off. He smirked and I smacked him hard across the face.

"Ow! You dickface!"

He smacked me back, and I flailed my arms out at him, smacking each other's hands, double chins out as we pulled our heads away.

"Quit your bitchfight and eat your food," I heard our other friend, Calum Hood, say behind me.

"Yes, Mr. Kiwi, Sir."

I called him Mr. Kiwi because, well, he was Kiwi. I guess it's like New Zealand or something?

"Don't call me that," he whined, pouting.

I poked his cheek and gave him a joking smile. He knows I'm only kidding. Calum is the only guy in the group I'm close to.

The last one of the squad arrived and Ashton Irwin sat next to Luke. Luke blushed and looked down, smiling to himself.

It's so blatantly obvious that Luke adores Ashton. Ashton's gay, Luke's bi. It's that simple! Just have sex already! But no. Every time Ashton sits by or is anywhere near Luke, Luke gets all flustered and says something stupid.

"I-I, um, is it raining or is it just my eyesight?"

Like that.

"No, you idiot," I sighed, facepalming.

Sometimes he can be so brain dead around Ashton, it makes me disappointed to be his frenemy.

"Why would your eyesight see rain?" Ashton laughed, scratching the side of his face, looking at Luke. "Did you get high with the hipsters?"

Luke blushed and closed his eyes. As if it would make it better.

"He's stupid," I said to Ash.

Ashton chuckled and Luke buried his face in his hands. When he removed them, he had the most miserable look on his face. I had to laugh. Calum choked on his chocolate milk and had to stand up and spit it in the trash can. When he returned, he was finishing his laughing.

Luke looked at Ashton, who was laughing, too. But he stopped when Luke looked at him with anger. Ash stopped laughing, but flashed me and Calum a close-mouthed, trying-not-to-laugh smile.

"I don't want to go to math," I sighed, deciding to change the subject and stop embarrassing Luke for now.

"Why?" Calum asked.

"Mr. Donovan is always looking over my shoulder like I'm writing illuminati messages instead of math. He's such a paranoid old bastard. Always glancing down at my papers and saying my name to make sure I'm paying attention," I complained. "I know I dye my hair and have an eyebrow piercing and act like I'm punk rock even though we all know none of us are but damn, boy, go away!"

We started laughing, because we could all relate. We all had Mr. Donovan, but we all had him at different times. I finished my cheeseburger and stood up to throw it out, the others doing the same.

~

In maths, I was writing my equations and shit on the paper and Mr. Nosyfuck came up behind me and read my paper as I wrote. I looked up at the big, round, bald guy staring down at me.

"Can I help you?" I snarled.

"Just making sure you're doing your work. Can't have hooligans like you slacking off."

Hooligans like me? What? Did he just technically discriminate me? That's judgmental. I won't have it.

"Listen, you nosy prick. I don't know what you mean by 'hooligans like me'", I did air quotations with my fingers, "but I'm not happy about it. It was extremely rude and judgmental and you should be lecturing me about it, not the other way around. Bastard," I spat.

"Michael Clifford, I am sending you to the principal's office!"

Aw, fuck.