"Like?" Zayn asked the question like it was made of lead--quick and hard, spitting it out like it was lethal.
                          
"Um. Yes." Ashton said, and then decided to give some context because Zayn was his best friend and he deserved the whole truth even though it would hurt. 
                          
"Like, I really like him, Zayn. And I would never in a million years want to make you unhappy but the feelings I have for him are like...make me feel like I'm floating." Ashton said in a rush at Zayn's downcast face. "I love you, and you know that, but you're my best friend. I would never want to jeopardize that by--,"
                          
"Too bad you already have." Zayn interrupted. He stood up too, pushing his chair in.
                          
"Don't call me. I need to get over loving you." 
                          
Ashton was carved out of ice and iron as he watched Zayn leave.
                          
And then there was a
                          
pause.
                          
And then a voice interrupted the stillness.
                          
"You need to go after one of them, you know," the bartender, Grace, informed him. 
                          
"But which one?" Ashton asked and his voice already sounded rough from the crying he had done earlier that day. 
                          
"Whichever one you care about the most." She said, shrugging her slight shoulders like deciding that should be like deciding on what drink to get.
                          
"It's not that easy." Ashton said.
                          
"It's not supposed to be." She responded.
                          
Okay.
                          
Well.
                          
He knew who he was going after.
                          
"Thanks, Grace." He said, slapping some notes on the counter to pay for their drinks with. "Say hi to Niall for me."
                          
x
                          
"Luke!" Ashton let all the desperation of the past 45 minutes he had spent wandering the streets of London creep into his voice. "I found you!"
                          
"Congratulations." Luke's muffed voice came from where his head was buried in his arms. He was curled up on the steps of an abandoned church, knees pulled up and back hunched so he was as small as his large body allowed him to be.
                          
Ashton paused for a moment and just looked at him because something about Luke stole all the air out of his lungs every time he let his eyes caress the line of his shoulders or the slope of his cheekbones. His blond hair was catching the noonday light and it was shining like a halo. He was practically ethereal as he raised his face and looked at Ashton with his summer sky eyes. 
                          
"Hi." Ashton blurted.
                          
"Hello." Luke said like he had walked 3,000 miles. 
                          
"Are you mad at me?" Ashton asked with razor-edged dread.
                          
"I don't think so." Luke responded. "I am furious with your friend, though." 
                          
"Zayn? Yeah. He--yeah."
                          
"You can't joke about shit like that." Luke clenched and unclenched his fists. 
                          
"Zayn always does. Alcohol jokes are kind of his thing." Ashton shrugged, sitting down a couple feet away from Luke. "You get used to it."
                          
"I won't get used to it." Luke said quietly. "Alcoholism isn't a joke."
                          
Ashton's mind flashed back to his talk with Mikey, when Mikey had angrily told him that Luke had had a rough year. Could that possibly mean...?
                          
"Were you an alcoholic?" Ashton asked, balancing carefully on seventy eggshells.
                          
Luke shook his head and seemed to work up to responding for a couple seconds.
                          
"No. My best friend was. And trust me, CPR is even less fun when the only person who's ever been there for you is drowning in their own vomit. That actually happens, you know? It's not a joke. It's not a joke." He wasn't meeting Ashton's eyes, but Ashton was glad because his chest was cracking in half for what this angel boy had been through.
                          
"Oh, Luke..." was all he could say from his position two feet away. 
                          
Luke (finallyfinallyfinally) looked at him across the cement steps and his eyes were oceans; blue and full of water.
                          
Ashton reached across and held Luke's hand, and Luke tried to suppress his tears because he really hated crying, and they both just existed together for a little while. 
                          


                          
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