hello if anyone is still reading this

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         I still can't stop thinking about his words. The scene is still, very vividly, playing in my head as I prepare breakfast; me, in the exact same spot as I am now, him behind me, telling me that he's more than probably going on tour and he wants me to come with him.

         But most importantly, he wants us to be married by then.

         And a number of other things, but I'm just concentrated on that last bit. Everything about us is dysfunctional in every way possible, and a pair of rings on our fingers wouldn't solve it – but I can't help thinking, if we weren't so fucked up as individuals, we would've gotten to this point under normal circumstances anyway. So maybe this is-

         "Morning." I almost drop the knife from my hand, the voice behind me startling me. Before I can process it any further I turn around, realizing I've made a mistake even before my head is completely facing the person.

         Riley. Once again, Riley.

         "Morning," I smile meekly at him, before getting back to slicing the tomato in front of me. Although, I did notice a surprised look on his face when he saw mine. Maybe he didn't even have it figured out that it was me when he spoke, and maybe he would now be going where he planned to instead of approaching me-

         Jesus Christ, I can't wait to go home. This 'bonfire thing with friends' isn't turning out to be such a good idea.

         "Hi, Lucy," he greets me again, having me a million times more uncomfortable and nervous than I was five seconds earlier. "What's up?"

         "Not much," I'm pretty proud of how normal my voice sounds, especially having him so close to me and all. "You? Sleep well?"

         "Mhm."

         "That's nice."

         I can still feel him beside me, quite possibly less than a meter separating us. "Want something to- eat?" I'm almost cut off as he places his hand on the counter, just about four of five inches from mine, to lean against it. His actions are still not quite problematic, but it doesn't stop a lump from forming in my throat and a nauseous feeling setting in my stomach.

         "Sure," He almost sighs, activating a red flag in my head as he places his other hand on my back. Alright, I just have to stay calm. I don't need anyone that might see us assuming anything by just looking at us and realizing that I'm behaving weirdly. "What do you have to offer?"

         "Well, we ate most of the food yesterday, so- whoa," I take a step to my right as I feel his whole body against the left side of my body. Okay, at this point, I wouldn't mind someone seeing us and coming to get me out of here. "Why don't- why don't you just sit down, you don't have to-"

         "Lucy, for crying out loud," he interrupts me, the fond and kind of pitiful look he's giving me not helping the sickness in my stomach at all. "You know, I'm not gonna be around forever. You have to tell him sometime."

         What I've come to notice the past few weeks through his behavior and what Ashton had told me, is that he just might not be doing this out of spite. He doesn't have a hatred for Ashton, he's not approaching me and talking to me like this so he'd piss him off- I think he truly, sincerely believes that I'm faking my amnesia.

         But not because my act isn't good enough or anything of that sort – he's still truly, sincerely waiting for anything my dumb ass talked to him about to come true.

         "You keep talking to me like that and I keep not understanding you, so if you could just-"

         "Lucy," he drags my name out, gripping my waist and forcefully turning me to him; I'm pretty sure I can say I'm frightened at this point, while his face remains relaxed and unfazed. "Lucy, Lucy, Lucy-"

         "Can you please let go of me, Riley?" I raise my brows up at him, smiling but in actuality desperate, "I'm really not comfortable."

         "Baby, I'm just trying to help you. Help us."

         This just proves my earlier assumptions about him still thinking that our 'plans' would come true – he's so caught up in it that he's become delusional. In all of my pitying myself because of him, I've forgotten that him having side effects from our fling is also a possibility.

         Except he has side effects way, way different from mine.

         "Can you- I'm begging you-"

         "When Ashton comes downstairs, he's gonna see us like this," he says calmly, completely ignoring me, making my heart stop with that sentence. "You've been taking an awful lot of time to do break up with him yourself, even when I step in-"

         -when he steps in? So- all of his bullshitting around, all of his bullshitting to Ashton, all the lies he's told regarding the past two months, was to make him break up with me?

         "-you keep... mending your relationship or whatever, like you really want to be with him. I get that you don't want to hurt him too much and all, but come on already."

         Everything is slowly beginning to click. If only someone could walk in on us already, I don't even care how this looks anymore, as long as it's over in the next 30 seconds.

         "Riley," I gulp as I say his name, "listen to me carefully when I say this."

         For the first time, he doesn't look like he's about to interrupt me or talk over me or altogether ignore me. "I want to be with Ashton."

         "...What?"

         I let out a long sigh, relieved that my words are getting to him, "I want to be with him, I want- only him, I've never wanted anyone as much as him! I love him, I'm so in love with him- and I'm sorry if there was a time in my life where I was fucking stupid enough to not realize that and came to you, but he's the absolute only one for m- Ashton!"

         The semi-loud scream of his name happens in the moment that I see him walk into the kitchen- despite having obviously just woken up, he doesn't look shocked or even surprised the slightest bit; he marches in, right over to us, as if he knew what was going on-

         Riley is about two or three inches taller than Ashton and a bit broader, but Ashton has no problem literally detaching him from me, knocking him onto the ground. I stumble a bit and almost fall over too when I'm finally free of his hold, and observe the two of them on the kitchen floor; I have a feeling Riley is still too bewildered by what I've told him to realize what he's gotten himself into.

         "Listen to me, now," Ashton says, his tone calm, clearly still half-asleep but beyond angered just as clearly. "I have been trying – believe me – very hard not to murder you with my bare fucking hands the past three months. Even now, knocking out your teeth is hard to resist. Let me be very clear, I don't give a fuck about you or your life or the fact that we used to be best friends, as far as I'm concerned, the world is better off without you."

         I grip the counter behind myself, horrified, watching them from a fair distance; Ashton has his hands dangerously close to Riley's neck as he holds him against the floor and I'm really hoping that he won't do something stupid.

         "But for the sake of the woman standing over there, I'm not going to do that. And for my own sake as well. If you have anything human left in you, you will leave her and the whole group the fuck alone."

         Just as Ashton begins letting go of him, he knocks him against the kitchen tiles twice as hard- "This is the first and last fucking time that I'm going to ask you nicely. Leave us alo-"

         Before he could finish the word, let alone the sentence, Riley gets some of his strength back; and I'm standing with my hand over my mouth, watching them with tears in my eyes as he pushes Ashton off of him, having him stumble and fall onto the floor too. Just as I thought this would turn out to be way worse than I could've predicted, Riley gets up and... leaves. Leaves.

         Ashton quickly gets himself up on his feet, evidently thinking there would be a fist fight, but he's as surprised as I am when Riley walks out. Out of the room, out of the house- we both see him walking, probably towards his car, through the kitchen window.

         I let out a small sigh as he gets out of my sight, but the relief that washes over me is short lived when a million things cross my mind; what happens after this? What if he tries to make contact with some of the guys again? What if he turns them against Ashton- what if he does something to Ashton? Or me?

         I subconsciously turn my head to where Ashton was, but then do a double take that clears my head from my train of thoughts – he's no longer there, he's walked out too.

         My head is spinning and I can't even begin realizing how out of control things have gotten. Not only Riley's irrational behavior that might turn into something far worse, but also Ashton now.

         Oh my God, Ashton. Who knows what's going through his head now.

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i need 5sos to give me som(usic)ething so i'd get the motivation to finish these stories but they will be complete at some point!!!!! thank you to the probably 8 people reading this for putting up with me ♡