Liz, with the help of Ashton and Ben, had deep cleaned the house to have it ready for the open house two days after Andrew had passed. They had to have the funeral soon because Ben and Jack were only able to stay for a couple of days. They had things at work they couldn't get out of, and Liz made sure they were able to accommodate that.

    Luke had left his room once the entire two days—just to push Ashton's bag out the door so he could have his things. He was still upset, and refused to speak to anyone.

    Ashton had called Caity the next morning, begging her to do something, see if she could get him to talk. She said she tried calling Luke, but he sent her call to voicemail like he'd been doing with everyone's calls, and she texted him to let him know he could talk about anything. He ignored that too.

    She told Ashton she thought he just needed to be angry for a little bit. Sometimes, people who weren't great at processing their emotions would rather be angry at things for a while...especially people like Luke who was forced to suppress his feelings. Anger was easier to deal with. She figured that was the case now, he just needed time before he was ready to deal with his dad's death and take the time to listen to what they all had to say.

    That made Ashton feel better, but he hated the fact that his baby was hurting and there was nothing he could do about it. He would do anything to take Luke's pain away, and this was killing him.

    Liz asked Ashton to take a tray of sandwiches from the kitchen to the living room where they'd set up a table for refreshments, but he stopped at the bottom of the staircase upon hearing the sobbing coming from upstairs.

    His heart ached, knowing his Lukey was hurt and wouldn't let him do anything.

    "It's so hard, isn't it," Liz walked by, taking the tray from him and setting it down. She put her hand on his shoulder and rubbed his arms. "Seeing the person you love in pain and not doing anything to help,"

    "I just want him to feel better,"

    Liz smiled.

    "He'll get better, eventually. Even if he was letting you in, this pain he's got will never go away. It might lighten up, but even all the love in the world can't help. You need to give him—"

    "Time, yeah." Ashton sighed. "I hate being patient,"

    Liz chuckled, patting his arm.

    "You're a good one, Ashton. I'm glad he has you."

    He nodded at her as she went over to fix something else. She couldn't stay still. She'd been up all morning making sandwiches, preparing food, cakes, all sorts of things. Ashton told her to relax and he would go to the store and take care of all that for her, but she told him this was how she coped and she was okay.

    There was a knock on the door. Ashton was closest so he went over and opened it up. The open house wasn't supposed to start for another hour, but there were always those people who thought they could come over whenever.

    Standing on the front porch dressed in all black were three faces Ashton had missed dearly.

    "Cal, Lou, Haz!" he gasped. He'd called Calum the night Luke got mad at him and asked if he could try talking to Luke. It didn't work, so Calum decided the next best thing would be for him to come visit. Ashton didn't know he'd be bringing Harry and Louis, though.

    "Hey, Ashy, how you holding up?" Calum launched himself into Ashton's arms, holding him tight. Harry came around behind him and joined the hug, but Louis stayed off to the side, watching them warily.

    "Get in here, Lou," Harry sighed. Louis bit his lip before joining the group hug. He wasn't sure if he was supposed to, he felt like he wasn't as close to them. He joined the crew late and never forgot that. None of them cared, they accepted him in without thought, but it kept Louis up thinking about it.

    "Well, what do we have here?" Liz walked past the scene and stopped. "Why don't you boys come inside instead of making a scene on my porch?" she teased.

    They let go of each other and came inside.

    "I'm Liz, Luke's mum."

    "Calum," he opened his arms for a hug. He was a hugger, but so was Liz, so it was okay. "I'm so sorry about your husband, Mrs Hemmings,"

    "It's Liz, and thank you Calum."

    He let her go, and she turned to the other two boys.

    "I'm Harry, ma'am."

    "Nice to meet you, Harry. Call me Liz." he smiled, hugging her when he walked over.

    Louis waved shyly from behind Harry.

    "That's Louis, he's being silly now though." Louis' face heated up and he looked at the floor before peeking up at her.

    She smiled kindly at him.

    "I can't thank you boys enough for being here. The fact that you came for my Lukey is just..." she shook her head, trying to stop herself from tearing up. "Thank you."

    "We'd do anything for him," Calum said. He looked to Ashton. "Where is he?"

    "Up in his room," Ashton shrugged. "He won't come out,"

    Calum nodded.

    "Is it okay if I go try to talk to him?" Cal looked at Liz.

    "Of course, but I'm not sure what he's up for."

    Calum nodded.

    "I'll do my best." He turned away, walking over to the staircase she pointed at. He stopped at the bottom step and look up. "LUCAS! OPEN THE DOOR YOU TWAT. I'VE MISSED YOU!" Without looking at the other people in the room, he marched upstairs, unsure if his greeting would be well received.

    Ashton and the others waited with bated breath to see if the door would open.

    The click could be heard in the quiet house, the squeak as the door was hesitantly cracked open, and a weak, "Cally?" from a broken boy who'd spent days crying.

    Liz breathed a sigh of relief as the door snapped shut. At least Calum was allowed in.

    "So, are you two hungry?" Liz asked Harry and Louis. "I'm sure you must be if you've been travelling so long,"

    "It was only a two hour flight," Harry told her. "Uh, but yeah, I could eat," he amended at Ashton's insistent nod. She gestured for them to follow her into the kitchen. Louis walked in with her while Harry grabbed Ashton.

    "How have you been?" The bartender asked.

    Ashton shrugged helplessly.

    "I don't know what to do. I can take care of him, I know I can. I feel useless when he won't let me be there for him."

    Harry patted his shoulder.

    "He'll come around, mate. You'll be back to holding his hand and kissing his forehead again very soon."

    "Yeah," Harry pushed him toward the kitchen so they could save Louis from having to talk to Liz by himself for too long.

    The boys sat in the kitchen with Liz until the first guest showed up. They had been chatting about random things back in New York while Liz listened in, she was just glad to have something else to think about.

    "Can you call Calum and see if he and maybe Luke would come downstairs?" Liz asked Ashton as she went to greet the first guests. He nodded.

    "Yeah?" Cal asked gruffly, picking up right before the call went to voicemail. Ashton had started to think he'd just ignore it.

    "Liz wants to know if you and Lu will come downstairs. People are arriving,"

    "I'll see." there was a shuffling sound as Calum pressed the phone against his shirt to talk to the blonde, then he was back. "We'll be down momentarily."

    "Great, see you—" but he'd already hung up.

    A bit later, the door opened upstairs and Luke and Calum came down.

    "Lukey, it's so good to see you," Harry said, walking over to him.

    Truthfully, the boy didn't look good. Not at all. His eyes were bloodshot and there were dark circles under his eyes. He was wearing a rumpled black long sleeve shirt half-tucked into black jeans without rips.

    Luke let Harry hug him, but didn't hug back.

    Ashton was hesitant to greet him, but settled with just a hello. Luke glanced at him before walking away.

    "He's got headphones in," Calum said. "He didn't want to talk to anyone. This was the only way to get him down here. I figured that would be all right,"

    "I guess that's better than nothing," Ashton agreed. "How are you, Cal?"

    "Good. Niall sends his regards, he couldn't take off from work. His boss is a real ass,"

    "That's okay, tell him thanks," he nodded. "How, uhm, how does he seem?" Ashton bit his lip as he watched Luke stand in the corner of the living room, staring at a photo of his dad.

    "He's upset. About his dad, and he also told me that you didn't let him be there when his dad died and lied to him the entire day so you could have a date?" he couldn't hide the accusation in his voice.

    Ashton shook his head.

    "I'm not surprised he's seeing it that way. It wasn't like that, Cal, I swear."

    "You've got like two minutes to explain before I deck you. That boy hasn't stopped sobbing for two days, and he's my best friend. There better be a really good explanation."

    Ashton was glad Luke had a friend like this, someone who was always looking out for his best interests, someone who didn't care how much they loved each other, but just wanted the best for him.

    "I talked to his dad that morning, he told me he was probably going to pass away, but he wanted Luke to have a good day. He told me to keep him out, because he didn't want him seeing him that way." Ashton teared up a bit. "I was sending him pictures all day, Liz said he was so happy because Luke was happy,"

    Calum sighed. He was hoping to hear something like that, but was prepared for the worst.

    "He needs to hear that,"

    "I know, but he won't speak to me." Ashton shrugged. "I've tried, but he won't listen."

    "Give him some time, and I'll try talking to him later tonight; I don't want to overwhelm him."

    "All right. Thanks, Cal, I appreciate it."

    "We'd both do anything for him, yeah?"

    "Yeah," Ashton agreed. "So I knew you were going to be here, but how did Harry and Louis end up coming?"

    Calum smiled.

    "I told them I was coming and they literally dropped what they were doing and booked tickets. I wasn't sure if it would be okay since they're both sort of in charge of both of your bars, but they both temporarily closed for 2 days. I hope that's fine..." Calum wasn't sure how running a business worked, but usually closing down wasn't a good thing.

    Ashton sighed.

    "Yeah, that's probably best. Lukey needs his friends right now, I can't believe you all came."

    Calum shrugged.

    "That's what you do for friends, Ash. You go to family members funerals, attend weddings, come over at 3am with ice cream for break ups, take up martial arts, go to therapy sessions...it's just what you do for the people you love."

    He patted Ashton's shoulder before walking away and going over to rescue Luke from an old woman who was getting uncomfortably close to him. He knew the last thing the blonde needed was harassment by an old person.

    Ashton wandered around aimlessly, picking up food when he passed by the table, talking to people who decided he was worth it to talk to. So far he'd met two of Luke's uncles and the old woman who he learned was Liz's aunt.

    Eventually after his third lap around the room—Harry, Louis, and Calum were all sitting with Luke who still ignored him—Ben took pity on him and had him join his circle.

    He talked to Ben and his cousins for a bit before Luke walked over, head down but Ashton could still tell he was crying.    

    Without even looking up, he barreled into Ashton, wrapping his arms around his chest.

    "Sweetheart, what—"

    "I'm so so sorry. I should have heard you out," he kept babbling about how sorry he was and how he should have listened. A couple people started looking over at them, so Ashton gently guided Luke out of the room, through the kitchen and out the back door. He sat down on the top step of the wooden deck, holding Luke on his lap like a child.

    "Take a deep breath, okay? Whatever is wrong, we'll work it out, yeah?" he rubbed circles on Luke's back hoping that would help. Luke buried his head into the crook of Ashton's shoulder as he tried to match his breathing to his.

    "I never should have shut you out. C-Calum told me what happened, I did-n't give you the chance to tell me what really happened."

    "You had every right to be mad at me, Sweetheart. I hid it from you because it was easier, but maybe it wasn't right. I'm so sorry I didn't tell you when I found out."

    Luke shrugged, finally able to look at his boyfriend.

    "You did what you thought was best. You always do everything with me in mind. You're so thoughtful."

    Ashton kissed the tears off his cheeks.

    "I love you, Luke."

    "I love you, Ash."

    Luke leaned up to kiss and make up, but Ashton pulled away.

    "What—"

    "Can we both promise to not do this again? Can we work on communicating better and not shutting the other person out when something happens? This was...kind of horrible."

    Luke looked, truly looked at his boyfriend. He looked worse than Luke felt. His face was pale and there were huge bags under his eyes. His cheeks were full of stubble, he clearly hadn't shaved in a couple days, and his shoulders slumped forward like he was too tired to keep himself up. How could Luke do something like that to the man who had been nothing short of perfect to him?

    "Yeah, of course. I-I don't even know how to begin saying I'm so sorry for all I've put you through..."

    "Don't sweat it, hon. We grow when we learn from the choices we make."

    Luke was in awe of him.

    "I'll never stop loving you."

***

See, I promised they wouldn't stay angry for too long.

I had a sh*t night tonight so i decided to post this bc it made me happy that Lashton is back ❤️❤️❤️ I hope you're all doing well!! Feel free to drop a random comment here just to let me know ur alive 😝 a joke, random fact, smthin about your fave hobby. I'd love to hear from y'all ☺️☺️

~ashtonfortherwin