Paint You Wings // Ashton Irwin [au]

Twenty-six

Ashton's POV

Tomorrow cannot come any faster. I just want to see her, hear her voice, something. It's only been a day and a half, but it feels like it's been an eternity since I've seen Emmie. I've been worried about how she is and how it went during her time of 'thinking' back in her hometown. There were so many instances when I wanted to send her a text or call her yesterday, but I chickened out each time. Instead, I ended up calling Julia and had her tell me when she arrived from Glendale. It eases my nerves just knowing that she is back in the same city as me again.

Yesterday, staying in communications was a form of torture in itself. I have become so accustomed to having Emmie sit next to me and it feels like a part of me is missing. I think Professor Ross even noticed how much of an arduous effort it was to keep my knee from bouncing up and down and stop shifting around in my seat during his lecture. It had to be the longest ninety minutes of my life sitting in there alone. I mean, before I met Emmie, I sat alone in the front of the room and was completely okay with it. Now, I realize how dependent I have become on her. I should probably work on that.

All morning I have been pacing around the house, trying to get my mind off leaving and driving over to see Emmie. I want to give her the space that she needs, but at the same time I just want to hold her in my arms and never let her go. God, I feel like I'm in high school all over again. A friend turning into a crush, a crush turning into a relationship, a relationship turning into a marriage—well, failed engagement. I stop pacing for a second and chuckle to myself. At least I can laugh about it now.

Today, I literally have nothing to do but wait around. I refuse to go to any of my other classes to avoid a repeat with Linda and any other horny girl who is begging to get laid. There are other things that I should do, like go see my advisor to switch majors before registration for the spring semester starts, but I just don't feel like it. What I want to do is go over to the General Studies building and wait for Emmie and Michael to get out of class like I normally do, but I am restraining myself from going. Well, that, and before Michael left for class, he threatened to kick me in the balls if I showed up. So now, instead of experiencing the pain that has been argued to be equivalent to childbirth, I decide to finally clean up my room; might as well do something productive.

I climb up the stairs from the living room and open the door to my bedroom. The product of my past depression and anger still covers every inch of the floor. Not even the carpet can be seen under the overlapping pages of melancholic art. Each colorless painting that I pick up from the floor is nothing more than brush strokes to me now. What used to be the center of my life is nothing more than just a memory. She should have always been just a memory.

I'll always love Natalie even if I don't want to. First loves don't just die and leave you forever. They will always be a part of you no matter what. But when another person stumbles along (literally) and pulls you in deep, you experience a different love.

A love that is beyond comparison to your first. A love that without a doubt, triumphs what you once believed love was. A love that changes you for the better. A love that is so perfect that it seems unreal.

For me, that love is Emilia.

I take the fifty plus pages of sketchbook paper that is now cleared from my floor and throw them in the waste basket where they belong. I move over to my bed and kneel down to the ground and reach underneath the bed frame where the worst of my gloomy days hide. My hand comes in contact with a glass bottle and as I try to pull it out, it clanks against another empty bottle. One after one as I pull each bottle out, my conscious tells me how much I screwed up by consuming so much alcohol.

A total of nine bottles, all averaging out to be one liter of fluid ounces each are removed from under my bed. I stare at the bottles in shame. Actually seeing all that I drank is a real eye-opener. It sickens me that I even went this far because of a single paper. I grab as many bottles as I can hold in my arms and take them downstairs to dispose of them in the recycling bin. It takes three trips up and down the stairs to remove all the bottles from my room. I try not to think anymore of my mistake and continue on with cleaning.