after you left |ai|

43

"I hope we can do this again some day." He said with a soft grin and I laughed before nodding.

"I hope we can do it again very soon." I replied and he smiled widely. When he was done admiring his own work, he looked at me again and placed a kiss on my forehead before starting to dry himself. I did the same and put on the shirt he had handed me. It was way too big and I could use it as a dress but it smelled a bit like him and that made it all okay.

"You look exhausted" he mumbled when I tried to suppress a yawn, "let's just get to bed and still try to get a few hours of sleep." I nodded softly before making my way to his bed, I was already under the covers by the time he turned off the bathroom lights.

"Thank you for everything the past 24hours, it was pretty perfect." I said when he got in bed next to me, he immediately put his arms around me and pulled me against him, my head resting on his shoulder and my arm wrapped around his torso.

"Tonight has been one of my best nights in the past 18 months, that is all because of you. Thank you for showing me there was still hope when I had lost all." He whispered before pressing a soft kiss on my forehead, "But now try to sleep a bit, we can still talk as much as we want tomorrow."

"Okay. I love you bub" I said as I moved my head to look at him.

"I love you too, darling" He said before pressing a last soft kiss on my lips. I smiled when he pulled back before laying my head down again and closing my eyes.

—

"Can we just stay here forever?" I asked Ashton while I tried to pull the covers over my head even more. He watched me with a grin before pulling the covers down to reveal my face and upper body. Without any warning, he started attacking and tickling me which made me let out a loud squeal before the room was filled with our laughter and me yelling at him to stop. It didn't take long before my eyes started to fill with tears from laughing too loud and my stomach started hurting. "Ash, please" I begged repeatedly but he showed no mercy and just went on until I could no longer take it.

"We have to get out of bed." He said before laughing again at my red face. But instead of getting out of bed, he just laid down again too, to catch his breath from laughing too loud. I saw that as the perfect payback opportunity and quickly moved so I was straddling his waist to keep him down, I was going to start tickling him but something changed.

"Everything alright?" He asked when I didn't do anything, I just stared down at him while he waited for me to try and give him payback. "Elle?"

"Yeah, everything's alright." I mumbled before leaning down and placing a soft kiss on his lips, he kissed me back immediately and placed his hands on my waist, just underneath his shirt.

I don't know what made me change my plan, maybe it was the smile on his face, dimples in his cheeks and tears in the corners of his eyes or maybe it was the painful memory that got brought back up for a second.

When I pulled away, he looked at me with an unsure smile and he clearly noticed how I changed in a split second. I sat back down next to him and leaned against the headboard, my bare legs covered by the blanket. His phone lit up with a text notification and I heard him curse under his breath before looking at it but he too changed in a split second. It was that same frozen moment I had.

"I don't have to go pick up Liv so we got the day to ourself." He said after he wrote a quick text back, he turned around to look at me and by now I had realised it was the second option, the painful memory.

"Is she staying with Jackie?" I asked, it was a dumb question but I didn't want him to ask about what was on my mind.

"Yeah, they're having a girls day." He said softly while his eyes stayed on me. "Jackie often still struggles with it. She never gave herself much time to heal and always just tried to hold her mom and I together. She was traveling between London and LA all the time, to be with both of us. On the days that she struggles, she always comes to pick up Liv and she takes her to the beach. There's this one spot Sam and I always went and when Jackie came to visit, they spend a lot of time there. Liv is the reason she moved to LA. It's her way to be closer to Sam again." He admitted and I nodded slowly while listening. He was explaining his mood change without me asking, in hopes that I'd do the same.