"Wake up Fuckboy." Someone says as a pillow hits Ashton in the face.

"Luke keeps his money under the bed, take it and leave me alone." Ashton whines, refusing to open his eyes for whoever decided it was a good idea to trespass in his room.

"Sell out your new boyfriend, why don't you." Luke shouts in disbelief, unsatisfied with Ashton's lack of movement. Taking the time to whack the boy with the curls once again, seeing as that had little to no effect on the shorter lad, Luke moved on to plan B.

Ashton wheezed out a string of inappropriate words as the taller of the two flopped down on top of him, effectively knocking the air from his lungs.

"Can I help you?" Ashton asked, looking down at the noodle boy rather casually for someone who'd just been rudely awoken and was having trouble collecting the right amount of oxygen.

"Nope." The boy whispered, offering a small warm smile before nuzzling his nose into the crook of the older boy's neck without a second thought. Ashton nearly choked on the air he was attempting to consume, although the two were often a lot more touchy feely than best friends should be this was a whole new level in his opinion.

"Hashtag no homo." Luke mumbled as an after thought, successfully getting the other boy to snort.

"Why are you here, Luke?" Ashton sighs, shoving the other boy off him because his tall blonde quiff was pretty close to going up his nose.

"I'm taking the bus with this beautiful hunk of teenage boy?" His answer comes out like a question as he gestures to Ashton with a small shrug. To which the curly haired boy replies with a single raised eyebrow. "Okay okay okay, you've twisted my arm... There's some weirdo at my bus stop that won't leave me alone and keeps asking me personal questions, so I'm getting on the bus with you."

Ashton rolled his eyes, "You're supposed to be the Bad Boy, Luke. That basically means you glare at the people that look at you the wrong way and press lit cigarettes into the face of the nerd who decides to open his mouth."

Luke chuckled, shoving his friend lightly. "Slow down, Al Capone, bad boy and member of the mafia are two different things." He was pretty much used to Ashton's shoot first, ask questions later attitude when they were alone, the older enjoyed one too many action movies.

"The bus comes in five minutes, by the way." Luke added, flashing Ashton a quick grin before exiting the room.

Ashton flew around his room, desperately collecting all his homework and quickly throwing on clothes as he went. He stopped by the bathroom to brush his teeth quickly, happy that he'd managed to at least shower last night.

He threw a mint or two in his mouth as a precaution, assuming his haphazard job on his teeth wouldn't be very rewarding in the long run.

"Come on Ash! We've still gotta make it to the stop!" Luke's voice rang from downstairs, there was a certain lightness to his voice that made Ashton roll his eyes, the lanky blonde was amused to say the least.

Ashton swore profusely when he smashed his hipbone against the large dresser next to his door on the way out of his room.

"Swearing isn't good for you, so don't fucking swear." Luke greeted him at the door, presenting a muffin and a juice box.

The shorter boy raised an eyebrow at the irony of that sentence.

If anyone should be concerned about their health, it should be Luke, Richmond's resident 'Bad Boy.' Ashton nearly snorted at the thought, the same boy that smiled extremely wide for photos and the same boy that likes cuddling and penguins, held the title of the badass at their school.

To say everyone on the bus was surprised when they shuffled on was an understatement, Luke skipped school the day before so everyone assumed he was suspended, which wasn't hard to believe.

Luke wasn't even a senior yet and he already held the record for most times suspended. Which included a span of two months the year before, because he snuck into school during school hours to not only get revenge on the Geography teacher who suspended him but Luke also went through the trouble of waiting ten minutes before the bell, outside of Ashton's science class to hand him some lunch.

So it came as a shock to see the two step onto the bus, even the bus driver seemed a little confused.

Not only were the two unexpectedly getting on the bus but it looked bad. Ashton didn't have time to straighten his hair because of Luke, so it was a mass of curls. He couldn't even run a brush though it with the amount have time he had.

As he awkwardly slid into a bus seat, closely followed by Luke, Ashton realized a problem.

While racing around the room for clothes, Ashton grabbed the first items of clothing that came into contact with his hand. Which consisted of tight black skinny jeans which had three zippers placed randomly along them that he's been meaning to throw out forever, a black t-shirt with bright yellow Batman symbols, and black vans. In retrospect, he could have done a lot worse. But like his grandfather once said, it's like a super modernized castle. No ballroom.

"Is that my shirt?" Ashton asks, examining the weekend warriors shirt Luke wore under his red and black flannel.

The blonde smirks, "Is it?" He questions teasingly.

Imagine how that looks, a disheveled boy with major bed head and a confident smirking blonde wearing the otherr's shirt getting on the bus together. Now all they need is the punch line.

As if on cue, the bus stops to pick up the last of the kids that ride on this bus. The seats quickly fill up as a new boy steps on, handing a slip of paper to the driver.

The boy turns toward the back of the bus, only to find all of the seats taken.

He lets out a barely audible "oh."

A smirk etches its way across Luke's lips, removing his arm from around Ashton's shoulders as he opens his mouth. "My lap's got free parking."

Luke patted his leg gently while pulling on a warmer smirk, welcoming the boy.

The boy's lip twitched upwards slightly as he raised an eyebrow.

"Its open twenty-four seven." Luke said, forgetting Ashton completely as he sent the raven haired boy a oh-so-subtle wink.

"Always on the job, I see." Ashton mumbled, passive aggressive glare directed out the window. At what? He couldn't tell, everything was a little blurry because he'd forgotten to put in his contacts. He thought it was safe to assume it was a skinny shrub next to someone's door.

"Oh, leave the poor boy alone. Its his first day." The boy seated in front of the pair said. He had black hair, like the new kid but it was framed on either side of his skull by white hair. Ashton couldn't see much of the dyed hair boy, since was was facing away but he felt like a herd of zebras would accept him into their family whole-heartedly with that kind of hair.

Luke chuckled, "C'mon, I was just having a little fun."

"Fun? Like the kind you had with Sunshine over there?" The Clifford boy twisted in his seat so he could nod toward Ashton.

"Here." The boy in front of Luke and Ashton says, moving his bag so the new kid could sit next to him.

Luke scoffed, looking at Ashton with an expression that said 'can you believe this guy?' Only to find Ashton squinting at him.

He pulled a pair of glasses out of his flannel's pocket. "Thought you might forget your contacts." He shrugged, handing the curly haired boy the glasses.

"How kind." Ashton muttered, putting on his glasses and looking-more like glaring-out the window once again, only to find out as the bus started moving that he'd been glaring directly at a stick thin person in a bright green sweater. Oops.

"Calum?" Ashton said surprised to find the tanned boy seated in front of him when he put on his glasses.

The star of the opposing school's football team turned around to look at him.

"Ashton? Sorry I didn't recognize you without straight hair." Calum's cheeks darkened slightly from not recognizing his own friend.

"What are you doing here?" Ashton asked, curious as to why the boy was on their bus.

"Kitten here," He paused to pinch the boy's cheek affectionately, to which the boy shoved Calum's hand away. "Moved, and I didn't think I could stand going to school without this Tool by my side so I switched." He shrugged, like it was no big deal.

"Why did you act like you didn't know each other when you first got on, sorry for hitting on you by the way." Luke mumbled the last part a little awkwardly, refusing to meet Ashton's gaze.

"Can't be targets of homophobia until we know what we're up against." Michael said, a smirk playing on his lips slightly.

Ashton was quick to doubt that the pair would be subjects of homophobia just by looking at them, he could tell that the school would be waiting for a fight to happen between Michael and Luke because they both seemed pretty cocky. Calum, it seemed was the bottom of the two, although Ashton had dated a shy guy that turned out to be rather dominant which lead to their breaking up because his member was pretty small and his personality was shit. Ashton decided that the couple alternated, their personalities clashed too much to simply have a top and a bottom.

"What classes do you have?" Ashton asked, hoping that either one of them were in some of his classes because all the only class Luke and he shared was Math, which didn't float too well with Luke and he often skipped.

After briefly looking at each of their timetables, they found that Calum had Music and Math with Ashton and Phys Ed with Luke. While Michael had English with Luke and Music, English and Art with Ashton.

They arrived at school, getting off the bus together pushing and shoving. Luke and Michael were laughing at a story Calum was telling them about Ashton.

"Guys, stop laughing! I was like twelve, how was I supposed to know that it was a real skunk?" Ashton yelled, trying to hold back his own laugh at the memory.

The moment kind of shattered when someone yelled, "Aye 'emmo!" Which caught Luke's attention immediately. It was Patrick, you could tell from the accent, although no one knew where he was from because his accent was the weirdest.

"Trick! Thought you were suspended?" Luke yelled back with a laugh, heading over to his pack. There were only four but they packed a punch if anyone fucked around with them.

"Squad goals." Michael said in a clipped tone, not hiding the sarcasm in his voice as he saw a small cloud of smoke rise up when Luke arrived.

"I was under the impression that he hung out with you." Calum mumbled, looking at the group of smokers with slight distaste.

"He does. Well-He usually does, I honestly don't know what's been going on with him lately." Ashton frowned, heading toward the school.

"Dude looks like a wannabe punk." Patrick said bitterly, waving his cigarette toward Michael.

"Don't judge too quickly," Luke said, handing the lighter he just borrowed to one of his mates. "He seems pretty cool."

"You think everyone's cool until you have to punch them, bet you ten bucks he'll fancy Bi-gone Irwin." Patrick said, waving a bill in Luke's face with a smirk.

The ginger was under the impression that Ashton was some science nerd that hung out with Luke so he could do his homework. Bi-gone was some sexuality word play he'd come up with that he thought was hilarious, Luke on the other hand, mocked it under his breath whenever he got the chance.

The thing about Patrick was he happened to be a homophobe, he hated gays with a sick passion. The only reason he didn't say shit to Luke was because he was the only one keeping Patrick from getting beat up by the footie team.

Luke snatched the bill out of Trick's hand without difficulty, he stuffed it in his back pocket and took a long drag of his cigarette, "Dude's dating the other newbie." He coughed, flicking his wrist toward the school's front doors.

They all watched Ashton enter the building, Calum paused and held the door open for Michael, Michael raised an eyebrow at the raven haired boy but didn't question his random act of kindness. As soon as Michael started walking, Calum pinched his bum and laughed when the the other boy turned around and smacked his arm. Michael tried to stomp inside but Calum spun his around and gave him a quick peck on the cheek.

"Cute." Kyra said, turning back toward the group. Her heavily made up eyes looking at the final member of the group, Shawn, distastefully.

"Hey." He said, raising his arms in surrender. They weren't a very affectionate couple, to which Luke was kind of grateful, but Kyra wasn't too happy about it and and would often make passive aggressive remarks about it whenever the opportunity arose.

"So what's the deal between you and Bi-gone Irwin?" Shawn asked, desperately trying to get Kyra's negative attention off him. He slipped her hand into his to cheer her up a bit.

"What do you mean?" The blonde said, raising an eyebrow. This was the first time he'd ever been questioned about Ashton.

"Y'all are pretty close, you definitely don't hang out with us as much as you could and Van told me you two got on the bus together." Shawn explained lazily, puffing out smoke every so often. Van was basically a drug dealer, Shawn and him went way back but no one they knew did drugs.

Luke shrugged, he wasn't too fond of Van if he was being honest. "We're mates, there's nothing to it."

Trick scoffed, "C'mon? You expect me to believe there's 'nothing to it' when you both go for dud-Wait, you fancy him don't you, 'emmo?" A grin etched it's way onto his freckled face.

"Ash's a friend." Luke muttered curtly, hoping that Trick would drop the subject.

But knowing Patrick as well as Luke did, the boy didn't think before he spoke.

"A friend for now, let me know when you guys start banging because I don't want to be around when he starts clinging to you. He'll be getting more than secondhand smoke if he decides to come out here." Trick said, absentmindedly rolling up his sleeves like he always did when he was looking for a fight.

"Ash wouldn't come out here if I paid him a hundred dollars, he doesn't like people like you." Luke said rather coolly, flicking the remains of his cigarette in Trick's direction, stepping on it as he stood up straight.

"People like me? Are you sure you don't mean people like you? Because we're pretty fucking similar." Trick snapped, jabbing a finger against Luke's chest as if to make some kind of point.

"I don't go banging sluts left and right, Trick. Maybe I should inform the Football Team about Neveen and Jessica then let them know that I'm not going to step in." Luke snapped, slightly amused by how fast the ginger's expression changed.

"No no no no, Luke please! Don't." Patrick pleaded, the anger slipping off his face immediately.

Luke just sighed, stepping of the curb and throwing a quick, "Whatever man." over his shoulder as he headed for Richmond.

The school in question looked like a prison. No really, they'd refurbished an old prison into a shining example of why kids call school prison. They hadn't bothered to remove the barbed wire fencing around the perimeter, heaven forbid someone wanted to break in to the school after dark.

Walking into school every morning or just walking down the hall had a lasting effect that Luke would never get used to. Everyone stared, everyone stopped, everyone whispered.

All these false rumours spread whenever he even looked at someone.

"Did you hear about Luke and Kate?"

There was nothing about Luke and Kate, he had literally only bumped into her and did the polite thing and helped her pick up her books.

Not to mention he was gay, and there was not a single person that didn't know. He'd a sexuality joke when the principal told him to go straight to the office. He wasn't hiding anything.

Luke cut around a corner on the way to his locker only to find Michael leaned up against it, normally he wouldn't mind, but Michael happened to be leaning to the right, Ashton's locker was to the right of Luke's. Michael was leaning closer to Ashton as they conversed.

Luke had to threaten a druggie to get that stupid ass metal cubbyhole beside Ashton's and he was not about to have some big mouthed punk teenager.

"Excuse me." Luke grumbled as soon as he was in earshot of the boy.

Michael didn't spare Luke a sideways glance as he moved to the other side of Ashton.

"Hi Luke, Michael was just telling me about the trip he went on with Calum to Italy last summer. Isn't that exciting?" Ashton's eyes were lit up in astonishment, he'd once told Luke about his dream to travel all over the globe. He was pretty sure Luke was drunk and didn't remember though.

"Speaking of Calum, where is he?" Luke asked, looking around for the tanned boy even though he knew Calum wouldn't be in sight.

"He needed to piss." Michael said with a shrug, apparently indifferent about his boyfriend not being around.

• • • •

"Luke!" Calum yelled, waving the boy over to the table him and the other boys had managed to grab, it wouldn't be long before the Footie Team would be there to claim it though.

Luke held up a finger, signalling that he'd be there in a minute. He cut in front of a small frazzled girl with thick glasses in the cafeteria line, not that anyone would complain or try to stop him.

He gave a warm greeting to the cafeteria lady as he paid for his greasy pizza and chocolate chip cookie.

Luke wasn't surprised to find the entirety of the Football Team plus their girlfriends surrounding the table Calum had claimed as his own. It didn't look like he was planning on giving it up either.

They didn't recognize Calum, he was only a number to them on the field. The one person that could singlehandedly stop them from scoring a goal.

Luke stood and watched them bicker for a few minutes, munching on his lukewarm pizza.

It was all fine and dandy until one of the football players turned to Ashton. That's when everyone that was listening stopped pretending they weren't.

"Heard your boyfriend got suspended, better thank your lucky stars that he's not here to see you cry." One said, beginning to advance on the curly haired boy.

Ashton looked so small, with his hair unstraightened and his glasses on, he looked really scared too.

Luke set his tray down on the table between the football player and Ashton.

"What did I miss?" He asked, raising an eyebrow at the group of populars standing around them. "Can I help you with something?" He asked.

"Yeah, you're sitting at our table." One of the girls toward the back spoke up.

"Strange." The blonde said, licking his lips as he gestured to the table top. "I don't see any of your names on here."

"I don't see yours either." Kelsey, a pretty brunette, said with a smirk on he heavily glossed lips. She had this triumphant look on her face like she'd managed to outsmart a fox.

As if on cue, Luke slid Ashton's tray up, everyone leaned in to find a tiny Hemmo etched into the table. Of course, Luke had the unfair advantage of having scratched his name on the surface of every single table, not that anyone needed to know that or even how he managed to do it.

The popular group couldn't even formulate a decent comeback to that logic or sheer coincidence.

Michael and Calum stared incredulously at the tall blonde as he finished off his pizza, handing the crust to Ashton along with half his cookie.

"I didn't want to walk all the way to that table over there." He said with a shrug, nodding his head toward the table the populars were being to settle into even though there was a large puddle of chocolate milk across it. Luke watched as they hurriedly looked at the surface to check for Luke's name.

Not that he was going to tell them, but Hemmo was erected over a thin sharpie swirl on one of the benches.

Just like that, they were plunged back into conversation, Calum talking avidly to Luke about FIFA with Michael pitching in every so often. Ashton just sat and listened, he wasn't into video games.

After five minutes, Luke switched conversation to something stupid like gorillas so Ashton could join in.

"Hey Ash?" Luke said, once their heated debate about Nickelback vs. Iggy Azalea had slowed down.

"Want to go for a walk?" He asked, already standing up. Ashton looked a little unsure but he was up for it as soon as Luke flashed his famous thousand watt smile, it wasn't all that famous to anyone but Ash technically.

They waved goodbye to the cute couple as they left the cafeteria.

"Where are we walking to?" Ashton asked, assuming Luke was going to be an ass and take him to the scary as hell infirmary.

"Close your eyes." The boy with the lip piercing said, holding out his hand for Ashton to take.

They walked a little too quickly and Ashton kept tripping over his feet but they got there faster than Luke thought they would.

He pushed open the old greenhouse and sucked in the smell of various flowers. He turned to Ashton, leading him carefully to the middle of the small glass house. He grabbed Ashton's other hand and traced a spiral into it with his thumb.

"Open your eyes." Luke whispered, biting his lip as he waited for the shorter boy's reaction to Luke's little hideout.

Ashton's eyes opened and the sun come out from behind a span of grey clouds that had coated the sky all day. Ashton's eyes opened and his hair looked golden bronze. Ashton's eyes opened and his face lit up.

Luke was struck by how well the curly haired boy in front of him seemed to fit in the room.

His hair curled like the ever growing vines of the archway above their heads. The green in his eyes matched every single shade of green present in the greenhouse. The brown in his eyes dulled the intensity of the thousand vibrant petals that rose from the pots around them.

His tan skin contrasted the white flowers in the most beautiful way and Luke had to hold himself back from picking a white lily and tucking it behind the other boy's ear.

"Wow." Was all Ashton managed to say, and even then it wasn't able to come out as more than a hushed tone. He looked up high, to where the sun fought it's way through the vines and hanging flower pots. He looked down at the minuscule plants in their tiny pots, each with different coloured flourishes curling across the pottery.

Finally he looked at Luke, the boy in all black save for the red flannel. His blonde hair held high in a quiff and lip ring shining in the sunlight, and eyes that were easily the prettiest shade of blue in the room, the school, the world. He didn't fit in here, he was tall and awkward. But at the same time, maybe he did, among flowers and plants that were as unique as he was.

"Wow." Ashton repeated a little louder, blinking a little faster in the sudden brightness.

Luke forgot what he was going to say. He'd planned this entire thing out, he was going to say something so they could move forward with the plan. His mind came up with a blank, it was filled to the brim with Ashton.

He probably looked like a blabbering fool, his mouth opening and closing repeatedly like a fish out of water. Finally he spit out something that might resemble a compliment.

"Wow yourself."

A/N: 4156 words for your enjoyment because I have not updated in forever. So there you go :3

I thought it would be funny to start with "Wake up Fuckboy" and end on "Wow yourself"

Any thoughts? Questions? Concerns?