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The thing is, Ashton loves his band. He really, truly does.
They’re not only his best mates, but also his family. He has come to rely on them so much in the past couple of years and most of the time he can’t picture his life without them. He knows those boys like the back of his hand, knows all their ticks and quirks, what they like and don’t like. He’s the first to tell catering Luke’s allergic to strawberries and hates carrots so don’t even bother with them and always next to Michael when he knows the boy can’t deal with the noise anymore. Michael would never say anything but Ashton knows he’s more introverted then the rest of them and sometimes he just needs a little space to breathe.
That’s the thing though, because while Ashton knows everything about his boys, it’s a two way street and Ashton can’t smile or frown without all of them knowing exactly what’s wrong. And if they don’t, they have calculated, practiced ways to make him talk. It’s all very degrading and he’s honestly just lucky none of the One Direction boys have caught them tickling the shit out him yet because he’s way too cheeky to everyone and he doesn’t want to be on the receiving end of an eight way tickle fight, he may just die.
So when they’re on the second leg of the stadium tour and Ashton comes down with some ridiculous, none life threatening but severely annoying cold that makes his head pound, he’s not entirely sure why he thought hiding it would be a good idea. It was actually the worst idea he’s ever had if he’s being honest, but he rarely is with himself.
It’s just, his mates, worry.
They worry too much and Luke gets these ridiculous frown lines and Calum can pull a better disapproving face than his own mother and he doesn’t want them to worry, not about him. He’s not really worth it. He’s just the drummer, he sits in the back. If Luke, or Calum or Michael got sick then there would be a problem. But not him.
Nobody else really sees it like that though, apparently.
Besides, he’s supposed to be the oldest in the band, he’s the dad figure out of there little band of Aussie misfits and it’s absurd enough Luke could probably carry him like a sack of potatoes across his shoulder because he’s an 18 year old giant. He doesn’t need his little brothers worrying about him too.
Therefore when he wakes up one morning, god knows where, some country that doesn’t speak English, and he’s well aware he has probably contracted some kind of weird European bug, he decides to quietly keep it to himself. He takes some medication he’s got lodged in his bag, takes a hot shower and desperately tries to maintain the cough that is threatening to expel his lungs every couple of minutes.
He barely feels ill anyway, beside the headache, sore throat, slight dizziness and cough. He’ll be fine.
Famous last words.
At breakfast he lasts about 10 minutes before Michael starts giving him weird sideways glances that are more annoying than they are full of concern. Ashton promptly ignores him though, to lathering too much vegemite on his toast (whoever got vegemite in this country is his god) that he’s not going to finish anyway because the thought of it is making him nauseous.
It doesn’t take long for Michael to do the creepy eye talk thing they do with Calum and Luke and suddenly Ashton finds the conversation Harry and Liam are having to his right particularly interesting even though he doesn’t for the life of him know what they’re on about. He’s actually pretty sure he heard ‘purple watermelon’ and maybe that’s the sign he should have stayed in bed today.
“Hey Ash,” Suddenly long nimble fingers have wrapped themselves around his upper arm, gently coaxing him back to the other side of the table and he sighs when he faces Michael, Calum and Luke all looking at him concerned.
“Yea Mikey?” He says probably more enthusiastically than necessary with his most cheeky grin (he knows his grin is cheeky okay and he’s not above using below the belt tactics to get out of this) which is probably a blatant give away.
“You feeling okay man?” Calum asks sceptically.
“Yea, of course I am why?” Ashton says nonchalantly but he’s eyeing Michaels hands cautiously as they look ready to pounce on his forehead at any moment. He’s going to have to make a quick getaway before he lets that happen.
“You look a bit, peaky.” Luke finishes lamely.
Ash just rolls his eyes, which does not do wonders for his sore head, “No I’m fine. A bit tired from the last few days, you know still working on my hangover from the other night. But nah, I’m fine. Stop being such worrywarts,” he laughs casually, standing up and ruffling Luke’s hair affectionately.
He gets a glare for that one.
“We’re not being ‘worrywarts’ Ash we just want to make sure you’re okay, you seem a bit sick is all,” Calum tries to reason with him as nice as possible even though Ash can tell he’s getting frustrated.
“Yea and remember what happened the last time you were sick and almost, passed out on stage,” Michael says not so pleasantly.
Ashton grins sheepishly at that. Okay so maybe he has quite a past record with being sick and not telling anyone, and maybe that’s why his bandmates keep a closer eye on him then necessary. But seriously he has this under control.
“I’m fine, I swear. You’ll be the first to know if I think I’m going to pass out. Promise,” He adds when none of the boys look at all convinced and Michael looks like he’s about to tackle Ashton for a temperature.
Luckily that’s when Niall decides he wants to make an exit to the pool and Ashton quickly jumps at the chance to get away from prying band members, “Irish wait up, I’ll see you later guys. Don’t stress,” He laughs as he quickly catches up with Niall leaving three very concerned and annoyed bandmates behind.
He doesn’t miss the way Harry and Liam smirk and roll their eyes at him, clearly overhearing the exchange and probably not believing a word he says. Ash just ducks his head embarrassed and leaves with Niall as quickly as possible.
Stupid boy band.
Luke sighs dejectedly as he crashes back into his seat along with Michael and Calum.
“Why does he always make things so hard?” Michael asks frustrated.
“Is he okay?” Louis asks, the 1D boys joining there conversation after witnessing the minor dispute that had occurred.
Luke shrugged, “Nah he’s sick.”
“We just don’t know how sick,” Calum says.
“Does he do this often?” Liam asks.
“He never tells us when he’s sick,” Luke says defeated. He hadn’t really expected Ashton to admit to them he was feeling poorly, but he had his hopes high that the older boy would trust them with such information.
Louis mulls this over for a minute, “Don’t worry he’ll come round. We’ll look after him,” He winks.
Maybe this will be easier with more people helping them, Luke hopes.
-/-/-/-/-/-
Maybe not.
After disappearing to the pool with Niall it didn’t take Harry long to join them and inform Niall on Ashton’s supposed ill health. Niall’s not very subtle though so he was willing to simply drag Ash back to his hotel room kicking and screaming as soon as he’s told, but once the boys had turned their back on him Ashton had completely disappeared.
It’s not like they sent a search party for Ashton that day, he was a big boy. 20 actually, and he could probably look after himself.
Except 5 Seconds Of Summer completely sent out a search party for him that day because, no, they didn’t believe he could look after himself. Not at all.
Fortunately Ash is a lot better at hide and seek then they gave him credit for because he goes missing for the entire day.
Mostly he’d just wondered around aimlessly, looking for places to take a quick nap. A few hours before the concert though he’d caught a ride with Lou on the way to the venue, and crashed on the couch in her make up room before the show.
Lou was nice, she was sweet but not over bearing and she didn’t ask any question or force him to take a temperature when looked like he might pass out. Instead she just commented on how he looked a bit pink, she’ll have to try and cover that with foundation later, why don’t you take a quick nap on the couch.
Ashton loved Lou and he now loved her couch.
By the time the boys started to make their way to the venue he was almost completely wrecked despite not actually doing anything all day and all he really wanted was home, his mom and his bed. But that’s not a very dignified thing to want at 20 and in an international band so instead he curled in on himself and tried not to let self-pity get to him too much.
It was his own fault anyway, if he’d said something in the morning he’d have one of his band mates to cuddle and he wouldn’t be alone. But then he also wouldn’t be left alone all day and they’d be prodding him and feeding him weird remedies, generally making his head worse from chatter and he just didn’t need that today either. It was a vicious cycle he found.
He didn’t like people fretting over him, nobody ever did until he met the boys and even then he was still the ‘fretter’ not ‘frette’. He’s been a big brother his entire life and his dad walked out on him when he was little so he’d had to take up the role of care giver at a pretty early age. He’d never had time to get sick and if he did he powered through it because he had school and work and little siblings to take care of. His mom couldn’t afford for him to be unwell, and although he loves his mother and his childhood, gentleness towards his behalf when ill generally is something that lacked.
Not that he minded, Ash never minded. But it was a foreign concept to him. When Luke gets a migraine or Calum gets a bug, Ash is the first one there with medicine, a wet cloth and a hug.
However he’s certainly not qualified to deal when it’s the other way around.
The first time he’d sneezed during band practice and Luke had been generally concerned for his health Ash had literally laughed him off because of course he was fine. The next day when he’d come in pronouncing all his ‘n’s like ‘b’s because of his stuffy nose and everyone had tried to make him sit down and drink tea he’d been honestly quite confused.
People didn’t need to worry about him, he was fine.
That didn’t stop his band though, with good reason. As whenever Ash got sick he’d ignore it until they forced him to rest. One time, right before a Hot Chelle Rae gig they hadn’t noticed how ill he was feeling and Ash had gotten so sick he’d passed out just as they left the stage.
They’d all been mortified and guilt ridden and Ashton had been thoroughly embarrassed.
They couldn’t let it happen again.
It didn’t take long for someone to enter Lou’s dressing room and catch the curly haired brunette sleeping on her couch soundly, like a big over grown puppy dog.
Louis and Liam cooed at the boy and Lou whispered at them to shut up, he needed all the sleep he can get.
“Is he okay?” Liam asked concerned while Louis took a photo of the sleeping teen.
“Yea he’s fine, just a cold I think. Where have the other boys been?” Lou asked as she started Louis hair.
“They’ve been looking for him, he’s been hiding from them all day.” Liam rolled his eyes.
“That’s why he’s been kipped out on me couch then,” She laughs softly.
Liam nodded and walked over to the boy, gently running his hands through his curls. Subconsciously Ash nuzzled his head into the touch and Liam could feel a slight fever, it wasn’t anything too serious but he’d get Paul to get a thermometer to make sure.
“Hey Ash, wake up for me bud?” Liam coaxed running his fingers through the boys hair with one hand and typing out texts to the other boys and Paul with his other.
Ash groaned softly and his eyes fluttered open slowly. When he saw Liam kneeling next to him he groaned louder, annoyed and tried to turn to have his back facing the Wolverhampton. Liam laughed and gently held him into place.
“None of that, come on I’ve got to let the boys know where you are they’ve been looking for you all day. And I’ll get Paul to bring a thermometer and some meds, do you think you’ll be able to make it through tonight’s show?” Liam asked.
Ash just groaned again hiding his face in his hands, “I’m fine, Go away, you’re worse than they are.” The boy mumbled.
“Daddy Direction is 100 times worse than anyone I’ve ever know, but you got yourself into this Irwin it’s what you deserve,” Louis laughed from his chair.
Liam scoffed, “As if you’re not just as bad, Mr-Niall-had-a-temperature-in-Prague-and-I-almost-had-a-heart-attack.”
Louis just poked his tongue out at the boy childishly.
“Come on,” Liam said moving the boy on the couch so he could sit and have Ashton’s head lie across his lap, holding him into place so they boy didn’t try to pull another runner.
“You know Liam when we agreed to have 5 seconds of summer on this tour I didn’t realise we’d be taking on the roles of caretakers, I may have reconsidered it,” Louis teased.
Ashton just gave him the finger.
“5SOS are our baby Aussie brothers, we have to look out for them when they’re ill and stupid,” Liam smiled running his fingers through the boys hair, trying to relax him. It seemed to be working somewhat but he could see the boys cheeks turning a considerate red, which he had to admit was actually kind of adorable.
“Hey is Ash okay?” Harry asked upon entering the dressing room with Niall and Zayn hot on his heels.
“Ash is fine thanks for asking. Go away,” Ash replied moodily burying his head further into Liam’s lap. This was completely and totally degrading, he really should have reconsidered his options this morning.
Harry smirked at the sight before him and Niall started cackling, “Oh my god he’s so cute, that’s adorable someone needs to take a picture.” Niall laughed already pulling out his phone.
“Don’t worry I’ve already instagramed it,” Lou replied easily.
She was such a traitor, she was definitely coming off Ash’s Christmas card list.
“OKAY WHERE IS THAT STUIPD BOY I’LL NECK HIM,” A very loud Australian accent could be heard from the corridor.
Zayn rolled his eyes, “He’s in here but you can’t neck him, Liam probably won’t let you.” He shouted back.
“Liam is like a mama tiger with her cubs, very protective,” Harry smirked.
Liam rolled his eyes but didn’t proceed to stop running his fingers through Ashtons hair.
Quickly Michael, Luke and Calum entered the dressing room which really wasn’t large enough to hold this many grown boys and they all sighed in relief when they saw him.
“So he’s not dead,” Calum said.
“It’s a shame really,” Michael gritted, Luke elbowed him in the stomach.
“You okay Ash?” Luke asked kneeling next to the boys head that was still in Liam’s lap.
“I’m fine, you’re all over reacting. I was just napping.” Ash replied easily.
Luke let out a frustrated but relieved huff, “Jesus Ashton.”
Ashton coughed slightly, trying to lessen the burden but it didn’t really work. He grinned sheepishly up at his boys, “Sorry.”
Michael rolled his eyes, and flicked the boy on the ear gently, “You should be.”
Soon enough Paul came into the room with all kinds of medication and thermometers to determine whether Ashton would be allowed to play the show that night. After much fussing and yelling, although he had a bit of a temperature, he was allowed to play drums after he was high on all sorts of antibiotics. It was just a minor chest infection according to the on call doctor that had arrived (although the need for a doctor was absurd to Ashton anyway) but he was to go straight to bed after their performance, which of course his bandmates complied with easily, hurling him out of the arena and into a car after the performance with many pokes and probs.
That’s how he found himself completely suffocated in what felt like 5 blankets in a very fluffy hotel bed with Luke and Calum sitting either side of him, force feeding him chicken soup and orange juice every other minute.
“Seriously I’m fine, I’m not hungry,” Ashton complained for what felt like the hundredth time after Luke once again tried to get him to eat some soup.
“Fine,” The boy pouted slightly, “but if you’re hungry we can get you anything, really.”
Ashton rolled his eyes, sinking further into the blanket hoping the bed would just swallow him up, “I’m fine, really.” He added when Luke just pouted at him.
“Yea sure your fine,” Came a grumpy, sarcastic reply from the next room and a green haired Michael appeared tapping away on his phone, “You just hid from us all day, almost giving us a heart attack by the way and now you have chest infection which requires all sorts of medication because you sound and look like shit. Nope not sick at all. By the way the boys said hi and they’ll be around after the show.” He added settling himself on the end of the bed, giving Ashton a pointed look while he rubbed the boys ankle, letting Ashton know he wasn’t as mad as he let on.
One thing Ashton had learnt about being in a band with Michael for so long was that the boy wasn’t nearly as tough as he let on. Although he always seemed to be annoyed and frustrated most of the time that was his way of saying, I love you do no leave me you idiot. Ashton would find it more endearing had the coloured haired lad not been scolding him for the past 40 minutes about erratic behaviour.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t think it was that bad, it wasn’t that bad I was just sleeping. Can you all just stop being mean to me now?” He asked pathetically, entirely sick of them bossing him around telling him how irresponsible he had been all day. Someone just hug him and shut up already.
Calum rolled his eyes, “We were never mean to you, you big baby.”
“I’m not a baby,” Ashton mumbled but preceded to rest his head against Luke’s chest and allowed Luke to pull his close and scratch at his scalp lightly.
“Of course you’re not,” He patronized while Ashton nuzzled into his hand like a cat.
Calum sighed loudly, “How on earth did you ever survive without us?”
Ashton shrugs, because sometimes he’s honestly not sure how he survived without these boys. Before these boys he didn’t really even have that many friends. Sure he knew a lot of people, could hang out with them if he pleased. But he didn’t have actual friends that cared about him. Sometimes its weird to think that 18 year old Ashton rocked up to band practise with a bunch of 16 year olds from a different school. Luke was sure Calum was mad asking him because he was clearly a lot older and probably a lot cooler than them, why would he want to join there ridiculously lame band?
Turns out Ashton was the perfect little fit for their lame band, because Ashton wasn’t exactly cool himself and was more than happy to be a part of something he thought was the most amazing thing to exist.
Calum ran a few fingers through Ashton’s hair gently, mumbling to himself about stupid bandmates and decided he needed some food ASAP. Taking Michael with him to the kitchen, and one last glare to Ashton suggesting move from that spot and I’ll kill you, Ashton was left alone with Luke.
It was silent for a moment, Ashton even thinking he might be able to fall asleep and avoid this whole mess when a particularly nasty coughing fit became him. After a few minutes of hacking coughs, and Luke patting his back gently he settled back into Luke’s chest, Luke chuckled.
“What are we going to do with you Ashy?” Luke asked fondly.
Ashton shrugged and sighed defeated, “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to make you worry.”
He honestly hadn’t, apparently that had been the wrong move.
“We like looking after you Ashton, we’re your friends. We don’t like to see you hurt or sick,” Luke tried to explain, “You’re our ash, I don’t know what we’d do if something happened to you.”
“I’m not dying Luke I’m fine, it’s just a cold.”
Luke sighed frustrated and pulled Ashton in closer, grasping the older boys hand and playing with his fingers, “I know that. But I don’t like it when you don’t tell us what’s going on. I worry. And before you even say it I worry more when you don’t tell us then when you do, and you would hate it if I got sick and didn’t tell anyone and then ran away all day. So you don’t get to do it either, don’t make me put a bell on you, or some kind of tracking device because I will. And don’t make me call my mom either, because I’ll do that too if you’re not careful and nobody wants the wrath of Mama Hemmings on them because she’s scary and she coddles like there is no tomorrow. Don’t make me unleash that on you because you’re a big baby.”
Ashton smiled fondly but quickly nodded despite himself, the last thing he wanted to do was make Luke worry. Or have his mom on his back, he’d seen her when Luke had chicken pox. That was kind of scary.
Not long after there was loud banging and crashing heard from outside their hotel room and quickly a stampede of One Direction bombarded there room, arguing and loud conversations included.
“You know Ashton, I was pretty sure I heard a radio interview recently where some apparently very contradictory information was given out,” The voice of Louis Tomlinson could be heard in a mischievous manner. Before Ashton could even process the flash that had presumably gone off taking a very incriminating photo of him his bed was full of 5 British boys which it most definitely could not fit.
“And what information is this?” Ashton deadpanned, trying to look unimpressed but coming across more as pouty.
“Was that the interview where he said that he stays away from band cuddles because they are quote, ‘not really his thing’?” Harry supplies usefully from Louis other side grinning madly.
“Yes I’m pretty sure that’s it, the one where tough Ashton Irwin says he doesn’t do band cuddles and lets them do their thing? I’m starting to feel like you’re a dirty liar Ashy,” Louis teases.
Ashton’s face is now on fire because these boys are jerks and his head hurts so he can’t even fight back properly, so he just buries his face undignified more into Luke’s chest, “Shut up, you suck.” He mutters.
“Aw Lou leave him alone you’re so mean,” Zayn laughs.
“He can cuddle whoever he wants, he’s feeling poorly,” Liam agrees, taking a seat next to him and easily manoeuvring the smaller boy away from Luke and into his arms. Ashton feels like he has no choice but to rest his head on Liam’s very broad chest and is surprised Luke let Liam take him away so easily, he felt betrayed by his younger band mate. When did Liam get so big and was able to manhandle people so easily? Surely that’s not normal.
“Oh I’m sorry I forgot Liam is adopting 5 seconds of summer now. My mistake,” Louis laughs.
Liam just pokes his tongue out at him, but continues to hold Ashton close to his chest protectively. Liam can’t help it if he feels for the boy, the 5SOS boys have always been like little brothers to him and he knows how awful it is to get sick on tour when you’re young. Because the only thing you want is your mom but you can’t very well tell anyone that.
It’s terrible.
“Leave our bandmate alone Tomlinson. And Payno he’s ours you don’t get him,” Calum teased joining the pile on the bed with Michael.
“Yea,” Michael agreed, “You’ve got your own drummer, not our fault he’s not as good as ours.”
Ashton rolled his eyes but couldn’t help the blush that formed on his cheeks which he hid in Liams chest.
Yea, maybe they were all idiots. But they were his idiots.