When There Is Nothing Left But Love

“No, Scarlett, you don’t get it. You don’t know how much Ashton can drink. If he’s not drunk, he can drink all the way until the sun rises. He’s causing harm to himself, but nothing Jared and I say can deter him. If anything happens to him because of this, we can’t bear the responsibility!”

Joe described Ashton’s situation so vividly. I could feel the anxiety manifested in his tone.

I stood on the balcony, allowing the wind to blow softly against my face. Irritated, I spoke on the phone, “If he can’t bother to take care of himself, then let him drink to death!”

“Scarlett…”

“Scarlett, are you a woman at all?” Apparently, Joe’s phone was snatched away by none other than Ashton. He spoke to me in a strong nasal voice, obviously drunk.

“What’s that got to do with anything? Ashton, you go drinking at this hour and now you’re throwing tantrums at me? How old do you think you are? Three?” The other side of the line might have been put on speaker because Joe seemed to fly off the handle once I finished my rant.

He called out Ashton in a drawl, obviously in a teasing tone.

But Ashton probably shot him back an eerie look, thus the other end of the phone went quiet again.

I was really not in the mood to be dragged into this sort of nonsense, so I said, as casually as I could, “Ashton if you’re doing fine, don’t call me! I’m hanging up!”

Before he could think of a comeback, I hung up right away and turned off the phone for good measure.

That night, I could not sleep well, as per usual. I kept having nightmares. I finally managed to get some sleep when dawn broke, and then Stacey called.

She could hear the exhaustion in my raspy voice. She asked, “Ms. Stovall, you didn’t sleep well, did you?”

“Give me

assailed me. I got up and sat on the side

it this way! I’ll come to pick you up in a while, so you

she was faster. “Open the door for me

that was what she

I checked my phone. Other than the bunch of missed calls from Ashton last night, there were no other

but my

brought breakfast and, upon seeing the dark circles under my eyes, said, “How about

Stovall family is throwing a banquet on Monday. John’s arranged a fitting session for me but I kept ditching him. After we sort this out,

her eyes darkened as she muttered a confusing choice of

to me. “Come on,

nodded, my head

I experienced discomfort straight away. It was like being hounded by a daunting aura, trapping

the suburbs. That raised some questions. “Why are we going to

replying, “I’m taking

want

came up. I could not think of anyone

her, I prompted, “Who,

another half-hour drive before we