Stories I Never Finished

Blinding Lights

Late evening, and the stars were missing from the polluted city skyline beyond the bricked ceiling of the subway station.
People littered the platform, rugged up in layers of clothes to fight the late night chill. A few men had earphones in, typing away on their phones, while women stood closer to the yellow line across the platform's edge; eyes anxiously waiting for the subway to hurry along and pick them up.

Luke Hemmings let his eyes scan across the platform to his right, taking one music-playing earphone out from where it had been tucked beneath the edge of his black beanie. Listening to the subway approach, he tucked his earphone back in and fixed the strap of his satchel to sit over his shoulder properly.

Pressing play on a new The Weeknd album, he shoved his phone into the pocket of his blue duffel coat, fluff-lined hood hiding the back of his neck.
With black jeans, shirt and boots, he wasn't choosing to stand out among the darkness of the city—even under all the lights above the surface.

The doors opened and he joined the few scattered passengers as they stepped into an almost empty subway train. Choosing to stand rather than sit with the scattered group of people on the subway seats, he stood with his bag holding arm raised to grab the small strap hanging among many others in a line.

A woman sat diagonal to him, her body curled in on itself within her long black coat while her hands clutched a novel within their delicate grasp; eyes buried into the story. With a quick glance she looked up at Luke the moment he looked away, gauging how much of threat the towering blond could be, only to relax slightly when she saw the small gay-pride pin among aesthetic pins sitting on the side of his beanie.

The whistle of a man sitting across from her went ignored the first time, gaining a few glances by nearby passengers, but the third time he whistled and waved finally grabbed her uneasy attention; soft eyes lifting to meet the older man's gaze.

"What'cha reading?" His smile quirked up into a grin, and Luke rolled his eyes when the man's tongue darted out to wet the cracked pink of his lips.

"A book." The woman vaguely replied, uncomfortable.

"Yeah? What's it about?" The man pestered, standing up. "Romance right?"

He sat down next to her, so close Luke supposed she could smell every place he'd been to earlier in the day.
The man sat and pestered her, touching her hair and asking her questions. As the subway rolled to break at Luke's stop, he spared the woman a glance and met her pleading gaze.

Awkward, he adjusted his bag and walked off the train. He couldn't take a burly man like that, and he was sure some other passenger would say something eventually.