destiny - malum

02

The class continued and the boy didn't look in my direction again, not that I was convinced he had looked in my direction at all. Had I imagined him waving at me? Perhaps my cereal had gone bad and I was hallucinating, but can cereal even go bad?

I had to get over myself pretty quickly, though, because I had French next. Not that I cared about French one bit - nor could I speak anything in the language for that matter - but because Matt freaking Thomas sat behind me.

So of course, he had to trip me up as soon as I stepped into the classroom, and I had to confront him. "What's your problem?"

"You."

"Right," I rolled my eyes. "Ha ha, very funny. I haven't heard that one before."

He didn't seem to have heard what I said, which was frankly unsurprising given the fact that he doesn't pay attention to anything. "You think you're welcome, but you're not. You have no friends here."

It was true, and I was happy to just leave the conversation at that, but Luke had to be a good person and defend me in front of the toughest and meanest guys in school. Have I ever mentioned how much I hate that kid?

"He has me. And that boy in your sports class waved at him, so we'll count him, too." I have to say, I've never seen Luke stand up to anyone like that, and I was almost proud until I realised what he had said.

I glared at Luke and he shifted uncomfortably in his chair. "Woah, he wasn't waving at me."

"Do you mean Calum? Because you're right, there's no way that he'd ever wave at you." Matt turned to his friends and snickered, pointing his thumb in my direction. "What a loser."

Now, let me get this straight. I'm a lot of things, but I'm not a bully. Well maybe occasionally, when Luke forgets to do my homework for me or takes the last piece of chicken, but I'm not one to retaliate and lash out.

I just kinda laugh it off, and pretend I'm watching them strip down to their underwear or something. That always helps. But Matt never failed to push me to my limits, and being pushed around was something I hated above all else - and that's saying something, since I hate pretty much everything.

So sure, maybe I stood up and punched the jerk in the face, then laughed as he stumbled out of the classroom holding his nose to stem the blood flow. And yeah, maybe I told my teacher to run after her little pet as she shoved me towards the headmasters office.

But do I regret it? Hell no.

Well maybe a bit, I suppose, since I got suspended. It probably didn't help that I tried to justify myself by saying that I only punched him, and could've torn his limbs off of his body one by one if I really wanted to.

"Two weeks," I grinned, when Luke came to meet me outside the gates at the end of the school day. I'd been told that if I was seen on the school premises, there'd be serious consequences and although I usually didn't care all that much, I was in enough trouble for my liking.

Luke groaned and ran his fingers through his hair. "No way! Does that mean I have to talk to other people?"

"Dude, really?" I raised my eyebrows but Luke just shrugged. "My mum's gonna kill me! And probably you, too, because you know me and that's a good enough reason for her."

"That would be the worst way to die. Can you imagine what they'd put on my gravestone?"

He couldn't help but laugh, and eventually I did, too. It wasn't actually that funny but it seemed an appropriate reaction, and if my mum let me live then I would definitely be grounded - and being grounded meant no Luke for an entire week. So laughing with him whilst I still could didn't sound so bad.

Then I remembered something (woah, that doesn't happen often). "Do you think Matt meant what he said? That there was no chance Caleb waved at me?"

Luke frowned and tilted his head. "Do you mean Calum?"

"I don't care what his name is. Let's call him Charlotte."

"Um," the blond hummed, "okay. So Charlotte waved at you. And trust me, he did. He was looking right in your direction, and other than me there was no one nearby."

I didn't want to ask it, but decided to anyway. "How do you know he wasn't waving at you? I mean, if I were him, I'd definitely be waving at you."

"Because I know. If you've ever trusted me-"

"Nope."

"-then you'll believe me when I say he waved at you. Not me, not anyone else, you. I can't believe you're so worked up over all of this, why does it even matter?"

I shrugged casually, but 'casually' for me pretty much means as-awkwardly-as-possible-so-that-it-looks-ridiculously-strained (which it may have been?). "It just does. Maybe I'm sick of you being my only friend, and Charlotte looked cool."

"Do we really have to call him Charlotte?" Luke asked and I shook my head, laughing as he breathed a sigh of relief. "Thank god for that, it was starting to get confusing. My cousin is called Charlotte, you know."

"I did not know."

"Well, you do now."

Luke glanced suddenly around and frowned at the lack of people, which for him was really unusual. We'd been so preoccupied to realise the place had cleared out, undoubtedly because everyone had run as far from the school as possible once the bell had sounded, and we were the last ones left.

Alone. At school.

I faked a laugh. "Yeah, I'm going to leave now. I gotta get started on the best two weeks of my life."

Then I ran. Really, really, fast (for me).

~~~~~~~

A/n: *sweats nervously* .... I totally didn't forget I started this fic

I have absolutely no idea how this is going to turn out so just go with it I guess, hopefully it won't be as bad as I'm expecting it to be lmao

Thank y'all for reading xx