alumni ➢ luke hemmings [DISCONTINUED]

3.4 ➢ I'm Sorry.

SOPHIE HAYES

I don't know what compells me to do it or why I seem to be incapable of staying away from the boy with the lip ring and arm tattoos, but I call Luke.

I call him and when we speak, something lights back up inside of me, like a firework waiting to go off. It's not nerves. I'm not scared, not like I used to be. It's butterflies.

He's looking at me with so mych tensity in his eyes that I can't seem to match them with his words; he's apologising and promising me that it won't happen again, but all I can look at is his lips.

They curve a very beautiful way. When he smiles, he gets the tiniest trace of a dimple, and when he talks they form swiftly and quickly, yet still remain oddly alluring. I can't stop looking. But he's too apologetic to notice.

To be honest, I hadn't even thought about last nights events since getting here. I was mostly hung up on seeing Luke again, even though it's only been a full day since he dropped me off at the dorm complex, maybe not even that.

I watch as he takes a sip of his coffee, black as usual, only this time made by himself. We're not in Sadie's café like we'd usually be. No; now we take cautious sips of our differing drinks in the quiet of his penthouse.

"What's on your mind?"

I snap my attention back from the city of Manhattan to the boy in front of me, his jaw still a little bruised and his knuckles covered in a mix of plasters and stitches. There's so much of him that I wanna know. But more importantly, there's so much of me that I want to know; like why I keep feeling this way over somebody who scared the ever-living fuck out of me a few months ago.

Shaking my head, I drink some of my hot chocolate. My smile is weak and I don't think Luke's convinced. "Nothing much."

Yet he nods, leaving it at that. There's a part of me that wants him to press on, to keep asking questions even though I'll completely refuse at the very beginning. But he doesn't.

He takes a seat next to me, on this big plush couch that overlooks New York. He's so close that I can feel his knee knocking against mine, even when he scoots to the side a little bit to give me some space.

My heart is racing. Why is it racing? Hearts shouldn't do that.

Luke puts his hand on my knee. It probably doesn't mean anything, not to him, but it sends so many signals to so many different parts of my body that I can feel myself tensing up. But he just drinks his coffee, acting nonchalant, probably not knowing any better as he stares out into the city.

"Did you grow up here?"

He looks at me, a small smile playing on his lips. I wanted to get to know him better, so I'm going to.

"No," Luke says. I can't even tell if he's lying, but he doesn't expand on his point. "What about you? Where did you grow up?"

"I was born in the Philippines," I start, hesitant to carry on just in case I bore him. But Luke gazes at me intently, pressing at me to continue. "We moved to Australia for a bit, that's where I met... you know," I say.

Luke nods. "I figured."

"Yeah," I say somewhat awkwardly, "Then we moved to England and just stayed there for a while,"

"England," he repeats. I nod. "I've never been there."

"You haven't?"

"Haven't had the time,"

"But you want to," I say. He shrugs slightly.

"I guess. Not on my own, though."

"Why not?"