Starstruck (the Idea of Always)

Zaterdag 16:27

JENS
Jens knew that Lucas was in Antwerp with Ralph, but to be completely honest, he didn't want to share, even though he knew that technically Ralph was the one doing the sharing. Lucas was doing the same that Jens had been doing a few hours earlier, swooping back and forth in the half-pipe, every once in a while looking up at Jens and smiling brightly. Earlier they had begun asking questions to each other, just simple ones. The first question he had asked Lucas was "What's your favorite color?"

Lucas had started laughing shyly, and he looked away before saying, "You can't tell anyone this." Jens jokingly said, "Pink?" but Lucas started laughing harder, and it was obvious that Jens was right.

"Are you serious?" Jens asked as he started laughing too. He leaned forward to look at Lucas's face, playing it off as him teasing him.

"It's such a pretty color!" Lucas defended himself. "Especially when it's like, pastel, not like the super bright pink, I don't like that."

Jens started laughing harder and said, "Okay, that's fair, I guess. Pink in chill."

"Pink is chill." Lucas pushed his shoulder against Jens's, almost pushing Jens off the ledge they sat on.

"What's your favorite color then, if you're so above pink?" Lucas asked Jens and looked at him. Jens looked right back.

"Blue."

"Blue is chill."

"Blue is chill."

As Lucas skated in front of Jens, Jens couldn't help but think of how often he saw blue and pink together. Usually in baby items, but they still complimented each other.

"Do you have anywhere to go?" Jens called down to Lucas when they looked at each other again.

"No," he said.

"Ralph isn't asking for you or anything?"

Lucas pulled his phone out of the front pocket of his hoodie and stepped on the back of his skateboard, slowing to a stop. He looked at his phone for a second and then said, "No," again.

"Nice."

Lucas looked at Jens and quirked his eyebrows up quickly and nodded slightly before pushing his board up the slope for Jens to catch. When Jens caught it, he ran up the slope and pulled himself up next to him.

They say next to each other for a second, and then Jens leaned backward, reaching behind Lucas to grab his bag. His arm brushed Lucas's back. When he pulled his bag closer, it bumped into Lucas, and Lucas said, "Are you trying to push me off?"

"I'll fucking do it," Jens replies as he unzipped his bag and rummaged through it for his phone.

"I'll kill you."

"Mmhm." Jens glances up at Lucas and suppressed a smile.

Lucas sat patiently as Jens typed into his phone, Interesting questions to ask. After a second, Jens pulled his head up and said, "Okay. What celebrity would you rate as a perfect ten?"

He asked this partially to see if Lucas's answer would be a girl or guy.

"Uhhh," Lucas hesitated. He looked up to the darkening sky, thinking. "Young Leonardo di Caprio," he said, looking back at Jens. Jens's heart jumped a little.

"Seriously?"

"Yeah, like Jack from Titanic? Or Romeo? He was cute." Lucas started smiling like he was trying to act serious, but it wasn't working. His cheeks looked pink.

"Romeo?"

"Yeah?"

"I haven't seen that one."

"Yet," Lucas added, pointing to him. "I'm gonna make you watch it now." Jens smiled.

"Okay." He paused for a second before passing his phone over to Lucas. "Your turn."

As Lucas scrolled, Jens placed his bag behind himself and leaned back on it, the bag holding his head up. He closed his eyes.

"If you had the money for it, would you try space tourism?" Lucas asked. Jens noticed that this question wasn't on the page that he had used, but didn't really care, even though usually he didn't like people doing stuff on his phone.

"Yes. One hundred percent," he said, not opening his eyes. He could feel Lucas looking at him.

"Why?"

"Why not? It's awesome."

"How?"

"The universe is so big, dude. There's so much out there." Jens opened his eyes now and looked over to see that Lucas had shifted his whole body, sitting crisscross, facing Jens. He had never actually talked about how into space he was, and he wasn't in a way. He couldn't name all the planets or types of stars or anything like that. He just thought it was fascinating that the world wasn't the only thing in their universe or galaxy.

"And we don't even know if there are other universes. Like, there might be another universe completely different from ours. Or exactly like it."

LUCAS
Lucas liked to see how excited Jens got about space. It was cute.

"Exactly like it?" he asked, trying to get Jens to keep talking.

"Exactly like it, or a little bit different. Like...like parallel universes." Jens reached up and messed his hair up a little. "Maybe somewhere there's a parallel universe where everything is the same, there's a Lucas and a Jens doing exactly what we're doing, except..." He trailed off and looked away from Lucas, glancing around them. "Except the skateboards are yellow. Or something," he finished awkwardly.

"That's really cool to think about, actually." Lucas smiled slightly. "How many Lucases and Jenses are there? In all the universes?"

"Infinite ones."