Bare Knuckles ♛ lrh

13- maccas

Luke's plan backfired.

He had successfully pushed all thoughts of the girl out of his mind and was going about his day with no prospects of her. He was lying on his bed watching a random show on his T.V. when his phone vibrated against his sheets. He reluctantly picked it up and looked at the text, assuming it was Calum or Ashton being a jackass, as they only texted him to make fun of him. It was neither guy though, the name tagged above the message caused his heart to jump in his chest, the contents of the text making it beat faster,

evelyn flores: hey luke :) you left pretty early this morning, is everything okay?

The simple message checking up on his left him feeling annoyed—at himself. He was annoyed at himself because if he really wanted to push all thoughts of her away, it would take a lot more willpower than he first imagined. He stared at the text on his screen for what felt like ten minutes as his fingers hovered over his keyboard. He tapped away on the screen; typing a few words, then deleting them, typing some more and deleting those.

Locking his phone and throwing it beside him, Luke groaned loudly and dragged his hands over his face. Seemingly no reply he came up with would be a decent enough excuse as to why he practically ran out of her house in the early morning. He felt that slight twist in his gut that he had been experiencing more and more lately. He still felt guilty about making her cry the previous night, he felt guilty for leaving as soon as he woke up and he felt guilty for wanting to push her away, he was captivated by her and it wasn't anyone's fault but his own.

Those feelings he had regarding the girl only solidified that he was absolutely screwed, and he would have to try harder if he actually wanted to forget about his sentiments towards her—just now he wasn't so sure he wanted to. With trust issues and the unfamiliarity of the situation, he was scared, yet another feeling he wasn't used to. He didn't want to admit he was smitten over the girl but deep down he knew it was true, he just wasn't ready to face what that meant.

A few days went by, then a week, and Luke was still hung up on not texting Evelyn back. After receiving her thoughtful text, little memories of the girl loomed in the back of his mind. Oftentimes he found himself zoning out of reality for brief moments as he replayed the way she looked at him moments before her lips were on his, the kiss soft and sweet.

Evelyn often thought back to the kiss with the boy she had yet to hear back from. It brought a small smile to her lips every time, though the realization that he had essentially ghosted her over the past week made her smile drop into a frown.

She was staring at her phone, waiting for a text back. She wanted to send another but didn't in fear of being a bother. If he wanted to text me, he would've already, she told herself every time she felt the urge to text him again.

As she was staring at the single blue text on the screen, her phone vibrated with a notification from someone else—Michael. Evelyn clicked on the message apprehensively as she wasn't sure if it would be a good idea to talk to him after what happened with Luke.

'hey wanna hang out?'

She bit her lip as she contemplated if she should or not. It was as obvious as ever the red-head was a sore subject among her newly made friends—besides Calum, he seemed like he was friends with anyone and everyone. After a few more seconds of debating she agreed, she felt it couldn't do much harm as she was bored, Finley was at a lecture and Luke had ignored her for seven days. Her phone buzzed again as she received a new message.

'cool! let's meet at maccas in 20'

Her eyebrows furrowed as she read the message, she had never heard of 'Maccas'. After asking what that was, facepalming after learning it was McDonalds, she got ready to meet him.

Evelyn left the apartment and started her walk down the sidewalk towards the restaurant Michael chose. The sun was cast away by the dark clouds, a cool breeze blowing through the more crowded streets she was walking along. For once she had a jacket on, and was thankful as it started to drizzle. She pulled the hood over her curly hair and walked a little faster to get to the McDonalds.

Just as Evelyn pulled the entrance door open, thunder rumbled in the sky above her and the rain came down heavier. She shivered as the air conditioning blew over her now damp clothes.

She scanned over the tables quickly and spotted the bright dyed hair and walked towards him.

"Hey," she smiled as she sat in the chair across from him.

"Hey Evelyn,"

"How are you?" she asked.

"Better now that you've joined," Evelyn lightly smiled at him.

"What do you want to eat, it's on me," Michael asked as he stood from his chair.

"Oh, I can pay for myself, it's fine," she said, hoping Michael would let her pay for it, she always felt bad when people spent their own money on her.

"No can do. So what do you want?"

Evelyn huffed dramatically and told him her order, "A six piece happy meal,"

Michael's laugh boomed through the room, causing a few stares, "Why does that not surprise me?"

Evelyn blushed as Michael went to the counter and paid for their orders.

"So what have you been doing lately? I haven't seen you or Finley in a while," Michael asked, as he sat down with their trays of food, Michael's consisting of enough food for three people.

"We've both had a lot of work lately and haven't had much time to do anything else," she told him.

"What about you?"

"Well I've been hanging out with some old friends, trying to finish my annoying ass classes and working at my shit job," Michael listed off. Evelyn laughed at how annoyed he sounded.

"Where do you work?" she asked him.

"Some stupid movie thearter. It's always so fucking busy and I hate almost all the customers that come in."

"Let me guess, the one by that law firm?" she asked him, holding in a laugh. She would never want to work anywhere near the area he worked, all the people there were more entitled than most and acted above anyone they ran into. She felt bad that Michael had to deal with snobby business people daily.

"Ugh, yup," he groaned with a mouthful of food, as he hit his head on the table. She laughed at Michael's expense.

"Why in the world would you even apply for a job over there?" she asked incredulously.

"Trust me it wasn't my first choice," he rolled his eyes, "I applied to like seven other places but they didn't like my hair, tattoos and piercings—said I'd 'scare away precious business,'" he mocked, his voice high pitched.

"And don't even ask me how I got hired at Castle, my appearance totally offends more than half the customers," he said as Evelyn went to ask him that.

She laughed loudly and covered her mouth with her hand, not wanting to spit food out everywhere. She tried imagining Michael, straight-out-of-a-punk-band-Michael, trying to be nice entitled assholes.

"What do you do in your free time?" He asked, trying to change the topic off his poor job situation.

"Well I like going out when it's nice outside," she said lamely, Michel fake gagging at what she said. She tried to avoid telling him that lately she was with Luke and his friends. She felt it was better to not bring him up anyway.

"So how are you and Hemmings?" Or not, she thought. Michael tried to play it off cool, as if his question wasn't completely random.

"Fine, I guess?" she shrugged, as she grabbed a french fry off Michael's tray, suddenly uncomfortable.

"Hey, you have your own fries!" Michael laughed as he smacked her hand away, "But really, you shouldn't hang out with him you know," Michael said, staring intently at her as he took a bite out of his second cheeseburger. Evelyn's eyes moved down before she responded.

"Well you don't really have to worry about that,"

Michael tilted to the side, silently urging her to explain, "He's kinda been ignoring me."

Michael's eyes light up slightly, "How long?"

"Since last thursday," she muttered, somewhat bitterly. Michael refrained from smiling, hoping that Luke actually took what he was saying seriously. Michael could just feel that Luke was going to hurt this girl and was silently praying Luke was smart enough to realize that too.

"I'm sorry," Michael said, only feeling a little remorse because of the defeated look on her face.

"It's okay, trust me," she smiled at him.

"Can I tell you something?" he asked as he grabbed his soda after silence fell over them. She nodded her head, not wanting to talk with the embarrassingly large amount of food in her mouth.

"Luke was in a gang,"

Evelyn nodded her head at him, still trying to swallow the food. Michael studied her face, waiting for any sort of reaction—preferably a negative one—but only got the nod of her head.

Michael wasn't sure what he expected her to do; maybe gasp and freak out or look disgusted. He definitely hadn't planned her calm demeanor, almost like she already knew that. So, Michael tried again.

"He used to sell drugs and pissed so many people off," He paused, still trying to gauge the girl's reaction to what he was telling her. "I guess it runs in the family though, his brothers were in one before they—"

Michael looked down annoyed at the phone ringing on the table that cut him off. Evelyn looked at her phone, Finley's contact lighting it up. She sheepishly smiled at him, "Sorry, is it okay if I take this?"

Michael nodded and she thanked him before she stood from her chair and walked towards the front of the restaurant. Michael leaned back in his seat and groaned, rubbing his hands along his face. He was annoyed that he had been interrupted and wondered why the hell she looked like she couldn't care less about what he was telling her, he felt she desperately needed to know so she could stay safe. He assumed that maybe it was because of the fact Luke had been ignoring her. He just had to come up with another way to convince her of cutting ties with the blonde.

A few moments later Evelyn came back over and smiled apologetically at him, "I'm so sorry, I really need to go now, b-but," she stuttered, reaching her hand into her jacket pocket, "We can reschedule this hang out for a different day," She smiled as she placed a five dollar bill on the table.

"Bye, Michael!" she called, as she quickly ran over to the room and left the building. He sighed defeatedly as he stared at the money on the table.

Evelyn ordered an uber, hoping to get out of the still heavy downpour and get home to Finley. When Evelyn answered Finley's call, the girl was speaking extremely loud and fast. It startled Evelyn, she was worried something had happened and worried more when Finley started yelling at her to get home as quickly as possible.

Evelyn got in the uber and sat anxiously in the traffic and watched the raindrops roll down the window, while texting Finley to let her know she was on her way.

♛ ♛ ♛

hello all! hope you're doing well! got kind of a shorted chapter today

i finally finished school so now it's summer break, which also means i'll *hopefully* have more inspo to write more chapters

thank you for reading, voting and commenting! it's very much appreciated

stay safe guys!

-olivia