rain ✧ lrh

7. stay far, far away from luke hemmings

Ruth had no fucking clue what was going on between Ashton and Nova.

All she knew was that at the moment, she was eating breakfast with her roommate and lunch with the curly-haired boy, and they never spoke about each other anymore. She had attempted to pry, she had asked both of them what had gone on that night when she had left them alone to get food, but they had become aversion experts overnight.

It's not like she didn't have secrets of her own, but she had a strange feeling that whatever they were hiding was bigger than what she was keeping from her two friends.

Ruth Williams was in a relationship, and her friends had no idea. They always asked, of course, but she found it easier to shake her head, smile, and tell them that she wasn't looking for anyone. She just wanted to focus on passing her classes. She didn't know why she was so keen on hiding parts of herself from Ashton and Nova, as she knew that they were two of the most accepting people to ever walk the face of the earth, but she didn't want them to treat her differently. And besides, how would she even tell them? What kind of conversation would present her with the right kind of circumstances to casually announce hey, I've been in a relationship for the last three months and I'm pretty sure I'm in love. She comes into the diner every night while I close and she makes me feel really nice. Did I mention she's a girl? Because she is and I'm gay and you guys didn't know that and now you do but I still don't know if I want her to meet Ashton because his jokes are so stupid she might leave me already-

In short, Ruth found herself in a bit of a predicament. It felt like she was living three separate lives all at once and she despised it; but there was nothing she could do but sit back and watch her friends drift apart and her girlfriend quickly start to question why the hell she wasn't allowed to meet her friends, why it seemed like no one was allowed to know about them at all.

"Ruth," a voice interrupted her thoughts - the ones that had been plaguing her for days.

She looked over at her girlfriend, blinking at her in response.

"You just seem really far away, is everything okay?"

Ruth smiled inwardly at the question. She loved her girlfriend, and she wasn't one of the people who felt like she didn't deserve someone like her because she genuinely felt like maybe she deserved someone who treated her right and held her hand and kissed her forehead before she fell asleep in her arms.

She just wished she could treat her the way she should be treated.

"I'm okay. Just tired," She looked down at her fingers that were resting on the top of the shiny countertop.

And she was tired, but that wasn't why her mood was so drab. She had started to wake up earlier in the last few days; not because she liked being up early, but because it gave her enough time to stand outside of the dining hall and watch Nova Montgomery sit down in the seat next to Luke Hemmings himself - she'd spent so many mornings out there she had been able to see the bruises and scars on his face slowly fade over time.

Luke would always stay until the designated time that Nova had set aside for breakfast with her friend would arise, and Ruth would watch him walk out of the door and down the sidewalk before she dared to move towards the entrance herself.

A few times, she swore she even saw him crack a smile as he walked away.

She wouldn't deny it; Nova and Luke seemed to make sense. She knew that Ashton despised the blonde boy but he never gave a solid line of reasoning for it; both her and Nova had agreed to avoid the boy at all costs. But the more days she spent looking at the two of them sitting together at a table (if you asked Ruth, they seemed to be moving closer to each other every morning), she began to notice that Nova smiled brighter when she'd come home from classes. She spent less time by her phone texting her father at every interval and more time being present, something she hadn't been doing for the past year.