𝙏𝙀𝙈𝙋𝙏𝘼𝙏𝙄𝙊𝙉 • 𝙇𝙍𝙃

02. petunia misses you

PETUNIA MISSES YOU

the streets were quiet, the air was cold, and the eye contact was excruciatingly painful as luke and emma stared at each other, neither one able to muster up a single would from the english language to make this encounter less uncomfortable.

emma could feel her eyes getting wet, but she refused to cry. she quickly blinked the tears away before breaking eye contact, instantly missing his warm blue eyes and hating herself for feeling anything other than pure hatred for the boy standing a few feet away from her.

she chewed on the inside of her cheek and shoved her hands into her jacket pockets, silently praying luke would break the silence between them. because if he didn't, they would probably never speak again.

she couldn't help but think about how they got here. four years ago they were so happy... so in love. what happened?

"em-"

"don't call me that" emma snapped.

"i'm... sorry," luke breathed out. cautiously walking closer to emma. "how's lucas?"

emma scoffed at the audacity luke had to ask her about the cat they had adopted while they were dating.

having two pets during a breakup meant one would go with emma while one stayed with luke, and he insisted she take lucas, knowing how much emma loved the tiny cat.

luke took the girls profound silence as an answer that she didn't want to make small talk, she probably didn't want to talk to him at all.

"petunia misses you" luke ignored the rough patch that was this conversation and, despite emma's body language that was screaming at luke to walk away, continued walking until emma was firmly trapped between the brick wall and himself.

"why are you here, luke?"

emma never thought she would see the day where luke would feel so foreign rolling off her tongue. but after not saying it for 705 days (emma had kept count) she couldn't help but wince at the sound of his name coming from her lips.

"you cut your hair... and it's darker now" luke continued to ignore her question, pretending as if she never said it.

he had to fight the urge to run his fingers through her hair.

luke had planned to find her here, after maya had spilled her plans for the bachelorette party to michael, who unknowingly spilled them to luke.

finding out his ex-girlfriend was engaged...and from michael of all people, was a different kind of hurt. though he knew it couldn't compare to the hurt he put emma through. but he had to do it — for her sake.

luke didn't think too much about what he would say, but he knew he had to tell her she shouldn't go through with it — not when luke knew they were supposed to end up together, they would end up together if luke had any say in the matter.

he expected to see her and jump straight to the chase about why he was here,

but seeing her, actually being in the same place as her, physically noticing how different yet painfully similar she looked to the emma he had lost so many years ago, it hurt him more than he had anticipated.