Cigarettes

Chapter 36

Layla's POV

"Chloe, don't go up there alone!" I yelled at the little, brown haired girl that was running towards the slide on the playground we were currently on.

"Do you want me to go watch her?" Luke asked from next to me and I smiled at him.

"Could you?" I made the most innocent face I could as Luke jumped to his feet from the swing he was sitting on.

"Of course!" He exclaimed and jogged towards the slide.

I mostly asked him if he could watch Chloe because I loved watching him with her. He looked so genuinely happy and careless. There was no problems on his mind, just a smile on his face. The laugh that he made every time Chloe said something funny was priceless. I was glad I started seeing it more often lately. I didn't miss that cocky smirk of his at all.

Luke held Chloe's hand as she climbed up the slide and then walked next to her as she slid down. When she was on the ground, Luke looked at me happily and waved, just to be forced by Chloe to go back to the slide so she could slide again.

I smiled and just watched them for a while. I wish I could take Chloe home with us just so I could watch Luke play with her daily. I wonder if Luke would be like that with his own kid as well.

I can't believe I just thought about this. My thoughts are getting crazy.

I looked down at my lap and shuffled with my frozen fingers. I didn't realize Luke came back and was now standing right in front of me. Looking up, I didn't see Chloe so I looked around the playground.

"She's back in the sandbox." Luke seemed to read my mind and I nodded. He sat back on his swing and I looked at him.

"Luke, what's your biggest fear? " I smiled, looking to the ground and probably seeming lost.

Luke looked at me and exhaled. He then looked up at the dark sky and thought about the question for a while, squinting through his eyelids in order to remember something.

"I don't think I have fears anymore." He admitted, surprising me with his answer.

I thought he was going to say something like death, dark, insects, height or something classical like that. I didn't think he was fearless.

"You don't have any fears?" I repeated, making him chuckle.

"I don't think I do. I can't remember any now." Smiling, Luke swung a bit in his swing just to stop a second later due to the screeching noise. "How about you?"

Oh. I didn't think about my fears when I asked him that question. It just popped in my mind and I shot it out of my mouth, like I always do with everything. I can never stop my mouth from saying things I don't want to say. Or at least things that I haven't thought about before saying them.

What were my fears?

"I'm afraid of getting cancer." I admitted. "I'm afraid of cancer in general, actually. I hate it. I hate the idea of cancer. If I had one wish I would wish for cancer to have never existed!" I finally remembered as I got more excited by every word I said.

Talking about cancer would always get me angry and at the same time afraid and I could talk about it for hours. Hating was never my way of solving anything, but I could never make myself stop hating cancer.

In fact, I wanted to hate cancer, it deserved to be hated.

Luke stayed quiet as he just nodded. His hand then reached towards me as be brought his head back up. He put a loose strand of my hair behind my ear and grinned, and I realized he didn't want to talk about subjects as unpleasing as the one we've just talked about.