𝐏𝐑𝐎𝐉𝐄𝐂𝐓 𝐖𝐈𝐋𝐃𝐅𝐋𝐎𝐖𝐄𝐑⁰¹ʰᵉᵐᵐⁱⁿᵍˢ✓

⁷⁶i am glad now and forever

clementine

"Can I borrow your jacket?" I ask Luke as I tie my hair back, earning an approving nod from him while he brushes his teeth behind me.

When I step out of the washroom, the horizon is only starting to light up, dawn making its way to my home's skyline, though reaching late on our bedroom floor.

Luke had suggested dropping by my family flower shop early this morning, perhaps help out with some stuff before bringing lunch to mom at the hospital.

If I'm anything besides cold and willing to return to sleep this morning, it's nervous. Maybe it's because I've begun to be slightly paranoid that one of the band's fans will find us somehow, or that I'll be keeping dad company while he rests for today.

More likely, it's the latter, but it's a bitter taste on my sweet-craving tongue, and I still have to get used to the idea of him being this way.

When he wakes, I'll probably be with him for most of the time and grow more attached than a socially-awkward toddler.

"In your suitcase, yeah?" I call out, bringing out Luke's unpacked suitcase from the closet and laying it on the bed.

I hear him spit out the toothpaste before replying. "Yeah! Should be right on top,"

I zip the case open and immediately lay my eyes on his leather jacket, folded in half above everything else.

Excitedly, I grab it, shrugging it on and looking across at the body-length mirror in the closet, a smile creeping at me at the sight of how much larger the jacket is

After turning to close the suitcase back, I pause, spotting a small Moleskine journal sitting on a pair of jeans, a pen sandwiched between the pages.

I reach for it and take it in my hands, examining the cover with its small star doodles and smiley faces. "Aw, you keep a journal?" I ask when Luke walks out in time.

He chuckles, sitting on the bed to put on his shoes. "Yeah. I thought it would be a nice change to write on paper aside from my phone,"

"Ooh, can I open?" He nods, granting me my permission. "How many have you written?"

A fawning smile grows on me once I see his handwriting, scratching out sentences, words, then replaced with better ones, letters at the top of which I assume are guitar chords.

"I don't know, like, ten? Maybe more," He responds, now trying to scratch off a stain on the suede of his boots.

I flip to the next page and it's just like the first, and I begin to notice the repetitions of content — of drawings, songs, more songs, ideas, and chords. For some reason, my chest feels warm just at the thought that I'm holding something so beautiful like this.

This is Luke as he is; the scribbles of stars and circles on the corners of his notebook, the slanted, almost unrecognisable letters, and lyrics of abstract ideas and expressions that guard the borders of his heart.

I look up at him and close the journal, throwing it in his suitcase and zipping it back up. "You ready?"

He stands next to me and huffs out. "Yeah, let's go,"

Grabbing my bag, I put it on as he opens the door, ready for us to walk out of and start our way to the flower shop.

Ollie should be there when we arrive since he's taken some of dad's earlier shifts, his time more filled now that he has that as well as school.

But he'll figure it out, as he always does, and my optimistic side of myself has high hopes dad's gonna wake soon.

He will.