romeo + juliet ↠ l.h

28

Of course, the one day Luke isn't here, all hell breaks loose. I had texted him approximately six times asking him where he was considering his car wasn't in the driveway when I left and he clearly wasn't at school. Am I crazy? Maybe.

"Listen everyone, I know this sucks and it's never happened before and we have no clue what to do, but we'll get through it." Ms. J attempts to calm down the members of the committee that are losing their minds.

"How are we going to do anything with no money?" Mateo questions. He looks gutted. I think he was looking forward to After-Grad more than any of us.

We'd just been told that the donors pulled out. Whatever hundred-thousand dollar plans we had were gone. The venue payment was due next week, and we had zero dollars.

Being the level headed person that I am, I realized that a six figure budget was entirely unnecessary. Throw us a party in the gym and call it good. Would it be as fun? No. Would it be as cool? No. Would we have a good time? Probably not because my classmates have been used to a certain standard of living that they won't accept anything less than.

Truth is, I had grown to love this little group. I liked the feeling of contributing. I liked planning a fun night. I was sad, but I recognized the magnitude of the issue. First world problems.

Scratch that. Upper class, elitist problems.

It takes approximately six seconds after Mateo's question that I connect the dots.

The donor backed out.

The donor was Luke's dad.

Luke is not here.

My brain struggled to come up with any reasoning for this. Did Luke get in trouble? Disowned? Is he dead in a ditch somewhere?

Stop it, Emma.

He probably had a valid reason. He woke up sick or his car is in the shop, or maybe he's out of town and just forgot to tell me.

This morning we didn't meet up. I knew my mom would be up early getting ready for her breakfast with her friends, or rather my dads friends wives. I laid awake at 6am wishing I was outside with him. It was the first morning we hadn't seen each other in awhile. It felt weird to break whatever routine we had started.

What felt even weirder was the fact he hadn't texted me. Last night he sat on his balcony and smoked a joint while we talked on the phone. I watched him through my window of course, because if I could see him it felt like I was sitting there smoking with him. He seemed normal and fine.

We hadn't talked about what happened at The Inf. In retrospect, I should have went to the hospital, but it's not my friends fault for not knowing how to react. Everything ended up fine physically, I was just scared. Scared that next time, I won't get away. Scared that next time, my friends won't be there.

My brain didn't comprehend what Luke had said when he thought I was asleep. I love you. I pretended like I hadn't done the exact same thing to his sleeping body just nights before. I wondered if either of us would ever get the courage to face it. He may be my boyfriend by technical terms, but I was more shy around him than anyone I'd ever met. Maybe if I let loose a little, he might say it to my face. Tell me that he loves me and that nothing else matters. That we won't inevitably break up when he goes away to whatever elite school his dad picks.

This is all, of course, if he's alive. So far, the signs are pointing to no.

"Emma, can you hear me? I said have you heard from Luke?" Mateo snapped his fingers in front of my eyes, breaking me out of whatever trance I was in.