Song I recommend for the chapter: Kiss Me by Jason Walker
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Allis' POV
"Allis I'm begging you, please tell me what happened," Luke pleads. There are tears rimming his eyes, but I continue to back away from him. There is nothing he could say right now to make me feel better, and I think that deep down he knows this. "Allis if you don't tell me what happened, I'm going to lose control." His voice has raised but he does not continue to come near me.
When I don't answer, he lunges towards Ben. I scream at him to stop and run out the front door. As much as I want to run away from everything, I am frozen in my yard. Luke follows me outside, his cheeks are now wet with tears.
"Please tell me what is going on baby," he begs once more.
"Why should I tell you when there's so much that you've never told me?!" I finally snap. I can't hold it in any longer.
"What did he tell you?" He asks softly.
"You've hurt people Luke, why would you do that? Why did you steal and cause harm to others? How could you do that?!" I ask, now screaming at him. "And most importantly, you harmed yourself," I continue, not allowing him to answer any questions. "Those drugs could have killed you!"
"That's not even the worst of it," I hear Ben speak before I can say anything else. I turn to him but Luke keeps his eyes on me. "Hasn't he ever told you that he almost killed someone?" A small smile appears on his lips, an evil smile. It frightens me, but not as much as the words that just came out of his mouth.
My eyes are wide and I turn back to Luke, begging him to tell me that this was all just some cruel prank. "Is this true?" I whisper as the tears fill my eyes once again.
He runs his hands through his now messed up hair and sighs deeply before saying anything, tears still rolling down his cheeks. "I was so messed up Allis. You have to understand that my life was so fucked up before you."
"Just answer the question Luke," I demand before he can say anything else.
"Long before I met you, there was this guy named Zach Branson. We became friends shortly after Aleisha left. He was a horrible influence on me, but I didn't care. The guys tried to tell me to stop being friends with him and it made me angry, so I cut them off. He got me into too many drugs and basically pressured me into doing bad things. We bullied kids and robbed people and I feel horrible about all of it. I messed up big time when I was friends with him..." He trails off.
"Get to the point," Ben says and my stomach continues to cave in on itself.
"One day after school, Zach and I were getting high at a park just down the road. We were kinda far into the woods where we always went to smoke. Somehow, one of the kids that we always picked on found us. His name was William, I never knew his last name. Him and his friends came out of nowhere. For some reason, they thought that they could stand up to us. He told us that he was going to rat us out for smoking. I was already arrested once and I couldn't go back to jail. So I told him not to, but he refused to back down. I told his friends to leave and they took off, just like that. Zach told me that the only way to shut him up was to beat some sense into him, so that's what I did." Tears are now pouring out of his eyes and if I wasn't so furious with him, my heart would be breaking for him. Instead, it is breaking because of him, all over again. "Zach just stood there and watched as I hit this kid continuously, kicking him in the stomach, never stopping. When we heard something not too far away from us, Zach told me we needed to leave. We left him there on the ground, blood pouring from his mouth and nose. I'm not sure how anyone found him, but someone did. He was immediately taken to the hospital and suffered major head trauma among other things. If they wouldn't have found him, he wouldn't have made it. I left him there to die, for no reason. I hate myself every single day for it. I never saw him again, never got the chance to apologize." When I knew that he has finished the horrid story, I can't stand to look at him any longer.
The world was spinning and as many times as I blinked, I couldn't stop the dizziness from taking over. I forced the bile down my throat but knew it would make its way up soon. I was horrified of the things Luke did, I was scared of him. What's even worse is that he had kept all of this from me and planned to for who knows how long. Probably forever.
"You need to leave," I manage to get out. I am trying to hold in my sobs, but it's not working so well.
"Allis, please." He steps towards me once again and I back away.
"GET OUT OF HERE LUKE!" I scream.
His eyes are wide with fear and heartache. He turns to Ben and before I know it, he is on top of him. He only hits him twice before blood starts to drip from Ben's nose and all I can picture is the poor little boy he hurt not that many years ago.
"LUKE STOP IT!" I scream again as I try to get him off of Ben.
Everything next seems to happen in slow motion and is nothing but a blur. As I am trying to pull Luke's arm off of Ben, I see Ashton, Michael, Calum and Linley all run out, their eyes wide with fear. Suddenly, my cheek is burning with pain. I fall backwards onto the concrete and involuntarily shut the world out as everything goes black.
