《Ｌｏｖｅ Ｔｈｅｓｅ Ｄａｙｓ》

11. Summer of vicious misery

For days after Valentine's Day my mind had gone on a spiral of thinking and self-sabotaging remembering the look on Luke's face the last time I saw him. I felt like someone who had committed a vicious crime, thinking I had ruined every possible relationship with him. Was it that bad that I liked him?

Was it that mortifying the idea of me feeling love for someone? Was it a burden, being loved by me?

On February 19th we celebrated Oliver's birthday, he liked football a lot so we all wore football jerseys of our respective teams.

The night before we had all gathered together to bake the cake because, in all honesty, we all forgot to. Luke, as it was expected, couldn't make it, but he was present through the phone with me. Leela had to retrieve a bowl she had at home so Alex took the opportunity to take her while we were all waiting at Sadie's place. They were growing closer each day and, eventually, he took the final step. As they were riding in the elevator, he couldn't help himself from kissing her. And he gave her that movie-like kiss she had dreamed of her whole life. From that moment on, Leela was completely drunk in him.

Luke and I spoke a lot over the phone about going to the party together, I was with Darcy so he went to pick us both up. We were talking, at least it wasn't pure silence, but the atmosphere was still strange. Like a feeling that he knew that I knew he knew. And it was tormenting.

"Did you bring your beer?" Leela asked me, I pulled out one of the cans Luke had given me for Valentine's Day in response.

"I can't wait to finish them so I can turn them into pots for my plants!" I told her about my plans, "they're so pretty as well" I smiled, content with my gift. I saw Luke giving me the side eye but, when I turned to him, he looked away. I was already starting to feel dejected when I saw him look down and smile to himself, like he was proud of the choice of gift he made, and I felt relief. Maybe it wasn't all so tragic.

Maybe we could pretend like nothing happened.

The celebration went by fast, we had a lot of fun, drank wine and the boys played cards. Darcy was feeling terribly sick but she went anyway, for Oli. While we were all outside, she was lying in the sofa with apparent fever, so he snuck in to cover her with a blanket. I thought it was such a sweet gesture. Oliver and Luke had a very similar behavior, they would never openly admit to care, but they did.

At the end, Oliver drove us all home and Luke looked out the window the whole trip. Once again, he wasn't letting me in. I felt sad it was over because that was our excuse to talk; how are we going to get to Oli's house? How are we going to decorate the cake? What are we going to wear? At what time will you pick me up? Now it was all over, done.

After a couple of days I went to school with Kyro, my one month old cat. I snuck him in inside my backpack so I could go support Charlie and Oliver who were sitting for an exam. Alex and Luke were there for the same reason. I got to the yard where they were sitting and they got silent when I got there. I didn't find it suspicious at first because I was too concerned with people not seeing the animal in my bag.

When we sat down, Kyro immediately looked for Luke. It was the first time he saw him, but he quickly found his lap and made himself comfortable there. Luke is also a cat person, so his eyes were sparkly. Every cat person knows that feeling of being 'the chosen one'.

After the exam was over, and both boys failed, we decided to go to Charlie's apartment to have dinner, like always. The girls joined us later. We ate pizza and Kyro ate chicken. After dinner, we watched a movie and Luke fell asleep in the couch. When I looked over to him, he was cuddling with Kyro, and I felt my heart physically ache.

I carefully moved his feet so I could lay in the couch too, and he held my legs unconsciously. The memory of the image still brings a smile to my face, Kyro, Luke and I cuddling together, I didn't want to move. Darcy and Oli were in talking terms again, Alex and Leela were closer every day, and Luke was starting to let me back in. Everything was finally going fine for everyone.