BAD OMENS ✬ luke hemmings

1.2 | détente

After school.

The two are sitting at a table inside Ms. G's classroom, with the older woman across from them with her elbows on the wooden surface with her chin resting on her knuckles. They've been there for five minutes sitting in an uncomfortable silence, refusing to look at the other.

Aria doesn't know how the entire charade is meant to work, or play out, but if her homeroom teacher thinks that there would be some sort of resolution she'd be wrong. Aria is perfectly fine not having a resolution, she does not want to hear what Luke has to say nor does she care, there's no point in fixing something that's far too old.

"Okay, why don't we start off with the root of this... conflict?" Ms. G proposes, "Tell me, when you two really started to, um, dislike each other?"

"Ninth grade." Aria responds, keeping her answer short and simple. Maybe if she detaches herself, giving straight forward replies, she can get out of the classroom sooner and go home.

"Alright, so four years?" The older woman nods, "Why?" She's jumping right into it, there's no point wasting their time, she wants to find the root of the conflict and get the two – very stubborn and outspoken teenagers – talking.

"Because, he was dick, called me a bitch and a fucking loser, then chased popularity." Aria says, hearing a scoff sound from the blonde sat next to her. "He was too scared about how I might affect his social status."

"Luke?" Ms. G says, "Would you like to add in your input?" Choosing to ignore vulgarity this conversation will – most definitely – include for the next hour.

"Yeah, I actually would," he sits up in his chair. "She was a complete bitch who never had anything nice to say, she's a toxic leech that feeds off her friend's' misery." Luke explains, with every ounce of venom he can deliver.

"Oh wow, that's rich." Aria comments, "Like you were any better, going off to Lyla every chance you got to talk shit about me. If you're going to be fake, be classier about it and don't go to the person with the biggest fucking mouth."

"Like you didn't run to Willow every chance you got." Luke retorts, "You fed her lies, she stopped talking to me halfway through the year."

"Maybe that was your own fault, ever think of that?" She questions, "Do you think Willow liked hearing about how you hated all the girls? And you 'fed lies' to the rest of them, Casper, Gaby, Joanie, and Lyla?"

"Oh please, don't act like Lyla didn't tell me about half the shit you said in ninth grade." He scoffs, "Yeah, she didn't like you, thought you were a self-obsessed cunt."

"Of course she'd say that," Aria mutters. "She'll say anything to get in with the right crowd, and there was no way in hell she'd choose me over you."

"Because she knows the truth."

"Wrong!" She snaps, "You're a guy, do you really think a fourteen-year-old girl would choose her girl-friend over a guy? No, you're fucking stupid if you think that. She chose you because you were a gateway, and a guy."

"How does that have to do with anything?" Luke argues, "Why can't you accept the fact that you're in the wrong? That you blew this way out of proportion? And that you ruined my friendships with those people?"

"Excuse me?" Aria is in shock, that those words came out of his mouth, that he thought that sentence and made himself the victim. "What friendships did I ruin? Because as far as I know, you're still friends with Casper, you're still friends with Joanie, Lyla, and Gaby – before she left. The only friend you 'lost' was Willow, and you rarely ever talked to her."