The Jock Neighbor

Chapter 2

Briar' POV

What the fuck is he doing here? In this class? Addressing me? I have to be dreaming. Not once have Luke and I spoken in the four years that we have known of each other. Luke moved next to me a couple days after I did. It was a new neighborhood that they made next to the older one around the school. They did some redeveloping and my father and I ended up landing this place. It's a really gorgeous house and I'm more than grateful for what I have. When I first saw Luke as he was moving in, I immediately had a terrible school girl crush on him, so naturally I never spoke to him, or looked at him.

"Is this seat taken?" He asks in a light manner as he gestures towards the seat right next to me.

I shake my head out of its daze. "Yeah, I think a Luke is assigned that seat." I say quickly. Some people in the class chuckle but I don't know why. Obviously he couldn't be the Luke and be the Luke seated next to me. There's no way, the universe isn't that nice to me.

As if on cue, the Literature teacher says, "Luke, please take your seat next to Miss Madison, class is about to start."

My eyes just about pop out of my head as Luke takes his respective seat next to me. I look around the class in search of my friends, finally spotting them spread around the class. They all give me a "What The Fuck?" look, probably mirroring the one on my face. Of course they know about my crush on Luke. They know every aspect of my life, even what I eat for breakfast. They also know about my mom, something very few people know and definitely not something I go around talking about.

I turn slowly in my seat, facing the teacher as he begins to speak about what the course will entail and what to expect these next few months. He introduces himself to us and then signals for all of us to turn to our desk partners and explain something about ourselves. My breath catches when I realize what that means. I have to talk to Luke.

"So," he starts as he turns fully towards me. "What's one thing about you that you would like to tell me?"

His smile catches me off guard. I have never been at the receiving end of one of his smiles, so this was a whole new feeling for me.

"Um, I guess that I can read a 500 page book in less than 3 hours?" I say as if it's a question.

He looks impressed. "That's not an easy feat so the fact that you can do that is brag worthy. You should tell people that more often." He winks at me and my breath catches.

I quickly clear my throat and change the subject so the focus is off of me. "Thank you. What's something you want to tell me?"

He ponders over it before his eyes light up. "I really like the movie Step Up All In."

He doesn't go into detail.

"Let me guess, you like it because of Moose?" I ponder as I smile at him slyly.

He gasps. "How did you know?"

"Because I like that movie for the same reason. It's so cool that we get to see his dance style grow over the movies."

"See you get it." He chuckles with a smile on his face.

I smile back at him, subtly surprised that it's so easy to talk to him like this. If I had known all those years ago that this is what it would be like to talk to him, I would have done it a long time ago.

"Alright everyone, eyes back up here." The teacher interrupts everyone. I begrudgingly turn towards him. "I hope you enjoyed talking to the person next to you, because that will be your partner for the rest of the semester."

Shock overtakes my body but I try my best to hide it. I don't need Luke to find out how hard I've been crushing since freshman year, especially not now.

Classes drag on for the rest of the periods until the lunch bell rings. Finally, I'm starving. I find Stacey, Lucy and John before we all head to the cafeteria. The line is already ridiculously long, but I hope that there's just enough for me.

As we inch closer to the food, I feel a tall presence behind me and freeze. I know this feeling.

"Hey, Briar, right?" Luke's deep voice rings in my ears and it causes a subtle shudder to pass over my spine. Slowly I turn around.

"Hey, yeah it's Briar. What's up?" I ask as if his presence isn't affecting me.

He opens his mouth to say something when my friends pull me forward so that I can grab some food. I don't have time to apologize before they're yanking me away from my filled tray, almost causing me to drop my food in the process.

We check out and make it to our normal table that we've sat at since freshman year before I'm bombarded with questions.

Lucy: "You sit next to him?!"

Stacey: "You're partnered with him?!"

John: "He spoke to you outside of class?"

My mind takes a minute to process the three questions thrown at me all at once.

"Um yes to all three. Trust me I'm just as confused as you guys. He and I have not spoken for 3 years, now our fourth year comes and he's talking to me more than once. I honestly never thought this would happen." I finish breathlessly. I spouted all of that out in one breath.

"Well little miss Lady Luck must be on your side today because I have never seen someone with that much luck in one day. The one guy you've been crushing on for 4 years is suddenly your table partner and your literature partner. Make that make sense." John says astonishedly.

"You're telling me." I say under my breath.

I go to take a bite of my cinnamon roll and sausage cafeteria lunch special when I hear his voice again. Wow three times in one day.

"Hey, what I was trying to tell you earlier was that we should exchange numbers and plan a day to get together for our project. I know we have some time but we already have some suggestions and an outline provided by the teacher so I think we should jump on it when we can." He explains is reasoning but he had me at "exchange numbers".

"Yeah for sure. Here, let's swap phones and input our numbers." I say as I lend my phone in his direction. He does the same to me and we input our numbers into each others phones before giving them back.

"Awesome, thank you. I'll text you later today after football practice." Luke says with a smile before turning to walk away.

I sit there, completely gobsmacked. "Three times in one day and now I have his number."

"Girl if anyone is luckier than you in this world I truly fear what that will look like for them." Stacey says.

I shake my head before going to eat my lunch again. We all converse here and there as we eat our lunches, but my eyes drift over to Luke who now sits at the "cool table". I make eye contact with Hayley, the queen B. She's captain of the cheer team standing at 5' 3", blonde hair, blue eyes, very fair skin, the kind of body every woman wants, you get the gist. She used to be really sweet but now she's incredibly mean to everyone, except for those she deems worthy of her better side, but even then it's just really manipulative and has subtle gaslighting mixed in the compliments. (A/N: I do not think cheerleaders are like this, I just needed to add a character that wasn't like the others and this is what came to mind)

Hayley sees that we are making eye contact and decides to start touching Luke's bicep and thigh in a very suggestive manner. Disgust bubbles in my chest and I look away, my lunch threatening to make an appearance.

I somehow manage to finish my lunch just in time for the bell to ring, letting us know that it's time to head to our next class. I decide to push away what I saw at lunch with Hayley and go on with my day.

I just hope Luke's okay after what she pulled.

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Hello all! Here is chapter 2! I really hope you enjoyed it! It is now time to go to bed so sweet dreams to those that are reading at night! Much love xx