BAD OMENS ✬ luke hemmings

4.4 | chai latte

"You're deranged if you'd think I'd ever do that," Aria rolls her eyes, reaching for her glass to take a sip of the hot liquid in it.

She and Luke have been ditching detention for the past two weeks. The office doesn't seem to care all that much, and to be fair, they both assume the admin has completely forgotten about them considering there hasn't been any reports of bad behaviour.

On top of that, Aria has managed to convince Michael to go home without her. After painfully long conversations, pro and cons lists, not to mention the lies she spewed in addition to the pile of bullshit she created as if he were one of her history essays, Michael agreed. He's been taking the bus or ubering home.

The best part is, she doesn't feel guilty. Why should she? If anything, she feels good, great even. The idea of keeping one thing to herself, the lying, the sneaking around, and clandestine meetings, it's all perfect. She feels no guilt, remorse, or simple obligation that pushes her to tell her group of friends, as far as she sees it... it's none of their business.

This has always been about her and Luke, and while she's grateful that her friends have had her back in the past, she knows they won't take it too kindly if they find out she's been fraternising with the devil.

So, until the potential day when the universe decides to kick her ass and force her to face the consequences of her own actions, she'll happily live in the moment. She's kept secrets before, and she's perfectly content doing it again.

"I'm deranged to think that you'd swim in a lake?" Luke repeats, shaking his head at the response he got from the girl. "What about the beach?"

"I haven't swum in, or touched the ocean, in over a decade." She replies, "It's disgusting."

It's Luke's turn to roll his eyes, "Oh, you must be fun at parties."

"Please, there's nothing fun about getting cholera." She snorts, bringing her now empty cap back to her lips and tasting the last drop of her latte. "And I am fun at parties, you would know if you ever got invited to them."

"I doubt a girl who orders a venti chai latte with two pumps of vanilla and almond milk is all that fun," he retorts. "I'm pretty sure the guy behind the counter had a stroke trying to punch in that order."

Aria scoffs, at least she knows what she wants and doesn't stare at the board looking like an idiot. The whole point of going to get a drink, whether it be coffee, tea, or anything, is because of regular cravings and routine. The way she sees it, if she goes to a place more than once then she has her order for the next ten years, it saves on time.

"It's a simple order." She defends herself, "And I have perfect reasoning for it too."

"Oh, yeah, and what is that?"

"Duh, I have to get venti because I don't enjoy my drinks, I chug them. Almond milk is nicer on my stomach, and the pumps of vanilla are purely for flavour." She explains, "It's nice to know what you want, and what you like."

Luke sometimes forgets how picky the girl is. He forgets that Aria Stanton isn't just the stuck up bitch who has been tormenting him for years and stole his leather jacket, but that she's a girl who's fine with 'going with flow' unless it interferes with her predetermined, psychotic list of rules.

For example, she refuses to tie her hair up if she washed it that day. Why? Simple, because she styled it that morning, blown-dried to perfection, and if she ties it up it'll mess with her bangs. She never wears hats or rolls down the windows on those days, unless she has good reason to.

She doesn't get her nails done at salons that don't use new nail filers, buffs her natural nails, or uses clippers. Why? Because, when she was eleven she watched a video that said it was bad, which ties into why she never gets acrylics.