BAD OMENS ✬ luke hemmings

6.0 | take my hand

Luke will never get used to this, or more likely, he doesn't ever want to get used to it.

He would rather die than get used to the feeling she gives him, which sounds ridiculous considering the two aren't currently up to much, and he's thinking about how to make this moment – this feeling – last forever despite the clocks ticking.

Luke leans against the front of Aria's car, struggling to keep the burger in his hands from falling apart while trying to minimize the insane grease leaking through the thin parchment of the wrapper. They are back at the far end of an unnecessary parking lot for the lake– which starts to become more and more visited as the months pass and the weather warms.

He wasn't, and still isn't, entirely sure what compelled the girl to drive to his house earlier that afternoon – with no notice other than a text asking if he was up to anything – and buy food from some new mom-and-pop diner in town before driving to their current secluded – yet out in the open – area for lunch. Either way, he's glad she did.

Luke's one complaint is that she's turned away from him, sitting on the hood of the car, and practically refuses to look at him. This is not for reasons of avoidance but because she's been spending too much time with Michael, and his mannerisms have transferred themselves onto her! Meaning, she's eating those deep-fried wings like a pig.

Maybe the situation isn't entirely bad; Aria doesn't have to see him failing to keep his burger together. If this were to happen months ago, she'd call him incompetent and an idiot for not knowing how to eat a simple meal before recommending he cut it up into pieces, and he'd comment on how the wings aren't going to fly away, given the speed she's eating them.

Sure, they are awkward, simply because they need to figure out what to do now and where to go from here. However, when Aria picked him up, they seemed perfectly fine since they both had the comfort of music to fill the quiet and unasked questions between them. Now, the two are eating in, what Luke hopes is a comfortable silence.

Are they supposed to act any differently?

Well, they are together, but they aren't at the same time– and it's not like Luke expects Aria, and himself, to be more affectionate than before. So, is he – are they – supposed to act differently now?

"Is this a date?" He asks, suddenly wishing he could take it back and cursing himself for speaking his thoughts out loud. Luke turns his head to Aria, who has turned to look at him, pulling a wing between her teeth leaving bare bones.

No one can blame him for wondering, voicing that regretful thought, and potentially risking whatever quiet, peace and calm they have transitioned to. He wants to, needs to, stop overthinking all of this, but the anxiety about fucking it all up before it even begins is getting to him. Besides, Luke does not want to sit in a parking lot eating greasy food – which, by the way, is no different from what the two usually do – to be his and Aria's first date.

"How would I know?" She shrugs, giving no helpful answer to his question as she tosses the scraps into a box with the others.

"Do you want it to be?"

"Um, I'd say this is no different from what we always do," Aria says, again not answering the question, while she grabs a tissue from the brown paper bag. Luke figured since half of her exams will be written essays, where she will be expected to answer the question, she'd be better at answering his.

"If this is a date, it's not a good one." He playfully remarks, slightly shaking his head before biting into the burger – that she recommended he get; despite claiming that the diner opened three months ago, Aria somehow knew the entire menu.