faking it l.r.h

0.5

Adelaide

"A-about things." He adds and sits across from me.

"Yeah? What things?" I ask and lock my phone, placing it face down on the table. My eyes flicker up at him and his lips are pursed.

"Like why you stopped talking to me, or why you—." I stop him by putting my hand up, his eyebrows knitting together. I squeeze my eyes shut dramatically, processing all that he said.

"Wait, wait.— me?" My response isn't what he had in store by the looks of it.

"What? What do you mean? It was my fault?" He asks and I feel myself grow tired of this back and forth duel.

"Sophomore year, you stopped talking to me, because I-I...I'm confused" I don't want to tell him if he's confused about why. I don't want to admit that we lost our friendship to a rumor, which was mostly true.

"Me too." He shakes his head innocently. My shoulders slump, what the hell is he talking about? I remember it clearly. Noah told me that Luke knew, and I remember looking back at Luke over his shoulder. He was laughing at me, with his friends. I remember it clearly.

"Well...?" I say in confusion, my cheeks burning.

"Well, I'm not blaming you." He returns. I chew on my bottom lip and think for a moment. If he didn't think I was obsessive, then what have I been thinking this whole time? 

"So, you believed this he said she said shit?" He asks when it's too silent except for the commotion around us in the lunch room.

I look down at his colorful hands, I don't wanna bare the disappointment that's probably evident in his crystal blue eyes. I promised myself I'd never hurt him, or see him hurt again.

"Well?" He says like a parent who's waiting for their child to respond and say that they, in fact, did break the vase.

"I did believe it, Luke, because everyone thought I had a crush on you—." "But you're gay." He cuts me off and I swallow hard, nodding. I feel bad for lying to his face but I'm glad that I can finally talk to him face to face.

"Yes," I say quietly and peer around to make sure no one heard. He hunches over and rests his elbows on the table, his fingers twisting the ring on his pinky finger. 

"H-how come you never told me?" He asks.

"Are you kidding? How would you have taken that?" I ask and turn my body so I'm facing him. He thinks for a moment and licks his lips, running his tongue over that damn lip ring. I remember when he came to school with that piercing, everyone went wild and he knew it. Of course, we weren't friends at the time so I couldn't make fun of how everyone would drool over him when he walked by but I talked to Riley about it.

"So, your girlfriend? What's her name?" He asks and I recognize a glint of the way we used to talk at midnight on his bed. I rack my brain of any name that wouldn't sound obviously fake.

"Her name is Grace." That sounded convincing, right? Grace is a typical name, sounds real. He nods and so I know that he believed me. I'm a liar. "She doesn't go here, in fact, she's in college. We met because of Michael." I add. Michael does know someone named Grace in his human evolutionary class.

"She sounds nice." He replies, obviously trying to act casual.

"Yeah," I respond quietly.

"Wow, that's nice." He says awkwardly.

"What about your girlfriend? What's her name?" I ask. He seems to light up at the mention of her, my heart skipping a beat, and not in a good way.

"Her name is Margo," Of course, her name is unique and beautiful, just like her. What kind of name is Adelaide anyways? I need to stop thinking like a jealous ex-girlfriend. I wish I had the chance to call him my ex-boyfriend but sadly that's not the way the world works.

"That's nice," I reply in monotone. It's not that I'm uninterested, I asked about her, It's just I envy her. I got it real bad, I want everything she has, but I can't. She probably makes him melt underneath her touch, he probably stays up all night thinking about her. This isn't normal, to think like this... I don't even have a crush on him.

"Well, Addie, I'll see you later." He smiles and I notice he has a dimple on his left cheek. There are some things that I don't know anymore, like if he still has anxiety about the same things or if he has the same posters on his walls of All Time Low and Blink. I wasn't there to grow up with him the past 2 years, but he probably doesn't think about this stuff like I do. I over analyze, one of my many flaws.

"Bye Luke," I say and watch him get up and walk to his friends that are waiting at the other table.