creole ➸ [michael au]

November 26, 2015.

Narrow lines.

By this time, Michael and Alice were completely ignoring each other. Nobody was willing to involve themselves between them; For Michael was an indirect asshole and Alice was just unbothered to begin with. 

It was a regular Thursday afternoon for them, most of the kids on the campus were off for thanksgiving but Michael stayed behind, a part of him wishing that Alice sticked around.  No matter how many times he tried to tell himself otherwise, he liked making Alice upset.

Maybe it was the way her nose would scrunch up when she saw him, or maybe it was because she would always roll her's once their eyes met.

Alice, however, was more intrigued by the fact that nobody wanted to be friends with Michel, except Calum.

"Are you listening to yourself, Alice?" Wendy cocked her neck forward, "Have you not seen his piercings? He's creepy."

"Yeah," Rebecca added, she was adding another coat of red nail polish that probably had a ridiculous name, "I heard he killed someone."

"Stop, you're so full of shit," Alice groaned, an image of Michael popping in her head. "I'm pretty sure you're thinking of Michael Myers."

The chorus of laughter could've probably been heard from across the campus, especially since their hallway was nearly empty, apart from Chase, the curly head boy in Alice's anatomy class that actually wanted to go to school for the arts.

Michael probably could've heard them from his usual post at the LSU sign, if his thoughts weren't already flooded with images of her, that is.

He hadn't fallen for her, at least that's what he wanted to think. It's been like four days, he would think to himself. There is no way someone could fall for someone in four days.

However, Alice wasn't just anybody. She was preppy,  yet content enough to be okay with being alone. She had a future ahead of her, when Michael bailed out after high school. She had culture, what could he do to impress her? His accent? Show her how many beers he could chug down before he would be buzzed?

As he flicked his lighter, the taint flame nonchalantly dancing along with the southern wind, he could see her scowl from a mile away. Just like the first night, and the night after that.

He never gave cigarettes a second thought, he smoked them since the age of sixteen just to infuriate his parents along with his ripped jeans. He soon eased up on them, Hell, he's been smoking them long enough. Now, by the age of twenty-three and his parents hardly speaking to him, cigarettes were like old friends to him.

His refuge.

He smoked them; some days, one would be suffice, then others, he would smoke and smoke until he saw everything in a grey illusion and his coughing fits matched the thumps of his aching head.

He never evaluated why he smoked as much as he did. In fact, he hasn't evaluated anything beyond the times of his high school literature assessments. Literature was always a good thing for him, even when his report cards would seem like the only letter in the alphabet was F, he still seem to receive a pretty passing grade in English Lit.

He probably smoked because he liked the feeling of his abdomen burning. He remembered once how he burned someone with the end of his cigarette because they looked at him the wrong way.

Michael chuckled to himself, remembering how the adrenaline of actually causing someone pain rather then being his old wimpy self was far more satisfying. He changed for the better then, he was tired of being thrown around like someone's punching bag.

Alice, however, wasn't perfect either.

She worked her ass off in high school; not because she wanted to get into a good school, or because she enjoyed her studies. She worked hard because she wanted to get away from her parents as soon as possible.

She tried running away, but New Orleans wasn't a little prairie civilization; someone was always going to recognize you. Once the acceptance letter from LSU came in the mail, she basically had one foot out the door.

It wasn't because she didn't like her parents, in fact, she loved him more than anything. She just felt like fulfilling their expectations weren't the first things in her list. She didn't want to study medicine and marry an average man and have the perfect middle class family; She wanted to live. She wanted everything fast paced, with no strings attached so she could attain her carefree philosophy.

Which is why she could always look for Calum, although he was her best friend and he knew everything about her, he was also her favorite pass time because he didn't look to engage her in anything more than what she wanted.

Due to that fact that Alice adored freedom, she only had three serious relationship. Two of the three left because of the mutual disconnection of emotions. The last one, who she met from the age of eighteen to until her last days before her twenty first and who also knew her like the back of his hand, was caught cheating. She never to took the time to even ask him for an explanation, because she just threw his things away, along with any chances she could've given him.

She didn't believe in seconds chances.

She didn't believe in blaming herself, or lowering herself for a male.

She also didn't believe in love.

She thought she did, almost every single guy she engaged with seriously had a very big impact on her, and she thought she was in love. However, they never sticked around.

Maybe her Prince Charming was out there, somewhere around the Mediterranean or on Neptune.

Maybe he was someone who she had passed on Tchoupitaoula Street many times before, but never bothered with because he wasn't the usual type she looked for.

Or maybe he wasn't like Prince Charming at all. Maybe he was bizarre and he swore a lot and he didn't know anything about sweeping a girl off her feet or creating that fairy tale ending with her.

The fact that he was out there and would be willing to treat Alice as if she was main attraction was enough for her.

• — • —

(Author's note)
I'm literally drowning in crush problems and listening to 80s soft rock doesn't help at all, I feel like the ending is so cliché.
I just hope you're having a good day, tho.