Footloose || lrh

ariel

I sat with Rusty as we, along with the rest of our small town, listened to my Father preaching just like we did every other sunday morning.

Today he was preaching about Progress and Money.

"Let's talk about Progress. We all have computers. We all have mobile phones. Who here today remembers the time when you had to go into the bank to collect money?" He asked as some of the older men and woman started laughing hysterically as if my dad had said the funniest thing ever. "That's what I call progress."

"Look at the cute boy across from us!" Rusty suddenly whispered in my ear.

I followed her eyes, and my eyes landed on a boy that looked the same age as us. I had never seen him before, and that is a huge surprise as everyone knows everyone in this small town.

We looked at each other for a few moments before I broke the eye contact and looked at Rusty, rolling my eyes.

After church, my Dad stands outside of the church to greet the people of the community who have came this weekend.

I was standing a few steps away from them with Rusty, when the new boy, or whatever you want to call him, appeared beside my Father with Wes Warnicker.

Although I wasn't in the conversation, I could still faintly hear what they were talking about.

"Nice preaching today Reverent." Wes smiled at my Father as he shook his hand.

"Thankyou. Good to see you." My Father replied as he looked at the boy, obviously as he was not a familiar face.

"This is my nephew, Luke. Luke Hemmings. The one I was telling you about." Wes spoke up, probably noticing my Father's confused face which soon broke out to a smile when Wes explained who he was.

So he was called Luke.

"Luke, Luke. Welcome to Beaumont, it is great to have you here with us. I know you are going to love your new high school. In fact the graduated class this year is the biggest in history." My father boasted, "Roger! Come over here. How many seniors do we have this year?" He asked

Roger began to walk over, "About two hundred and twenty." He replied

"Rogers here, is the school principal." My Father explained, as Luke and Rogers shook hands and said their hello's.

"Wait do you play football? Cause we really need a good kicker." Roger spoke which made Luke smirk and roll his eyes playfully. "But remember, if you want to play for us you need to stay clean and not get into any trouble. I heard that you already had a little run in with the law." He sighed as Wes looked at him questionly, not knowing what he was talking about. "You see here in Beaumont we have rules about playing music to loud." Rogers explained to Luke.

"You're kidding me! He got busted for playing music?" Wes piped up, looking shocked that someone would get in trouble for something so simple. but that's exactly what this shitty town was like with all these stupid laws.

"Ariel!" My Mum suddenly said, which caused me to turn around and face her. She was coming towards me with Luke beside her, "Luke, I want you to meet my daughter. She goes to the same high school that you will be attending." My Mother informed, "This is Luke Hemmings, Ariel. He will be attending school with you tomorrow."

I looked at him for a few moments without saying anything, as he did the same with me, "Hi." I smiled which he soon returned.

"Hey Dad?" I said, already finished with talking to him, "Could I stay at Rusty's tonight? We have that science project due for tomorrow and we are going to be working on it pretty late."