Promotion {Luke Hemmings/5SOS Fanfic}

44) The Aftermath

" I just wanted to forget. I wanted to forget it all ever happened. " -Chapter  34

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A FEW DAYS LATER...

"Can I see her?"

Taking it one step at a time, Luke could feel his heart quicken after every few seconds. What would he tell her? How would she react when she saw him? When would she recover fully?

So many questions raced through the singers head and quite frankly, it was making his anxiety even worse. Already nervous about Chloe's condition, he couldn't bare thinking about what she had went through... the trauma she dealt with.

As his hand fell on the door knob that lead into Chloe's hospital room, Luke paused.

He liked his dry crackled lips with another troublesome thought: what if she blames this all on him?

Luke shook his head rapidly back and forth with a sadden frown. Stop blaming yourself man, you saved her in the end... that's all that matters.

With a sigh, Luke pushed his worried thoughts to the far reaches of his mind and opened her door before anything else could make him change his decision.

Peeking his head through the open crack, he waited for his azure blue eyes to adjust to the dim lit room. Then, Luke walked in slowly and headed straight for the windows. Drawing them back slightly, just enough to let in a decent amount of light, he turned. Now facing Chloe's direction, he took a deep breath and let the scene rest in his head.

Luke touched the corner of his eyes in an attempt to wipe away the beginning of tears. Chloe was well cared for now and that eased him to an extent... but not enough.

She was wearing those typical hospital gowns with IV's hooked up to her and what not. Cloth bandages were wrapped around her head and around her waist to treat the concussion and scratched up back she had suffered when Ryan had roughly handled her. Her face was peaceful as she laid there in slumber. Chloe's lips were plump and soft, her eyes closed and rested, and her hands were by her side... unmoved and undisturbed.

Seeing her finally receive the medical help that she needed, should have calmed Luke but it only brought back events from the past and possible, one of his worse memories. His mind traveled back to the times when he visited Chloe in the hospital back at Sydney... where she had fell into a coma after running out when she had found out about his affair with Lola.

Luke again, shook his head, although more violently as if to erase those hideous thoughts from his head. I was so stupid and naive then to believe I was protecting Chloe by believing that Ryan was trying to do good.

He then looked at Chloe again and just as one memory quickly dissolved, another one took over its place. This time however, it wasn't a memory he regretted. 

Seeing Chloe sleep so peacefully like that reminded him of the time when he had just met her and she asked him and the rest of the band to come over to her house. He pictured himself laying beside her the day after when Chloe had asked him to stay the night and at that time, he never imagined that he would fall in love with such an amazing girl. All of them, the boys, Natalie, Sam, and Chloe herself use to tease him about his "undying love" for her.

Luke tried shaking himself free from the memory as he walked over to her hospital bed but he was unsuccessful. He kissed her lightly on top of the head before grabbing the blanket that clung around Chloe's waist. He pulled it up to cover her upper body and just like that... Luke's mind conjured up another memory of when he had done the same exact thing.

His thoughts roamed everywhere... back to the first few days of getting to know Chloe when he had took over her room and looked through her bras and panties... back to when they performed a photoshoot together... back to when they went to the mall and goofed around... back to when he heard her sing for the first time...

Luke's thoughts lingered for a moment when he recalled how mind blown he was when she had sung... what did she sing... Luke furrowed his eyebrows in thought and then, with a satisfied smirk, he remembered that she sang "Hot" by Avril Lavigne.

Thinking about it now, Luke was grateful for running into her by accident on the first day of their magazine opportunity and he couldn't believe that they've been through so much in the past few years. Half of which, she had missed out because of her coma.

He thought about all the hugs they shared, the kisses, the laughs... and he relived the day he had asked her to be his girlfriend over and over in his mind. Luke thought about finding out that she had gotten out of her coma state to reading about her confession to him. Then he thought about all the downhill events they went through... him running away, her kidnappings, his cheating, and overall confusion in general.

Luke thought about how difficult and rough their relationship together was but even through all the shit they went through together, he knew that he wouldn't have changed anything about it.

At the end of the day, it made him love her that much more.

Despite everything they went through and for what was to come in their future, Luke just knew that he would be by her side the whole time. Even after learning what Chloe's doctor had to tell him, he wasn't going to go down without a fight... that's what she taught him.

Most importantly? Luke wasn't going to break the promise that he made: he would never let Chloe Winters go again and he would never... ever stop loving her.

....But as Luke's jumbled mind replayed old memories and was gradually beginning to settle down, he hadn't realized that Chloe's eyes were now open.

Similar to Luke, she too was lost in thought but over different reasons.

She stared at him... at the blonde haired man beside her hospital bed. He was looking at her, but it didn't seem as if he actually saw her. 

Chloe wasn't sure if it was because of his captivating blue eyes, or his handsome looks, or if it was something else altogether... but she just couldn't keep her gaze off of his.

He was wearing a black shirt and black jeans but she couldn't tell what shoes because she feared that if she moved, it would break the spell he was under. So instead, she just focused on his facial features. His eyes were gentle and his smile was warm but he looked extremely worn out and tired... His face was unshaven and he had a small cut on the bridge of his nose and a smudge of black on the side of his left cheek.

Judging by the bags under his eyes and the evidence that she was in the hospital for a reason, he must've stayed overnight for her.

"Hi,"

Chloe looked up.

She was consumed by her own thoughts that she didn't notice that he he had broken free from his trance and was now watching her, as she had done to him just earlier.

"You don't remember who I am, but I'm Luke Hemmings."

He smiled at her and she couldn't tell whether it was a grateful or a disappointed expression. 

Shaking the thought from her mind, she just mumbled kindly, "Chloe... Chloe Winters."

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