Naturally ↠ lrh

11. Need

*Luke's POV*

I see a sliver of long, dirty blonde hair on the ground. I'm not able to see the rest of her body because of the crowd.

"Luke? What are you doing here?" I hear the sweet voice from behind me, and I start to wonder if I'm hallucinating.

I turn around, looking behind me to see if it's real.

"Hey, are you-" I run to her, pulling her into my arms, holding her as if she'd crumble if I let go.

"You fucking scared me. Don't ever do that again," I said, tears streaming down my face.

"I'm so confused, what did I do?" She replied, hugging me back.

"I-I thought I failed again. I thought I almost lost you," I shook my head, burying my face into her hair, taking in her sweet scent.

"Luke, Luke, calm down. Tell me what's happening," she said as she pulled my head to look at her.

The police sirens were going off, and an ambulance was driving away. I see Dylan in the distance, being shoved into a police car.

"He was here? Did he hurt you? Did he talk to you?" I said swiftly, trying to make sure that he didn't hurt her.

"No, Luke, don't worry. He didn't hurt me," she replied as she looked in the direction that I was looking in.

"Did he talk to you? Did he tell you anything?" I asked. He could've told her about it. I can't let that happen. She'll think I'm some kind of monster and won't want to talk to me anymore.

"Yeah, he talked to me, but what would he have to tell me?" She asked, looking back at me.

"N-Nothing, I was just making sure he didn't try to upset you," I broke her gaze and watched the police cars drive away.

"Luke, tell me. I can already tell that you're lying," she grabs my chin, forcing me to turn my head to look at her.

She'll hate you if you tell her. You're going to lose her too.

Right. But I can't keep it from her forever. She's going to keep asking. Should I make something up for now? No, she'll hate me even more for lying.

"Luke?!" She shook my body, shaking me out of my thoughts.

"Um, I can't tell you here," I told her, grabbing her hand and starting to walk to my house.

You're so lucky that they're not here anymore. You'd be dead if they saw you with her.

I shake the thoughts out of my head before continuing to walk.

"Luke, where are we going?" I hear her ask from behind me.

"My-"

"Luke! What the hell?!" Calum comes running towards us, panting and gasping for air.

"Oh she's okay!" Ashton said before running towards her and pulled her into a hug, making her let go of my hand.

"So why'd you take so long to get ready?" Michael asked Hayley, tilting his head to the side in confusion.

"I actually took, like, ten minutes to get ready, but this accident happened and I couldn't just keep walking," she explained as she pulled away from Ashton.

"Well that explains it," I said, walking to her before putting my arm around her waist. The boys looked at me with a strange look before Michael and Calum start talking to each other about Fifa.

"We should probably get back to Michael's house," Ashton says, walking ahead in the direction of Michael's house.

"Yeah, let's go," I said, before starting to walk forward with my arm still around Hayley's waist.

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*Luke's POV*

I was walking Hayley back to her house after hanging out at Michael's house. Ashton offered as well, but I got to her first and she agreed.

It would've made more sense for Ashton to take her home, he's her neighbor, not you.

Oh whatever. We were walking in a comfortable silence and enjoyed to beautiful night sky.

"Hey Luke?" I hear her speak up, looking at me. Looking back at her, I gave her a gentle smile.

"Yeah?"

"You know that little opening of land that you found me in and said you go there too?" She asked, tucking a loose hair that had fallen out of her bun behind her ear.

"Yeah, what about it?" I asked, kicking rocks on the gritty sidewalk.

"Can you take me there again? I still have about an hour before I have to get home," Hayley told me, tugging her sweater a little tighter around her body.

"Sure," I said before grabbing her hand and leading her in the direction that the forest was in.

It took us around 5 minutes to get there. As soon as we got there, we lay on the rock that over hung the small lake.

"Luke?"

"Yeah?"

"Do you still hate me?" She asked, turning her head to look at me.

"Of course not," I said, looking back at her and reaching over to run my fingers through her hair.

"Then why did you get so mad when I first met you?" She looked at me with a confused look, her eyebrows raising.

Don't tell her why. You can't trust her.

But I can. I know I can trust her. I know she won't tell anyone else.

"I-It was a song that my ex-girlfriend loved, and I didn't realize you were singing it at first but once you got to the chorus I knew that it was the song," I said, looking back up at the night sky.

That's not all of it. You know that that's not all of it.

"Oh, I'm so sorry, I didn't know," she replied, her lips turning down into a pout.

"It's alright, I'm over that now," I looked back at her, her head now facing the sky, looking at the beautiful stars.

"Hey, is it okay if I ask you one more thing?" She brushed her hand against mine, slowly putting it on top.

"Yeah, what is it?"

"Why did you help me? I thought you would've just ran away when you saw me in that alley," she said, tracing patterns into the top of my hand.

Tell her. You need to tell her the real reason why you helped her.

I thought about telling her for a minute. If I do tell her, she'll think I'm some kind of monster. If I don't tell her, I don't know if I can deal with the guilt. She'll hate me even more for keeping it from her.

"Luke? Luke are you still there?" Hayley asked as she slightly shook my hand.

"Huh? Y-Yeah, sorry, I was just spacing out," I replied, giving her a sweet smile.

We both sat up, her hand still on top of mine.

"I still don't understand why you helped me in that alley, most people would've just left me there," she said before quietly laughing. "I never thought that anyone would ever care about me, until I met you. I always felt like people didn't really need me in their life to survive, you know? Auburn hasn't even talked to me since I moved, and I haven't made a friend that's a girl," she added, looking at me.

"But ever since I met you, everything changed. I felt like someone cared about me. I felt loved. Even when I did something you didn't like, you still made the effort to help me out. Thank you," she continued, returning my smile.

I don't know what had gotten into me, but in a few seconds, my lips were pressed against hers.

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There's really nothing to put for an author's note so I hope you enjoyed this chapter because I definitely enjoyed writing it ;)