Consequences |LRH|

Chapter 11

Evie

"I seriously cannot get over the fact that your brother entered you in a competition without telling you!" Michael says out of the blue, interrupting Calum mid sentence. Rolling my eyes, I glance down at where my phone laid on the floor. The screen illuminated with one of those 'Hey this irrelevant person you haven't talked to in years just sent you a thing on Candy Crush!' notifications but my eyes focused on the time. 12:38am. We had been talking for quite a while now, my eyes narrowing slightly through tiredness. Somehow we had all managed to spread out in the tiny lounge in my hotel room. Calum and Ashton were sitting on the couch, Michael on the floor with his arms resting on the coffee table in front of him to prop up his head. Luke was sitting in the arm chair and I had found myself leaning back against his knees.

"Righto then Mike. Anyway, back to what I was saying! Evie, are you single?" Calum asked almost too casually. I choke a little on the air in my lungs. I hesitate for a few seconds. Do I want to answer that? What do I tell them? Do i tell them the whole truth, the half-truth or nothing? I mean, I don't know what we are and making assumptions was never a good idea. There was a tap on my shoulder bringing out of my head and into reality.

"Um, well, kind of. It's a bit hard to explain." I breathe out, half truth will do. But it is kind of the whole truth. I am still technically single. 3 of the 4 boys look to me, egging me on to explain.

"Explain please Evie?" Ashton laughs, "How can you be kind of single? It's a yes or no thing." Michael and Calum chuckle at Ashton's comment. Luke's body tensed behind me, his action unintentionally making me more nervous.

"Uh, well, there's this guy in LA but he travels a lot for work so-," I physically felt Luke relax and a small piece of me was offended. Did he seriously think that I would tell them right now? Right here? "And we have been on a few dates here and there but I guess I'm just not sure if the thing we have is serious or not. But, it's something." I smile self-consciously, the bubble of anxiety bursting and trying to drag me down as I realized I had just had a conversation about Luke and I's potential relationship with not only his friends, but him too. I tried to push the feeling to where it belonged, the back of my mind – I could freak out about this later- and found myself trying to deflect.

"And you guys? You are all rockstars, would it be uncouth of me to assume you have girls throwing themselves at you?" I chuckle slightly. Michael laughed in reply and my eyebrows furrowed at the look in his eyes. Quickly it was replaced by a kind smile and a joking attitude but I filed the look away for later.

"Well, rock stars. I can take that compliment but thousands of girls? Not really. Maybe one or two. As for single, I am at least." He sent a wink in my general direction and glancing up at Luke's reddening cheeks, I figured it was for him.

"Yeah, same." Calum and Ashton couldn't have answered that more in sync if they had practiced it but then all of their eyes drifted to Luke and just stared through him like they already knew something, they just needed to coax it out of him.

My heart skipped a beat as he barely glanced down at me, playing it off as though he was checking his phone. They figured it out or at least knew something. We weren't as stealthy as we thought.

"Um, I'm technically single because we aren't official but like mentally I'm not? I'm not seeing anyone besides her." He explained, his attention directing to his phone as I bit my lip and tried not to grin too wide.

That was really sweet. I could hear him tapping at his phone quickly and Calum chuckled as he watched how quickly Luke was typing.

"Oh! Has that girl you've been fretting over all day finally replied to you?" Luke just nods, an affirmative 'hrmph' was all he did and I relaxed. They didn't know that it was me.