Burning Up The Sun // Muke

Chapter 8

Instead of waiting for Calum at the bins to walk home together that day, Luke just kept walking. He couldn't deal with any kind of awkward silences or apologies, it could all wait until tomorrow. He had important stuff to do and think about tonight, and this silly friend drama could wait. Straight after exiting the school building, Luke put his earphones in and walked the route back as quick as he could, looking momentarily to the thicker part of the woods where he had seen Michael run to. Or thought he had. Damn it.

The music in his ears guided him home as if on auto-pilot, he had completed the same route so many times. He didn't notice his Mother's car in the driveway as he strode the driveway to the door, so jumped when he heard a shout of "Hey Luke!" from the living room when he closed it behind him. 

"Mum?" he called, as if it could be anyone else.

"In here, son." 

Luke walked into the living room and found her sitting reading a book on the couch, which was a rare scenario to even see her sitting down. Luke's Mother, Liz Hemmings, was kind of a badass. She worked full-time as a nurse, meaning her shifts were long and gruelling, and he found himself seeing less and less of her as his school commitments got longer, as did his collective time spent sleeping. Though the pay wasn't incredible and the hours were crazy, she spent her life dedicated to helping people believe in themselves that they could get better again, and he admired the hell out of her for it. 

"Hey Mum. You're home pretty early." Luke said, looking at the clock in the corner of the room, which only read 4:00pm.

Liz smiled up at him through her reading glasses. "Got the afternoon off, son. Night shift tonight."

Luke whistled. "Damn. Well it's nice to see you, maybe we can have dinner together. I'll just put my stuff upstairs."

Luke backed out of the living room and ran upstairs to dump his bag and school stuff, where he hoped they would fall into some sort of time vortex and he'd love to never see them ever again. Under his bed would do.

Upon leaving his room, he retrieved the note from Michael in his pocket, read it one more time, and carefully folded it back to where it was. He smiled to himself before bounding back downstairs to see his Mum.

x x x

Luke closed the door behind him at 8.45 wearing a hoodie over the same clothes he'd worn to school. He'd had a great evening with his mother, having a home-cooked chicken stir-fry, and watching The Time Traveller's Wife, which was actually a better movie than he had expected. But plaguing his mind the whole evening was this mysterious meeting Michael had set up. What would they talk about? His head was spinning already. Why had this guy been getting him so worked up lately? It really didn't make sense.

Michael just seemed so... Familiar to Luke. Even though Michael said himself he was new to the school, Luke felt such a strong connection that he was meant to know this boy, somehow. Like angels among stars were breaking their backs just to get these two together. No, Luke physically shook his head while walking. No, not like that.

When he reached the end of the woodland path that brought him to the school, his eye was drawn to a boy with bright blonde hair, sitting on the wall next to the bins, fiddling with something in his hands. Luke smirked and quickened his pace in his walk over to the boy, who looked up and smiled when Luke was a few steps away.

"Detention boy." Michael said, putting his hands in his pockets.

Luke's smile grew. "You called?"

Michael looked down at his feet, then back up at Luke, his smile more subdued. He looked nervous. "Lets walk for a bit."

Luke agreed, and the two boys strolled, hands in pockets, along the backdrop of the orangey pink tones of a sunsetting sky.