Michael Clifford Imagines

Facing the Inevitable (Part 2)

"Now that there are three of us, we're going to have to come up with another way of doing this presentation." Luke groaned. Since your project was due at the end of the week, he had called you and Michael to join him on the roof to begin working on your presentation. However, Michael was nowhere to be found. Leaving the two of you on your own. Really, just leaving Luke. He was too focused to even notice your presence.

Luke was currently sitting in the center of the coffee table with his laptop in his lap. Surrounding him were excerpts from the play, all three of your copies of Romeo and Juliet, as well as a sea of notes that had been scratched out and re-written over and over again. He'd pulled over the green block to sit beside him. His binder laid open, as well as a bright blue pencil pouch overflowing with highlighters and pens. As if he needed more, there were already more than enough spread across his notebooks and sticky notes.

"Luke, do you need me to do something? You look like you're drowning in notes." He didn't answer, he just continued tapping his pen against the edge of his laptop, while stressfully running a hand through his blonde locks. "Luke?" No answer. "Luke?" Doing the only thing you could think off, you stepped in front of him, closing his laptop and taking it from him.

"Hey!"

"You need a break." You told him while setting the laptop down beside you on the couch. "You've been sitting there for over half an hour just buried in your thoughts. Take a break and let me help."

"I can't take a break now. The project is due on friday, and we don't even know what we're going to do? I don't want to do some stupid powerpoint now since half the class is going to do that. A speech would just be one of doing something which would deduct points, and I definitely don't want that. We could always do a video, but I don't know if we have enough time to put that together. And a poster is third grade work. There's no way we'd get even a decent grade with one of those!" This time he dropped his pen, pulling at the ends of his hair with both hands now.

You knew Luke wasn't purposefully bring snappy to you. He was just lacking the usual control he had, which was clearly bothering him. Just like (Y/BF/N), you noticed how much control Luke had over important things. His studies, his insanely neat room, how perfect he normally kept his hair, the exact number of bracelets he wore on the same arm, his eating... If it was something Luke could control, he did. But, in this project, he was losing that control. His thoughts were going crazy, and he couldn't process what all he was trying to do. Which brought out this effect on him.

"Hey," You grabbed both of this wrists, pushing them into his lap, "relax. We'll figure this out-"

"I have arrived and have the perfect idea for this presentation that will wow you two and Ms. Banks." Michael said, as he entered on his crutches. He dropped them by the couch after crashing down next to you and propping his foot on top of Luke's notes. You pushed his foot off the side, knowing Luke would just ignore it, even if he needed what was underneath it.

"Two questions. One, where have you been? Two, what's this brilliant idea of yours that is supposed to wow us?" You asked.

"One, busy. Two, I suggest that we put on a play."

"Michael, we can't just do the whole play. It's multiple acts and we only get ten minutes max to do this presentation."

"Not the whole thing, we could paraphrase it. I'll be Romeo. You'll be juliet, obviously, and Luke can be the narrator plus every other important person."

"So, you want me to be the Narrator, Benvolio, the Nurse, Lady and Lord Capulet, Lady and Lord Montague, Mercutio, Tybalt, Paris, Friar Laurence, AND the Prince?"

"You do like to do most of the work." Michael added.

"You do realize that those characters have scenes together, right?"