Rochester Avenue // Luke Hemmings

Chapter 17 - 'Frustrating? Like Sexually Frustrating?'

Monday rolled around and the boys were late. But then again, I was early. When I arrived at the studio there was no one there, and I had to admit I was slightly hoping Luke would be there so we could talk. At that thought I shook my head to myself. He probably didn't want to talk.

I needed to stop thinking about this.

When Kate arrived, I immediately stood up, prepared to do the coffee run. However she just said to me, "Just so you know, Fran's bringing along her... cousin, I think it was, today, just to see how things work around here. I think her name was Sasha. If you ever wanted to bring someone along it wouldn't be a problem," she told me, and I nodded.

A couple of minutes later Fran arrived with a very pretty blonde trailing behind her, looking around herself in interest. As soon as Fran saw me, she smiled and came over.

"Noelle, hey! How was your weekend?" she said with a twinkle in her eye. Oh, she'd seen the pictures. I mean, I assumed she had. I hadn't seen them myself but I guessed they were on the Internet.

"Uh, okay. You know. Is this your cousin?" I asked, glancing at the other girl.

"Yeah. Noelle, meet Sasha. Sasha, meet Noelle."

I smiled politely at Sasha. Her eyes had been wandering around the studio with interest but now they were looking me up and down. Clearly she didn't think much of what she saw because she wrinkled her nose slightly before going back to examining the studio. I raised my eyebrows at Fran who shot me a wry smile and shrugged her shoulders slightly.

"Anyway. The boys are late again?" Fran guessed, sitting herself down on the couch while Sasha walked around, running her hands over everything. I sat down next to Fran, crossing one leg over the other.

"Of course." I didn't mention how Luke and I had had an argument. "Probably hung-over."

She laughed slightly. "As usual."

After a moment Sasha sat down next to her cousin and started questioning her about the band while completely ignoring me. I just ignored her and bit my nails as I thought of the tension that was bound to be between Luke and me. Finally Ashton appeared in the doorway, looking surprisingly cheerful as Michael, Calum and then Luke followed him in. At the sight of the guys, Sasha sat up straight and plastered a smile onto her face and Fran chuckled softly.

"Morning," Ashton said brightly, glancing at the clock on the wall. "Or... afternoon. Whatever. Who's this?"

As Fran introduced Sasha, Luke's eyes wandered over to me, only looking at me for a second before drifting over to Sasha. I noticed the way her gaze widened in appreciation as she looked Luke up and down, a small smile curling onto her lips. She stood up and said slightly breathlessly, "Hi Luke. I'm Sasha. It's really nice to meet you."

He raised an eyebrow. "Uh, hi. What–"

"I've always been really interested in the music industry so my cousin Fran said I could come along today to just, you know, see how things work. I love your music by the way." She fluttered her eyelashes at him – something which I have never been able to do ­­– and he nodded.

"Thanks."

A weight settled next to me as Sasha started up some conversation with Luke about god knows what, and Michael said quietly in slight amusement, "Do you know her?"

I looked over at him and half smiled. "Nope, but I don't like her."

"Me neither," he whispered and we both started laughing. At that, Luke looked over but I ignored him as Michael spoke again. "What happened with you and Luke? Trouble in paradise?"