Fall.

Chapter 26.

It was the end of the day and I was dragging Luke behind me as I walked down the hallway, out the school doors. I had seemed to grow even more attached to Luke these past few days after what he told me at my house last week. I was scared, to say the least. I wanted to be with Luke all the time and make sure that he was okay, that he felt needed by someone. And that he knew how much he really mattered to me.

"Can you please stop dragging me around like I'm some pet? You might as well get a leash for me." Luke groaned from behind me.

"I'm not trying to." I shrugged. I stopped walking and turned around to face him.

"I'm still perfectly capable of walking on my own." He snapped. I didn't see why he was so upset, I wasn't even pulling him that hard. He was freaking out over nothing.

"Yeah, I know." I snapped back. "I was holding your hand, I don't have to if it's that much of a problem."

"You have a surprisingly strong grip, Stel. It hurts." Luke chuckled, looking down at my hand that was clutching onto his wrist more than his hand.

"I-"

"Whatever, it's fine." Luke sighed.

"Are you okay?" I asked. Luke sighed once more, glancing down at the ground.

I wanted so desperately for Luke to return to his normal self again, for him to snap out of this funk he was in. I wouldn't even care if he started being rude to me again, anything but how he was acting now. It hurt seeing him hurt, to put it bluntly.

"I'm trying to be." Luke's eyes met mine again. His hands were shaking, and I wasn't sure if it was from the cold or how nervous all of this made him.

"Luke, please." I said, my voice coming out as more of a whisper than anything. Luke bit his lip and looked around us, watching people pass by while we stood still, in our own little world. He groaned and ran both of his shaking hands through his hair.

"Let's go." Luke turned me around abruptly, pulling me in the opposite direction we needed to go in.

"Go where? I thought we were going back to my house?" I questioned, this time it was Luke dragging me down the street.

"Change of plans." Luke called back to me.

His actions surprised me, these past few days Luke had seemed to become very distant. He never talked unless he absolutely needed to, he ate even less than normal, it was like he wasn't even there anymore. I knew he was getting worse, no matter how hard he was trying to make himself better again. To see Luke acting like this, almost...normal, was great. He had seemed to switch right back to normal like it was nothing, I wasn't about to do anything to stop it.

Luke stopped walking and looked back at me, almost like he was asking for my permission to continue walking. Even though I had no idea what Luke had up his sleeve, I was going to let him take me where he wanted to go.

"Well, where are we going?" I asked. He held his hand out to me and I took it, lacing our fingers together.

"On our second date." Luke smiled softly at me, his grip on my fingers tightening.

We arrived at the movie theater a little while later, the last place I expected Luke to take me. We had talked in the past about how movies made bad dates and I knew Luke was too smart to just totally forget that. Luke knew me too well to take me on a date that he knew I didn't want to go on. He had something else planned, I knew that.

"Hey, Cal!" Luke called as we walked into the theater. Calum was behind the counter like always, it seemed like he was constantly working.

"What are you doing here?" Calum laughed at Luke as he climbed over the counter and started searching through drawers under the cash registers. "You're off duty, you can't be back there."