Seniors // Luke Hemmings

5. Bad luck

"Emmaaa, wake up, sunshine", James sang. I groaned and turned around in my bed, pulling the sheets over my head. "Okay, I really don't want to do this but you let me no choice", James said. 

Even though I couldn't see his face I knew he had an evil grin on his face.

I felt the bed dipping next to me, followed by him starting to tickle me. "No! James! You know how ticklish I am! Stop it", I giggled. "Only if you get up", he laughed. "Okay okay, I surrender but I can't get up if you're tickling me!" He finally stopped, allowing me to get out my bed.

James stayed here last night. We made our homework and then spent the rest of the evening watching random youtube videos like we always did.

It wasn't really a big deal because he slept here before. None of our parents even worried anymore if we didn't come home at night since we were always staying at each other places. We just needed to send them a text and it was settled.

Carter and James were the only two guys who my parents didn't mind coming home with me. We've all known each other since we were toddlers and we always remained our friendship. Besides, all of our parents also get along with each other very well.

"You better go dress yourself because you look like crap", James joked. I rolled my eyes at him and then pushed him out of my way so I can take my clothes. I start changing into my clothes, not even minding about James standing in the room. I had literally nothing to be ashamed of when I'm with my friends. We had no secrets for each other.

When I was completely ready for school I hurried downstairs when I heard a car horn from outside. "Carter's here", Amanda said. I grabbed my bag from the ha and followed my friends to the car. "Good morning!", I smiled. "Hey, did you stayed here, James?" Carter asked. I spotted jealousy in his voice, he really sucked at hiding his crush on Amanda. Everybody noticed it except for Amanda and himself. "Yeah, Emma kinda needed my help", James answered, smiling at me. "Oh okay", Carter mumbled, not caring anymore because he now knew James was with me and not with Amanda.

My fourth lesson of the day was history, we wouldn't be doing much because we'll be working on a big project. "There are a few rules: you work in groups of 2, I make the pairs and you won't complain. You all know each other so it shouldn't be a problem. You need to hand in the assignments in 2 months. It's a lot of work so I wouldn't wait too long to start", our teacher explained with very little enthusiasm in his tone. Everybody sighed when they heard the words 'I make the pairs'. "Okay, so the first pair is Jake and Samantha", he continued, ignoring the sighing. I patiently waited until my name was called as I scratched some circles in my textbook. I looked up from the book and looked around to find someone who wasn't paired up with someone yet and then I noticed the only one besides me that still was alone was the person I absolutely didn't want to work together with. And then I heard my name. "And Emma, you will work together with Luke."

I stopped breathing for a while. This couldn't be true. From all the people I had to work with Luke Hemmings. Luke Hemmings, the boy who drove me crazy by being charming one minute and being a complete douchebag the next. The boy with who I didn't want anything to do with anymore. And now I needed to work with him.

I turned around to see Luke sitting in the back with his mouth open in disbelief. "You'll get this lesson to work on it in class, you need to do the rest at home. So you can go sit together with you partner now", the teacher said. I stared at him as he sat down at his chair and took out some book. He had absolutely no idea what he just did to me.

The chair next to me moved and Luke looked at me while he rested his head on his hand. "Howdy partner", he laughed. I gave him a simple "Hi" and chose to keep it as cold as possible with him. I would not get my heart broken by this guy.

"I'm sorry okay? What more do you want me to say?" Luke sighed. "Well you could explain me why you were so rude to me", I answered him. "I'm really sorry, I always act like a total asshole but I don't mean to, really. Please don't be mad at me", he said so quietly that I almost didn't hear him. I looked up to get overwhelmed by his ocean blue eyes and looked right into them for a while until I forces myself to be the one to look away.

"Okay fine I forgive you but please don't act like that again", I sighed. "I'll do my best", he smiled. "Let's just start all over again", I suggested. "Hi, I'm Emma Williams", I said while holding out my hand. "Hello, my name's Luke Hemmings. Nice meeting you", he smiled and shook my hand.

The bell rang and Luke and I walked side to side outside. We agreed on working together on the project for the rest of the day so we could make clear who does what part and it's Wednesday so we would have all afternoon. "Are we going to your place or mine?' he asked. "Well, I figured out that we may better go to yours", I said. He nodded without further questioning it and lead me to his car. "Shouldn't you say something to your friends 'cause I think they're waiting for you", Luke spoke pointing at the group of staring people. "Yeah, right. I'm gonna tell them quick, please come with me", I begged him. "Why do I need to come along? Are you afraid of your friends?" he laughed and I couldn't help but smile by hearing his warm laugh. "No but if I go alone they'll ask me a lot of questions", I answered, again forcing myself into not liking Luke Hemmings. "Oh, okay. Is that what they did when I took you away from them to the mall?" he asked. I nodded and dragged him along with me by his arm without saying anything more.

"Hey guys! I'm going home with Luke to work on our history project", I smiled at them. I felt very uncomfortable and I had a feeling I wasn't the only one feeling uncomfortable "Oh okay", Amanda smiled. "I'm Amanda by the way", she said at Luke. "Oh right, so this are Carter, Sarah, James and Amanda", I introduced them. He gave them a small wave and smile, while he kept standing behind me. James looked really shocked because I'm going home with Luke while Amanda and Sarah kept smiling like 2 idiots and Carter just stood there, too caught up in admiring Amanda to bother me or Luke's presence. "Anyway we better get going", I said and turn to Luke, who was awkwardly standing behind me. He nodded and I waved my friends goodbye. "Have fun!" Sarah giggled, earning an angry look from me.

"James hates me", Luke said when he got in the car. "Why would you think that?" I asked as I put on my seat belt. "I saw the way he looked at me, he's mad because you're coming to my house", he said. "Luke, that makes completely no sense", I sighed while I fixed my hair in the mirror. Luke rolled his eyes, I wasn't sure if he did that because of me fixing my hair or because of what made no sense to me was crystal clear for him. "Yeah, it does. He has a crush on you", he smirked. I raised my eyebrows at him. "Seriously, Luke? He's my best friend, he's just being protective", I said. "Oh my god, Emma, you're so naïve", Luke laughed. "He's so in love with you and he's jealous because this is already the second time you're coming with me instead of with him", he smiled.

I didn't reply to him because I started wondering about it. Did James really liked me? It would make sense. I quickly shook the thought out of my head. "No, he can't have a crush on me, it would ruin our 15 years of friendship. You're wrong this time, Hemmings," I said. "You'd be surprised by the amount of times I'm actually right, Emma. Just wait and you'll see," he said with a stupid grin on his face.