Lucas ✔️

Three

The walk home was tiring, cold, and wet. I didn't mind the cold, I just didn't like the wet; the way it seeped into your clothes. It wasn't a long walk to get home and I followed a few busy streets, so I was always comfortable walking when it got a bit dark. Tonight, however, I had a bad feeling in my stomach - a clenching, uneasy feeling which made me feel sick.

I batted a ghoul away from my face harshly and took another slow step through the icy sludge covering the footpath. I could see the small bar coming into view across the street, the one where I had been horribly embarrassed by the good-looking woman laughing at me. The place where I saw that set of eyes watching me through the door.

I had never been inside but, in the past, when I used to leave the house often and come home late with friends, I always used their neon sign as a landmark that I was only three blocks away from our house. Now, I barely left the house, so seeing the sign made me reminisce for the good old days when he was alive, and I was a happy, sociable teen.

The luminescence flickered, lighting the damp road a bright blue hue, the colour flashing from damp and icy spots on the tarmac. The street lights weren't on here, their damaged bulbs having never been changed as long as I had lived here. Even though it was now pitch black, the sun hiding below the horizon and starting someone else's new day, I wasn't scared. Heck, maybe I even welcomed the danger the darkness brought. 

The neon sign flickered, casting a blue hue over those standing outside the bar. I walked past the bar slowly, carefully taking each step so I didn't end up as a heap on the damp pavement due to the thin cover of ice. 

Then I saw him.

I paused mid-step, his long hair and pale skin shining under the blue neon lighting caught my attention. He looked like he stepped straight from a neo-noir movie. A cigarette perched lightly between his fingers as he looked straight up to the night sky. I followed his gaze looking at the few stars speckled in the blackness before looking back at the stranger.

His hair hung long down his back brushing at his lower back. I had never seen anyone, let alone a male, with such beautiful, long locks; it was dark, almost pitch black, yet shiny as it reflected the lights. The man brought the cigarette to his mouth, still looking straight up at the sky, and took a puff, letting the smoke leave his mouth slowly. 

My eyes were glued to him, his beauty, his grace. He looked like a marble statue that was copy-pasted into this damp and dreary backdrop. His presence alone lit up the area, made it look magazine-worthy, the building, which was otherwise a dreary dump, suddenly ticked all the aesthetic boxes. 

The men standing near him were short and stumpy in comparison, their cigarettes looked gross and their skin looked sickly in the blue light; he, however, looked divine. A woman sauntered out of the bar, draped in a slinky red fabric which clung to her curves, and made her way up to the stranger. She leaned against him gently as he lowered his head from the sky to look at her. 

Her assets were pushed up against his chest, voluptuous flesh burst from the top of her dress in an appealing show. I let out a deep sigh as she ruined the picture-perfect moment of a beautiful man lost in thought, looking at the sky, highlighted by the blue luminescence of the neon sign nearby. If I had a camera, I would have taken a photo - before she arrived, anyway. I looked away as she used her lithe fingers to reach up and pull the cigarette from his mouth, lifting it to her mouth and taking a puff of her own as he looked back at the sky.

I pulled my jacket closer around me and took another slow step, keeping my eyes firmly on the treacherous path in front of me and not watching what they were doing across the street. The woman had shattered the dream, ruining the beautiful moment. My breathing was constricted as a ghoul flung itself to the end of my scarf, its weight pulling one end down to tighten the wool around my neck. I coughed loudly and whacked it away, loosening the scarf quickly.

"Bloody ghoul," I choked out, rubbing my neck lightly where the scarf had tried to choke me. It was the third time this afternoon a ghoul had tried to choke me, so I made a small reminder not to wear a scarf again this season. 

A small noise brought my attention back to the man across the street. He was standing with his hand up to his mouth, hiding a small smile, and I knew instantly the chuckle had come from him. The woman in the red dress was still pressed up against him except now she was glaring at me. He pushed her off gently, grabbing his cigarette back from her hand, and I used that opportunity to look away and continue my slow trudge down the street.

When I was a few meters away I dared a quick glance back, not able to help myself. He was intriguing, a mixture of good and bad, light and dark, his beautiful looks were entrancing, and his laugh was even more so. Looking back was a bad idea.

He had moved slightly, the woman standing next to him looking a little miffed, and was lifting his hands to grab his long hair, his eyes meeting mine as the cigarette dangled from his mouth loosely. His fingers wrapped through the soft threads, pulling them and twisting them into a bun at the nape of his neck. Even the woman in red seemed to become entranced by his graceful movements.

As I had my neck turned back to look at him, my eyes locked with his mesmerising ones, the ghoul I had whacked away rolled back and placed itself strategically under my foot as I stepped. The world moved in slow motion as my body headed straight for the cold and wet snow that was built up next to the footpath. I landed in the damp snow butt-first, my jeans quickly becoming soaked with cold water. My body was instantly freezing, goosebumps burst up along my skin as I sat frozen in shock for a few seconds.

The ghoul rolled around the footpath in a way that made me believe it was laughing at me, and I knew if it had fingers I would be pointing them at me saying 'ha-ha-ha!. I clenched my fists and stood up quickly, the dirt and snow mixture fell off my clothing but the cold stayed. I took one step and then booted the ghoul with my best kick, as though I was kicking a goal in the world cup.

"Asshole!" I yelled as I kicked, my voice angry and my face red. My pants were dripping wet, I was freezing, I had other ghouls hanging on me, and I still had three blocks to walk. My leg fell back into place next to my body and I stood there breathing loudly for a minute before a loud, melodic laugh brought my attention back to those across the street. This laugh was louder than the small chuckle I heard earlier', and the sound made my stomach clench in an odd pain. It was heavenly, the type of laugh I would become a stand-up comedian just to be able to hear it again.

The not-as-good-looking men were all looking at me like I was having a bad trip, a few even turned and shook their heads as they headed back inside. They probably thought I was some random crack addict roaming the streets. The red woman stood with her eyebrows raised high as she looked at me knowingly. I was pretty sure she also thought I was a crack addict and she was reminiscing about some time she was high and did something similar; which just made me dislike her even more.

And he, the gorgeous male from a neo-noir film with the world's most gorgeous hair, was laughing loudly, one hand clenched at his stomach and one hand wiping tears from his eye. Red-hot embarrassment rose up my cheeks as I realised what an idiot I looked like to him, kicking and swearing at air. I just hoped he didn't think I was an addict, too.

I felt my stomach clench at the sound of his laughter, butterflies erupted in my stomach as I hung my head in shame. As much as I wanted to keep listening to his melodic laugh, I couldn't stand the horrific embarrassment. I grabbed my scarf and wrapped it tighter, lifting it up to my nose so they wouldn't be able to see my embarrassment as I quickly, and carefully, hightailed it home, the bastard ghoul following closely behind.