𝐏𝐑𝐎𝐉𝐄𝐂𝐓 𝐖𝐈𝐋𝐃𝐅𝐋𝐎𝐖𝐄𝐑⁰¹ʰᵉᵐᵐⁱⁿᵍˢ✓

¹⁸nelson and susan

clementine

My ears perk up at a familiar sound and I pry my eyes open, feeling my skin tingle from the cold air, the hair rising as I realise where I am.

I wipe the sleep from my eyes, looking around my surroundings with furrowed brows, seeing the familiar rooftop from where Luke and I talked all night.

Luke.

I look to my side, seeing him sound asleep on the plastic chair, arms crossed across his chest, closed eyes facing the bright sky; my cat, Darth, curled asleep on his wide lap.

I bite down my lip, hiding back a smile at the adorable scene. Even asleep, he's beautiful.

Once again, a familiar buzzing catches my attention and turn to the glass table where my phone is having a slight tantrum, flashing Mara's contact photo across the screen.

I groan, not wanting to move from my position. But I reach out and take my phone anyway, swiping accept on the call and raising it to my ear. "Hey," I quietly greeted, not wanting to wake Luke.

I first hear Mara's laboured breathing from the other side before some shuffling with the phone. "Uh... umm... Clem? Clementine? Uh..." I hear the panic in her voice but I'm unsure of what it's about.

"Hm?" I close my eyes and keep my phone by my ear, the cool breeze trying to persuade me back to slumber. "What's happening?"

Mara nervously clears her throat. "Okay, so, uh... so I think someone broke in,"

My eyes fly open at the news and I immediately sit straighter. "What do you mean someone broke in?"

"And they took Sunny and Darth," She continued. "I woke up this morning and when I tried to find them so they could eat, I couldn't find them anywhere. And when I checked, the front door was closed but it wasn't locked."

Oh. My bad.

"It's probably Nelson, you know how he's always trying to convince us to let him mate his cat with our Darth. This is probably it, it's probably him, oh god -"

Nelson is our next-door neighbour and he has his own cat who's a short-haired tabby who yowls all too loudly around one AM.

When I moved in with Mara and first talked to Nelson, he kept mentioning someone named 'Susan', how she always has a bad temper, and how he hoped her yelling wouldn't disturb my sleep.

Turns out, after a whole week of living there and being awoken by yowls at one AM, Susan was not his wife, as I had presumed, but his female cat in heat.

I leant back on my seat, rubbing my eyes with my free hand. "Mara, nobody broke in," I said and I could hear the confusion practically radiating off her through the phone. "That was me. Luke and I came last night and took the guitar and the cats,"

She sighed in relief and I hear her murmur something to someone else. "Oh, thank god. Honestly, I don't know what I would've done if it was Nelson,"

"Is that guy still there?" I ask, leaning towards the table and petting Sunny, who was curled out of shape on the glass, purring as she continued to sleep.

"Guy? Oh, yeah, but he asked if I'd want breakfast in this restaurant he mentioned, so we should be gone in ten minutes or so," She replies and I raise a brow at it, surprised that they aren't going to leave it as a one night stand. "Wait, wait, hold up. Did you say Luke was with you?"

I nod though she can't hear and I look over at the sleeping man, the light catching on his hair and making a few strands look golden. "Yeah, we were going to go to the studio but... uh... something happened, so we just came right here." I smiled at the view of him stirring in his sleep, looking ever so comfortable despite how hard the seat must be. "We're actually in the rooftop right now,"

I hear her swoon from the other side. "Oh my god, tell me you did something up there," She says, excitement apparent from her tone.

I look back at Luke and he's still very much sound asleep, his mouth even parting a little bit to let out a soft snore. "Did what?"

Mara scoffs, then I hear the familiar sounds of her makeup drawer. She must be getting ready to go out. "Clementine, don't play dumb with me," She scolds and I give out a chuckle. "Did you do anything? Hug? Make out? Sex?" She said each suggestion louder than the other.

"Mara!" I whisper-yell into my phone. "We're on a rooftop, how do you expect us to do that?" She snickers as a reply. "Besides, we're just friends," I say, biting down on my lip at the very simple thought. "Just friends. And I don't like him that way," Liar, my subconscious comments.

"Psshh, whatever," Mara answers. "I will pretend to believe this bullshit you're telling yourself. At the meantime, I should be out with Wyatt until, I don't know, late tonight? Unless the hospital calls me in."

I scoff, remembering how the guy looked the night before. "Wyatt? Is that his name?"

"Hey," Mara calls out, hearing by my tone that I'm not exactly into this Wyatt as much as she is. "He's a pretty cool guy. Be nice to him."

I roll my eyes. "Whatever you say, Amara,"

"Really! He is!" She tries to convince me. "He's a nice guy who treated me good last night."

I stifle back a laugh. "That's because you slept with him, Mara," I answer back plainly.

"Hey! This time, I'm not talking about that. When I thought the cats were stolen, he offered to help with looking. Before that, he wanted to cook me breakfast. Now, he wants to take me to this restaurant."

I hear a genuine tone as she speaks, telling me that she really likes this Wyatt. Whatever it is she sees in him, I'm willing to blindly trust in it. It's been some time since she's talked about someone this way and I miss it.

"If you met him, you'd actually like him. He even paints." She adds.

I laugh. "Okay, now you're just making things up,"

"No, last night he saw some of your paintings in the living room and he said that he painted too. Even talked about mediums and how he liked your technique and whatnot, all that art talk that I don't understand."

We stay silent for a minute, all I do is listen to her get dressed and mutter something about her jeans.

Would it really be so bad if I decided this Wyatt was an okay guy for her? She looks out for me and I can't help but do the same for her as well

"Anyways, I'm dressed." She says after a few minutes and I hear some shuffling on her end. "Wyatt and I will be gone right now, so you can come down,"

"Mhm..." I hum into my phone, distracted with other thoughts looking around my head.

"Love you, bye!" She bids in a cheery tone before I hear the click, indicating the end of our call.

Twisting my mouth as I think about what had happened the night before, I'm not sure if it had really happened. It feels like a fever dream or some mirage that I'd made up all in my head. But if I would look to my side, there would be a man sitting there, just as real as he was last night.

"Who's Wyatt?" A voice blurts and I jump in my seat, my heart skipping for a second as the sudden sound interrupts my thoughts.

"Jesus fuck!" I exclaim, waking Sunny and Darth abruptly.

I turn to Luke who's wide awake with a humoured grin. I would fall absolutely weak in the knees due to his smile but my heart is not in the condition to be swooning.

He laughs, holding Darth closer to his chest. "Pretty sure Jesus died a virgin," He comments.

╳╳╳

i hope yall are doing well during these times.
please stay safe & treat people with kindness.