Please Take Me Home

Easy Target

Please Take Me Home

-

Chapter Twenty-Six

-

Easy Target

Luke was absolutely exhausted. He had mistakenly answered one of Ashton's phone calls at god knows what time and ended up having to stay up and talk, getting Ashton to calm down and whatnot. Apparently Ashton had still been worked up about whatever had happened to Calum over the weekend, which really wasn't fair on Luke, because as mean as it is, Luke really couldn't care any less, but he wasn't going to say that to Ashton, was he?

So when it was close to two am, Luke had finally gotten Ashton off the line and tried to fall asleep, but was kept up by his worrisome thoughts. It was nights like these that the part of his brain that stored all his paranoia liked to come out and prevent him from falling asleep. As blind as Luke was to Michael's wellbeing, he knew something wasn't quite right.

***

It was the middle of Luke's, Friday, first period Maths class, that something clicked. He didn't know where it came from or how he got to the suspicion, but once he thought it out, it just... explained everything.

Michael... Calum... The bruises.

Just, how?

Luke knew that they both didn't particularly like each other, he knew that for sure. And he knew that both of the boys had denied getting hurt by saying that it happened by their own a cause.

Though, how and why?

Luke knew that Michael wouldn't hurt someone just for a sake of it, especially someone like Calum, who was all bark and no bite.

Nah, it didn't make any sense. It was obviously a coincidence.

But Luke kept thinking about how rigidly Michael had been moving on Friday night, when he had seen him at the servo, and how on Saturday, he had ignored how red Michael's knuckles had been, because he didn't want to believe it. Now, seeing as Calum had come back yesterday, battered and bruised...

Luke didn't know what to think of it.

While getting back to work, Luke dismissed any worried thought to that back of his mind and purposely chose to ignore anything of the matter, because he knew if Michael really needed help, he would ask for it.

***

Michael, on that Thursday night had gotten another phone call from Alex and Jack.

He had answered his phone and gotten an answer that he had been anxiously waiting for. He hadn't actually thought that they would agree to his solicit for money. Given, Jack actually was yelling at him more than talking to him, asking him why he got himself into all these situations. It was Alex who then came onto the line and spoke to Michael and Alex reassured him that Jack was only acting out like that because he cared for Michael.

Michael made sure to thank Alex, (and Jack too), and promised once this all blew over, he would visit over the summer holidays or something, and keep in touch.

They organised for the money to be dropped off by Alex near the train station, for the next day and then Alex advised him to get the money to the people as soon as possible. Of course, Michael wasn't an idiot, he knew that, he just wasn't really looking forward to the whole thing going down.

***

He knew he was going to have to text Luke, saying that he was going to meet up with him after school or else the blue-eyed boy might mistake his absence for something personal.