The One in Which He’s Alive // l.h.
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word count: 2.7k+
summary: it’s in the pouring rain and at two in the morning that suddenly, luke hemmings stands on your doorstep—soaked—to tell you how much he doesn’t miss you.
His hair, his clothes—literally his everything is soaked to the core, as he turns around under the pouring rain and climbs the steps towards your parents’ patio, where he, at least, is a little more protected from the wetness of the storm. Before you even get one word out, he begins to talk. And he talks. And talks. About how much he doesn’t miss you. How great he is. How much he loves life right now. “I ain’t missing you,” he shouts over the downpour and thunder. “I’ve spent the last months actually living! I feel like I have an actual life again,” he says, throwing his hands out, like he couldn’t keep the excitement in him. He looks at you and grins. The corners of his mouth raise quicker than the lightning that’s bound to come again any second now, and it splits his face in two so violently, you fear it’s going to rip.
“Okay…” you tell him quietly with a raised eyebrow, because you don’t know what else to say to a guy professing his non-existent feelings to you, when just a couple of months prior, you’d been in this exact situation, though then it was him, spending every second trying to convince you how much he loves you.
“Seriously,” Luke says. “I’m so perfect. I don’t miss you at all. Everything’s fine.”
“Luke—”
“I don’t want you and I don’t need you anymore.”
Crossing your arms over your chest, you shift your weight onto your other foot and lean against the doorframe. “Luke, why are you here? And why are you telling me this at two in the morning?”
He grins again. “Because I thought about you. Because I’m always thinking about you.” His grin falls for a nanosecond. “But I’m over you. I promise I am. I mean, I’m so alive, baby. You should feel what I feel.” He lifts his hands again, but this time he grips the doorframe with them—which you’re leaning against. His face comes near you, and for a moment you think he’s about to kiss you, causing you to back away. You aren’t sure, if the small flinch you see is real or not, but he doesn’t give you a chance to analyse, as he begins to talk again. “Literally every feeling I feel is suddenly enhanced by a hundred. They’re so intense, it still knocks the breath out of me, even after months.”
You don’t answer but rather take in his wet appearance. Sure, there is a cocky grin sitting on his face and there is no alcohol-stench coming from his breath, but still, you feel like he isn’t himself right now. “What’s going on, Luke?” you ask, trying to gently coerce an answer out of him.
“Nothing’s wrong,” he says immediately, the grin coming back to life.
“You can’t just come here and tell me how fine you are and how much you don’t need me and expect me to believe you are fine. No normal person does this.” Sighing, you uncross your arms, doing something you wouldn’t have thought you’d do, ever again. “Look, if you want, you can come in. I can get you a towel or something and we can talk properly.”
Tonight is just full of surprises, because suddenly, he begins to shake his head no and whines like an actual four-year-old—with an actual voice that’s higher than normal. “No, I don’t want to come in,” he says—or rather moans. “I just wanted to say those things I’ve said and now I’m leaving.”
Rushing to grab hold of his arm before he steps off your patio, you shake your head at him again, forgetting that he cannot see you as he has his back turned towards you. “Hold on for a sec, Luke,” you say. “Please.”
Facing you again, he looks at you with an expectant expression. A moment of silence later, he raises an impatient eyebrow.
“It’s just—Just because we aren’t together anymore, doesn’t mean I don’t care about you.” And that is the truth. Luke has been such a large part of your life, it is physically impossible to stop caring about him from one sudden moment to another.
This time his eyebrow doesn’t raise in impatience, but rather hurt, it seems. “Yeah…um—thanks, I guess. But I really have to get going.”
You tug at his arm again, getting impatient yourself. “Oh, for God’s sake, just come inside for a minute. You’ll get sick wandering around, dripping as you are.”
It takes you another full minute of pulling at his arm to get him moving, though at last, he steps foot inside the house where it all ended.
///
Do you feel it? My love for you? I don’t, really. Because loving you has become a part of me and my soul—like I was put here on the sole purpose of loving you. I was so used to this feeling that having it ripped away from me felt like ice cold and hot water thrown in my face at the same time. It felt like someone was trying to rip me to shreds from the inside—particularly from my heart.
///
“Here is a towel and here, a change of clothes.” You hand him the pieces of fabrics. “They’re my dad’s, but you two are similar sizes of giant, so I think it’ll fit.” Like you hoped, this raises a genuine smile to his lips, as he takes the clothes and the towel from you, nodding in appreciation.
“I’ll return them to you…someday,” he says, smiling sheepishly. Luke has a reputation of keeping borrowed things, but it doesn’t really matter anyways.
“Don’t worry about it, honestly. Now go change, I don’t want you staining our furniture,” you tell him, before turning around and walking towards the kitchen.
“Where are you going?”
“I’m gonna fix us some hot chocolate, of course. I sure hope you didn’t have seafood before this.” You grin at him.
///
“You’re gonna make us hot chocolate? Now?” You ask, laughing.
“Why not?” Luke asks, pulling the mugs out of the cupboard.
Jumping onto the counter, you cross your legs and roll your eyes at him as he places the mugs next to your thighs. “Uh, because we just had sea food! You’re gonna throw up.”
“Me? If I have to go through this, then so do you!” he exclaims, laughing, nudging your knee with his hips.
“Excuse me?” You push him away, giggling. “I’m not an idiot! I know the outcome of this equation—I will not drink the hot chocolate!”
Luke ignores you, prepping the two drinks. Then he places one mug beside your thigh. His eyes hold a glint as he smirks. “Oh you will.”
“Not in a million years, Hemmings,” you say, laughing and jumping off the counter. “Why would I?”
Leaving his own mug beside yours, he comes at you slowly—the playful and somewhat also devilish glint still in his eyes. “Because if you do…I’m gonna promise you amazing sex tonight. Sex so amazing, you will never be the same. I’m telling you, babe.”
A snort bursts from your throat as you bend over and cannot contain the laughter in you. “You’re gonna bribe me with sex?” you ask, giving his chest a slap. But you don’t pull your hand away. Instead, you let it wander towards the crook of his neck up to the sides of his face and then you pull him down to you, so you can whisper something in his ear. “Babe. If I wanted, I could just tie you up and give myself the most ah-may-zing sex. I’m an independent ass bitch.”
All of the sudden, his arms are wound tightly around your waists, and your feet aren’t on the ground anymore. Your legs wrap around his hips automatically, as do your arms around his neck. Kisses are being trailed down your throat, as Luke walks you two out of the kitchen. “What about our hot chocolate, huh?” you ask, grinning.
“What hot chocolate?” He smiles at you sweetly, and then captures your mouth with his.
///
Awkward air engulfs you two, as you’re sitting side by side on the small couch, each one blowing at the hot chocolate, trying to quicken its cooling process—or maybe you were just avoiding the person sitting beside you, but who knows?
“Are you alright?” you begin, as you cannot take this god-damn silence any longer. “Tell me what’s going on.”
He lowers the mug slightly, smiling at you. “Like I said, I’m perfectly fine. Everything’s good.” He raises the hot chocolate to his lips and takes a rushed sip. “Fuck,” Luke curses, “that’s hot.”
Cocking your head to the side, you watch him lower the mug and stand up. “I’m just gonna…get myself a glass of water,” he says, pointing to your kitchen and wandering off without waiting for your reply.
Something is definitely wrong with him, you decide. The way he’s acting confuses you. Who the hell visits his ex-girlfriend just to tell her how fine he is? He’s somehow giddy and restless and exhausted at the same time, like he’s on edge. Like he cannot contain whatever’s going on inside him. The shadows underneath his eyes and the scruff on his jaw tells you he hasn’t slept well in a long time, but then again, he never slept long nor well. Luke’s always been a restless person—always working on something in his head or with his guitar. Sometimes he’d wake up in the middle of the night and have to write or else he’d forget the lyrics that sprung onto him in his dream. You loved being woken by a sleepy Luke and his guitar, though. You loved lying in the dark, listening to his raspy voice singing quiet words you knew were meant for just you.
Somehow, you know that nowadays the reason he wakes up in the middle of the night isn’t to write love songs about you anymore.
///
You once said, to be hurt means to be alive. For we cannot feel the hurt, if we aren’t alive and living and putting ourselves out there to be hurt. Well, I’ve spent the last months living. I was hurt. Or rather I am hurt. Everything hurts. Therefore I am, in fact, probably the most alive motherfucker on this planet right now, because it HURTS. What, you might ask? Not having you, is one answer. I love you. With every ounce of my being, with every beat of my heart and every breath I take, I entirely, fully and unconditionally love you.
///
“Please stay the night? It’s four in the morning and the storm doesn’t look like it’s about to pass anytime soon. You can take the guest room,” you say, wringing your hands in front of you. “It’s really no problem, and I’d feel a whole lot better, knowing you aren’t walking home right now.”
There’s another storm, and it’s in his eyes. He’s looking at the wall to your right, debating. You aren’t sure why it is such a hard decision for him to make, but you pray for him to stay. You will never forgive yourself, if he walks away now.
The seconds tick away, and finally, he nods once. “Okay,” he says, throwing you a shy smile. It surprises you, how after everything you two have already been through, he still has his shy moments. But this is just how Luke is, and you love this silent part about him.
Reaching your hand out, you wait for him to give you his mug, though, instead, he stands up as well. “I got it,” he says. “It’s the least I can do.”
///
Even to death, one might say.
///
She hands you the letter with her eyes lowered so you won’t see the tears in her eyes, but you do anyways. You’ve never seen her cry before. She’s someone you cannot even imagine how she’d look crying, because she is one of the happiest people you know, but now you do. You see the redness of the tender skin around and on her eyelids, the tremble of her lips and the crease between her eyebrows as she tries to hold the dam back. She looks smaller somehow. Like she doesn’t have enough energy to straighten her back. Like she is already focusing everything in her to keep herself from falling apart.
You don’t blame her. Rather you blame yourself.
Your hand comes up to wipe away a tear you haven’t noticed before. Between taking in her broken appearance and staring at the letter in her hand, you haven’t paid attention to your own body and emotions. Now that you reach for the letter, you notice the penetrating pain in your chest which keeps your lungs from working properly.
“Breathe, sweetheart,” Liz whispers softly. She presses the letter into your stomach, but instead of removing her hand after you clutch it with both of yours, she encloses it around your trembling ones and squeezes. One hand comes up to brush the hair from your face. It’s wet and sticky around your skin. “It wasn’t your fault,” she says firmly, her eyes a hard and genuine blue. Her palm stays against your cheek. You can feel her thumb soothingly wipe the continuous stream of tears away, as her own flows down her face.
And then she leans in and hugs you. Her arms come around your shoulders tightly, and she squeezes seemingly every emotion into you. And somehow she slowly squeezes yours out of you. And she rubs your back with one hand, shushing. She holds you, as both of you try to fix your hearts with this one hug.
///
Dear love,
You once said, to be hurt means to be alive. For we cannot feel the hurt, if we aren’t alive and living and putting ourselves out there to be hurt. Well, I’ve spent the last months living. I was hurt. Or rather I am hurt. Everything hurts. Therefore I am, in fact, probably the most alive motherfucker on this planet right now, because it HURTS. What, you might ask? Not having you, is one answer. I love you. With every ounce of my being, with every beat of my heart and every breath I take, I entirely, fully and unconditionally love you. Even to death, one might say.
Do you feel it? My love for you? I don’t, really. Because loving you has become a part of me and my soul—like I was put here on the sole purpose of loving you. I was so used to this feeling that having it ripped away from me felt like ice cold and hot water thrown in my face at the same time. It felt like someone was trying to rip me to shreds from the inside—particularly from my heart.
I was hurting before my heart was crushed—before you begin to think this is your fault. It isn’t. This whole thing (us breaking up) started because of what I was going through. None of this is your fault. I never want you to feel that. I never wanted you to feel any of the hurt I felt, in fact, and I might burn in hell, if you are. I’m sorry, my love. I’m a selfish idiot, and I couldn’t leave without seeing you one last time. I cannot apologise enough.
Please forgive me.
Yours truly, an angel (as of recently)
PS: That was me, trying to lighten the mood.
PPS: I love you.
PPPS: So so much.
///
“Call me, if you need anything, okay?” you tell him, helping him adjust the sweater of your father you’ve given him around his broad shoulders.
“Will do, love.” Your heart clenches at the nickname, but you solely smile. It feels good to hear it.
He looks at you with a look that causes your insides to churn and your legs to wobble. Then he leans down and presses a soft kiss to the space between your temple and forehead—something he does when he wants to kiss both at the same time, he once said. Turning on his heels, he quickly jumps down the steps of your front porch, leaving you to watch him walk away under the clear blue sky after a storm. It reminds you of the colour of his eyes.
a/n holy shit. i was—and still am—seriously debating whether or not i should put this online. the idea came to me after listening to missin’ you by the summer set for some unknown reason, as that song is not a sad song at all. i’m scared to put this out there, since it doesn’t have a happy ending. but then again, not all stories do. and i’m sure you know, this is purely fictional and i simply borrowed luke as a solely fictional character for a just as fictional story.
as always, feedback is greatly appreciated.
much love. my inbox is open. always.